248 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. XIII 



logical arguments, to pave the way for consideration 

 of the imperfection of the geological record. 



Such were the lines on which he delivered his 

 Friday evening lecture on " Persistent Types " at the 

 Royal Institution on June 3, 1859. 



However, the chief part which he took at this 

 time in extending the doctrines of evolution was in 

 applying them to his own subjects, Development and 

 Vertebrate Anatomy, and more particularly to the 

 question of the origin of mankind. 



Of all the burning questions connected with the 

 Origin of Species, this was the most heated the 

 most surrounded by prejudice and passion. To 

 touch it was to court attack; to be exposed to 

 endless scorn, ridicule, misrepresentation, abuse 

 almost to social ostracism. But the facts were 

 there; the structural likenesses between the apes 

 and man had already been shown ; and as Huxley 

 warned Darwin, " I will stop at no point so long as 

 clear reasoning will carry me further." 



Now two years before the " Origin " appeared, 

 the denial of these facts by a leading anatomist led 

 Huxley, as was his wont, to re-investigate the question 

 for himself and satisfy himself one way or the other. 

 He found that the previous investigators were not 

 mistaken. Without going out of his way to refute 

 the mis-statement as publicly as it was made, he 

 simply embodied his results in his regular teaching. 

 But the opportunity came unsought. Fortified by 

 his own researches, he openly challenged these 



