Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley — Volume 2

by Thomas Henry Huxley

I plead guilty to having accepted the Birmingham invitation [to unveil the statue of Joseph Priestley]. I thought they deserved to be encouraged for having asked a man of science to do the job instead of some noble swell, and, moreover, Satan whispered that it would be a good opportunity for a little ventilation of wickedness. I cannot say, however, that I can work myself up into much enthusiasm for the dry old Unitarian who did not go very deep into anything. But I think I may make him a good peg whereon to hang a discourse on the tendencies of modern thought.

I was not at the Cambridge pow-wow—not out of prudence, but because I was not asked. I suppose that decent respect towards a Secretary of the Royal Society was not strong enough to outweigh University objections to the incumbent of that office. It is well for me that I expect nothing from Oxford or Cambridge, having burned my ships so far as they were concerned long ago.

I sent your note on to Knowles as soon as it arrived, but I have heard nothing from him. I wrote to him again to-night to say he had better let me see it in proof if he is going to print it. I am right glad you find anything worth reading again in my old papers. I stand by the view I took of the origin of species now as much as ever.

Shall I not see the address? It is tantalising to hear of your progress, and not to know what is in it.

I am thinking of taking Development for the subject of my evening lecture, the concrete facts made out in the last thirty years without reference to Evolution. [I.e. at the British Association; he actually took "Animals as Automata.">[ If people see that it is Evolution, that is Nature's fault, and not mine.

We are all flourishing, and send our love.

Ever yours faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

[The paper on Animal Automatism is in effect an enlargement of a short paper read before the Metaphysical Society in 1871, under the title of "Has a Frog a Soul?" It begins with a vindication of Descartes as a great physiologist, doing for the physiology of motion and sensation that which Harvey had done for the circulation of the blood. A series of propositions which constitute the foundation and essence of the modern physiology of the nervous system are fully expressed and illustrated in the writings of Descartes. Modern physiological research, which has shown that many apparently purposive acts are performed by animals, and even by men, deprived of consciousness, and therefore of volition, is at least compatible with the theory of automatism in animals, although the doctrine of continuity forbids the belief that] "such complex phenomena as those of consciousness first make their appearance in man." [And if the volitions of animals do not enter into the chain of causation of their actions at all, the fact lays at rest the question] "How is it possible to imagine that volition, which is a state of consciousness, and, as such, has not the slightest community of nature with matter in motion, can act upon the moving matter of which the body is composed, as it is assumed to do in voluntary acts?"

[As for man, the argumentation, if sound, holds equally good. States of consciousness are immediately caused by molecular changes of the brain-substance, and our mental conditions are simply the symbols in consciousness of the changes which take place automatically in the organism.