348 Lightman
never liked Whewell’s coinage “scientist,” as he considered it to be an
unscholarly Americanism.^31 In 1894 he remarked, “to any one who re-
spects the English language, I think ‘Scientist’ must be about as pleasing a
word as ‘Electrocution.’”^32 But he had no problems with “biology,” argu-
ing that it was not “simply a new- fangled denomination” for what used
to be known under the title of natural history. On the contrary, Huxley
declared, “the word is the expression of the growth of science during the
last 200 years, and came into existence half a century ago.” Realizing that
natural history included “very heterogeneous constituents,” discerning
men decided to group botany and zoology together since it was possible
to obtain an “extensive knowledge of the structure and functions of plants
and animals without having to enter upon the study of geology or min-
eralogy.” In his discussion of the origin of the term “biology,” Huxley
believed that Bichat, Lamarck, and Treviranus, three scientists working at
the beginning of the nineteenth century, were among the fi rst to treat all
of the sciences dealing with living matter as if they were part of one disci-
pline. He credited Lamarck with the fi rst use of the term biologie in 1801
in his Hydrogéologie, and asserted that Treviranus’s great merit lay in the
publication of an entire work titled Biologie, the fi rst volume of which ap-
peared in 1802. As a result of the efforts of these men at the beginning of
the century, by the 1870s the term “natural history” had come to be seen
as “old” and “confusing,” and “all clear thinkers and lovers of consistent
nomenclature” used “biology” to characterize the study of the totality of
living phenomena.^33 In comparison to natural history, Huxley’s biology
was stripped of all religious content. The study of living phenomena did
not involve the analysis of exquisitely designed organs of perfection and
it could be conducted without having to deal with any questions concern-
ing the wisdom, power, and benevolence of a divine being. Huxley’s work
on education reform helped to spread the use of “biology” and led to the
decrease of the label “natural history.”^34
In the same essay Huxley laid out the ideal way to study biology. The
earlier essay had stressed the democratic nature of science, though com-
mon sense required discipline and training. Here Huxley insisted that the
study of biology must be analogous to the study of the other physical sci-
ences. It was not enough just to read books and attend lectures. Referring
to the way science was studied at Oxbridge, Huxley criticized “the ‘paper-
philosophers’ [who] are under the delusion that physical science can be
mastered as literary accomplishments are acquired, but unfortunately it
is not so.” It was also necessary to perform experiments in the laboratory.
The student of science must touch, handle, and see the things symbolized
in language in books. Huxley then told his readers how biology was prac-