An Autobiography
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY VOLU~lE II r HERBERT SPENCER'S \\fORKS. I I Synthetic Philosophy: ] IR""tf PIH~CIPLI s. J vol, rzrno, ~2.00. TIII-I Pl{I~l I1'LI:S (IF BIOLOGY. 2 vol-, rzmo, $:4.00. Till: 1'1<1:\1'11'1."-" (IF 1'~\LIIULOG\". z vols, 12nlO. :1'400, T'n r: PUI'\"LIPLE'i OF ~·U( J(IL(J('Y. J vols, rzrno. ~6.(J{). THE l'RIXt"IPLES OF LTlIILS. 2 vols. 12fl10. ~.J 00. Essays: Scientific, Political, and Speculative. Xew edition; J vols. r zrno, ~6.oo. Social Statics, Al.ridged and Revi-ed : and TilE M.\N tW'Sf(S TIll; SrATE. 1\01. •"mo. ~2 W. The Study of Sociology. 1 \'01. rcrno, ~1.50. Education. I \'01. rcmo, Cloth, $1.25; raper, 50 cents. Facts and Comments, I vol. rzmo. $1.Zv net; postage, 12 cents addruonal. Various Fragments. I vol. rzmo. Cloth, ~J.25. The Inadequacy of .. Natural Selection." 1 \01. rzmo. Paper, 30 cents, Descriptive Sociology. A Cyclopredia of SOCIal Facts. Svo. I oho. :l'Vi.OO D. APPLJ:TO:\' .\:'\D CO~IP.\"Y, XEW YORK. AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY BY HERBERT SPENCER ILLUSTRA TED IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. II NE'V YORK D. APPLETON AND COl\IPANY 1904 COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY D. APPLETON AND COMPANY Publishc(l ApI"iT, 1904 · .. ' .,"." CONTENTS OF VOL. II. PART VII. CHAPTER PAGE XXX. A SYSTE:\J OF PHIL050PHY PROJECTED. 3 XXXI. PLANS FOR EXECUTIXG IT 32 XXXII. A PLAN FIXED UPON 55 PART VIII. 1860-1867. XXXIII. 'VRITIXG FIRST PRf.VCfPLES XXXIV. AN AlJTU~IN'S RU.AXATIONS XXXV. A VOLUME OF 1HE BIOLOCJ" XXXVI. A DIGRES<;ION XXXVII. ANOTHER VOLU:\IE OF THE BfOLOCY XXXVIII. IMPENDING CESSATlO,," XXXIX. SAD EVENTS. v CONTENTS PART IX. 1867-1874. CHArTER PAGE XL. RE-CASTING FIRST PRINCIPLES 179 XLI. AN IIIIPRUDEXCE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES 200 XLII. A TOUR IN ITALY 208 XLIII. DEVELOPING THE PSYCHOLOGY 232 XLIV. FINISHING THE PSYCHOLOGY 260 XLV. AN EXTRA BOOK 283 XLVI. Soxns MINOR INCIDENTS 300 XLVII. THE DESCRIPTIVE SOCIOLOGY . 305 PART X. XLVIII. A RETROSPECTIVE GLANCE XLIX. VOL. 1. OF THE SOCIOLOGY. L. A SERIES OF ARTICLES • LI. THE DATA OF ETHICS. LII. CEREMONIAL INSTITUTIONS. PART XI. 1879-1889. LUI. Up THE NILE • 393 LIV. ENDING OF THE DESCRIPTIVE SOCIOLOGY 410 LV. POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS 416 LVI. A GRIEVOUS MISTAKE 443 VI CONTENTS CHAI'TER PALE LVII. COIlIIXG EVENTS • LVIII. A VISIT TO AlI!ERICA LIX. COXCLUSION • PART XII. LX. REFLECTIONS WRITTEN FOUR YEARS LATER 489 APPENDICES. A NOTE CONCERNING THE LIFE AXD LETTERS OF T. H. HUXLEY 553 A. PROGRAMME OF THE SYNTHETIC PHILO'>OPHY 557 TI. LETTER TO MR. G. H. LEWES 565 C. DOCUMENTS CONCERNING THE CESSA'l lOX OF THE ISSUE OF THE PHILOSOPHY 573 D. A NEW INVALID-BED. 576 E. ENGLISH FEELING ABOUT TilE AlIIERICAX CIVIL WAR • 580 F. A NEW FISHING-ROD JOINT 591 G. OBITUARY NOTICE OF J. S. MILL • 594 H. LETTER OF PROF. YOUIIIAXS 598 INDEX 605 Vll PART VII. xxx. A SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY PROJECTED. XXXI. PLA)I[S FOR EXECUTING IT. XXXII. A PLAN FIXED UPON. 44 CHAPTER XXX. A SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY PROJECTED. My search for a fit place of abode when I returned to town, ended satisfactorily. Malvern House, otherwise 13, Loudoun Road, St. John's Wood, in which I settled my- self, is a good house seated in the midst of a garden walled round. The occupier, who carried on a wholesale busi- ness in the city, and who, as I afterward learnt, feared to fall into a state of chronic melancholy, as his father had done before him, had hit on a prophylactic-surrounding himself with a lively circle. In addition to the family, consisting of host and hostess, three daughters and a son, ranging from seven up to about twenty, and a governess, there were as boarders an old retired government official (a commissioner of some kind I think he had been) lively notwithstanding his years-eighty and a wit; a "grass-widow," pleasant to look upon but without an idea in her head, whose husband was in India; and her friend, a vain old lady who played the part of duenna. Beyond the fitness of the circle and the salubrity of the locality, which is on the backbone of St. John's Wood, the place had the advantage that it was within two minutes' walk of No. I, \Vaverley Place, then occupied by Huxley. \Ve had a standing engagement for Sunday afternoons: a walk of a few miles into the country along the Finchley Road, or up to Hampstead, being the usual 3 AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY routine. Many pleasant talks and useful discussions there were between us on those occasions during the succeeding year. I remember that once when, as it would seem, society and human life