ich could not easily be filled up; but
this was the _annus mirabilis_ of his university career. He gained
prize after prize; he was always first class in the college
examinations; he won the chancellor's medals for Latin and English
verse, and, indeed, almost divided with Owen the honours of the place.
To crown all, he gained the Ireford University scholarship, which Owen
had won the year before.

Of all the men of his year, he was the most honoured and respected; he
wore the weight both of his honours and his learning "lightly like a
flower," and there was a graceful humility, joined with his
self-dependence, which won every heart, and prevented that jealousy
which sometimes accompanies success.

The most important event in his intellectual progress was the attention
which he began to turn at this time to biblical and theological studies.
He was thankful in later years that he had deferred such inquiries to a
time when he was capacitated for them by a calm and sound judgment, and
a solid basis of linguistic and historical knowledge. He had always
looked forward to holy orders, and regarding the life of a clergyman as
his appointed work, he considered that an honest, a critical, and an
impartial study of the Bible was his first duty. In setting about it,
he came to it as a little child; all he sought for was the simple truth,
uncrushed by human traditions, unmingled with human dogmas, untrammelled
by human interpretations, unadulterated by human systems. He found that
he had a vast amount to unlearn, and saw clearly that if he fearlessly
pursued his inquiries they would lead him so far from the belief of
popular ignorance, as very probably to bar all worldly success in the
sacred profession which he had chosen. But he knew that the profession
_was_ sacred, and, fearless by nature, he determined to seek for truth
and truth only, honestly following the prayerful conclusions of his
clearest and most deliberate judgment. Even in these early days the
freedom and honesty of his research drew on him slight sibilations of
those whose religion was shallow and sectarian; in after years they were
destined to bring on him open and positive persecution.

Not that Julian was ever in the least degree obtrusive in stating his
beliefs when they widely and materially differed from the expressed
opinions of the majority; except, indeed, in the cases when such
opinions appeared to him dishonest or dangerous. He was scrupulously
c