difficulties of ecclesiastical institutions revealed their origin. The
fact was that at this time Hugh was accustomed to assert with much
emphasis some extremely provocative and controversial position. He was
markedly scornful of Anglican faults and mannerisms, and behaved both
then and later as if no Anglicans could have any real and vital belief
in their principles, but must be secretly ashamed of them. Yet he was
acutely sensitive himself, and resented similar comments; he used to
remind me of the priest who said to Stevenson "Your sect--for it would
be doing it too much honour to call it a religion," and was then pained
to be thought discourteous or inconsiderate.

Discourteous, indeed, Hugh was not. I have known few people who could
argue so fiercely without personal innuendo. But, on the other hand, he
was both triumphant and sarcastic. There was an occasion at a later date
when he advanced some highly contestable points as assumptions, and my
aunt, Mrs. Henry Sidgwick, in an agony of rationality, said to him, "But
these things are surely matters of argument, Hugh?" To which Hugh
replied, "Well, you see, I have the misfortune, as you regard it, of
belonging to a Church which happens to know."

Here is another extract from my diary at this time:

"_August_ 1903.--At dinner Hugh and I fell into a fierce argument, which
became painful, mainly, I think, because of Hugh's vehemence and what I
can only call violence. He reiterates his consciousness of his own
stupidity in an irritating way. The point was this. He maintained that
it was uncharitable to say, 'What a bad sermon So-and-so preached,' and
not uncharitable to say, 'Well, it is better than the sickening stuff
one generally hears'; uncharitable to say, 'What nasty soup this is!'
and not uncharitable to say, 'Well, it is better than the filthy pigwash