w, in August (1830), Mr. Gladstone conversed with
Anstice in a walk from Oxford to Cuddesdon on subjects of the highest
importance. 'Thoughts then first sprang up in my soul (obvious as they
may appear to many) which may powerfully influence my destiny. O for a
light from on high! I have no power, none, to discern the right path for
myself.' They afterwards had long talks together, 'about that awful
subject which has lately almost engrossed my mind.' Another
day--'Conversation of an hour and a half with Anstice on practical
religion, particularly as regards our own situation. I bless and praise
God for his presence here.' 'Long talk with Anstice; would I were more
worthy to be his companion.' 'Conversation with Anstice; he talked much
with Saunders on the motive of actions, contending for the love of God,
_not_ selfishness even in its most refined form.'[40]

EVANGELICAL IN RELIGION

In the matter of his own school of religion, Mr. Gladstone was always
certain that Oxford in his undergraduate days had no part in turning him
from an evangelical into a high churchman. The tone and dialect of his
diary and letters at the time show how just this impression was. We find
him in 1830 expressing his satisfaction that a number of Hannah More's
tracts have been put on the list of the Christian Knowledge Society. In
1831 he bitterly deplores such ecclesiastical appointments as those of
Sydney Smith and Dr. Maltby, 'both of them, I believe, regular
latitudinarians.' He remembered his shock at Butler's laudation of
Nature. He was scandalised by a sermon in which Calvin was placed upon
the same level among heresiarchs as Socinus and other like aliens from
gospel truth. He was delighted (March 1830) with a university sermon
against Milman's _History of the Jews_, and hopes it may be useful as an
antidote, 'for Milman, though I do think without intentions directly
evil, does go far enough to be justly called a bane. For instance, he
says that had Moses never existed, the Hebrew nation would have remained
a degraded pariah tribe or been lost in the mass of the Egyptian
population--and this notwithstanding the promise.' In all his letters in
the period from Eton to the end of Oxford and later, a language noble
and exalted even in these youthful days is not seldom copiously streaked
with a vein that, to eyes not trained to evangelical light and to minds
not tolerant of the expansion that comes to religious natures in