CHAPTER V 

 1850-1851 



IN the Huxley Lecture for 1898 (Times, October 4) 

 Professor Virchow takes occasion to speak of the 

 effect of Huxley's service in the Rattlesnake upon his 

 intellectual development : 



When Huxley himself left Charing Cross Hospital in 

 1846, he had enjoyed a rich measure of instruction in 

 anatomy and physiology. Thus trained, he took the 

 post of naval surgeon, and by the time that he returned, 

 four years later, he had become a perfect zoologist and 

 a keen-sighted ethnologist. How this was possible any 

 one will readily understand who knows from his own 

 experience how great the value of personal observation 

 is for the development of independent and unprejudiced 

 thoiight. For a young man who, besides collecting a 

 rich treasure of positive knowledge, has practised dissec- 

 tion and the exercise of a critical judgment, a long sea 

 voyage and a peaceful sojourn among entirely new 

 surroundings afford an invaluable opportunity for original 

 work and deep reflection. Freed from the formalism of 

 the schools, thrown upon the use of his own intellect, 

 compelled to test each single object as regards properties 

 and history, he soon forgets the dogmas of the prevailing 

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