1 8 HUXLEY 



the anger and the austerity were passing moods ; they 

 were the price which he and others paid for abiding 

 virtues; for the "woman's element" l in him which 

 made him cling to wife and children ; for the quick 

 response to every call of duty or affection ; for the 

 generous application of great powers to noble and un- 

 selfish ends. Of him may be said what Lowell has 

 said of Lessing : " No biographical chemistry is 

 needed to bleach spots out of his reputation." 2 His 

 home was " a focus of the best affections not less 

 than of intellectual light." 3 He loved anniversaries ; 

 the devotion of his children warmed him " better than 

 the sun," and when his gifted daughter Marian died 

 in the flower of womanhood, he confessed, in the 

 depth of his grief, that " man is not a rational animal, 

 especially in his parental capacity." Where he 

 hated, the scorn and loathing were deserved, for they 

 were manifest only against the insincere and the 

 evasive ; if he could not brook contradiction, it was 

 only where ignorance or folly vaunted their assurance 

 and their blunders ; if he could not suffer bores gladly, 

 by what right did they compel a waste of time un- 

 grudgingly given where counsel or information were 

 honestly asked, no matter by whom ? For, like all 



1 " I have a woman's element in me." — I. 61. 



2 The English Poets and other Essays, p. 278. 



3 Leslie Stephen, on" Huxley," Nineteenth Century, Dec, 1900, 

 p. 917. 



