344 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. XIV 



Philosophy," and do not know to what doctrine she has 

 committed herself. 



They seem to have excluded Miss Bradlaugh simply 

 on the noscitur a sociis principle. 



It will need all the dexterity I possess to stand up for 

 the principle of religious and philosophical freedom, 

 without giving other people a hold for saying that I have 

 identified myself with Bradlaugh. 



It was the same a little later with the Sunda}' 

 Society, which had offered him its presidency. He 

 writes to the Hon. Sec. on Feb. 11, 1884: 



I regret that it is impossible for me to accept the 

 office which the Sunday Society honours me by offering. 



It IB not merely a disinclination to add to the work 

 which alreadv falls to mv share which leads me to say 



i/ / / 



this. So long as I am President of the Royal Society, I 

 shall feel bound to abstain from taking any prominent 

 part in public movements as to the propriety of which 

 the opinions of the Fellows of the Society differ widely. 



My own opinions on the Sunday question are exactly 

 what they were five -and -twenty years ago. They have 

 not been hid under a bushel, and I should not have 

 accepted my present office if I had felt that so doing 

 debarred me from reiterating them whenever it may be 

 necessary to do so. 



But that is a different matter from taking a step 

 which would, in the eyes of the public, commit the Royal 

 Society, through its President, to one side of the 

 controversy in which you are engaged, and in which I, 

 personally, hope you may succeed as warmly as ever I 

 did. 



One other piece of work during the first half of 

 the year remains to be mentioned, namely, the Rede 

 Lecture, delivered at Cambridge on June 12. This 



