392 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xxv 



science. For Mr. Mivart, while twitting the generality of 

 men of science with their ignorance of the real doctrines of 

 his church, gave a reference to the Jesuit theologian Suarez, 

 the latest great representative of scholasticism, as following 

 St. Augustine in asserting, not direct, but derivative crea- 

 tion, that is to say, evolution from primordial matter endued 

 with certain powers. Startled by this statement, Huxley 

 investigated the works of the learned Jesuit, and found not 

 only that Mr. Mivart's reference to the Metaphysical Dis- 

 putations was not to the point, but that in the " Tractatus 

 de opere sex Dierum," Suarez expressly and emphatically 

 rejects this doctrine and reprehends Augustine for assert- 

 ing it. 



By great good luck (he writes to Darwin from St. Andrews) 

 there is an excellent library here, with a good copy of Suarez, in 

 a dozen big folios. Among these I dived, to the great astonish- 

 ment of the librarian, and looking into them as " the careful 

 robin eyes the delver's toil " (vide Idylls), I carried off the two 

 venerable clasped volumes which were most promising. 



So I have come out in the new character of a defender of 

 Catholic orthodoxy, and upset Mivart out of the mouth of his 

 own prophet. 



_r)arwin himself was more than pleased with the article, 

 and wrote enthusiastically (see Life and Letters, iii. 148-150). 

 A few of his generous words may be quoted to show the 

 rate at which he valued his friend's championship. 



What a wonderful man you are to grapple with those old 

 metaphysico-divinity books. . . . The pendulum is now swinging 

 against our side, but I feel positive it will soon swing the other 

 way; and no mortal man will do half as much as you in giving 

 it a start in the right direction, as you did at the first com- 

 mencement. 



And again, after " mounting climax on climax," he con- 

 tinues : — " I must tell you what Hooker said to me a few 

 years ago. ' When I read Huxley, I feel quite infantile in 

 intellect' " 



This sketch of what constituted his holiday — and it was 

 not very much busier than many another holiday — may 

 possibly suggest what his busy time must have been like. 



