troversy on the basis of what will be taken
and alleged to be an absolute secularisation of the colleges; as well as a
reversal of what was deliberately considered and sanctioned in the
parliamentary legislation of 1854 and 1856. I incline to think that this
work is work for others, not for me."

It was not until 1871 that Mr. Gladstone consented to make the bill a
government measure. It rapidly passed the Commons and was accepted by the
Lords, but with amendments. Mr. Gladstone when he had once adopted a
project never loitered; he now resolutely refused the changes proposed by
the Lords, and when the time came and Lord Salisbury was for insisting on
them, the peers declined by a handsome majority to carry the fight
further. It is needless to add that the admission of dissenters to degrees
and endowments did not injuriously affect a single object for which a
national university exists. On the other hand, the mischiefs of
ecclesiastical monopoly were long in disappearing.

VII

(M100) We have already seen how warmly the project of introducing
competition into the civil service had kindled Mr. Gladstone's enthusiasm
in the days of the Crimean war.(199) Reform had made slow progress. The
civil service commission had been appointed in 1855, but their
examinations only tested the quality of candidates sent before them on
nomination. In 1860 a system was set up of limited competition among three
nominated candidates, who had first satisfied a preliminary test
examination. This lasted until 1870. Lowe had reform much at heart. At the
end of 1869, he appealed to the prime minister: "As I have so often tried
in vain, will you bring the question of the civil service before the
cabinet to-day? Something must be decided. We cannot keep matters in this
discreditable state of abeyance. If the cabinet will not entertain the
idea of open competition, might we not at any rate require a larger number
of competitors for each vacancy? five or seven or ten?"

Resistance came from Lord Clarendon and, strange to say, from Mr. Bright.
An ingenious suggestion of Mr. Gladstone's solved the difficulty. All
branches of the civil service were to be thrown open where the minister at
the head of the department approved. Lowe was ready to answer for all the
departments over which he had any control,--the treasury, the board of
works, audit office, national debt office, paymaster-general's office,
inland revenue, customs and post-office. Mr. C