1894 LETTERS aoJ 



of Nature. I thought it (I mean the book, not the pun) clever 

 from a literary point of view, and worthless from any other. 

 You will see that I have been giving Lord Salisbury a Roland 

 for his Oliver in Nature. But, as hinted, if we only had been 

 in Section D ! 



With my wife's and my kind regards and remembrances — ■ 

 Ever yours very truly, T. H. Huxley. 



Athenaeum Club, Dec. 19, 1894. 



My dear Farrer — I am indebted to you for giving the 

 recording angel less trouble than he might otherwise have had, 

 on account of the worse than usual unpunctuality of the London 

 and Brighton this morning. For I have utilised the extra time 

 in reading and thinking over your very interesting address. 



Thanks for your protest against the mischievous a priori 

 method, which people will not understand is as gross an anach- 

 ronism in social matters as it would be in Hydrostatics. The 

 so-called " Sociology " is honeycombed with it, and it is hard 

 to say who are worse, the individualists or the collectivists. But 

 in your just wrath don't forget that there is such a thing as a 

 science of social life, for which, if the term had not been so 

 hopelessly degraded, Politics is the proper name. 



Men are beings of a certain constitution, who, under certain 

 conditions, will as surely tend to act in certain ways as stones 

 will tend to fall if you leave them unsupported. The laws of 

 their nature are as invariable as the laws of gravitation, only 

 the applications to particular cases offer worse problems than the 

 case of the three bodies. 



The Political Economists have gone the right way to work 

 — the way that the physical philosopher follows in all complex 

 affairs — by tracing out the effects of one great cause of human 

 action, the desire of wealth, supposing it to be unchecked. 



If they, or other people, have forgotten that there are other 

 potent causes of action which may interfere with this, it is no 

 fault of scientific method but only their own stupidity. 



Hydrostatics is not a " dismal science," because water does 

 not always seek the lowest level — e.g. from a bottle turned upside 

 down, if there is a cork in the neck ! 



There is much need that somebody should do for what is 

 vaguely called " Ethics " just what the Political Economists have 

 done. Settle the question of what will be done under the un- 

 checked action of certain motives, and leave the problem of 

 " ought " for subsequent consideration. 



