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

422

Lzfe of Benjamin Jowett

[CHAP. XII

of giving away money to others, and I think that you first
showed me the way to do this.
I cannot say that I shall pray for your boy at his confirmation
(though he has my best wishes). But, if he comes to Oxford,
I will try to help him as far as I can, in his College course, for
your sake.
With very kind regards to Mrs. Greenhill,
Believe me, yours truly and affectionately,
B. JOWETT.
To -
OXFORD, May 3I, 1867.
I want you to admit the possibility of better and happier
days coming; and I believe that they will come, not exactly
in the sense which youthful holiday-making, love-making
follies expect them, but days in which you will see your work
more fully carried out, and bless God for the retrospect
of the past with all its great trials.
What do you think that I have been doing during the last
month? Translating the Politics of Aristotle. You will say
that I am mad about translating. But I am not. It was
necessary to read the book carefully for my work upon Plato,
and the translation is much wanted, and is now half finished.
To
OXFORD, June, 1867.
At what a rate the chariot of democracy is driving! It
almost takes away one's breath. Last week the democratic
movement might have been stopped, the Ministry driven
from office, and a Bill something like that of last session
introduced. But all that is now impossible. Household
suffrage, lodger franchise, one year's residence, are fairly
given and cannot be withheld. And if the Conservatives
are, as appears, really willing to give up principles which
they held sacred a month ago, the Bill is certain to pass.
For their opponents cannot, if they would, oppose them,
and the Lords dare not.
Think of the effects on the Church of England (that of