528 Notices of Books, [October, 



are but few of our modern teachers of Science that are able 

 fairly to divest themselves of the cramping influences of this 

 patchwork view of Nature. Amongst these few Dr. Huxley 

 stands out with leading prominence. His special study having 

 been that of Biology, which is placed, so to speak, midway be- 

 tween the physical and moral subdivisions of Natural Science, 

 he stands upon a middle eminence, from which he can best survey 

 the equally surrounding area of human knowledge. With an 

 intellectual vision of unusually great penetrating power, and a 

 moral nature of well-balanced proclivities, he is thus able to 

 present to his readers, with remarkable vividness and impartial 

 truthfulness, a picture of the great panorama thus placed at his 

 feet. The " Critiques and Addresses " is a series of these 

 pictures, not avowedly connected and yet not altogether detached. 

 They are all painted with remarkable artistic power, and more or 

 less characterised by a catholicity of treatment which obliterates 

 the artificial boundaries that have been mischievously set up 

 between, physical, physiological, moral, and theological science. 

 The powerful essay on " Mr. Darwin's Critics " is a fine example, 

 of this. It is positively refreshing to be able to travel in the 

 midst of a purely scientific atmosphere over a fertile region of 

 thought which is usually rendered pestiferous by the miasma of 

 theological bigotry, and to leave it, as we may after wandering 

 under Professor Huxley's guidance, with a healthily invigorated 

 intellect. 



In the first two papers we have political subjects treated in 

 like manner, without at all descending to " the region in which 

 Tories, Whigs, and Radicals ■ delight to bark and bite.' " 



In the course of his enquiry into the limits of Government 

 functions, Prof. Huxley comes in collision with the conclusions 

 of his friend and fellow-worker — we might almost say twin- 

 brother in Science — Mr. Herbert Spencer, and the consequent 

 combat is conducted with the utmost vigour on both sides, ac- 

 companied with a polished courtesy suggestive of a courtly 

 fencing bout between the most chivalric of antagonists. Ac- 

 cepting Mr. Spencer's parallel, Prof. Huxley contends that "the 

 vascular system, or apparatus for distributing commodities in 

 the animal organism, is eminently under the control of the 

 cerebro-spinal nervous centres — a fact which, unless I am again 

 mistaken, is contrary to one of Mr. Spencer's fundamental as- 

 sumptions. In the animal organism Government does meddle 

 with trade, and even goes so far as to tamper with the currency.'* 

 We will not venture to step between such combatants, or even 

 to record the *' hits " on either side, but merely state in the 

 meantime that" few can follow this controversy on a two-sided 

 subject without profiting considerably by seeing both sides so 

 well displayed. 



While the subjects usually supposed to belong rather to the 

 provinces of ornamental or controversial literature than to science 



