nt services given his country by such work,
as well as in general recognition of his distinction in science, that
he was sworn a member of Her Majesty's Privy Council, so attaining a
distinction more coveted than the peerage.

The voluminous reports of the Commissions shew that Huxley, very far
from being a silent member of them, took a large part in framing the
questions which served to direct witnesses into useful lines, and that
his clear and orderly habit of thought proved as useful in the
elucidation of these subjects as they were in matters of scientific
research. For the most part, the problems brought before the
Commissions have lost their interest for readers of later years, but
there are matters still unsettled on which the opinions of Huxley as
expressed then remain useful. The Commission of 1876, for instance,
dealt with vivisection, a matter on which the conscience of the
ordinary man is not yet at rest. Although Huxley was intensely
interested in the problems of physiology, and although at one time he
hoped to devote his life to them, fortune directed otherwise, and the
investigations for which he is famed did not in any way involve the
kind of experiments known as vivisection. The greater part of his work
was upon the remains of creatures dead for thousands of years or upon
the lifeless skeletons of modern forms. On the other hand, he was
keenly interested in the progress of physiological science, he had
personal acquaintance with most of the distinguished workers in
physiology of his time at home and abroad, and from this knowledge of
their character and aspirations he was well able to judge of the
wholesale and reckless accusations brought against them. He was a man
full of the finest humanity, with an unusual devotion to animals as
pets, and with knowledge of the degrees of pain involved in
experimenting on living creatures. He insisted strongly on the
necessity of limiting or abolishing pain, wherever it was possible; he
agreed that any experiments which involved pain should not be
permitted for the purpose of demonstrating known elementary facts.
But, from his knowledge of the incalculable benefits which had been
gained from experimental research, and from his confidence in those
who conducted it, he declined to give support to the misguided
fanatics who desired to make such experimental research a penal
offence, even when conducted by the most skilled experts for the
highest purposes.

Huxley con