“Of course I understand your argument perfectly, and feel the might of it.”
From this last letter I think we may conclude that Asa Gray’s feelings on this subject rested, as he says, “on faith,” and that, intellectually, he saw no way of meeting Darwin’s arguments.
CHAPTER XVIII.
INFLUENCE OF DARWIN UPON HUXLEY.
HUXLEY AND NATURAL SELECTION.
It is of the utmost interest to trace the influence of Darwin upon Huxley, his great General in the numerous controversial battles which had to be fought before the new views were to secure a fair hearing and, at length, complete success. Now that we are quietly enjoying the fruit of his many victories, we are apt to forget how much we owe to Huxley, not only for evolution, but for that perfect freedom in the expression of thought and opinion which we enjoy. For Huxley fought on wider issues than those raised by evolution, wide as these are; and with a success so great that it is inconceivable that any new and equally illuminating thought which the future may hold in store for us, will meet with a reception like that accorded to the “Origin of Species.”
At first sight it seems a simple matter to describe the effect of the “Origin” upon Huxley, considering that he, more than any other man, expounded it, and defended it from the most weighty of the attacks made upon it. Hence, it is only natural to believe, as many have done, that he was in entire agreement with the conclusions of the book as regards natural selection as well as evolution. On the other hand, the opinion has often been expressed that Huxley, although agreeing with the “Origin” for some years after its first appearance, changed his mind in later years, and no longer supported Darwin’s views.
I shall give reasons for rejecting both these opinions about Huxley, although the first is far nearer the truth than the second. The latter is clearly untenable, and was probably merely an inference from the fact that after a time Huxley ceased to enter into Darwinian controversies. But this was because he had done his work with entire success, and therefore turned his attention in other directions. Whenever he was called on to write or speak about Darwinism, as he was on two occasions within a few months of his death, his writings and speeches left no doubt about his thoughts on the subject. Furthermore, in the Preface to “Darwiniana,” written in 1893, he expressly denied that he had recanted or changed his opinions about Darwin’s views.
In order to appreciate the influence of Darwin upon Huxley, we must find out the beliefs of the latter upon the “species question” before the appearance of the “Origin.” In his chapter “On the Reception of the ‘Origin of Species’” (“Life and Letters,” Vol. II.) Huxley says that, before 1858, he took up an agnostic position as regards evolution “... upon two grounds: firstly, that up to that time, the evidence in favour of transmutation was wholly insufficient; and, secondly, that no suggestion respecting the causes of the transmutation assumed, which had been made, was in any way adequate to explain the phenomena.” It is obvious that these two grounds are entirely distinct, and that the logical foundation of the first is far more secure than that of the second.
The effect of the “Origin” was completely to convince Huxley on the first ground: from that time he never doubted the truth of evolution, however it may have been brought about. With regard to the second ground, it is quite clear that Huxley had a very high opinion of natural selection: he thought it incomparably the best suggestion upon the subject that had ever been made, and he firmly believed that it accounted for something—that it may even have taken a dominant part in bringing about evolution. On the other hand, he never felt quite confident about the entire sufficiency of the evidence in its favour. It is probable that he was far more interested in the establishment of evolution as a fact than in natural selection as an explanation of it. He saw the vast amount of research in all kinds of new or almost neglected lines, which would be directly inspired by evolution. And his own investigations in some of these lines soon afforded some of the most weighty evidence in favour of the doctrine. Natural selection had not the same personal interest for him; no one has expounded it better or defended it more vigorously and successfully, but Huxley’s own researches never lay in directions which would have made them available as a test of the theory. Of natural selection he might have used the words of Mercutio—it may not be “so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door,” to contain the whole explanation of evolution, “but ’tis enough ’twill serve”; it will, at any rate, prevent him from feeling the second ground on which he had maintained an agnostic position.