6 OCTOBER 1928, Page 2

The Bishop of Durham, in his sermon before the Congress

opened, drew a gloomy parallel between the condition of France and Russia on the eve of revolution and the present state of . England. Revolution had commonly been preceded by attacks on sex morality and religious education. He saw in England to-day both these evil portentsefforts to disintegrate the home by weakening the marriage ties and efforts to de-Christianize the schools. As a nation we were living on " an inherited capital of Christian morality," but this was steadily wasting. The Bishop was in a gloomy mood. We cannot think that his denunciation was justified except in the sense that all moral diatribes are deserved by miserable sinners. -We do not detect-any serious national change for the worse. • * • *