MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO
ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO
THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd.
TORONTO
APHORISMS
AND
REFLECTIONS
From the Works of
T. H. HUXLEY
Selected by
HENRIETTA A. HUXLEY
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
1908
Richard Clay and Sons, Limited,
BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND
BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.
First Edition, 1907.
Reprinted, 1908.
PREFACE
Although a man by his works and personalityshall have made his mark upon the age he lives in,yet when he has passed away and his influencewith him, the next generation, and still more thesucceeding one, will know little of this work, of hisideals and of the goal he strove to win, although forthe student his scientific work may always live.
Thomas Henry Huxley may come to be rememberedby the public merely as the man who heldthat we were descended from the ape, or as theapostle of Darwinism, or as the man who worstedBishop Wilberforce at Oxford.
To prevent such limitation, and to afford moreintimate and valuable reasons for remembrance ofthis man of science and lover of his fellow-men, Ihave gathered together passages, on widely differing[Pg vi]themes, from the nine volumes of his "Essays,"from his "Scientific Memoirs" and his "Letters,"to be published in a small volume, complete in itselfand of a size that can be carried in the pocket.
Some of the passages were picked out for theirphilosophy, some for their moral guidances, somefor their scientific exposition of natural facts, orfor their insight into social questions; others fortheir charms of imagination or genial humour, andmany—not the least—for their pure beauty of lucidEnglish writing.
In so much wealth of material it was difficult torestrict the gathering.
My great wish is that this small book, by theeasy method of its contents, may attract the attentionof those persons who are yet unacquaintedwith my husband's writings; of the men and womenof leisure, who, although they may have heard ofthe "Essays," do not care to work their way throughthe nine volumes; of others who would like to readthem, but who have either no time to do so or coinwherewith to buy them. More especially do I hopethat these selections may attract the attention of theworking man, whose cause my husband so ardentlyespoused, and to whom he was the first to reveal,by his free lectures, the loveliness of Nature,the many rainbow-coloured rays of science, and to[Pg vii]show forth to his listeners how all these gloriousrays unite in the one pure white light of holytruth.
I am most grateful to our son Leonard Huxleyfor weeding out the overgrowth of my extra