EVOLUTION AND SOCIETY 



a step further in order to place Spencer above 

 Newton. It does not seem to have occurred to them 

 that Newton attained the reputation of being the 

 master mind of science only after a long and serious 

 critique of his work; it would have been better taste 

 to let the acid test of time determine what was the 

 value of the achievement of their new and untried 

 heroes. 



But the most irritating and exasperating character- 

 istic of this group was the assumption that in their 

 doctrines only was the truth to be found since they, 

 alone, were seekers after the truth. Day in and day 

 out they proclaimed that they wished only to bring 

 truth to light and that all the rest of the world were 

 guided by expediency and ulterior motives. In this 

 respect Huxley was the leader, and this complacency 

 drew caustic rebuke from the tolerant William James : 

 "It must be delightful, only I can't agree to what 

 seems to be becoming the conventionally accepted 

 view of him [Huxley], that he possessed the exclu- 

 sive specialty of living for the truth. A good deal of 

 humbug about that I — at least when it becomes a pro- 

 fessional and heroic attitude."" They all, like medi- 

 aeval knights, rode out to battle carrying a banner on 

 which was displayed the motto, Veritas praevalehit. 

 They attacked bitterly the beliefs of their enemies, 

 shouting their battle cry of "Facts we know and Law 

 we know but what you know is false." And when 



11 James, Life and Letters, vol. II, p. 148. 



