Ministers of culture: Arnold, huxley and liberal anglican reform of learning

History of Science

Volumn 43, Issue 2, 2005, Pages 115-138

  White, Paul ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE   (United Kingdom)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 19844366726     PISSN: 00732753     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/007327530504300202     Document Type: Review

References (176)

1. C. P. Snow, The two cultures, with an introduction by Stefan Collini (Cambridge, 1993).
2. T. H. Huxley, "Science and culture", in Huxley, Collected essays (12 vols, London, 1893-94), iii, 134-59, pp. 137, 142.
3. M. Arnold, "Literature and science", in R. H. Super (ed.), Complete prose works of Matthew Arnold (12 vols, Ann Arbor, 1960-77), x, 53-73.
4. L. Trilling, Beyond culture: Essays on literature and learning (London, 1966), 49;
5. S. Coulling, Matthew Arnold and his critics; A study of Arnold's controversies (Athens, OH, 1974);
6. R. H. Super, "The humanist at bay: The Arnold-Huxley debate", in U. C. Knoepflmacher and G. B. Tennyson (eds), Nature and the Victorian imagination (Berkeley, 1977), 231-45;
7. J. Paradis, T. H. Huxley: Man's place in nature (Lincoln, NE, 1978);
8. J. Hultberg, "The two cultures revisited", Science communication, xviii (1997), 194-215;
9. D. G. Burnett, "A view from the bridge: The two cultures debate, its legacy, and the history of science", Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, cxxviii (1999), 193-218.
10. A. Desmond, Thomas Huxley: From devil's disciple to evolution's high priest (London, 1998).
11. See, for example, R. Williams, Culture and society: 1780-1950 (London, 1958), 128;
12. S. Collini, Matthew Arnold: A critical portrait (Oxford, 1988), 67-68.
13. Among those who persist in viewing Arnold as inimical to science is P. Dale, In pursuit of a scientific culture: Science, art and society in the Victorian age (Madison, 1989), 170-4.
14. R. MacLeod, Government and expertise: Specialists, administrators and professionals, 1860-1919 (Cambridge, 1988), 1-24;
15. see also the collection of his important early essays on the reform of scientific institutions, Public science and public policy in Victorian England (Aldershot, 1996).
16. A more class-based analysis is presented by A. Desmond, Archetypes and ancestors: Palaeontology in Victorian London, 1850-1875 (Chicago, 1982),
17. The politics of evolution: Morphology, medicine, and reform in radical London (Chicago, 1989).
18. See also F. Turner, "Rainfall, plagues and the Prince of Wales", Journal of British studies, xiii (1974), 46-65,
19. "The Victorian conflict between science and religion: A professional dimension", Isis, lxix (1978), 356-76;
20. Turner's characterization of the period is reiterated in Contesting cultural authority: Essays in Victorian intellectual life (Cambridge, 1993), pp. x-xi.
21. See in addition T. W. Heyck, The transformation of intellectual life in Victorian England (London, 1982).
22. On the status of 'class' in British social and political history, see P. Joyce, "The end of social history?", Social history, xx (1995), 73-91 ;
23. G. Eley and K. Nield, "Starting over: The present, the post-modern and the moment of social history", Social history, xx (1995), 355-64;
24. D. Warhman, Imagining the middle class: The political representation of class in Britain, 1780-1840 (Cambridge, 1995). On the problematic use of the sociology of professions,
25. see J. Goldstein, Console and classify: The French psychiatric profession in the nineteenth century (Cambridge, 1987). On the limits of the secularization model,
26. see especially J. Brooke, "Religious belief and the content of the sciences", Osiris, n.s., xvi (2001), 3-28;
27. J. Brooke and G. Cantor, Reconstructing nature: The engagement of science and religion (Edinburgh, 1998).
28. P. White, Thomas Huxley: Making the 'man of science' (Cambridge, 2003), 67-99.
29. C. Kent, Brains and numbers: Elitism, Comtism, and democracy in mid-Victorian England (Toronto, 1978).
30. S. Collini, Public moralists: Political thought and intellectual life in Britain 1850-1930 (Oxford, 1991).
31. J. Moore, "Theodicy and society: The crisis of the intelligentsia", in R. Helmstadter and B. Lightman (eds), Victorian faith in crisis (London, 1990), 153-86.
