Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley — Volume 1

by Thomas Henry Huxley

The Bishop of Oxford attacked Darwin, at first playfully, but at last in grim earnest. It was known that the Bishop had written an article against Darwin in the last "Quarterly Review" (It appeared in the ensuing number for July.); it was also rumoured that Professor Owen had been staying in Cuddesdon and had primed the Bishop, who was to act as mouthpiece to the great Paleontologist, who did not himself dare to enter the lists. The Bishop, however, did not show himself master of the facts, and made one serious blunder. A fact which had been much dwelt on as confirmatory of Darwin's idea of variation, was that a sheep had been born shortly before in a flock in the North of England, having an addition of one to the vertebrae of the spine. The Bishop was declaring with rhetorical exaggeration that there was hardly any evidence on Darwin's side. "What have they to bring forward?" he exclaimed. "Some rumoured statement about a long-legged sheep." But he passed on to banter: "I should like to ask Professor Huxley, who is sitting by me, and is about to tear me to pieces when I have sat down, as to his belief in being descended from an ape. Is it on his grandfather's or his grandmother's side that the ape ancestry comes in?" And then taking a graver tone, he asserted, in a solemn peroration, that Darwin's views were contrary to the revelation of God in the Scriptures. Professor Huxley was unwilling to respond: but he was called for, and spoke with his usual incisiveness and with some scorn:] "I am here only in the interests of science," [he said,] "and I have not heard anything which can prejudice the case of my august client." [Then after showing how little competent the Bishop was to enter upon the discussion, he touched on the question of Creation.] "You say that development drives out the Creator; but you assert that God made you: and yet you know that you yourself were originally a little piece of matter, no bigger than the end of this gold pencil-case." [Lastly as to the descent from a monkey, he said:] "I should feel it no shame to have risen from such an origin; but I should feel it a shame to have sprung from one who prostituted the gifts of culture and eloquence to the service of prejudice and of falsehood."

[Many others spoke. Mr. Gresley, an old Oxford don, pointed out that in human nature at least orderly development was not the necessary rule: Homer was the greatest of poets, but he lived 3000 years ago, and has not produced his like.

Admiral FitzRoy was present, and said he had often expostulated with his old comrade of the "Beagle" for entertaining views which were contradictory to the First Chapter of Genesis.

Sir John Lubbock declared that many of the arguments by which the permanence of species was supported came to nothing, and instanced some wheat which was said to have come off an Egyptian mummy, and was sent to him to prove that wheat had not changed since the time of the Pharaohs; but which proved to be made of French chocolate. Sir Joseph (then Dr.) Hooker spoke shortly, saying that he had found the hypothesis of Natural Selection so helpful in explaining the phenomena of his own subject of Botany, that he had been constrained to accept it. After a few words from Darwin's old friend, Professor Henslow, who occupied the chair, the meeting broke up, leaving the impression that those most capable of estimating the arguments of Darwin in detail saw their way to accept his conclusions.

Note.—Sir John Lubbock also insisted on the embryological evidence for evolution. F.D.]

[T.H. Huxley To Francis Darwin (ibid.).]

June 27, 1891.

I should say that Freemantle's account is substantially correct, but that Green has the substance of my speech more accurately. However, I am certain I did not use the word, "equivocal."

The odd part of the business is, that I should not have been present except for Robert Chambers. I had heard of the Bishop's intention to utilise the occasion. I knew he had the reputation of being a first-class controversialist, and I was quite aware that if he played his cards properly, we should have little chance, with such an audience, of making an efficient defence. Moreover, I was very tired, and wanted to join my wife at her brother-in-law's country house near Reading, on the Saturday. On the Friday I met Chambers in the street, and in reply to some remark of his, about his going to the meeting, I said that I did not mean to attend it—did not see the good of giving up peace and quietness to be episcopally pounded. Chambers broke out into vehement remonstrances, and talked about my deserting them. So I said, "Oh! if you are going to take it that way, I'll come and have my share of what is going on."

So I came, and chanced to sit near old Sir Benjamin Brodie. The Bishop began his speech, and to my astonishment very soon showed that he was so ignorant that he did not know how to manage his own case. My spirits rose proportionately, and when he turned to me with his insolent question, I said to Sir Benjamin, in an undertone, "The Lord hath delivered him into mine hands."