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

1836-1840]

The Balliol Fellowshiz

election at Balliol in November very improbable 1!
Amidst the searchings of heart which he went through
before taking that decisive step, the last thing to occur
to his mind would be, that in changing his College he
would be leaving the coast clear for the admission of his
younger friend. Yet so it was; and we may safely infer
that Jowett had not as yet fallen under suspicion
either for liberal or Tractarian sympathies. In point
of fact, as appears from the letters to W. A. Greenhill,
while Evangelical prepossessions had been to a great
extent already discarded, he was looking keenly round
him with a suspense of judgement very uncommon in
one so young.
The circumstances of his election may best be told in
Dr. Holden's words:
'As this is an achievement only once before2, I believe,
recorded in the annals of Balliol, some particulars may be
interesting, especially as coming from one who was himself
a candidate. Four vacant Fellowships were to be filled up
by examination; all B.A.'s were eligible. The undergraduate
Scholars of Balliol had also the peculiar privilege of being
eligible, as the Master of the College, Dr. Jenkyns, used sometimes to remind them. It was current at the time that the
Rev. Robert Scott, afterwards Master of the College for sixteen years, and who had himself been elected Fellow from
Christ Church just two years before, had persuaded the young
Hertford Scholar, the most promising pupil in his lecture
room, to avail himself of this privilege and to offer himself
as a candidate for one of the four vacant Fellowships 3. It is
Stanley's Life, vol. i. p. 195. nor Oakeley had as yet become
Among the candidates was Mark known as followers of Newman.
Pattison: see his Memoirs, p. I77. 2 In the case of Jenkyns himThe Master, Jenkyns, was a stern self (so tradition says).
foe to innovations; Tait's ante- 3 A contemporary letter names
cedents were not Anglican; Scott E. M. Goulburn and John Turner
and Ward were not originally as 'the persons who with great
Balliol men; and neither Ward difficulty induced him to en