AN APOLOGETIC IRENICON 231 



" But the enormous influence which has thus been exerted by 

 the Jewish and Christian Scriptures has had no necessary con- 

 nection with cosmogonies, demonologies, and miraculous inter- 

 ferences. Their strength lies in their appeals, not to the reason, 

 but to the ethical sense. I do not say that even the highest 

 biblical ideal is exclusive of others or needs no supplement. But 

 I do believe that the human race is not yet, possibly may never 

 be, in a position to dispense with it." 



The inclusion of the essay on " Agnosticism " in Con- 

 troverted Questions led Mr. Frederic Harrison, in a friendly 

 article contributed to the Fortnightly Review, to object to 

 the identification of his views with those of Comte. 

 Huxley's reply, " An Apologetic Irenicon," appeared in 

 the November number of the same periodical, and in this 

 he objects to agnosticism being considered a mere pre- 

 liminary to positivism. He disclaims any intention of 

 setting up as an instructor of the human race, and meets 

 the reproach that his utterances had been negative in kind 

 by pointing out the necessity for destructive criticism, the 

 work of clearing the ground, at the same time adding : — 



" I venture to count it an improbable suggestion that any such 

 person — a man, let us say, who has well-nigh reached his three- 

 score years and ten, and has graduated in all the faculties of 

 human relationships ; who has taken his share in all the deep 

 joys and deeper anxieties which cling about them ; who has felt 

 the burden of young lives entrusted to his care, and has stood 

 alone with his dead before the abyss of the eternal — has never 

 had a thought beyond negative criticism. It seems to me in- 

 credible that such an one can have done his day's work, always 

 with a light heart, with no sense of responsibility, no terror of 

 that which may appear when the factitious veil of Isis — the 

 thick web of fiction man has woven round nature — is stripped 

 off." 



A good deal of the article is in some sort anticipatory 

 of the matter included in the Romanes Lecture on 

 " Evolution and Ethics," delivered the following year. 



