[The grand result of his determination not to compromise where truth was concerned, was the securing freedom of thought and speech. One man after another, looking back on his work, declares that if we can say what we think now, it is because he fought the battle of freedom. Not indeed the battle of toleration, if toleration means toleration of error for its own sake. Error, he thought, ought to be extirpated by all legitimate means, and not assisted because it is conscientiously held.
As Lord Hobhouse wrote, soon after his death:—
I see now many laudatory notices of him in papers. But I have not seen, and I think the younger men do not know, that which (apart from science) I should put forward as his strongest claim to reverence and gratitude; and that is the steadfast courage and consummate ability with which he fought the battle of intellectual freedom, and insisted that people should be allowed to speak their honest convictions without being oppressed or slandered by the orthodox. He was one of those, perhaps the very foremost, who won that priceless freedom for us; and, as is too common, people enter into the labours of the brave, and do not even know what their elders endured, or what has been done for themselves.
With this went a proud independence of spirit, intolerant of patronage, careless of titular honours, indifferent to the accumulation of worldly wealth. He cared little even for recognition of his work. "If I had 400 pounds a year" [A sum which might have supported a bachelor, but was entirely inadequate to the needs of a large family.], he exclaimed at the outset of his career, "I should be content to work anonymously for the advancement of science." The only recognition he considered worth having, was that of the scientific world; yet so little did he seek it, so little insist on questions of priority, that, as Professor Howes tells me, there are at South Kensington among the mass of unpublished drawings from dissections made by him, many which show that he had arrived at discoveries which afterwards brought credit to other investigators.
He was as ready to disclaim for himself any merits which really belonged to his predecessors, whether philosophical or scientific. He was too well read in their works not to be aware of the debt owed them by his own generation, and he reminded the world how little the scientific insight of Goethe, for instance, or the solid labours of Buffon or Reaumur or Lamarck, deserved oblivion.
The only point on which he did claim recognition was the honesty of his motives. He was incapable of doing anything underhand, and he could not bear even the appearance of such conduct towards his friends, or those with whom he had business relations. In such cases he always took the bull by the horns, acknowledged an oversight or explained what was capable of misunderstanding. The choice between Edward Forbes and Hooker for the Royal Society's medal, or the explanations to Mr. Spencer for not joining a social reform league of which the latter was a prominent member, will serve as instances.]
The most considerable difference I note among men [he wrote], is not in their readiness to fall into error, but in their readiness to acknowledge these inevitable lapses.
[For himself, he let no personal feelings stand in the way when fact negatived his theories: once convinced that they were untenable, he gave up Bathybius and the European origin of the Horse without hesitation.
The regard in which he was held by his friends was such that he was sometimes appealed to by both parties in a dispute. He was a man to be trusted with the confidence of his friends.] "Yes, you are quite right about 'loyal,'" [he writes to Mr. Knowles], "I love my friends and hate my enemies—which may not be in accordance with the Gospel, but I have found it a good wearing creed for honest men." [But he only regarded as "enemies" those whom he found to be double-dealers, shufflers, insincere, untrustworthy; a fair opponent he respected, and he could agree to differ with a friend without altering his friendship.
A lifelong impression of him was thus summed up by Dr. A.R. Wallace:—