Quotes from Thomas Huxley

God give me strength to face a fact though it slay me.

The only medicine for suffering, crime, and all the other woes of mankind, is wisdom.

Science is nothing but trained and organized common sense, differing from the latter only as a veteran may differ from a raw recruit: and its methods differ from those of common sense only as far as the guardsman's cut and thrust differ from the manner in which a savage wields his club.

how extremely stupid not to have thought of that

It is not who is right, but what is right, that is of importance. - Thomas Huxley

The great thing in the world is not so much to seek happiness as to earn peace and self-respect.

The Bible has been the Magna Carta of the poor and of the oppressed. The human race is not in a position to dispense with it.

L'échiquier représente le monde, les pièces sont les phénomènes de l'univers, les règles du jeu sont ce qu'on appelle les lois de la nature, et le joueur de l'autre côté nous est caché.

È proprio vero che il Poeta, o il Filosofo, o l'Artista il cui genio è la gloria della sua epoca, viene ad essere diminuito per il fatto che senza dubbio è storicamente probabile, per non dire certo, che egli è il diretto discendente di qualche selvaggio nudo e bestiale, la cui intelligenza appena bastava a farlo un po' più furbo della volpe, e per ciò stesso molto più pericoloso della tigre?

Economy does not lie in sparing money, but in spending it wisely.

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.

Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

It is the customary fate of new truths, to begin as heresies, and to end as superstitions.

I protest that if some great Power would agree to make me always think what is true and do what is right, on condition of being turned into a sort of clock and would up every morning before I got out of bed, I should instantly close with the offer.

People may talk about intellectual teaching, but what we principally want is the moral teaching.

The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon, but only to hold a man's foot long enough to enable him to put the other somewhat higher.

Misery is a match that never goes out.

Of moral purpose I see no trace in Nature. That is an article of exclusively human manufacture - and very much to our credit.

If some great power would agree to make me always think what is true and do what is right, on condition of being some sort of clock and wound up every morning before I got out of bed, I should close instantly with the offer.

The chess-board is the world; the pieces are the phenomena of the universe; the rules of the game are what we call the Laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just and patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance.

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.

Science and literature are not two things, but two sides of one thing.

Science is organized common sense where many a beautiful theory was killed by an ugly fact.

The ultimate court of appeal is observation and experiment... not authority.