THE CLEAR DEMAND OF DUTY.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 105, 20 May 1937, Page 4

THE CLEAR DEMAND OF DUTY.

11 The position to which his birth and the strange movement of unforseen circumstanoe have suddenly called His present Majesty, is one so prominent, so difflcult, so exacting, that the bravest spirit may well flinch from the burden," writes Dr. Hensley Henson, Bishop of Durham, in his diocesan magaziue, on the Coronation Service. "I cannot flnd in all history any parallel to the position of the King of England. The constitutional development which, in the course of many centuries, has withdrawn from the British Sovereign that direct control of government which his Royal ancestors possessed, has had the effect, not of dwarfing the crown into a quasi-Merovin-gian impotence, but of bringing into more illuminating prominence the man himself, and investing his personal .conduct with an ever wider range of influence. "The example of the King is no longer only potent within the narrow and relatively secluded precincts of a Court, but tells subtly and constantly over the whole area of popular life. Throughout the vast eajpanse of the British Empire, the King's voice can be heard by his subjects, and even the smallest details of his daily habit can6' be known. British people are not unmindful of this, and their sympathy goes out in full measure to the man who, through no choiee of his own but in response to the clear demand of patriotic duty, has been called to such a position. It is universally felt that the King has a right to the generous trust and loyalty of his subjects. He needs, as we all need in the varying measure of our duty, the Divine assistance of the Holy Spirit, and therefore, we*hold it most fitting tha.t he should begin his reign by solemn self-submission to the Almighty God, ' by Hbpm Kihgg reigu, and Prinoes decree justice/ »