as at present existing had been topics of somewhat pessimistic comment, I said (not however doing justice to my thought)-" Yes, one can- not hope for much more than to make one's mark and die." Whereupon Huxley, with greater self-abnegation, responded-" Never mind about the mark: it is enough if one can give a push." Reference to these walks and talks reminds me of an incident connected with one of them. Shortly after I had established myself in Loudoun Road, Buckle called. It was on a Sunday afternoon. Our conversation had not gone far when I intimated that the hour had come for the usual excursion; and, on my answering his inquiry who Huxley was (for then he was not widely known), Buckle agreed to go with me to be introduced. He went with us a short distance up the Finchley Road; but, saying that he had an engagement, presently turned back. \Ve looked after him as he walked away; and Huxley, struck by his feeble, undecided gait, remarked-" Ah, I see the kind of man. He is top-heavy." I have never done more than dip into The History of Civilisation in England; but I suspect that the analogy suggested was not without truth. Buckle had taken in a much larger quantity of matter than he could organize; and he stag- gered under the mass of it. November was occupied chiefly in seeing through the press the volume of Essays: Scientific, Political, and Spcculatiue; but its last days, joined with the first part of December, found me busy with a review-article. A 4 ,ET.37-38] A SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY PROJECTED letter to my father dated 28th November, contains the paragraph- " I have undertaken to write a short article on this Bank- ing crisis-perhaps under the title of the bunglingsof State- banking-in which I propose showing the evils of meddling and the superioritiesof an unrestricted system. It is for the next Westminster:" This essay, which appeared under the title of "State Tamperings with Money and Danks," displayed once more my antagonism to over-legislation. It is significant, too, as showing in another direction, an abiding faith in the self-regulation of internal social activities. An essay on such a subject seems a very unlikely place in which to meet with a biological doctrine; and yet one cropped up. Among reasons given for reprobating the policy of guarding imprudent people against the dangers of reckless banking, one was that such a policy interferes with that normal process which brings benefit to the sagacious and disaster to the stupid. "The ultimate re- sult of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools," was a belief expressed. This was a tacit assertion, recalling like assertions previously made, that the survival of the fittest operates beneficially in society. It appears that in the treatment of every topic, however seemingly remote from philosophy, I found occasion for falling back on some ultimate prin- ciple in the natural order. But now I come to an event of much moment-an event which initiated a. long series of changes and determined my subsequent career. Already I have, when speaking of each essay or book from time to time written, indicated the way in which it 5 AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY stood related to the general doctrine elaborated in after years. Here, to exhibit more clearly the attitude of mind and stage of thought which had been reached, it will be well briefly to recapitulate in immediate succession the implied steps of mental development. In the narrative of my boyhood I pointed out that I early became possessed by the idea of causation. My father's frequent questions-" Can you tell me the cause of this?" or-" I wonder what is the cause of that," pre- sented to me now one thing and now another, as due to some identifiable agency, usually physical. Though his religious views prevented him from denying the miracu- lous, yet so frequently did there recur the interpretation of things as natural, and so little reference did he make to the supernatural, that there grew up in me a tacit belief that whatever occurred had its assignable cause of a comprehensible kind. Such notions as uniformity of law and an established order, were of course not then entertained; but the kind of thinking into which I had been led, and which was in part natural to me, prepared the way for acceptance of such notions in due time. How deep-seated had become the implied kind of conscious- ness, was shown a little later by the incident I narrated as occurring at Hinton when Arnott's Physics was being read aloud; and when I called in question the conception of 'vis inertia? there set forth, which, as I dimly perceived, was irreconcilable with that conception of causation I had come to entertain.