48 HUXLEY 



in zoological classifications. The question was, of 

 course, a burning one in those days, and those who 

 touched it were apt to suffer. Various scientific 

 papers and works dealing with the features of the 

 brain and mind, which were said to be pecuhar to 

 man, aroused still further Huxley's interest, and 

 started him on personal investigations, which after- 

 wards caused his opinion to differ from these writers. 

 He soon found that the structures in question were 

 shared in common by man and many of the apes, 

 and these connections he taught in his lectures. 

 When the Origin of Species was published, it ap- 

 peared to Huxley that since vertebrate anatomy 

 was not a specially strong side of Darwin's work, he 

 himself might very well take up this side of the 

 argument, and thereby strengthen Darwin's conten- 

 tions. Tliis he did, and in 1860 actually had the 

 temerity to choose the relations of man to the lower 

 animals for the subject of his series of popular lectures 

 to working-men. Huxley finished wTiting the lectures 

 in 1862, so that they represented the careful thought 

 and investigation of a number of years. Before it 

 was issued in book form, it was submitted to an ana- 

 tomical friend who, although finding no eiTors in it, 

 earnestly warned Huxley of the consequences to 

 himself if he published it. The result, as we have 

 said, was that he encountered a perfect hurricane 

 of ridicule and misrepresentation for some time ; 

 indeed, he says that he is surprised to think how any 

 one who had simk so low as he was in the estimate 

 of his critics could have since emerged into relative 

 respectability. The book was issued in the Eversley 

 edition in 1894, together with "Other Essays." 

 The six points dealt with in the essays in the work 



