XI 



VIEWS ON QUESTIONS OF THE DAY 



IN politics Mr. Morris was the staunchest of Tories ; 

 he had inherited those principles from his fore- 

 elders, and they seemed to be in his very blood. 

 And yet he differed in many ways from the typical 

 Tory of his earlier days, who looked upon almost 

 every change with suspicion and aversion. His 

 Toryism consisted rather in his adhesion to the lead- 

 ing principles of the creed of the party, and not in 

 any aversion to change as such. Anything that 

 tended to weaken the Church in her union with the 

 State, or to the secularising of the educational 

 system of the country, to that he was resolutely 

 opposed. But within certain limits he not only was 

 not opposed to change, but favoured it when he saw 

 it meant a strengthening of the good ship of the 

 Church or that of the State. In all political ques- 

 tions he took the keenest interest, and was a great 

 reader of newspapers. Sometimes, in exciting times 

 like a General Election, his appetite for journalistic 

 literature was enormous, and as he read he would 

 frequently make mental or manuscript notes with a 

 view to answering by a letter to the paper some 

 question that struck him, or correcting some 



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