56 HUXLEY 



form from an article in the Nineteenth Century of 

 November, 1885, in which Mr. Gladstone made a re- 

 view of Dr. Reville's Prolegomena to the History of 

 Religions the vehicle of obsolete arguments in support 

 of harmony between the Mosaic cosmogony and the 

 theory of organic evolution. Re-stated by a man 

 whose high authority in matters political had led 

 many (for the logical faculty is, as yet, in the em- 

 bryonic stage in the majority of minds) to accept him 

 as an authority upon everything else, these arguments, 

 refuted, as they had been, over and over again, had to 

 be dealt with once more. l Huxley was the man for 

 the task. The article, " he used humorously to say, 

 so stirred his bile as to set his liver right at once ; " 

 indeed, stagnation making him "unendurable to him- 

 self and everybody else," he said that he was thankful 

 to " Providence " for specially devolving on Glad- 

 stone, Gore, & Co. the function of keeping " c 'ome 

 'appy ' for him." 2 



The controversies thus involved, together with 

 essays on philosophical and social questions, filled the 

 time between long intervals of broken health, and of 

 sojourns on Alpine summits. Arolla made him feel 

 young again : 



" Balm floating on thy mountain air 

 And healing sights to see ; " 



1II.425. 211.269. 



