26 OCTOBER 1934, Page 19

" WITHOUT COMMENT " [To the Editor of TIIE SPECTATOR.]

Sin,—In last week's issue of The Spectator, " Janus" quotes, without comment, a passage from a sermon delivered at Cambridge two Sundays ago, by the Bishop of Birmingham. The following is the passage : " Christ. lives ; it is well nigh impossible to go to a meeting of the League of Nations Union and not feel His presence." Perhaps I am betraying thickness of mind if I say that. I suspect sarcasm in your quotation of this passage without comment,' but. if my suspicion is sound, will you do me the kindness to enlighten me, who am always ready to be instructed by my betters, as to why Dr. Barnes's statement is funny " or " foolish " or otherwise entitled to be regarded with the derision which a superior person feels for an inferior's utterance ?—Yours very, very humbly, Savile Club, 69 Brook Street, W. 1. ST. JOHN ERVIN-E.

(" Janus " writes: " Mr. St. John Ervine reads a great deal into something very simple. It occurred to me that at the end of a Column consisting mainly of personal comment there 'might be room from time to time for the quotation of sonic striking passage ' without comment.' So I put one there. It seems a harmless act."]