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LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xxiii 



I understood it, I did not think Mr. Balfour supposed they would 

 acknowledge the position he ascribed to them, and that one of 

 his complaints was that they did not work out their premises 

 to their logical conclusions. I added that so far as one of Mr. 

 Balfour's chief points was concerned — the existence of the 

 external world — Mill was almost the only man on their side in 

 this century who had faced the problem frankly, and he had 

 been driven to say that all men can know is that there are 

 " permanent possibilities of sensation." He did not seem in- 

 clined to pursue the question of an external world, but said 

 that though Mill's " logic " was very good, empiricists were not 

 bound by all his theories. 



He characterised the book as a very good and even brilliant 

 piece of work from a literary point of view; but as a helpful 

 contribution to the great controversy, the most disappointing he 

 had ever read. I said, "There has been no adverse criticism of it 

 yet." He answered with emphasis, " No ! but there soon will be." 

 " From you ? " I asked. " I let out no secrets," was the reply. 



He then talked with great admiration and affection of Mr. 

 Balfour's brother, Francis. His early death, and W. K. Clif- 

 ford's (Huxley said), had been the greatest loss to science — 

 not only in England, but in the world — in our time. " Half a 

 dozen of us old fogies could have been better spared." He re- 

 membered Frank Balfour as a boy at Eton, and saw his unusual 

 talent there. " Then my friend, Michael Foster, took him up 

 at Cambridge, and found out that he had real genius for biology. 

 I used to say there was science in the blood," but this new book 

 of his brother's, he added, smiling, " shows I was wrong." 



Apropos to his remark about the Comtists, one of the com- 

 pany pointed out that in later life Comte recognised a science 

 of " the individual," equivalent to what Huxley meant by psy- 

 chology. " That," he replied, " was due to the influence of Clo- 

 tilde de Vaux. You see," he added, " with a kind of Sir Charles 

 Grandison bow to my wife, '' what power your sex may have." 

 As Huxley was going out of the house, I said to him that Father 

 A. B. (the priest who had been present) had not expected to 

 find himself in his company. " No ! I trust he had plenty of 

 holy water with him," was the reply. 



. . . After he had gone, we were all agreed as to the ex- 

 traordinary vigour and brilliancy he had shown. Some one 

 said, " He is like a man who is what the Scotch call ' fey.' " 

 We laughed at the idea, but we naturally recalled the remark 

 later on. 



