CBLAPTER V 



SCIENCE FOR THE PEOPLE 



No account of Huxley's life would be at all 

 comijlete which did not give some account of his 

 more popular wTitings and speeches. Forty or fifty 

 years ago it was by no means so common an event 

 for a great man of science to deliver addresses to 

 the man in the street, in the simplest of language 

 which every one could understand, as it is to-day. 

 And, doubtless, part of the great influence which 

 Huxlej'- wielded over the thought of liis time, and 

 subsequently, was to a great extent due to this very 

 fact, that he thought it no unworthy task, even for 

 his mighty brain, to attempt to place before a working- 

 man audience some of the profoundest truths of 

 science in the simplest of terms. Some of the more 

 important of these efforts were afterwards published 

 in book form, under the title of Lay Sermons, Addresses, 

 and Reviews. (Macmillan & Co., 1870.) 



They are prefaced Avith a letter to Tyndall, in which 

 Huxley explains that he would have Uked to have 

 dedicated the volume to Tyndall himself, except for 

 the fact that he thought such a formal dedication at 

 the beginning of the book Avould look like a grand 

 lodge in front of a set of cottages. Instead of the pre- 

 face and a dedication, tlierefore, this letter to Tyndall 

 is printed as a substitute for both. Tlie object of 