32. M. Arnold to M. P. Arnold, 1 November 1871, in C. Lang (ed.), The letters of Matthew Arnold (5 vols, Charlottesville, VA, 1996-2001), iv, 60.
33. Remarkably, this union between 'great' families was missed by Noel Annan in his famous study, "The intellectual aristocracy" (1955), in N. Annan, The dons: Mentors, eccentrics and geniuses (London, 1999), 304-41.
34. Coulling, op. cit. (ref. 4), 281-6;
35. Paradis, op. cit. (ref. 4), 165-6, 194-5;
36. Super, op. cit. (ref. 4), 231-45;
37. W. Irvine, Apes, angels, and Victorians: Darwin, Huxley, and evolution (Cleveland, 1959), 283.
38. F. R. Cowell, The Athenaeum: Club and social life in London, 1824-1974 (London, 1975);
39. Anon., Armchair Athenians: Essays from the Athenaeum (London, 2001).
40. G. Cantor and S. Shuttleworth (eds), Science serialized: Representations of the sciences in nineteenth-century periodicals (Cambridge, MA, 2004).
41. The most extensive study of Huxley's educational work is C. Bibby, T. H. Huxley: Scientist, humanist, educator (London, 1959).
42. Portraits of Huxley as utilitarian and technocratic have been advanced by Paradis, op. cit. (ref. 4),
43. Desmond, op. cit. (ref. 5).
44. On the history of the School of Mines, see Anon., A short history of the Imperial College, 1845-1945 (London, 1945). On technical education in nineteenth-century Britain,
45. see G. Roderick and M. Stephens, Scientific and technical education in nineteenth-century England (Newton Abbot, 1972);
46. W. Brock, "Science education", in R. Olby et al. (eds), Companion to the history of modern science (London, 1990), 946-59, and
47. "Queens wood College revisited", in W. Brock, Science for all: Studies in the history of Victorian science and education (Aldershot, 1996), chap. XVII.
48. T. H. Huxley, "On natural history, as knowledge, discipline, and power" (1856), in M. Foster and R. Lankester (eds.), The scientific memoirs of Thomas Henry Huxley (5 vols and supplement, London, 1898-1902), i, 305-14.
49. See also T. H. Huxley, "On the educational value of the natural history sciences" (1854), in Huxley, op. cit. (ref. 2), iii, 59.
50. M. Arnold, school report for 1852, in F. R. Sanford (ed.), Reports on elementary schools, 1852-1882. By Matthew Arnold (London, 1889), 19-20.
51. M. Arnold, "The function of criticism at the present time" (1865), in Super (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 3), iv, 258-85;
52. "On the literary influence of academies" (1865), Reports on Elementary Schools, 1852-1882. by Matthew Arnold, ibid., 232-57;
53. Preface to Essays in criticism, 1st ser. (1865), ibid., 286-90.
54. M. Arnold, Culture and anarchy (1868), in Super (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 3), vi, 91.
55. M. Arnold to M. P. Arnold, 7 July 1869, in Lang (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 13), iii, 356.
56. M. Arnold to M. P. Arnold, 20 February 1869, ibid., 316.
57. M. Arnold, Culture and anarchy (London, 1868), 27-28.
58. M. Arnold, St. Paul and Protestantism (London, 1870), 14.
59. M. Arnold to T. H. Huxley, 10 May 1870, in Lang (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 13), iii, 412.
60. T. H. Huxley, "On Descartes' 'Discourse touching the method of using one's reason rightly and of seeking scientific truth'" (1870), in Huxley, op. cit. (ref. 2), i, 166-7.
61. Op. cit. (ref. 28);
62. T. H. Huxley to M. Arnold, 10 May 1870, in L. Huxley (ed.), Life and letters of Thomas Henry Huxley (2 vols, London, 1900), i, 329.
63. M. Arnold, "The twice-revised code", "The principle of examination", and "The code out of danger", in Super (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 3), iii, 212-43, 244-6, and 247-51.
