God's Englishmen

Despite unequivocal Biblical sanction, both in the Mosaic law and in the commandments of Him who came not to destroy but to fulfil, the Church of England has been apologising for its seventy times seven forgivings of someone who did not spare the rod. The pedagogy of John Smyth QC, who ran muscular-Christian boot-camps for rich boys, reached such heights of enthusiasm that even the head teacher at Winchester college finally requested him to exert his holy rigours elsewhere. Naturally it did not occur to any among the nation's spiritual guardians to sully themselves by alerting the secular arm; and with an immaculately straight British face, the successor trust to Smyth's project has indignantly rebutted the idea that a cover-up may have taken place just because the Church authorities, emulating their Father in heaven, knew and did nothing.