Assorted George Letters

Writer: Thomas Henry Huxley, FRS

Date: 27th July 1894

Recipient: Dr. George Aldridge George,


               HODESLEA,
                STAVELEY ROAD
                  EASTBOURNE
                    July 27. 1894

Dear Sir,
           I regret that I am
unable to undertake
to read and criticise
your work. I have
various tasks to finish
in a very limited [time]
forming work which
needs to be carefully
economised.
        I am,
                Yrs very quickly
          T.H. Huxley

G.A. George Esq.

Notes:

Thomas Henry Huxley FRS, (1825-1895) was a biologist, best known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his advocacy of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.

Huxley's famous 1860 debate with the Lord Bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce, was a key moment in the wider acceptance of evolution, and in his own career. Wilberforce was coached by Richard Owen, against whom Huxley also debated on whether man was closely related to apes. Huxley was slow to accept some of Darwin's ideas, such as gradualism, and was undecided about natural selection, but despite this he was wholehearted in his public support of Darwin. He was instrumental in developing scientific education in Britain, and fought against the more extreme versions of religious tradition.

I admire Dr George Aldridge George's chutzpah in seeking Huxley's review, but can only sympathise with the great man who must have received hundreds of similar letters from amateur evolutionists such as Dr George (not that the subject of GA George's work is known or recorded). George's name was taken by Thomas Hardy for 'Mr. Aldritch', the Casterbridge surgeon, in Far From The Madding Crowd .

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