WIST

The chessboard is the world; the pieces are the are the phenomena of the universe; the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just, and patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man who plays well, the highest stakes are paid, with that sort of overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated — without haste, but without remorse.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“A Liberal Education and Where to Find It” (1868)
Full text.

Like all compulsory legislation, that of Nature is harsh and wastful in its operation. Ignorance is visited as sharply as willful disobedience — incapacity meets with the same punishment as crime. Nature’s discipline is not even a word and a blow, and the blow first; but the blow without the word. It is left to you to find out why your ears are boxed.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“A Liberal Education,” Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews (1870)

We have not the slightest objection to believe anything you like, if you will give us good grounds for belief; but, if you cannot, we must respectfully refuse, even if that refusal should wreck morality and insure our own damnation several times over. We are quite content to leave that to the decision of the future. The course of the past has impressed us with the firm conviction that no good ever comes of falsehood, and we feel warranted in refusing even to experiment in that direction.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Agnosticism and Christianity” (1899)
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Agnosticism is not properly described as a “negative” creed, nor indeed as a creed of any kind, except in so far as it expresses absolute faith in the validity of a principle which is as much ethical as intellectual. This principle may be stated in various ways, but they all amount to this: that it is wrong for a man to say that he is certain of the objective truth of any proposition unless he can produce evidence which logically justifies that certainty. This is what agnosticism asserts; and, in my opinion, it is all that is essential to agnosticism.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Agnosticism,” The Nineteenth Century (Feb 1889)

Full essay.

When I reached intellectual maturity and began to ask myself whether I was an atheist, a theist, or a pantheist; a materialist or an idealist; Christian or a freethinker; I found that the more I learned and reflected, the less ready was the answer; until, at last, I came to the conclusion that I had neither art nor part with any of these denominations, except the last. The one thing in which most of these good people were agreed was the one thing in which I differed from them. They were quite sure they had attained a certain “gnosis,” — had, more or less successfully, solved the problem of existence; while I was quite sure I had not, and had a pretty strong conviction that the problem was insoluble.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Agnosticism,” The Nineteenth Century (Jun 1889)
Full essay.

The great tragedy of Science — the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Biogenesis and Abiogenesis,” Presidential Address at the British Association (1870)
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Let us have “sweet girl graduates” by all means. They will be none the less sweet for a little wisdom; and the “golden hair” will not curl less gracefully outside the head by reason of there being brains within.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Emancipation — Black and White” (1865)
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The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence. Science is simply common sense at its best — that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Evolution and Ethics,” The Romanes Lecture, Oxford (1893)
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The results of political changes are hardly ever those which their friends hope or their foes fear.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Government: Anarchy or Regimentation?” (1890)
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The saying that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing is, to my mind, a very dangerous adage. If knowledge is real and genuine, I do not believe that it is other than a very valuable possession, however infinitesimal its quantity may be. Indeed, if a little knowledge is dangerous, where is the man who has so much as to be out of danger?

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On Elemental Instruction in Physiology” (1877)
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I can assure you that there is the greatest practical benefit in making a few failures early in life. You learn that which is of inestimable importance — that there are a great many people in the world who are just as clever as you are. You learn to put your trust, by and by, in an economy and frugality of the exercise of your powers, both moral and intellectual; and you very soon find out, if you have not found it out before, that patience and tenacity of purpose are worth more than twice their weight of cleverness.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On Medical Education” (1870)

The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin. And it cannot be otherwise, for every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority, the cherishing of the keenest scepticism, the annihilation of the spirit of blind faith; and the most ardent votary of science holds his firmest convictions, not because the men he most venerates hold them; not because their verity is testified by portents and wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses to bring these convictions into contact with their primary source, Nature — whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experiment and to observation — Nature will confirm them. The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On the Advisableness of Improving Natural Knowledge” (1866)
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To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or seaside stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On the Educational Value of the Natural History Sciences” (1854)

The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“On the Reception of the Origin of Species” (1887)
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The foundation of morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying; to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Science and Morals” (1886)
Full text.

The great end of life is not knowledge but action.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“Technical Education” (1877)

Full text.

Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“The Coming Age of ‘The Origin of Species’” (1880)

History warns us, however, that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions; and, as matters now stand, it is hardly rash to anticipate that, in another twenty years, the new generation, educated under the influences of the present day, will be in danger of accepting the main doctrines of the ‘Origin of Species’ with as little reflection, and it may be with as little justification, as so many of our contemporaries, twenty years ago, rejected them. Against any such a consummation let us all devoutly pray; for the scientific spirit is of more value than its products, and irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“The Coming of Age of The Origin of Species” (1880)
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Science … commits suicide when it adopts a creed.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“The Darwin Memorial” (1885)
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The antagonism between science and religion, about which we hear so much, appears to me to be purely factitious — fabricated, on the one hand, by short-sighted religious people who confound a certain branch of science, theology, with religion; and, on the other, by equally short-sighted scientific people who forget that science takes for its province only that which is susceptible of clear intellectual comprehension; and that, outside the boundaries of that province, they must be content with imagination, with hope, and with ignorance.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
“The Interpreters of Genesis and the Interpreters of Nature” (1885)
Full text.

God give me the strength to face a fact though it slay me.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
(Attributed)

Extinguished theologians lie about the cradle of every science as the strangled snakes beside that of Hercules.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Darwiniana: the Origin of Species (1860)

This may not be the best of all possible worlds, but to say that it is the worst is mere petulant nonsense.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
The Struggle for Existence in Human Society

I cannot say that I am in the slightest degree impressed by your bigness, or your material resources, as such. Size is not grandeur, and territory does not make a nation. The great issue, about which hangs true sublimity, and the terror of overhanging fate, is what are you going to do with all these things?

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Address, Johns Hopkins University opening ceremony (12 Sep 1876)
Quoted by Hubert Humphrey at the commencement address at the Holton-Arms School (Jun 1967).

Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
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Inscribed on his memorial at Ealing. Quoted in Nature (30 Oct 1902).

Surely it must be plain that an ingenious man could speculate without end on both sides, and find analogies for all his dreams. Nor does it help me to tell me that the aspirations of mankind — that my own highest aspirations even — lead me towards the doctrine of immortality. I doubt the fact, to begin with, but if it be so even, what is this but in grand words asking me to believe a thing because I like it.

Science has taught to me the opposite lesson. She warns me to be careful how I adopt a view which jumps with my preconceptions, and to require stronger evidence for such belief than for one to which I was previously hostile.  My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonise with my aspirations.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to Charles Kingsley (23 Sep 1860)
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Truth is better than much profit. I have searched over the grounds of my belief, and if wife and child and name and fame were all to be lost to me one after the other as the penalty, still I will not lie.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to Charles Kingsley (23 Sep 1860)

Science seems to me to teach in the highest and strongest manner the great truth which is embodied in the Christian conception of entire surrender to the will of God. Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to Charles Kingsley (23 Sep 1860)
Full text.

Make up your mind to act decidedly and take the consequences.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to Dr. Dohrn (17 Oct 1873)
Context.

The mediaeval university looked backwards: it professed to be a storehouse of old knowledge. … The modern university looks forward: it is a factory of new knowledge.

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) English biologist [Thomas Henry Huxley]
Letter to E. Ray Lankester (11 Apr 1892)