64. See also W. F. Connell, The educational thought and influence of Matthew Arnold (London, 1950),
65. F. G. Walcott, The origins of 'Culture and Anarchy' (London, 1970).
66. F. W. Farrar, Eric: or little by little, a tale of Roslyn School (London, 1858),
67. Julian Home (Edinburgh, 1859).
68. F. W. Farrar, An essay on the origin of language (London, 1860),
69. Chapters on language (London, 1865).
70. C. Darwin to F. W. Farrar, 1 October [1865],
71. C. Darwin to F. W. Farrar, 2 November [1865],
72. F. W. Farrar to C. Darwin, 6 November 1865, in F. Burkhardt and S. Smith et al. (eds), The correspondence of Charles Darwin, (Cambridge, 1985- ), xiii, 268-9,290-1, 297-8.
73. T. H. Huxley, On our knowledge of the causes of the phenomena of organic nature: Being six lectures to working men, delivered at the Museum of Practical Geology (London, 1863).
74. On the the Anthropological Society as a centre of racial theory, and its combative relationship with Darwinian supporters, see G. Stocking, "What's in a name? The origins of the Royal Anthropological Institute (1837-71)", Man, n.s., vi (1971), 369-90;
75. R. Rainger, "Race, politics, and science; The Anthropological Society of London in the 1860s", Victorian studies, xxii (1978), 51-70.
76. F. W. Farrar to C. Darwin, 1 February 1866, C. Darwin to F. W. Farrar, 3 February [1866], in Burkhardt and Smith et al., op. cit. (ref. 33), xiv, 31-32, 37-38. Royal Society of London archives, EC/ 1866/03.
77. Farrar's work on language and relationship with Darwin are discussed in S. Alter, Darwinism and the linguistic image: Language, race, and natural theology in the nineteenth century (Baltimore, 1999).
78. F. W. Farrar to C. Darwin, 5 February 1866, in Burkhardt and Smith et al. (eds), op. cit. (ref. 33), xiv, 41.
79. J. C. Melvill, The flora of Harrow. With notices of the birds of the neighbourhood, by the Hon. F. C. Bridgeman, and the Hon. G. O. M. Bridgeman, and of the butterflies and moths, by C. C. Parr and E. Heathfield (London, 1864).
80. F. W. Farrar, "On some defects in public school education" Notices of the proceedings at the meetings of the members of the Royal Institution of Great Britain,v(1866-69), 26-44, pp. 27-28, 33,42.
81. F. W. Farrar, "On the teaching of science at the public schools", Report of the thirty-sixth meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science held at Nottingham in August 1866 (London, 1867), 72-73.
82. F. W. Farrar to T. H. Huxley, 1 October [1866], Imperial College Archives, Huxley Papers (hereafter: HP) 16:21.
83. R. Farrar, The life of Frederic William Farrar (London, 1904), 106.
84. Report from the Select Committee on Scientific Instruction, Parliamentary papers, 1867-68, xv.
85. B. Jowett, The epistles of St. Paul to the Thessalonians, Galatians, Romans, with critical notes and dissertations (2 vols, London, 1855);
86. A. P. Stanley, The epistles of St. Paul to the Corinthians. With critical notes and dissertations (London, 1855).
87. B. Jowett, "On the interpretation of scripture", in Essays and reviews (London, 1860), 333-433.
88. E. Abbott and L. Campbell, The life and letters of Benjamin Jowett (2 vols, London, 1897), 290-320.
89. R. D. Smith, The Jowett papers: A summary catalogue of the papers of Benjamin Jawett at Balliol College, Oxford (Oxford, 1993).
90. B. Jowett, College sermons (London, 1895), 200.
91. See, for example, W. Brock and R. MacLeod, "The scientists' declaration: Reflections on science and belief in the wake of Essays and reviews", The British journal for the history of science, ix (1976), 39-66.
92. V. Quinn and J. Prest (eds), Dear Miss Nightingale: A selection of Benjamin Jowett's letters to Florence Nightingale 1860-1893 (Oxford, 1987), 249.
93. B. Jowett to T. H. Huxley, 23 December 1885, HP, 7:60.
94. On Leonard's education, HP, 7:13-26; on the Oxford chair, HP, 7:35-37.
95. T. H. Huxley, "Science and Church policy", Reader, iv (1864), 821.
96. Royal Commission on Scientific Instruction and the Advancement of Science. Reports from Comissioners, Parliamentary papers, 1872, xxv, 252-4.
97. Portraits of manly heroes can be found in C. Kingsley, The Roman and the Teuton: A series of lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge (London, 1864).
