LITTLE 

 JOURNEYS 



mortification of having to do so. Q Darwin is buried in 

 Westminster Abbey, but this was not to be the final 

 resting place of the dust of Mill, Tyndall, Spencer, 

 George Eliot or Huxley. These had all stood in the 

 fore of the fight against superstition and had given 

 and received blows. The Pantheon of such battle- 

 scarred heroes was to be the hearts of those who 

 prize above all that earth can bestow the benison of 

 the God within. "Above all else, let me preserve my 

 integrity of intellect," said Huxley. 

 Here is Huxley's letter to Spencer : 



4 Marlborough Place, Dec. 27, 1880. 



My dear Spencer Your telegram which reached me on 

 Friday evening caused me great perplexity, inasmuch 

 as I had just been talking to Morley, and agreeing with 

 him that the proposal for a funeral in Westminster 

 Abbey had a very questionable look to us, who desired 

 nothing so much as that peace and honour should at- 

 tend George Eliot to her grave. 



It can hardly be doubted that the proposal will be 

 bitterly opposed, possibly (as happened in Mill's case 

 with less provocation), with the raking up of past his- 

 tories, about which the opinion even of those who have 

 least the desire or the right to be pharisaical is strongly 

 divided, and which had better be forgotten. 

 With respect to putting pressure on the Dean of West- 

 minster, I have to consider that he has some confi- 

 dence in me, and before asking him to do something 

 for which he is pretty sure to be violently assailed, I 

 have to ask myself whether I really think it a right 

 thing for a man in his position to do. 

 Now I cannot say I do. However much I may lament 

 the circumstance, Westminster Abbey is a Christian 



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