33 Mind-Blowing Quotes By Thomas Henry Huxley

The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.

  

I am too much of a skeptic to deny the possibility of anything.

  

What we call rational grounds for our beliefs are often extremely irrational attempts to justify our instincts.

  

It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains.

  

Sit down before fact like a little child, and be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads or you shall learn nothing.

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Science is simply common sense at its best, that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.

  

Science commits suicide when it adopts a creed.

  

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.

Never

  

To a clear eye the smallest fact is a window through which the infinite may be seen.

  

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.

  

There is the greatest practical benefit in making a few failures early in life.

Life

  

It is wrong for a man to say that he is certain of the objective truth of any proposition unless he can produce evidence which logically justifies that certainty.

  

Do what you can to do what you ought, and leave hoping and fearing alone.

  

For once reality and his brains came into contact and the result was fatal.

  

If a little knowledge is dangerous, where is the man who has so much as to be out of danger?

  

History warns us that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.

  

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

  

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

Me

  

Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.

  

The great tragedy of Science — the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.

  

The scientific spirit is of more value than its products, and irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

  

In fact a favourite problem of Tyndall is—Given the molecular forces in a mutton chop, deduce Hamlet or Faust therefrom. He is confident that the Physics of the Future will solve this easily.

  

If individuality has no play, society does not advance; if individuality breaks out of all bonds, society perishes.

  

There are savages without God in any proper sense of the word, but none without ghosts.

  

Can any one deny that the old Israelites conceived Jahveh not only in the image of a man, but in that of a changeable, irritable, and, occasionally, violent man?

  

In fact a favourite problem of [John Tyndall] is—Given the molecular forces in a mutton chop, deduce Hamlet or Faust therefrom. He is confident that the Physics of the Future will solve this easily.

  

Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, whether you like it or not.

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How extremely stupid not to have thought of that

  

If a little knowledge is dangerous, where is the man (sic) who has so much as to be out of danger?

  

If I may paraphrase Hobbes's well-known aphorism, I would say that 'books are the money of Literature, but only the counters of Science.

  

Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority. -- Thomas H. Huxley

  

There are some people who see a great deal and some who see very little in the same things.

  

Let us understand, once for all, that the ethical progress of society depends, not on imitating the cosmic process, still less in running away from it, but in combating it.