The obvious suggestion is that I went out of my way to induce the Bishop of London to advertise one of my books. That is not the case.
I have never met the Bishop of London in my life. I have never even seen him. I have had one letter from him about my book, which I will not quote here, but which I will send Mr. Roget whenever he asks for it. It is the only communication I have ever had from him. Neither directly nor indirectly did I attempt to get the bishop to advertise me.
Yet his lordship preached about the book six or seven times—once in Westminster Abbey. He advised his ordination candidates to read it, and in his addresses to these gentlemen—subsequently published in book form—the passage remains.
The late Bishop of Truro advised the clergy to read it in several diocesan meetings. He also wrote a long signed article in a great London daily paper about my books, in which he said:—
“A story written by Guy Thorne, who has proved his gift and its purpose, may well touch the sore place of our race with a hand that is more human than statistics and more sympathetic than many organizations.”
Dr. Gott is just dead as I write this. I have many letters from him. In one of them—which again I will not quote, but which I will send my critic for his private reading when he asks for it—his lordship said that the book had helped him greatly.
There have been thousands of personal letters from readers about this one book. Dozens of them were from clergymen, from pastors of the Nonconformist and also the Anglican Churches. All this also I have said before, and the half-dozen letters which I have quoted have their own value, bear their own witness.
One of the greatest Nonconformist divines of England preached about the book.
There—I have said enough. It is sickening to have to say it. But Mr. Roget leaves one no alternative. He is not fair. For some reason or other—I do not know or care what it is, for he is an utter stranger to me—he takes this line. In the same issue of his magazine he writes of the President of the Congregational Union—“Mr. Jowett’s presidential address, as well as the speeches which followed it, were not remarkable, to say the least, for the charity of language used about the Church. All the old sectarian bitterness was expressed in the usual way.”
...I have been writing for many hours. The snow was blowing in from the Channel over the South Foreland when I began. The sky was a great pewter-coloured dome from which Mother Hulda’s feathers were falling, when I took up the pen.