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

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Lzfe of Benjamin Jowett

[CHAP. VII

His criticism in those days stimulated without discouraging. In setting before the mind a lofty ideal,
he implied a belief in powers hereafter to be developed,
and the belief seemed to create the thing believed in.
But the intellectual stimulus was not all. He seemed
to divine one's spiritual needs, and by mere contact
and the brightness of his presence, to supply them. If
he was ready to repress conceit, he was no less ready to
bestow encouragement on the diffident, and sympathy
upon the depressed; not without timely warning, when
he saw that danger or temptation was at hand. His
intimate knowledge of his former pupils' lives was
applied to heal the errors of their successors, and his
own experience of early struggles also had its effect. He
ignored trifles, but never let pass any critical point.
The mornings were of course spent in the Lecture
Room. This was the larger of the two rooms in the
Fisher Building which he then occupied. The lecture
list, like the choice of Tutors for the men, was a matter
of College arrangement. The subjects were distributed
amongst the Tutors and Lecturers, the division of
labour being, however, less minute than it became afterwards; and attendance on the prescribed lectures was
supposed to be compulsory.
Although Jowett had made his early reputation by
Latin scholarship, it has been observed that he seldom
if ever lectured on a Latin subject. His favourites were
Sophocles, Aristophanes, Thucydides, and the Republic
of Plato. There was no listlessness at any of his lectures,
and often one man would remain after the rest to discuss
a difficulty. If there was less of exact scholarship
imparted by him, than, for example, by James Riddell,
the whole subject was surrounded with an air of literary
grace and charm which had a more educative effect. As