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

1846-1850]

Lectures on Philosophy

'31

so little in another.' A later epigram of his may be
quoted here: 'Comtism destroys the minds of men;
Carlyleism destroys their morals.'
For his pupils at the time now spoken of, especially
for Alexander Grant, his philosophical teaching had
a peculiar charm. The course of lectures on the History
of Philosophy, mentioned in the last chapter, became
from year to year more comprehensive. It had no
immediate relation to the examination system as then
constituted, but helped to quicken men's intellects, and
gave them larger views about the books they were
reading. The kind of talk about the Ethics and Butler
which had'paid' hitherto no longer satisfied either examiners or examinees.-Single sayings of the great Tutor
passed from mouth to mouth, such as 'Logic is neither
a science nor an art, but a dodge'; and 'The efflorescence
of art is the bloom upon decay.' Another quotation, probably apocryphal (though some may think it prophetic), was
to the effect that 'Education is the grave of a great mind.'
He now also gave a course of lectures on the 'new
science' of Political Economy, which he had been
studying since 1841. Henry Smith was amongst his
auditors 1. The lectures were renewed from time to time,
but a few years after this he was wont to observe that
Political Economy, like Benthamism, had done its work,
except that there were problems connected rather with
the distribution than the accumulation of wealth which
had to be settled in the future 2. A sentence in one of his
letters to Lingen (September, i846) is significant:'All the wrrld are become Political Economists, and there
a See the Economic Journal for ness and also the difficulty of the
I893, p. 745. land question before the subject
2 It may be mentioned as an had been broached by any British
instance of his foresight, that he statesman.
had counted upon the inevitableI 2