98. On Kingsley's 'muscular Christianity', see N. Vance, The sinews of the spirit: The ideal of Christian manliness in Victorian literature and religious thought (Cambridge, 1985),
99. D. E. Hall (ed.), Muscular Christianity: Embodying the Victorian age (Cambridge, 1994).
100. On his correspondence with Huxley, see White, op. cit. (ref. 9), 114-20.
101. A. P. Stanley, The life and correspondence of Thomas Arnold (2 vols, London, 1844);
102. R. Prothero and G. G. Bradley, The life and correspondence of Arthur Penrhyn Stanley (2 vols, London, 1893), i, 104-5, 312.
103. P. Hammond, Dean Stanley of Westminster (Worthing, 1987).
104. A. S. Eve and C. H. Creasy, The life and work of John Tyndall (London, 1945), 202-6.
105. A. P. Stanley, Dedication of Westminster Abbey: A sermon (Oxford and London, 1866), 19-20.
106. Farrar, op. cit. (ref. 41), 109.
107. A. P. Stanley, Historical memorials of Westminster Abbey (London, 1868), 292.
108. M. Arnold to M. P, Arnold, 20 February 1869, in Lang (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 13), iii, 316.
109. A. P. Stanley to T. H. Huxley, 18 October 1876, HP, 26:237;
110. Desmond, op. cit. (ref. 5), 483.
111. A. P. Stanley to T. H. Huxley, 29 November 1869, 6 December 1869, 10 January 1870, 12 January 1870, HP, 26:226-30.
112. Prothero and Bradley, op. cit. (ref. 55), ii, 571-2.
113. The poem appeared in the Nineteenth century, January 1882.
114. Desmond, op. cit. (ref. 5), 298, 324, 627.
115. See also Turner, "The Victorian conflict" (ref. 7), 193-4.
116. R. Barton, '"Huxley, Lubbock and half a dozen others' : Professionals and gentlemen in the formation of the X-Club, 1851-1864", Isis, lxxxix (1998), 410-44.
117. Huxley, op. cit. (ref. 30),
118. Physiography: An introduction to the study of nature (London, 1871).
119. T. H. Huxley, Lay sermons, addresses and reviews (London, 1870).
120. The first in the series of political essays was "The natural inequality of men", Nineteenth century, xxvii (1890), 1-23.
121. J. Lubbock, Ants, bees, and wasps: A record of observations on the habits of the social Hymenoptera (London, 1882);
122. H. Spencer, The study of sociology (London, 1878);
123. J. Tyndall, The forms of water in clouds & rivers, ice, and glaciers (London, 1872).
124. The series ran from 1871 to 1911. See L. Howsam, "An experiment with science for the nineteenth-century book trade: The International Scientific Series", The British journal for the history of science, xxxiii (2000), 187-207.
125. On Arnold's poetic treatment of religion, see J. Livingston, Matthew Arnold and Christianity: His religious prose writings (Columbia, SC, 1986), 75-105.
126. B. Jowett, The dialogues of Plato, translated into English, with analyses and introductions (4 vols, Oxford, 1871);
127. Thucydides, translated into English, with introduction, marginal analysis, notes and indices (Oxford, 1885);
128. The politics of Aristotle, translated into English, with introduction, marginal analysis, essays, notes, and indices (2 vols, Oxford, 1885).
129. A. P. Stanley, Lectures on the history of the Jewish Church (3 parts, London, 1863,1865,1876);
130. Sermons on special occasions, preached at Westminster Abbey (London, 1882).
131. F. W. Farrar, The life of Christ (London, 1874);
132. The life and work of St. Paul (2 vols, London, 1879);
133. Darkness and dawn or, scenes in the days of Nero (London, 1891);
134. Gathering clouds: A tale of the days of St Chrysostom (London, 1895);
135. The gospel according to St Luke: With maps, notes and introduction (Cambridge, 1884).
136. Charles Kingsley, The water babies (London, 1863).
137. Kingsley alluded to the work and its theological significance in his letter to T. H. Huxley, 20 December 1862, HP, 19:211.
