11 SEPTEMBER 1976, Page 20

Kenny's Law

Sir: Mary Kenny may have discovered a new law, and Auberon Waugh brilliantly developed it; but I would challenge its newness. It was surely anticipated by Sir James Baillie in his 'Reflections on Life and Religion', published in 1952: 'It seems useless to attempt to reduce human behaviour to detailed calculation. It is man's business and delight to break through calculated order; no sooner is such an order set up than man will at once devise some means of escaping from it or throwing it over outright. Rather than give up this capacity, man will do wrong in order to claim it as his "right": T. M. Higham Crayke Castle, York