Thomas Huxley Quotes

Quotes about:

• The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon.

  Thomas Huxley

  Ladders, Off To College, Focus On Goals

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Collected Essays”, p.304, Cambridge University Press

  10 Copy quote

• 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.

  Thomas Huxley

  Life, Success, Education

  Thomas Henry Huxley (1908). “Aphorisms and Reflections from the Works of Thomas Henry Huxley”, p.120, Library of Alexandria

  33 Copy quote

• It is not who is right, but what is right, that is of importance.

  Thomas Huxley

  Humility, Dignity, Argument

  71 Copy quote

• Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.

  Thomas Huxley

  Graduation, Witty, Educational

  Thomas Henry Huxley, Cyril Bibby (1971). “T. H. Huxley on Education”, p.10, Cambridge University Press

  91 Copy quote

• The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of childhood into maturity.

  Thomas Huxley

  Life, Success, Children

  47 Copy quote

• Skepticism is the highest duty and blind faith the one unpardonable sin.

  Thomas Huxley

  Religion, Atheism, Sin

  19 Copy quote

• Learn what is true in order to do what is right.

  Thomas Huxley

  Order

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Collected Essays”, p.168, Cambridge University Press

  9 Copy quote

• Make up your mind to act decidedly and take the consequences. No good is ever done in this world by hesitation.

  Thomas Huxley

  Self Confidence, Mind, Acting

  Leonard Huxley, Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley”, p.116, Cambridge University Press

  43 Copy quote

• I care not what subject is taught, if only it be taught well.

  Thomas Huxley

  Education, Teaching, Care

  4 Copy quote

• Of the few innocent pleasures left to men past middle life, the jamming of common sense down the throats of fools is perhaps the keenest.

  Thomas Huxley

  Determination, Past, Men

  Thomas Henry Huxley, Leonard Huxley (1900). “Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley”

  5 Copy quote

• The great tragedy of science - the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.

  Thomas Huxley

  Beauty, Beautiful, Education

  "Biogenesis and Abiogenesis" (1870)

  118 Copy quote

• Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.

  Thomas Huxley

  Education, Knowledge, Authority And Power

  Thomas Henry Huxley, Cyril Bibby (1971). “T. H. Huxley on Education”, p.72, Cambridge University Press

  13 Copy quote

• I'd rather have an ape for an ancestor than a bishop.

  Thomas Huxley

  Bishops, Apes, Ancestor

  13 Copy quote

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

  Thomas Huxley

  Inspiring, Freedom, Men

  Leonard Huxley, Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley”, p.407, Cambridge University Press

  16 Copy quote

• We live in a world which is full of misery and ignorance, and the plain duty of each and all of us is to try to make the little corner he can influence somewhat less miserable and somewhat less ignorant than it was before he entered.

  Thomas Huxley

  Peace, Ignorance, Ignorant

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2012). “Lectures and Essays”, p.128, tredition

  12 Copy quote

• Science commits suicide when it adopts a creed.

  Thomas Huxley

  Suicide, Believe, Science

  Leonard Huxley, Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley”, p.422, Cambridge University Press

  16 Copy quote

• We are prone to see what lies behind our eyes, rather than what apprears before them.

  Thomas Huxley

  Lying, Eye, Behinds

  8 Copy quote

• It is the first duty of a hypothesis to be intelligible.

  Thomas Huxley

  Math, Statistics, Firsts

  Man's Place in Nature II (p. 126)

  4 Copy quote

• 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.

  Thomas Huxley

  Life, Player, Games

  'Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews' (1870) 'A Liberal Education'

  26 Copy quote

• Follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.

  Thomas Huxley

  Motivational, Science, Open Minded

  Thomas Henry Huxley (1997). “The Major Prose of Thomas Henry Huxley”, p.359, University of Georgia Press

  8 Copy quote

• The only people, scientific or other, who never make mistakes are those who do nothing.

  Thomas Huxley

  Mistake, People, Making Mistakes

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2012). “Collected Essays, Volume V Science and Christian Tradition: Essays”, p.166, tredition

  9 Copy quote

• 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

  Ocean, Land, Generations

  Thomas Henry Huxley “Selected Works of Thomas Henry Huxley”, Library of Alexandria

  7 Copy quote

• Science seems to me to teach in the highest and strongest manner the great truth which is embodied in the Christian conception of entire surrender to the will of God. Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.

  Thomas Huxley

  God, Christian, Nature

  Letter to Charles Kingsley, mathcs.clarku.edu. September 23, 1860.

  4 Copy quote

• The foundation of all morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying; to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge.

  Thomas Huxley

  Giving Up, Lying, Believe

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Collected Essays”, p.146, Cambridge University Press

  29 Copy quote

• There is but one right, and the possibilities of wrong are infinite.

  Thomas Huxley

  Infinite, Possibility

  Thomas Henry Huxley (2011). “Collected Essays”, p.236, Cambridge University Press

  7 Copy quote

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