{"author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley","total_quotes":46,"quotes":[{"text":"Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not. It is the first lesson that ought to be learned and however early a man's training begins, it is probably the last lesson that he learns thoroughly.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["discipline","education"],"id":794,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"In order to get over the ethical difficulties presented by the naive naturalism of many parts of those Scriptures, in the divine authority of which he firmly believed, Philo borrowed from the Stoics (who had been in like straits in respect of Greek mythology), that great Excalibur which they had forged with infinite pains and skill—the method of allegorical interpretation. This mighty 'two-handed engine at the door' of the theologian is warranted to make a speedy end of any and every moral or intellectual difficulty, by showing that, taken allegorically or, as it is otherwise said, 'poetically' or, 'in a spiritual sense,' the plainest words mean whatever a pious interpreter desires they should mean.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["allegorical-interpretation","allegory","ity","difficulty","divine","ethical","excalibur","greek-mythology","interpretation","naturalism","scripture","stoics","theologian"],"id":26842,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"The most considerable difference I note among men is not in their readiness to fall into error  but in their readiness to acknowledge these inevitable lapses.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["success"],"id":35198,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"The most considerable difference I note among men is not in their readiness to fall into error, but in their readiness to acknowledge these inevitable lapses.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["humility","inspirational"],"id":36931,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"Agnosticism, in fact, is not a creed, but a method, the essence of which lies in the rigorous application of a single principle. That principle is of great antiquity; it is as old as Socrates; as old as the writer who said, 'Try all things, hold fast by that which is good'; it is the foundation of the Reformation, which simply illustrated the axiom that every man should be able to give a reason for the faith that is in him, it is the great principle of Descartes; it is the fundamental axiom of modern science. Positively the principle may be expressed: In matters of the intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other consideration. And negatively: In matters of the intellect, do not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable. That I take to be the agnostic position, which if a man keep whole and undefiled, he shall not be ashamed to look the universe in the face, whatever the future may have in store for him.The results of the working out of the agnostic principle will vary according to individual knowledge and capacity, and according to the general condition of science. That which is unproved today may be proved, by the help of new discoveries, tomorrow. The only negative fixed points will be those negations which flow from the demonstrable limitation of our faculties. And the only obligation accepted is to have the mind always open to conviction.That it is wrong for a man to say he is certain of the objective truth of a proposition unless he can provide evidence which logically justifies that certainty. This is what agnosticism asserts and in my opinion, is all that is essential to agnosticism.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["agnostic","agnosticism","belief","definition","descartes","honesty","knowledge","science","socrates","truth"],"id":39579,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"It is my conviction that, with the spread of true scientific culture, whatever may be the medium, historical, philological, philosophical, or physical, through which that culture is conveyed, and with its necessary concomitant, a constant elevation of the standard of veracity, the end of the evolution of theology will be like its beginning—it will cease to have any relation to ethics. I suppose that, so long as the human mind exists, it will not escape its deep-seated instinct to personify its intellectual conceptions. The science of the present day is as full of this particular form of intellectual shadow-worship as is the nescience of ignorant ages. The difference is that the philosopher who is worthy of the name knows that his personified hypotheses, such as law, and force, and ether, and the like, are merely useful symbols, while the ignorant and the careless take them for adequate expressions of reality. So, it may be, that the majority of mankind may find the practice of morality made easier by the use of theological symbols. And unless these are converted from symbols into idols, I do not see that science has anything to say to the practice, except to give an occasional warning of its dangers. But, when such symbols are dealt with as real existences, I think the highest duty which is laid upon men of science is to show that these dogmatic idols have no greater value than the fabrications of men's hands, the stocks and the stones, which they have replaced.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["careless","conviction","culture","dogmatic","ethics","evolution","expression","fabrication","force","history","idols","ignorant","morality","personification","philology","philosophy","reality","science","symbols","theology","value","veracity"],"id":55794,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"The most obvious and the most distinctive features of the History of Civilisation, during the last fifty years, is the wonderful increase of industrial production by the application of machinery, the improvement of old technical processes and the invention of new ones, accompanied by an even more remarkable development of old and new means of locomotion and intercommunication. By this rapid and vast multiplication of the commodities and conveniences of existence, the general standard of comfort has been raised, the ravages of pestilence and famine have been checked, and the natural obstacles, which time and space offer to mutual intercourse, have been reduced in a manner, and to an extent, unknown to former ages. The diminution or removal of local ignorance and prejudice, the creation of common interests among the most widely separated peoples, and the strengthening of the forces of the organisation of the commonwealth against those of political or social anarchy, thus effected, have exerted an influence on the present and future fortunes of mankind the full significance of which may be divined, but cannot, as yet, be estimated at its full value.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["anarchy","civilization","comfort","convenience","development","famine","forces","fortune","future","history","ignorance","improvement","increase","influence","intercommunication","invention","locomotion","machinery","mankind","obstacles","pestilence","prejudice","production","science","significance","value"],"id":79030,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["abyss","facts","humble","inspirational","learning","nature","open-minded","peace","peace-of-mind","preconceptions","preparation","risk","science"],"id":97956,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"With theology as a code of dogmas which are to be believed, or at any rate repeated, under penalty of present or future punishment, or as a storehouse of anaesthetics for those who find the pains of life too hard to bear, I have nothing to do; and, so far as it may be possible, I shall avoid the expression of any opinion as to the objective truth or falsehood of the systems of theological speculation of which I may find occasion to speak. From my present point of view, theology is regarded as a natural product of the operations of the human mind, under the conditions of its existence, just as any other branch of science, or the arts of architecture, or music, or painting are such products. Like them, theology has a history. Like them also, it is to be met with in certain simple and rudimentary forms; and these can be connected by a multitude of gradations, which exist or have existed, among people of various ages and races, with the most highly developed theologies of past and present times.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["architecture","art","belief","dogma","evolution","falsehood","gradation","history","mind","music","natural","naturalism","painting","penalty","punishment","science","speculation","theology","truth"],"id":99697,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"},{"text":"History warns us ... That it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.","author":"Thomas Henry Huxley","tags":["fate","heresy","history","skepticism","superstition","truths","warning"],"id":131672,"author_id":"Thomas+Henry+Huxley"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":46,"pages":5,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}