IV MODERN EVOLUTION 235 



Huxley gives me leave to state his opinion to be that 

 the principle of strict secularity in State Education is 

 sound, and must eventually prevail.') Never has 

 any collection of writings, whose miscellaneous, un- 

 equal, and often disconnected character is obscured 

 by the common title ' Bible ' which covers them, had 

 such need for deliverance from the so-called ' be- 

 lievers ' in it. Its value is to be realised only in the 

 degree that theories of its inspiration are abandoned. 

 Then only is it possible to treat it like any other 

 literature of the kind ; to discriminate between the 

 coarse and barbaric features which evidence the 

 humanness of its origin, and the loftier features of 

 its later portions which also evidence how it falls into 

 line with other witnesses of man's gradual ethical 

 and spiritual development. 



Huxley was eminently fitted for the work of the 

 School Board, but its demands were too severe on 

 a man never physically strong, and he was forced to 

 resign. However, he was thereby set free for other 

 work, which could be effectively done only by ex- 

 changing the arena for the study. The earliest im- 

 portant outcome of that relief was the monograph 

 on Hume, published in 1879, an d the latest was the 

 Romanes lecture on Evolution and Ethics, which was 

 delivered in the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford on 

 the 1 8th May 1893. Between the two lie a valuable 

 series of papers dealing with the Evolution of Theol- 

 ogy and cognate subjects. In all these we have the 

 application of the theory of Evolution to the ex- 

 planation of the origin of beliefs and of the basis 

 of morals. To quote the saying attributed to 

 Liebnitz, both Spencer and Huxley, and all who 

 follow them, care for ' science only because it enables 



