Benjamin Jowett to Alfred Tennyson [1858]: 'I have great pleasure in sending some books which I hope you will accept, the best books in the world (except the Bible), Homer and Plato [...] I have added two or three other books which I thought you might like to see, the translation of the Vedas as a specimen of the oldest thing in the world, Hegel's Philosophy of History, whiich is just "the increasing purpose that through the ages runs" buried under a heap of categories. If you care to look at it will you turn to the pages I have marked at the beginning? It is a favourite book of mine [...] I also send you the latest and best work on Mythology, and Bunsen's new Bibelbuch, which, from the little I have read, seems to be an interesting and valuable introduction to Scripture.'