LECTURE II 1 



HUXLEY, AND THE PROBLEM OF THE NATURALIST 



ALL thoughtful students will prize the essays and addresses on 

 Education which make up the third volume of Huxley's " Collected 

 Essays." When written, these were regarded by most readers as 

 special pleas for scientific education ; but nothing could be farther 

 from the truth, although the prominence of "science" in their titles 

 gives some ground for this impression. They who read them now, 

 after scientific education has become an assured fact, will find that 

 Huxley shows, here as elsewhere, that he is no radical, seeking to 

 sweep away the ancient landmarks, but an enthusiastic admirer of 

 all that is good in the old, as well as a zealous advocate for the new 

 in education. 



While he improves every opportunity to set forth the need for 

 scientific education, he tells the student that he is a man and a citizen 

 as well as a student ; and the delights and the discipline of literature 

 and art and history are emphasized again and again, and each essay 

 is a plea for liberal culture ; although he never fails to demand the 

 removal of the accumulated ashes, and the rekindling of the pure^ 

 flame, until the very air the student breathes shall become " charged 

 with that enthusiasm for truth, that fanaticism of veracity, which 

 is a greater possession than much learning ; a nobler gift than the 

 power of increasing knowledge." 



No one Huxley least of all would dream of attributing the 

 " New Reformation " to any one man, and he speaks of himself 

 as " a full private who has seen a good deal of service in the ranks " 

 of the army ranged around the banner of physical science ; but the 

 object to which he tells us he has devoted his life the diffusion 

 among men of the scientific spirit of " organized common sense " 



1 This lecture is part of a Review of Huxley's Essays, which was printed in the Forum, 

 November, 1895. 



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