Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
any reader who has sampled the whole of his rhetorical output or who has
read commentary on this aspect of his public life as it can be traced through
his personal correspondence and the reflections of his contemporaries, is
his remarkable willingness, one might even say his principled determina-
tion, to make his naturalistic positions palatable to the most unlikely audi-
ences. The controversialist merely tries to best opponents in public debate,
and this was often Huxley's aim as well, but as we look in on his day-to-day
activities of writing and speaking, we are more likely to find gentlemanly
engagement, than we are to find antagonistic debate.
Contentious moments often brought out Huxley's rhetorical brilliance,
and this provided fodder for the tabloid journalism of his day. Desmond is
certainly right to say that he drew blood with “serrated teeth” and that he
“harassed” and “harangued” England's elites as he paraded the most radical
implications of evolution before popular audiences.
13
But it is in consider-
ation of the more staid aspects of his public personality that we can begin to
appreciate the true significance of his career as a rhetorical Darwinist. The
visiting American historian, John Fiske, found him to be a man of “tender-
ness and exquisite delicacy.” “I never saw such magnificent eyes in my life.
His eyes are black, and his face expresses an eager burning intensity. And
by Jove, what pleasure it is to meet such a clean-cut mind. It is like Saladin's
sword which cut through the cushion.”
14
Darwin recognized how superbly equipped Huxley was to face down
the storms that greeted his topic, but those who actually read what Huxley
had to say about Darwin's theory itself will be surprised by how tepid his
responses are. It was his desire to win a fair hearing for
Darwin
(not
Darwin-
ism
) that put Huxley in motion. As a scientific practitioner, Darwin symbol-
ized something of greater importance than the mechanism of evolution he
had proposed. His effort to account for life's origins and development on
strictly naturalistic grounds signaled the universal reach that science was
destined to achieve once free to follow its own course.
To stand up for Darwin was to advance the same cause that Huxley
was undertaking in his extensive efforts to design the institutional and cur-
ricular reforms that were breaking down the fortress doors of the Oxbridge
establishment and also putting science in on the ground floor of the new
redbrick universities that were fast springing up to cater to the needs of
England's exploding middle class—Huxley's middle class. It would be fair to
say, as Cyril Bibby does, that Huxley had the opportunity in the course of
his career “to inquire into and recommend upon the organisation of almost
every university and college in the country.”
15
Even the ancient institutions
