from "The Evolution of Theology: An Anthropological Study" (1886)

"I suppose that, as 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 shadow-worship as 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 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 is laid upon men of science 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."

T. H. Huxley

from a Letter to Julian and Juliette Huxley, August 9th, 1962

"I have been ruminating the possibility of writing a kind of contrapuntal phantasy. On one level there would be a kind of science fiction vision of what might be, if we used our resources with intelligence and good will.On another level it would be an account of what is actually happening at the present time. On a third level it would be another science fiction vision of what may be expected to happen if we don't behave with intelligence and good will. I can't yet envisage the form of such a book; but if I find a satisfactory form and can work it out in an interesting way, the result might be significant and important. In the mean time I must wait around like Mr. Micawber, for something to turn up---or, romantically, like the scholar gipsy, for the spark from heaven to fall."

Aldous Huxley

from "The ABC of Reading" (1934)

"The most useful living member of the Huxley family has emphasized the fact that the telescope wasn't merely an idea, but that it was very definitely a technical achievement."

Ezra Pound

from a Letter to Philip Whalen, March, 1954

". . . Rexroth has stomach trouble and his wife Marthe is pregnant again. But he still happily holds forth on KPFA & has managed to insult virtually everyone in the Bay Area now; he has the university here positively frothing. & a recent flaying of Huxley's Vedanta business and of southern California orientalists has won him a pack of enemies. He said, roughly, 'The only living member of the Huxley family who can think with even moderate clarity is Julian.'"

Gary Snyder

from " On the Advisableness of Improving Natural Knowledge" (1866)

"The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such.  For him, skepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin.  And, it cannot be otherwise, for every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority, the cherishing of the keenest skepticism, the annhilation of the spirit of blind faith; and the most ardent votary of science holds his firmest convictions, not because the men he most venerates hold them; not because their verity is testified by portents and wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses to bring these convictions into contact with their primary source, Nature---whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experiment and to observation---Nature will confirm them."

T. H. Huxley

from a letter to Martha Voegeli, May 3rd, 1961

"The only kind of religion, so far as I can see, that is compatible with scientific thought is a religion of mystical experience---not a Nirvana outside the world but within it . . . The ethical corollary of mystical experience (which involves a sense of solidarity with all beings) is compassion and ultimately ahimsa, with the paradoxical combination of working for the cause of goodness and at the same time obeying the injunction of Jesus (and all mystics) 'Judge not that ye be not judged.' Mystical experience is no more incompatible with science than aesthetic experience. Incompatibility arises when metaphysical interpretations are made."

Aldous Huxley

Aphorisms and Reflections, clxvii (1908, Henrietta Huxley, ed.)

"Of all the most dangerous mental habits, that which schoolboys call 'cocksureness' is probably the most perilous; and the inestimable value of metaphysical discipline is that it furnishes an effectual counterpoise to this evil proclivity. Whoso has mastered the elements of philosophy knows that the attribute of unquestionable certainty appertains only to a state of consciousness so long as it exists; all other beliefs are merely probabilities of a higher or lower order. Sound metaphysic is an amulet which renders its possessor proof alike against the poison of superstition and the counterpoison of shallow negation; by showing the affirmations of the former and the denials of the latter alike deal with matters which, for lack of evidence, nothing can be either affirmed or denied."


T. H. Huxley