Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley — Volume 1
- Pages
- about 486
- Category
- History
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 8.9 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
The American edition of the "Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley"
calls for a few words by way of preface, for there existed a particular
relationship between the English writer and his transatlantic readers.
From the time that his "Lay Sermons" was published his essays found in
the United States an eager audience, who appreciated above all things
his directness and honesty of purpose and the unflinching spirit in
which he pursued the truth. Whether or not, as some affirm, the American
public "discovered" Mr. Herbert Spencer, they responded at once to the
influence of the younger evolutionary writer, whose wide and exact
knowledge of nature was but a stepping-stone to his interest in human
life and its problems. And when, a few years later, after more than one
invitation, he came to lecture in the United States and made himself
personally known to his many readers, it was this widespread response to
his influence which made his welcome comparable, as was said at the
time, to a royal progress.
His own interest in the present problems of the country and the
possibilities of its future was always keen, not merely as touching the
development of a vast political force--one of the dominant factors of
the near future--but far more as touching the character of its
approaching greatness. Huge territories and vast resources were of small
interest to him in comparison with the use to which they should be put.
None felt more vividly than he that the true greatness of a nation would
depend upon the spirit of the principles it adopted, upon the character
of the individuals who make up the nation and shape the channels in
which the currents of its being will hereafter flow.
This was the note he struck in the appeal for intellectual sincerity and
clearness which he made at the end of his New York "Lectures on
Evolution."
A short sample. Read the whole book
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