A very fine day. I went accompanied by Henry, to church in the City. This time it was at St Antholin’s in Budge row, one of Sir Christopher’s designs. The interior is more neglected than any I have yet seen. It is peculiar in having an oval shaped dome supported by corinthian columns arranged in the same form, and set up on pedestals higher even than those noticed at St Augustine’s. A gallery only on the west side, with projections to break the angles. The internal woodwork plain. Much light as usual, not merely on three sides, but from the favorite circular window worked out arrived the dome. Service for Trinity Sunday, including the Athanasian creed, and a sermon appropriate to the occasion. The preacher alluded to the late movements in the church calling in question the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures and charming a rational construction of language, and run over the ordinary adjustments on the opposite side, in a very compact, clear and forcible manner. But I can see in the position of the English church no foundation for the position of this preacher. It was the assumption of a right to reason which justified the secession from Romanism which insisted upon absolute faith. To deny it now in turn can only be consistently done by returning to the original church. Quiet day. I read a portion of Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews. This reading has impressed me with it more than ever before. The style is freer, bolder, more connected and logical and compact than any of the others. There is a strain of eloquence running through it too which is different from the rest of the Scriptures, that is, less the offspring of emotion that of pure reason. Walked around the Regent’s Park. The crowd within it very great. The air delicious, and the verdure and foliage and blossom superb. We had company to dinner. Mr and Mrs Borland, Sir George Young, Mr Palmer, Mr and Miss Dayton, Miss Morgan. The latter brought from her father telegraphic intelligence from America, as usual materially impairing the favorable character of the last news. Singularly uniform has been that tendency in that quarter; so that he comes to be associated in my mind with evil. After dinner, we had Mr and Mrs Pike, and Mr Peabody. They seemed to like to stay so well that it was nearly twelve before the last of them left the House.24