Essays Upon Some Controverted Questions   By: Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895)

Page numbers enclosed by curly braces (example: {25}) have been incorporated to facilitate the use of the Table of Contents.

ESSAYS

UPON SOME

CONTROVERTED QUESTIONS

BY

THOMAS H. HUXLEY, F.R.S.

London MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1892

All rights reserved

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CONTENTS

PROLOGUE Page 1

I

THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF PALÆONTOLOGY

An Address delivered at the York Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 1881 55

II

THE INTERPRETERS OF GENESIS AND THE INTERPRETERS OF NATURE

Nineteenth Century , December 1885 75

III

MR GLADSTONE AND GENESIS

Nineteenth Century , February 1886 98

Note on the proper sense of the "Mosaic" narrative of the Creation 126

IV

THE EVOLUTION OF THEOLOGY: AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDY

Nineteenth Century , March and April 1886 131

V

SCIENCE AND MORALS

Fortnightly Review , November 1886 209

{vi} VI

SCIENTIFIC AND PSEUDO SCIENTIFIC REALISM

Nineteenth Century , February 1887 237

VII

SCIENCE AND PSEUDO SCIENCE

Nineteenth Century , April 1887 265

VIII

AN EPISCOPAL TRILOGY

Nineteenth Century , November 1887 298

IX

AGNOSTICISM

Nineteenth Century , February 1889 329

X

THE VALUE OF WITNESS TO THE MIRACULOUS

Nineteenth Century , March 1889 378

XI

AGNOSTICISM: A REJOINDER

Nineteenth Century , April 1889 407

XII

AGNOSTICISM AND CHRISTIANITY

Nineteenth Century , June 1889 449

XIII

THE LIGHTS OF THE CHURCH AND THE LIGHT OF SCIENCE

Nineteenth Century , July 1890 501

{vii} XIV

THE KEEPERS OF THE HERD OF SWINE

Nineteenth Century , December 1890 535

XV

ILLUSTRATIONS OF MR. GLADSTONE'S CONTROVERSIAL METHODS

Nineteenth Century , March 1891 559

XVI

HASISADRA'S ADVENTURE

Nineteenth Century , June 1891 583

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I am indebted to the Editors of the Nineteenth Century and of the Fortnightly Review for permission to reprint such of the following Essays as have appeared in the pages of those periodicals: and so large a proportion of the papers has been published in the Nineteenth Century that my acknowledgments are especially due to Mr. Knowles.

T. H. H.

May 4, 1892.

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PROLOGUE

Le plus grand service qu'on puisse rendre à la science est d'y faire place nette avant d'y rien construire. CUVIER.

Most of the Essays comprised in the present volume have been written during the last six or seven years, without premeditated purpose or intentional connection, in reply to attacks upon doctrines which I hold to be well founded; or in refutation of allegations respecting matters lying within the province of natural knowledge, which I believe to be erroneous; and they bear the mark of their origin in the controversial tone which pervades them.