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Thomas Huxley Biography

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HUXLEY, Thomas Henry (1825–95). An English naturalist and comparative anatomist. He was born at Ealing, now a suburb of London, May 4, 1825. He studied in the Medical School of Charing Cross Hospital, and in 1845 was graduated as M.B. and medalist at the University of London. In 1846 he was appointed assistant surgeon on the Rattlesnake of the royal navy, commanded by Capt. Owen Stanley, which was to survey the region of the Great Barrier Reef, east and north of Australia. Imbued with a passion for natural history, Huxley devoted himself to the study of the marine animals seen and collected during the four years of this survey service. His most important research, "On the Anatomy and the Affinity of . . . the Medusæ," was published during his absence and placed its author in the front rank of biologists. He demonstrated that the body of the medusa is essentially built up of an inner and an outer membrane, which he asserted were the homologues of the two primary germinal layers in the vertebrate embryo. (See Embryology.) This discovery stands at the basis of modern philosophical zoölogy and of a true conception of the affinity of animals.

In 1850, on his return to England, Huxley began a hard struggle against adversity and discouragement. Disappointed in the hope that the Admiralty would provide for the publication of his notes and drawings, he published the more important in the Philosophical Transactions (1851) and in the same year was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, which in 1852 gave him its medal. In 1854 he succeeded Edward Forbes as professor of natural history and paleontology at the Royal School of Mines. This was in the line of direct advancement, for his great ability as an educator and administrator as well as in original research brought him to many posts of honor, such as, in 1855, the Fullerian professorship of comparative anatomy at the Royal Institution; in 1863, the Hunterian professorship at the Royal College of Surgeons; in 1868, the presidency of the Ethnological Society; in 1869, the presidency of the Geological Society; in 1870, the presidency of the British Association for the Advancement of Science and a seat on the first school board of London; in 1871, the secretaryship of the Royal Society, of which he became president in 1883; in 1872, the lord rectorship of Aberdeen University; in 1881, the professorship of biology in the Royal College of Science (an expansion of the earlier chair in the Royal School of Mines); in 1892, Privy Councilor. He served on no fewer than 10 royal commissions, of which the most important were that of Inquiry into the Sea Fisheries (1864–65) and that on Scientific Instruction and the Advancement of Science (1870–75).

Huxley's gifts of exposition were as remarkable as his powers of research. His scientific lectures, like his papers, were models of clearness as well as accuracy, and he was both cogent and eager in debate, and fascinating in popular address. In 1858 he delivered the Croonian lecture on the "Origin of the Vertebrate Skull," in which he disposed forever of the hypothesis that the skull is, homologically, an expanded section of the vertebral column. The very next year The Origin of Species was published. Convinced by its arguments, Huxley threw himself heart and soul into their support; adducing much telling corroboration from his own investigations. His series of lectures to London workingmen in 1860 had this for their theme and did much to further the acceptance of the new doctrines. They were the basis of the powerful book Man's Place in Nature and were succeeded by many addresses, essays, and debates, influential in informing the public and overcoming both scientific objections and religious alarm. It may fairly be said that science as contained in the doctrines of organic evolution, and especially in the views of Darwin, is almost as much indebted to the lucid exposition and bold championship by Huxley as to the originators of the theories. Nevertheless Huxley accepted Darwin's hypothesis of natural selection with a qualification. He pointed out the lack of evidence that any group of animals has, by variation and selective breeding, given rise to another group in the least degree infertile with the first; but he believed this objection might disappear under prolonged observation and experiment. As to Lamarck's theory of use inheritance (q.v.), he declared, in 1890, his absolute disbelief, as the evidence then stood.

Huxley came to America in 1876 and delivered in New York three lectures on Evolution, taking as his texts the series of fossil horses. During that visit he delivered the opening address at Johns Hopkins University. Huxley's contributions to science were of the widest range and embraced every department of biology. His exposition of the relations of protoplasm as the physical basis of life is particularly masterful. He was not only a man of science, but a publicist. His services were always at command for the promotion of political, social, and moral reform—first and chiefly for the cause of national education. His devotion to labors thus entailed, added to professional toil, did much to undermine his health, which for some years towards the end of his life was very poor. He died at Eastbourne, June 29, 1895.

Professor Huxley bore an honorable part in creating the knowledge which will make the nineteenth century memorable; and a great part of it was made permanent in a series of books, of which the following is a complete list: Oceanic Hydrozoa (1859); Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature (1863); Elementary Physiology (1866; 4th ed., 1885); Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews (1870; 3d ed., 1887); Anatomy of Vertebrated Animals (1871); Critiques and Addresses (1873); Elementary Biology, with Dr. H. N. Martin (1875; 2d ed., 1876; 3d ed., ed. by G. B. Howes and D. H. Scott, 1877); American Addresses (1877); Physiography (1877); Hume (1878); The Crayfish: An Introduction to the Study of Zoölogy (1880); Collected Essays (9 vols., 1893–94). These contained some reprinted material as follows: Method and Results; Darwiniana; Science and Education; Science and Hebrew Tradition; Science and Christian Tradition; Hume; Man's place in Nature; Discourses, Biological and Geological; Evolution and Ethics; and other essays. Four volumes of Huxley's Scientific Memoirs, edited by Sir Michael Foster and Prof? E. Ray Lankester, were published between 1898 and 1902. An authorized collection of his minor writings appeared in eight duodecimo volumes (New York, 1897–1900).

His Elements of Biology became the model for a large number of laboratory manuals, and his Crayfish is a classic of the methods of the investigator and the instructor combined. Whatever his theme, the weight and honesty of his thought and the distinction of his style make his works part and parcel of the best books of his time.

The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XI (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 638-639.