letter from H. P., a master at Clifton College, who was
in doubt whether he ought to resign his mastership and go down to the
College Mission in Bristol._

Christ's College, Cambridge: May 1, 1901.

I have not had time to think over the matter yet, but my first feeling
is that you ought to be very slow to move. If men in your position,
who feel keenly interested in the highest welfare of their pupils and
long to influence them in spiritual matters, all go away to parish
work, what is to become of our public school boys? Masters are only
too anxious to leave for more 'directly spiritual' work, as they say.
But in doing so they leave a work of exceptional difficulty and
importance behind, and who is to take their place? I understand and
appreciate your feelings, but I am not at all sure that you have any
call to go.

How much directly 'spiritual' work have you with the boys? Could you,
if you desired, get more?

I will pray over the matter. Do be slow before you decide to leave. I
believe you ought to stay, {146} although it may be more difficult to
maintain your own spiritual life and ideals in a school than in a
parish. You may be doing more good than you know. It is easier to
find men to do parish work than to do school work of the highest kind.

There is a sermon of Lightfoot's in which he urges clergymen at the
University not to go away, because it is hard to maintain their
spiritual ideals at Cambridge, and because they seem to have so little
direct spiritual influence. May not this apply to your work also?

_To one about to be ordained._

Cambridge: May 1901.

It seems so clear to us that you have a call, that I find it hard to
realise that you yourself are uncertain. But the very fact that you
have been 'counting the cost,' and that you have no ecstatic joy at the
prospect before you, encourages me. I am glad you realise the
difficulties beforehand. What you don't fully see is the strength upon
which you will be able to draw. I often think of those lines of
Tennyson:--

O living Will that shalt endure
When all that seems shall suffer shock,
Rise in the spiritual rock,
Flow through our deeds and make them pure.[1]

That Will can transform our will, and the very weakness of our natural
will is then a help. The strength {147} is seen and felt to come from
an invisible source: 'Thy will, not my will.'

The terrible need of men to fight against the forces of evil impresses