The life and letters of Benjamin Jowett, M. A., master of Balliol college, Oxford.

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Lzfe of Benjamin Jowett

[CHAP. IX

to Mrs. Stanley or Mrs. Vaughan, if she is in Oxford, applying
the fable of the fox who has lost his tail.
'I don't write so often as I once did, but am not the less
truly your sincere and affectionate friend.'
Stanley disapproved of the policy of such an open alliance, and Jowett, in persevering with it, acted against his
friend's advice. As he told Dr. Symonds of Clifton, he
strongly felt the duty of continuing his efforts to clear the
minds of his countrymen from religious prejudices. He
determined, therefore, to complete his Essay and to send
it in. He also obtained the adhesion of Dr. Temple, whose
University sermon on the Education of the World lay in
the direction indicated, and when preached had given no
offence, escaping even the suspicion of heresy, except, it
is said, in the mind of Dr. Hawkins, the keen-scented
Provost of Oriel. Dr. John Muir of Edinburgh, the
Sanskrit scholar, was a zealous promoter of the scheme.
Jowett was hampered with the accumulation of many
duties: he said one day to a friend, with momentary
impatience, 'I ought not to have so much to do': but
if he could only get to the seaside for a few weeks
together, he thought he might make a good thing of this
piece of writing. He was working at it during a visit
to the Tennysons in the winter of I859, and wrote one
passage at least, that on the Parables, at Milford Vicarage,
Hampshire 2, where he talked anxiously over this and other
schemes. At one moment he turned suddenly and asked
his hostess, ' Can the truth do harm?' On her replying,
'It can surely do no harm to tell the truth,' he said, 'That
is the verdict of the simple mind.' Not that he had
fully calculated on the storm which followed, but he was
apprehensive of some misunderstanding, and he desired
1 Life of J. A. Symonds, vol. i. 2 I was then Vicar of Milp. 188. ford.- L. C.