Auden’s cheery bishop

Rhyme-royal’s difficult enough to play.
But if no classics as in Chaucer’s day,
At least my modern pieces shall be cheery
Like English bishops on the Quantum Theory.
—W. H. Auden, “Letter to Lord Byron”

Ah, my Lord of Birmingham, come in, sit on the fire and anticipate the judgement of the Universal Church.
—The Rt. Rev. Herbert Hensley Henson, Bishop of Durham

I like the company of men of science: they are not excessively intellectual in their hours of leisure and they give good dinners.
—The Rt. Rev. E. W. Barnes, Bishop of Birmingham[1]

In the fall of 1957, I began what turned out to be a two-year membership at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. This was a banner time for physics. In 1956, the...