"It is a superb biography of Gladstone to the end of his first government, and it is deftly united by several leitmotives. For example, Gladstone's lifelong admixture of high church and evangelical Anglicanism, his transition from Tory to Peelite to Liberal politics, his preoccupation with church-state relations, the great issue of the parliamentary franchise, Gladstone's outstanding powers of administrative concentration and maneuver--these themes connect the chapters....There is, too, in this biography an important and subtle appreciation of Gladstone as politician....A sophisticated and important book. It will surely stand high in the vast Gladstone literature."--History: Reviews of New Books

"With the publication of this book, students and general readers will now have convenient access to Matthew's important essays that have contributed significantly not only to an understanding of the Diaries but to Gladstone and his age as well."--The Historian

"An important and useful overview of Gladstone's first sixty-three years."--Albion

"The biographical essay he offers is the best interpretative analysis available of Gladstone as a politician and as a person."--Journal of British Studies

"Matthew is among those very rare editors who can also write biography. Scholars and general readers should be delighted to have his work available at an affordable price."--Victorian Studies

"A rare combination of high scholarship and handiness"--Nineteenth-Century Prose

"An epoch making piece of research. Matthew's approach is thematic rather than strictly chronological, a distinct advantage in terms of both historiographical originality and the practical implications for the reader."--American Historical Review