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The only question which any wise man can ask himself, and which any honest man will ask himself, is whether a doctrine is true or false.

Thomas Huxley

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Thomas Huxley
Age: 70 †
Born: 1825
Born: May 4
Died: 1895
Died: June 29
Anatomist
Anthropologist
Biologist
Carcinologist
Ichthyologist
Linguist
Naturalist
Paleontologist
Philosopher
Photographer
Physiologist
Lexington
Kentucky
T. H. Huxley
Huxley
Asks
Whether
True
Men
Doctrine
False
Question
Honest
Wise

More quotes by Thomas Huxley

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It is an error to imagine that evolution signifies a constant tendency to increased perfection. That process undoubtedly involves a constant remodeling of the organism in adaptation to new conditions but it depends on the nature of those conditions whether the direction of the modifications effected shall be upward or downward.
Thomas Huxley
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As a natural process, of the same character as the development of a tree from its seed, or of a fowl from its egg, evolution excludes creation and all other kinds of supernatural intervention.
Thomas Huxley
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The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon.
Thomas Huxley
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The known is finite, the unknown infinite intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions.
Thomas Huxley
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If the perpetual oscillation of nations between anarchy and despotism is to be replaced by the steady march of self-restraining freedom, it will be because men will gradually bring themselves to deal with political, as they now deal with scientific questions.
Thomas Huxley
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Not only do I disbelieve in the need for compensation, but I believe that the seeking for rewards and punishments out of this lifeleads men to a ruinous ignorance of the fact that their inevitable rewards and punishments are here.
Thomas Huxley
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The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of childhood into maturity.
Thomas Huxley
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The great tragedy of science - the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
Thomas Huxley
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Surely there is a time to submit to guidance and a time to take one's own way at all hazards.
Thomas Huxley
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If then, said I, the question is put to me would I rather have a miserable ape for a grandfather or a man highly endowed by nature and possessing great means and influence and yet who employs those faculties for the mere purpose of introducing ridicule into a grave scientific discussion-I unhesitatingly affirm my preference for the ape.
Thomas Huxley
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A man who speaks out honestly and fearlessly that which he knows, and that which he believes, will always enlist the good will and the respect, however much he may fail in winning the assent, of his fellow men.
Thomas Huxley
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Tolerably early in life I discovered that one of the unpardonable sins, in the eyes of most people, is for a man to go about unlabeled. The world regards such a person as the police do an unmuzzled dog.
Thomas Huxley
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The only people, scientific or other, who never make mistakes are those who do nothing.
Thomas Huxley
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Teach a child what is wise, that is morality. Teach him what is wise and beautiful, that is religion!
Thomas Huxley
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There is no sadder sight in the world than to see a beautiful theory killed by a brutal fact.
Thomas Huxley
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The birth of science was the death of superstition.
Thomas Huxley
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A drop of water is as powerful as a thunder-bolt.
Thomas Huxley
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Follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.
Thomas Huxley
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I do not say think as I think, but think in my way. Fear no shadows, least of all in that great spectre of personal unhappiness which binds half the world to orthodoxy.
Thomas Huxley
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If a man cannot see a church, it is preposterous to take his opinion about its altar-piece or painted window.
Thomas Huxley