i863 FACT AND SPECULATION 261 



immortality of the soul is very pleasant and very useful, there- 

 fore it is true. 



All the grand language about " human aspiration," " con- 

 sistency with the divine justice," etc. etc., collapses into this at 

 last — Better the misery of the " Vale ! in ajternum vale ! " ten 

 times over than the opium of such empty sophisms — I have 

 drunk of that cup to the bottom. 



I am called away and must close my letter. Don't trouble 

 to answer it unless you are so minded. — Ever yours faithfully, 



T. H. Huxley. 



Jermyn Street, May 22, 1S63. 

 My dear Kingsley — Pray excuse my delay in replying to 

 your letter. I have been very much pressed for time for these 

 two or three days. 



First touching the action of the spermatozoon. The best 

 information you can find on the subject is, I think, in Newport's 

 papers in the Philosophical Transactions for 1851, 1853, and 

 1854, especially the 1853 paper. Newport treats only of the 

 Frog, but the information he gives is very full and definite. 

 Allen Thomson's very accurate and learned article " Ovum " 

 in Todd's Cyclopcedia is also well worth looking through, though 

 unfortunately it is least full just where you want most informa- 

 tion. In French there is Coste's Developpement des Corps 

 organises and the volume on " Development " by Bischoff in 

 the French translation of the last edition of Soemmering's 

 Anatomy. 



So much for your inquiries as to the matters of fact. Next, 

 as to questions of speculation. If any expression of ignorance 

 on my part will bring us nearer we are likely to come into 

 absolute contact, for the possibilities of " may be " are, to me, 

 infinite. 



I know nothing of Necessity, abominate the word Law (ex- 

 cept as meaning that we know nothing to the contrary), and 

 am quite ready to admit that there may be some place, " other 

 side of nowhere," par exemple, where 2 + 2 = 5, ^"d ^'1 bodies 

 naturally repel one another instead of gravitating together. 



I don't know whether Matter is anything distinct from 

 Force. I don't know that atoms are anything but pure myths. 

 Cogito, ergo sum is to my mind a ridiculous piece of bad logic, 

 all I can say at any time being " Cogito." The Latin form I 

 hold to be preferable to the English " I think," because the latter 

 asserts the existence of an Ego — about which the bundle of 



