Thomas Henry Huxley, vol 3 | Page 2

at the head of the world was through organisation.
Writing on January 18, to Mr. Herbert Spencer, who had sent him some
proofs of his Autobiography to look through, he says:--]
I see that your proofs have been in my hands longer than I thought for.
But you may have seen that I have been "starring" at the Mansion
House.
This was not exactly one of those bits of over-easiness to pressure with
which you reproach me--but the resultant of a composition of pressures,
one of which was the conviction that the "Institute" might be made into
something very useful and greatly wanted--if only the projectors could
be made to believe that they had always intended to do that which your
humble servant wants done--that is the establishment of a sort of Royal

Society for the improvement of industrial knowledge and an industrial
university--by voluntary association.
I hope my virtue may be its own reward. For except being knocked up
for a day or two by the unwonted effort, I doubt whether there will be
any other. The thing has fallen flat as a pancake, and I greatly doubt
whether any good will come of it. Except a fine in the shape of a
subscription, I hope to escape further punishment for my efforts to be
of use.
[However, this was only the beginning of his campaign.
On January 27, a letter from him appeared in the "Times," guarding
against a wrong interpretation of his speech, in the general uncertainty
as to the intentions of the proposers of the scheme.]
I had no intention [he writes] of expressing any enthusiasm on behalf of
the establishment of a vast permanent bazaar. I am not competent to
estimate the real utility of these great shows. What I do see very clearly
is that they involve difficulties of site, huge working expenses, the
potentiality of endless squabbles, and apparently the cheapening of
knighthood.
[As for the site proposed at South Kensington,] "the arguments used in
its favour in the report would be conclusive if the dry light of reason
were the sole guide of human action." [But it would alienate other
powerful and wealthy bodies, which were interested in the Central
Institute of the City and Guilds Technical Institute,] "which looks so
portly outside and is so very much starved inside."
[He wrote again to the "Times" on March 21:--]
The Central Institute is undoubtedly a splendid monument of the
munificence of the city. But munificence without method may arrive at
results indistinguishably similar to those of stinginess. I have been
blamed for saying that the Central Institute is "starved." Yet a man who
has only half as much food as he needs is indubitably starved, even
though his short rations consist of ortolans and are served upon gold
plate.
[Only half the plan of operations as drawn up by the Committee was, or
could be, carried out on existing funds.
The later part of his letter was printed by the Committee as defining the
functions of the new Institute:--]
That with which I did intend to express my strong sympathy was the

intention which I thought I discerned to establish something which
should play the same part in regard to the advancement of industrial
knowledge which has been played in regard to science and learning in
general, in these realms, by the Royal Society and the Universities...I
pictured the Imperial Institute to myself as a house of call for all those
who are concerned in the advancement of industry; as a place in which
the home-keeping industrial could find out all he wants to know about
colonial industry and the colonist about home industry; as a sort of
neutral ground on which the capitalist and the artisan would be equally
welcome; as a centre of intercommunication in which they might enter
into friendly discussion of the problems at issue between them, and,
perchance, arrive at a friendly solution of them. I imagined it a place in
which the fullest stores of industrial knowledge would be made
accessible to the public; in which the higher questions of commerce
and industry would be systematically studied and elucidated; and where,
as in an industrial university, the whole technical education of the
country might find its centre and crown. If I earnestly desire to see such
an institution created, it is not because I think that or anything else will
put an end to pauperism and want--as somebody has absurdly
suggested,--but because I believe it will supply a foundation for that
scientific organisation of our industries which the changed conditions
of the times render indispensable to their prosperity. I do not think I am
far wrong in assuming that we are entering, indeed, have already
entered, upon the most serious struggle for existence to which this
country has