Benjamin Jowett on Henry John Stephen Smith

“In those days he was almost equally a lover of Classics and Mathematics. ...Even in the last years of his life he was in the habit of taking with him Greek books to read during the Vacation.”

“He was indulgent to the failings of young men, and felt a humane pity for persons who had lost their character. He was one of whom it might be said that 'he would have stood by a friend, not only in adversity, but in disgrace.'”

“He could see through the vanity and folly of a friend, and yet retain a never changing affection for him. Of his own life, he seldom or never spoke; he was not an egotist, and his own sayings or doings did not seem to interest him afterwards.”

“His mathematical speculations could have been shared by a very few, not more than two or three, of his contemporaries at Oxford. Yet he did not withdraw himself from business or society. He was not the silent philosopher who is lost in reverie, or who, while acknowledged to be a mathematical genius, is pointed at by mankind as a poor and eccentric mortal. He was a thorough man of the world and greatly liked by everybody.”

“He was very desirous to promote the interests of Natural Science in Oxford, and was in favour of some measure which would have made the knowledge of a portion of some one of the Natural Sciences the condition of obtaining a degree. The teachers of these sciences had long been fighting a battle against the older traditions of the University; they had now become the study of a few, but he clearly saw that they could never truly flourish until an interest in them was more generally diffused... But he was also the best friend that the older studies... for he could speak with authority, and he was firmly convinced that in education Science should not supersede Literature. He deplored equally the want of literary culture which he observed in many scientific men, and the gross ignorance of the most general facts of Science which prevails in the world at large, especially at English Universities and Public Schools. In a similar spirit he was anxious to encourage at Oxford the study of Medicine and also of Engineering, thinking that they would supply a missing link between the Physical Sciences and the older studies of the University.”

“Though not a poet or creative genius, he was... possessed of greater natural abilities than any one else whom I have known at Oxford. He had the clearest and most lucid mind, and a natural experience of the world and of human character hardly ever to be found in one so young. He took up all subjects at the right end; he knew whereabouts the truth lay even when he was imperfectly acquainted with the facts. And he was the most amiable and good-natured of young men. I might apply to him the words in which Plato describes the youthful Athenian Mathematician, Theaetetus, where he says: "In all my acquaintance, which is very large, I never knew any one who was his equal in natural gifts. He had a quickness of apprehension which was almost unrivalled, and he was exceedingly gentle. There was a union of qualities in him which I have never seen in any other, and should scarcely have thought possible, for quick wits have generally quick tempers... but he moved surely and smoothly and successfully in the paths of knowledge and enquiry. He flowed on silently like a river of oil. At his age it was wonderful. He was also surprisingly liberal about money, though his fortune was only moderate. (Theætetus 144).”