4O Selections from Huxley 



for long ages so slight and feeble as to be compatible 

 with the existence of almost any general view respect- 

 ing the mode of governance of the universe. No doubt, 

 from the first, there were certain phenomena which, to 

 5 the rudest mind, presented a constancy of occurrence, and 

 suggested that a fixed order ruled, at any rate, among 

 them. I doubt if the grossest of Fetish worshipers ever 

 imagined that a stone must have a god within it to make 

 it fall, or that a fruit had a god within it to make it 



10 taste sweet. With regard to such matters as these, it 

 is hardly questionable that mankind from the first took 

 strictly positive and scientific views. 



But, with respect to all the less familiar occurrences 

 which present themselves, uncultured man, no doubt, has 



15 always taken himself as the standard of comparison, as 

 the center and measure of the world; nor could he well 

 avoid doing so. And finding that his apparently un- 

 caused will has a powerful effect in giving rise to many 

 occurrences, he naturally enough ascribed other and greater 



20 events to other and greater volitions, and came to look 

 upon the world and all that therein is, as the product of the 

 volitions of persons like himself, but stronger, and capable 

 of being appeased or angered, as he himself might be 

 soothed or irritated. Through such conceptions of the 



25 plan and working of the universe all mankind have passed, 

 or are passing. And we may now consider, what has been 

 the effect of the improvement of natural knowledge on 

 the views of men who have reached this stage, and who 

 have begun to cultivate -atural knowledge with no desire 



30 but that of " increasing God's honor and bettering man's 

 estate." 



For example: what could seem wiser, from a mere ma- 

 terial point of view, more innocent, from a theological 

 one, to an ancient people, than that they should learn 



