"The poor ye have always with you." There are too many Christians who have regarded this statement of Jesus as a commandment.

The Rev. Charles Kingsley said "Religion is the opium of the people", and his remark was attributed to Lenin. With the spread of drug-taking a still greater menace appears. Opium may become the religion of the people. It is impossible for a state logically to ban cannabis and derive revenue from alcohol and nicotine.

When the two Scottish churches united in 1929 they asked the English Government not to hold the General Election in May at the same time as the Reunion Celebrations. The English replied that, if the date of the election were postponed it would interfere with the arrangements for the Derby.

In Canterbury Cathedral I read a memorial tablet to Archbishop Davidson giving in great detail all his achievements of his career. The only thing lacking was the recognition of the fact that it was Scotland that produced him. Speak no evil of the dead!

The proof that Scotland is recovering some sense of morality is that it is producing no more Archbishops of Canterbury.

Sir Alexander Sprot once told me that as he was passing Lloyd George’s office he saw Sir William Sutherland (the P.M.’s Private Secretary) dashing out and heard him shouting to a group of Tory M.P.’s, "Any of you know a b... that wants to be made a bishop?" The Church of England professes to believe that its bishops are chosen by the Holy Ghost (with whom the P.M. is obviously in complete communion).

Galton, the distinguished mathematician, drew up a table representing the life span of Presidents, Queens, Kings etc., for whom public prayers were offered and found that it was less than the expectation of life of their average citizens for whom no one prayed publicly.

He found, however, that the difference was not so great as to justify the conclusion that public prayers did them any harm!

Lord Davidson (formerly Archbishop of Canterbury) once stated "We Scots have been so busy governing England that we have had no time to govern Scotland." On the same mental and moral level a man might say; "True that I neglect my wife and children but look at the attention I pay to my neighbour’s. wife."