While attending Harvard, he taught school at Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, and Concord, Lexington and Northborough, Massachusetts.

[7] In the winter of 1850, Bowen lectured again before the Lowell Institute on political economy, and in 1852 on the origin and development of the English and American constitutions.

In 1853, on the election of James Walker to the presidency of Harvard, Bowen was appointed his successor as Alford professor of natural religion, moral philosophy and civil polity.

[3] After 1858, he lectured before the Lowell Institute on the English metaphysicians and philosophers from Francis Bacon to Sir William Hamilton.

In political economy, Bowen opposed the doctrines of Adam Smith on free trade, Thomas Malthus on population, and David Ricardo on rent.