138. Farrar, op, cit. (ref. 41), 142-3, 151-2, 161-2.
139. Farrar's Marlborough sermons were published in several volumes, The silence and voices of God (London, 1874)
140. In the days of thy youth (London, 1876).
141. Abbott and Campbell, op. cit. (ref. 45), ii, 121-40.
142. On Jowett's reform activities at Oxford, see A. Engel, From clergyman to don: The rise of the academic profession in nineteenth-century Oxford (Oxford, 1983).
143. S. Forgan and G. Gooday, '"A fungoid assemblage of buildings'; Diversity and adversity in the development of college architecture and scientific education in nineteenth-century South Kensington", History of universities, xiii (1994), 153-92;
144. idem, "Constructing South Kensington; The buildings and politics of T. H. Huxley's working environments", The British journal for the history of science, xxix (1996), 435-68;
145. G. Gooday, "Nature in the laboratory: Domestication and discipline with the microscope in Victorian life science", The British journal for the history of science, xxiv (1991), 307-41.
146. The activities of the Board are drawn from the London School Board report, together with minutes and evidence, for 1871 (London, 1872),
147. from accounts of the meetings in the Times. See Times, 30 March 1871.
148. London School Board report (ref. 79), 158-9.
149. M. Arnold, letter to the editor of the Pall Mall gazette, 2 November 1870,9.
150. M. Arnold, Schools and universities on the Continent (1868), in Super (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 3), v, 264, 289-97, 309-18.
151. See ref. 53.
152. Ibid., 247-49.
153. T. H. Huxley, "Scientific education: Notes of an after-dinner speech" (1869), in Huxley, op. cit. (ref. 2), iii, 129-30.
154. Huxley, op. cit. (ref. 2), iii, 115-17, 127.
155. See also T. H. Huxley, "A liberal education and where to find it" (1868), ibid., 96,
156. his evidence in the Report from the Select Committee on Scientific Instruction, Parliamentary papers, 1867-8, xv, 402.
157. Arnold, Schools and universities (ref. 82), 289-92.
158. See also his school reports for 1874 and 1876 in Sanford (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 21), 178, 200;
159. "A speech at Eton" (1879), in Super (ed.), op. cit. (ref. 3), ix, 21-22, 35.
160. Collini, op. cit. (ref. 11), 199-202.
161. See also J.Guillory, "Literary study and the modern system of the disciplines", in A. Anderson and J. Valente (eds), Disciplinarity at the fin de siècle (Princeton, 2002), 19-43,
162. Heyck, op. cit. (ref. 7).
163. J. Gibbins, "Constructing knowledge in mid-Victorian Cambridge: The Moral Sciences Tripos, 1850-70",
164. M. Beard, "Learning to pick the easy plums: The invention of ancient history in nineteenth-century classics", in J. Smith and C. Stray (eds), Teaching and learning in nineteenth-century Cambridge (Cambridge, 2001), 60-88, 89-106.
165. Engel, op. cit. (ref. 77), 230-45, 281-2.
166. A. Warwick, Masters of theory: Cambridge and the rise of mathematical physics (Chicago, 2003), 95-101, 264-7, 272-80.
167. F. W. Farrar, "On the history of classical education", Essays on a liberal education (London, 1867), 77.
168. T. H. Huxley, speech before the London School Board, Times, 9 February 1871.
169. Williams, op. cit. (ref. 6).
170. T. Eagleton, The idea of culture (Oxford, 2000), 6-7.
171. See, for example, Robert Lowe's famous speech on the need to educate England's future masters, in Hansard's Parliamentary debates, 1867, clxxxviii, 1549.
172. On the importance of educational reform in liberal politics, see also Connell, op. cit. (ref. 31), 61-87.
173. On the inability of English theorists to conceive that the 'people' or 'masses' might have their own culture, see M. Shiach, Discourse on popular culture: Class, gender, and history in cultural analysis, 1730 to the present (Cambridge, 1989), 82-86;
174. C. Baldick, The social mission of English criticism, 1848-1932 (Oxford, 1983), 63.
175. On the 'rediscovery' of 'popular' and 'working class culture' by social historians in the late 1950s and early 1960s, see Richard Johnson, "Culture and its historians", in J. Clarke, C. Critcher and R. Johnson (eds), Working- class culture: Studies in history and theory (London, 1979), 41-71.
176. R. J. C. Young, Colonial desire: Hybridity in theory, culture, and race (London, 1995), 58.