HUXLEY ii 



Another way of knowing is, when a thing is to 

 be known, to know it fully and exactly; to be 

 aware where the known begins, and where it ends ; 

 to be sure and clear what the terms, the symbols 

 used in the knowledge, really mean ; to have the 

 component parts of each bit of knowledge so 

 arranged that it may fitly serve as the instrument 

 of clear and exact thinking. This is the kind of 

 knowledge in which Huxley, above most men, 

 found his heart's content. We know from his 

 life that his love of machinery led him at one time 

 to wish to be an engineer. What fascinated him 

 in a machine was its completeness and perfection, 

 the fitting together of all its parts to a common 

 end, the feature that, if well and truly made, it 

 could at any time without harm be taken to pieces 

 and put together again. He demanded that, so 

 far as possible, each piece of knowledge of which 

 he had to make use should have the complete- 

 ness, the perfection, the clean fit of a machine. 

 With such exact and sharply defined knowledge 

 alone could he feel that he was thinking clearly. 



Some minds there are which find a charm in 

 indistinctness ; impressionists in matters of know 

 ledge, truth seems to them to have the greater 

 charm when its features are softened by a sur- 

 rounding mist of doubt and uncertainty; placed 

 before them in sharp, clear outlines, it offends 

 them as being hard and crude. It was not so with 

 Huxley. He felt as fully as any one the beauty 

 born of dimness which rounds off with softness 



