326 'DESCENT OF MAN 'EXPRESSION. [1871. 



another word. But I shall cheer up, I dare say, soon, having 

 only just got over a bad attack. Farewell ; God knows why 

 I bother you about myself. I can say nothing more about 

 missing-links than what I have said. I should rely much on 

 pre-silurian times; but then comes Sir W. Thomson like an 

 odious spectre. Farewell. 



. . . There is a most cutting review of me in the * Quar- 

 terly ' ; * I have only read a few pages. The skill and style 

 make me think of Mivart. I shall soon be viewed as the 

 most despicable of men. This ' Quarterly Review ' tempts 

 me to republish Ch. Wright, even if not read by any one, just 

 to show some one will say a word against Mivart, and that 

 his (i.e. Mivart's) remarks ought not to be swallowed without 

 some reflection. . . . God knows whether my strength and 

 spirit will last out to write a chapter versus Mivart and others ; 

 I do so hate controversy and feel I shall do it so badly. 



[The above-mentioned * Quarterly ' review was the subject 

 of an article by Mr. Huxley in the November number of* the 

 ' Contemporary Review.' Here, also, are discussed Mr. Wal- 

 lace's * Contribution to the Theory of Natural Selection,' and 

 the second edition of Mr. Mivart's ' Genesis of Species.' 

 What follows is taken from Mr. Huxley's article. The 

 ' Quarterly ' reviewer, though being to some extent an evolu- 

 tionist, believes that Man " differs more from an elephant or 

 a gorilla, than do these from the dust of the earth on which 

 they tread." The reviewer also declares that my father has 

 " with needless opposition, set at naught the first principles 

 of both philosophy and religion." Mr. Huxley passes from 

 the ' Quarterly ' reviewer's further statement, that there is no 

 necessary opposition between evolution and religion, to the 

 more definite position taken by Mr. Mivart, that the orthodox 

 authorities of the Roman Catholic Church agree in distinctly 

 asserting derivative creation, so that " their teachings har- 

 monize with all that modern science can possibly require." 

 Here Mr. Huxley felt the want of that " study of Christian 



* July 1871. 



