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Life cannot exist without a certain conformity to the surrounding universe — that conformity involves a certain amount of happiness in excess of pain. In short, as we live we are paid for living.

— Thomas Henry Huxley Reply to Charles Kingsley (1860)

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More quotes by Thomas Henry Huxley

The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.

On the advisableness of improving natural knowledge (1866)

Life is too short to occupy oneself with the slaying of the slain more than once.

The method of scientific investigation is nothing but the expression of the necessary mode of working of the human mind.

Our Knowledge of the Causes of the Phenomena of Organic Nature (1863)

Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.

The great end of life is not knowledge but action.

Technical Education (1877)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Henry Huxley (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.