selected as headmaster of Rugby in succession to Herbert Armitage James. His return was welcomed by the staff, but his unorthodox views on teaching soon met considerable opposition in some quarters. David maintained that a schoolmaster should study his pupils rather than subjects, and that too much attention was concentrated on the few cleverest pupils. He held that very few boys were stupid, and that there should be "a larger measure of controlled freedom in work and a wider choice of occupations should be contrived for the majority". Some of the older members of his staff considered that David's methods would undermine discipline and damage the school's reputation. In 1910, David was awarded a Doctorate of Divinity. Bishop Having previously declined invitations to accept a bishopric, David agreed in 1921 to become Bishop of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich. He was consecrated bishop in Westminster Abbey by Randall Davidson, Archbishop of Canterbury, on 25 July 1921, and was enthroned in St Edmundsbury Cathedral on 29 September the same year. In contrast with his predecessor, the first bishop, Henry Hodgson who was a member of the high church wing of the Church of England, David was an evangelical. The Manchester Guardian said of him, "deep spirituality, allied with no little indifference to ecclesiastical forms, and even to dogmatic affirmations, may be said to be Dr David's chief characteristic." The largely rural diocese was roughly coterminous with Suffolk, and consisted of 436 parishes. It was of recent creation, having been established by Act of Parliament in 1913, hiving off parts of the dioceses of Norwich and Ely. By an error in the drafting of the Act, the cathedral of the diocese was in Bury St Edmunds and the bishop's residence was in Ipswich, and communications within the diocese were not ideal. David remained in the diocese for only two years, scarcely time to get to know his clergy or to visit more than a few of the parishes. In 1923 David was translated to be Bishop of Liverpool. Succeeding Chavasse was a difficult task. The Manchester Guardian said of him, "In Dr. Chavasse Liverpool has enjoyed a true Chief Pastor, a Father-in-God, who, if he was not always right (no man is) was always honoured and beloved." A historian of Liverpool Cathedral, Peter Kennerley, describes David as "imaginative, enthusiastic, an innovator and educator strong on organisation and administrative structures, liberal and yet autocratic