When you go to a
dinner-party they put in front of you five different chalices, of five
weird and heraldic shapes, to symbolise five different kinds of wine; an
insane extension of ritual from which Mr. Percy Dearmer would fly
shrieking. A bishop wears a mitre; but he is not thought more or less of
a bishop according to whether you can see the very latest curves in his
mitre. But a swell is thought more or less of a swell according to
whether you can see the very latest curves in his hat. There is more
_fuss_ about symbols in the world than in the Church.
And yet (strangely enough) though men fuss more about the worldly
symbols, they mean less by them. It is the mark of religious forms that
they declare something unknown. But it is the mark of worldly forms that
they declare something which is known, and which is known to be untrue.
When the Pope in an Encyclical calls himself your father, it is a matter
of faith or of doubt. But when the Duke of Devonshire in a letter calls
himself yours obediently, you know that he means the opposite of what he
says. Religious forms are, at the worst, fables; they might be true.
Secular forms are falsehoods; they are not true. Take a more topical
case.
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