DEAN INGE’S CHALLENGE

Taranaki Daily News, 21 November 1930, Page 7

DEAN INGE’S CHALLENGE

DEFENCE OF THE EIGHTIES PROUD.TO BE OLD-FASHIONED SCORNS THE PRESENT DAY By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright. Rec. 7.30 p.m. London, Nov. 19. Dean Inge challenges the world with the announcement that he belongs to the ’eighties and asks: “Why should I be ashamed of it 7” “Were not the girls prettier and better behaved than the moderns?” the Pean asks. “They did not smoke, swear nor drink, and showed they possessed backbone without oeular demonstration. Were not Tennyson and Browning greater poets than the coterie of Georgians? Were not Gladstone and Disraeli bigger men than any of the present-day leaders ? “Was not sixpence in the pound income tax better than anything up to 'ten shillings? Was not the country then a going concern instead of an almost gone concern? Then the wealth of Britain was proverbial; to-day the shadow of bankruptcy is heavy across Lancashire and Yorkshire. ‘T wish Victorians could come to life and tell our generation what we really look like, but I suppose fifty years hence some old fogey will be. writing about the dear old ’thirties. I wonder what he will find to say in their praise!”