CHAP. V.] DUTY AND PLEASUKE. 119 



Quarterly Review, where of such an act it is stated that 

 &quot; it is moral as the continuation of those preceding deli 

 berate acts through which the good habit was originally 

 formed ; and the rapidity with which the will is directed 

 in the case supposed may indicate the number and con 

 stancy of antecedent meritorious actions.&quot; Not only, how 

 ever, does Professor Huxley avoid notice of this passage, 

 but he quotes my words as to the unmeritorious nature 

 of actions &quot; unaccompanied by mental acts of conscious 

 will directed towards the fulfilment of duty,&quot; so as to 

 lead his readers to believe that I say this absolutely. He 

 takes care not to let them know that here I am speaking * 

 only of the &quot; actions of brutes, such as those of the bee, the 

 ant, or the beaver,&quot; which, of course, never at any period 

 of the lives of any one of these creatures were consciously 

 directed to &quot; goodness&quot; or &quot; duty &quot;as an end, so that no later 

 spontaneous actions could in their case result from an ac 

 quired habit of virtue, on which account I was fully justified 

 in speaking of their actions as devoid of morality. This mis 

 representation is noteworthy ; but what is surprising in one 

 whose eulogies of &quot; honesty &quot; are so warm and so repeated is, 

 that the whole passage has been reprinted totidem verbis in 

 his Critiques and Addresses, after having had his attention 

 directly called to the injustice he had committed. 



Professor Huxley speaks of &quot; the most beautiful character 

 to which humanity can attain, that of the man who does good 

 without thinking about it &quot; (p. 468). Does he mean that the 

 absence of thought is the cause of the beauty ? If so, then 

 if I do the most beneficial acts in my sleep, I attain this 

 apex of moral beauty. This, of course, he will not allow. 

 Therefore, it is not by reason of the not thinking about it 

 that the action is beautiful, but, as Professor Huxley goes on 

 to say, because its author &quot; loves justice and is repelled by 

 evil.&quot; In this last point, then in this habit of mind, the 

 beauty consists. But will the Professor say that the man got 



* See Genesis of Species, p. 221, 2nd edition. 



