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He set his finite mind the task of solving the infinite. A mere creature, he sought to fathom the mind of his creator. Read the lines upon his tomb, written by his wife what do they teach? Nothing but 'let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. If a man follows Huxley, then is he a fool if he does not give to this poor squeezed-lemon of a world another twist.
But now, says Professor Huxley, conceptions of the universe fatal to the notions held by our forefathers have been forced upon us by physical science. Grant to him that they are thus fatal, that the new conceptions must and will soon become current everywhere, and that every one will finally perceive them to be fatal to the beliefs of our forefathers.
V. For the "according to nature" theory, see Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, passim; Rousseau, Discourse on Science and Art, etc.; J. S. Mill, "Nature" in Three Essays on Religion; T.H. Huxley, Evolution and Ethics. T. N. Carver, The Religion Worth Having.
The ghost comes from, and depends on, the animistic theory; the Supreme Being, as originally thought of, does not. All Gods are Elohim, kalou, wakan; all Elohim, kalou, wakan are not Gods. A ghost-god should receive food or libation. Mr. Huxley says that Tá-li-y-Tooboo did so.
Whenever there was in them the least touch of pride in what they had done, there was a good ground for attacking them; but so long as they were wholly humble, they were wholly victorious. There were possible answers to Huxley; there was no answer possible to Darwin. He was convincing because of his unconsciousness; one might almost say because of his dulness.
I thank Voltaire, that great man who, for half a century, was the intellectual emperor of Europe, and who, from his throne at the foot of the Alps, pointed the finger of scorn at every hypocrite in Christendom. I thank Darwin, Haeckel and Buchner, Spencer, Tyndall and Huxley, Draper, Leckey and Buckle. I thank the inventors, the discoverers, the thinkers, the scientists, the explorers.
This was a holiday full of interest for a man like Huxley who looked upon the history of the world and man's place in the world with a keen scientific mind. Added to this scientific bent of mind, moreover, Huxley had a deep appreciation for the picturesque in nature and life. Bits of description indicate his enjoyment in this vacation.
But the method which proposes to give children an education along the lines of least resistance is, like all other naturalism, a contradiction in terms, sometimes a reductio ad absurdum, sometimes ad nauseam. As long ago as 1893, when Huxley wrote his Romanes lecture on Evolution and Ethics, this identity of natural and human values was explicitly denied.
As a manner of doing this, there occur to me three interesting biographies, the Life of Darwin, the Life of Huxley, and the Life of Pasteur, which give the important part of the story of scientific development during the last half of the nineteenth century.
The consciousness for them has no purpose: yet it keeps company with its object. The metaphors which serve to define it, part of which have been imagined by Huxley, are all of a passive nature. Such is the light, or the whistling noise which accompanies the working of an engine, but does not act on its machinery. Or, the shadow which dogs the steps of the traveller.
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