"
Another who was present writes, "Most of the speakers rose, more or
less, above their usual level, but when Mr. Gladstone sat down we all of
us felt that an epoch in our lives had occurred. It certainly was the
finest speech of his that I ever heard." And Bishop Charles Wordsworth
writes his experience of Mr. Gladstone at this time, "made me feel no
less sure than of my own existence that Gladstone, our then
Christ-Church undergraduate, would one day rise to be Prime Minister
of England."
In the spring of 1832 Mr. Gladstone quitted Oxford. In summing up
results it may be said, in the language of Mr. Russell: "Among the
purely intellectual effects produced on Mr. Gladstone by the discipline
of Oxford, it is obvious to reckon an almost excessive exactness in the
statement of propositions, a habit of rigorous definition, a microscopic
care in the choice of words, and a tendency to analyze every sentiment
and every phrase, and to distinguish with intense precaution between
statements almost exactly similar. From Aristotle and Bishop Butler and
Edmund Burke he learned the value of authority, the sacredness of law,
the danger of laying rash and inconsiderate hands upon the ark of State.
In the political atmosphere of Oxford he was taught to apply these
principles to the civil events of his time, to dread innovation, to
respect existing institutions, and to regard the Church and the Throne
as inseparably associated by Divine ordinance.
Pages:
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79