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Ethics, Evolution and Biblical Criticism in the Thought of Benjamin Jowett and John William Colenso

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

Peter Hinchliff
Affiliation:
Balliol College, Oxford OX1 3BJ

Extract

With one minor exception, it was not much more than a series of coincidences which linked Jowett and Colenso. The one exception was when Colenso was in England after being excommunicated by Robert Gray, bishop of Capetown, as metropolitan. Samuel Wilberforce refused to allow Colenso to function in the diocese of Oxford but Jowett invited him to preach in Balliol chapel, which was not under the bishop's jurisdiction. Apart from this there seems to be no evidence of direct personal contact between the two men.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986

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References

1 Abbott, E. and Campbell, L., Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett, London 1897, ii. 64.Google Scholar

2 Jowett, B., Sermons: Biographical and Miscellaneous, ed. Fremantle, W. H., London198.Google Scholar

3 For an account of early scientific developments in the college and university see Smith, T.. ‘The Balliol Trinity Laboratory’, in Priest, John (ed.), Balliol Studies, London 1982, 187222,Google Scholar based on a dissertation submitted by the same writer for the honour school of Natural Science (Chemistry).

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11 I am indeed for this idea to Professor Hans Frei of Yale.

12 I am grateful to a former pupil of mine, Mr J. G. D. Nye, for undertaking the very boring job of checking these registers.

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17 The lectures were founded by G. J. Romanes in 1891 and were to be given annually by a man ‘of eminence’ on a scientific or literary topic. Gladstone gave the first lecture in 1892.

18 Jowett to Huxley, 18 April 1893; Imperial College, London, Huxley Papers: Scientific and General Correspondence vii. fo. 91. There is a copy of the letter in Balliol College, Typescript copies ofJowett Letters [3].

19 Helfand, M. S., ‘T. H. Huxley's “Ethics and Evolution”: the politics of evolution and the evolution of polities’, Victorian Studies xx (1977), 159-77 at p. 160.Google Scholar

20 The three lectures referred to are probably ‘On the natural inequality of men’, ‘Natural rights and political rights’ and ‘Government: anarchy or regimentation’, all delivered in 1890-see Huxley, T. H., Method and Results, London 1893, 290430Google Scholar.

21 All three of these letters are in the Huxley Papers at Imperial College, London, Scientific and General Correspondence, Jowett to Mrs Huxley, 3 February 1892, vii. fos. 81-2; Jowett to Huxley, 9 February and 8 July 1892, fos. 83-4 and 88-9. Copies are also in Balliol College.

22 , Helfand, ‘T. H. Huxley's “Ethics and Evolution’”, 177.Google Scholar

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28 Colenso, J. W., St Paul's Epistle to the Romans: newly translated, and explained from a missionary point of view. Ekukanyeni 1861.Google Scholar

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39 Cullen Library, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Archives of the Church of the Province of South Africa AB 223, MS Lecture by Bishop Colenso on Missions to the Zulus.

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