In the view of Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, the decision last month by Mr Justice Eady – that it was Max Mosley’s right to remain undisturbed by the press while being whipped on the buttocks by young women shouting imprecations in German accents – was based on a “deeply flawed, ‘anything goes’ philosophy ... devoid of the basic, decent moral standards”.

Lord Carey there invoked a world in which God sees everything, disapproves of much and licenses his priests to proclaim and shame those who breach the moral order. Thanks be to centuries of progress, not unwashed with the blood of anti-obscurantist martyrs, that we live in Mr Justice Eady’s, rather than Lord Carey’s, world. A judicial system tested by a judgment on Mr Mosley’s tastes, and doing the decent thing, cannot be all bad.