Frankness on the part of Mr. Huxley is not limited to his opinion of M. Comte; it accompanies us throughout his whole essay. He seems even to take pride, indeed, in naming always and everywhere his object at the plainest. That object, in a general point of view, relates, he tells us, solely to materialism, but with a double issue. While it is his declared purpose, in the first place, namely, to lead us into materialism, it is equally his declared purpose, in the second place, to lead us out of materialism. On the first issue, for example, he directly warns his audience that to accept the conclusions which he conceives himself to have established on Protoplasm, is to accept these also: That “all vital action” is but “the result of the molecular forces” of the physical basis; and that, by consequence, to use his own words to his audience, “the thoughts to which I am now giving utterance, and your thoughts regarding them, are but the expression of molecular changes in that matter of life which is the source of our other vital phenomena.” And, so far, I think, we shall not disagree with Mr. Huxley when he says that “most undoubtedly the terms of his propositions are distinctly materialistic.” Still, on the second issue, Mr. Huxley asserts that he is “individually no materialist.” “On the contrary, he believes materialism to involve grave philosophical error;” and the “union of materialistic terminology with the repudiation of materialistic philosophy” he conceives himself to share “with some of the most thoughtful men with whom he is acquainted.” In short, to unite both issues, we have it in Mr. Huxley’s own words, that it is the single object of his essay “to explain how such a union is not only consistent with, but necessitated by, sound logic;” and that, accordingly, he will, in the first place, “lead us through the territory of vital phenomena to the materialistic slough,” while pointing out, in the second, “the sole path by which, in his judgment, extrication is possible.” Mr. Huxley’s essay, then, falls evidently into two parts; and of these two parts we may say, further, that while the one—that in which he leads us into materialism—will be predominatingly physiological, the other—or that in which he leads us out of materialism—will be predominatingly philosophical. Two corresponding parts would thus seem to be prescribed to any full discussion of the essay; and of these, in the present needs of the world, it is evidently the latter that has the more promising theme. The truth is, however, that Mr. Huxley, after having exerted all his strength in his first part to throw us into “the materialistic slough,” by _clear necessity of knowledge_, only calls to us, in his second part, to come out of this slough again, on the somewhat _obscure necessity of ignorance_. This, then, is but a lop-sided balance, where a scale in the air only seems to struggle vainly to raise its well-weighted fellow on the ground. Mr. Huxley, in fact, possesses no