20 Teachings of Thomas Huxley 



for him to defend his position with respect to 

 the hypothesis set up by Mr. Darwin; for it 

 was well known how inseparable was the friend- 

 ship between the two, and hence gossiping 

 tongues had some excuse, perhaps, for dis- 

 crediting Huxley's indorsement of the "Origin 

 of Species" and the "Descent, of Man." It was 

 precisely this fact which led Huxley to declare 

 that the last position in which he hoped to find 

 himself was "That of an advocate for Mr. Dar- 

 win's views, if by an advocate is meant one 

 whose business is to smooth over real difficul- 

 ties and persuade where he cannot convince." 

 In spite of the careful way in which they had 

 been worked out Darwin's theories as first 

 enunciated were open to severe criticism and 

 in this respect they were not ignored. Then 

 as now jealousy was a rather too prevalent 

 characteristic of human nature, and conse- 

 quently many lost sight of the true goal to- 

 ward which all were striving and became slaves 

 to their own petty desires for everlasting fame. 

 Huxley saw these faults, but he must have 

 considered them unavoidable, for he says: "I 

 adopt Mr. Darwin's hypothesis subject, to the 

 production of proof that physiological species 

 may be produced by selective breed inn- just as 

 the chemist adopts the atomic theory subject 

 to the proof of the existence of atoms." But 

 aside from all this "The whole analogy of 

 natural operations furnishes so complete and 



