Thomas Henry Huxley was born May 4, 1825,  the son of George Huxley, a schoolmaster, and Rachel Huxley.  He received two years of formal education at his dad's school, and was for the rest self-educated.

Although he was raised Anglican, he became interested in Unitarianism and its naturalistic thinking.  This interest led him to begin studying biology with his brother in law.  His studies led to a scholarship to Charing Cross Hospital in London, where he won awards in physiology and organic chemistry.

He served as assistant surgeon on the HMS Rattlesnake. which was surveying the waters around Australia and New Guinea.  To pass the time, he began investigating the various forms of sea life.

Huxley met and fell in love with Nettie Heathorn in Sydney in 1847.  He then continued his biological research in that part of the world. After returning to England, he was elected to the Royal Society in 1850, but could not find an academic position.  Depressed and angry, he began taking on controversial stands -- including denial of the Christian version of geology.

In 1854, he began teaching at the Government School of Mines.  Finally established as a gentleman, he brought the patient Nettie to England and they married in 1855.

Huxley met Darwin in 1856, and they developed a long and close friendship.  He took it upon himself to begin a campaign for Darwin's theory, which earned him the nickname "Darwin's bulldog."  In particular, he fought against the church and for the concept of human evolution from apes.  All the while he was a great promoter of science in general and scientific education in particular.

Huxley was responsible for a great deal of research, from his original work on sea creatures to later work on the evolution of vertebrates.  He also came up with the idea of agnosticism -- by which he meant the belief that ultimate reality would always be beyond human grasp.  And he is responsible for the popular metaphysical point of view known as epiphenomenalism.

In 1882, his daughter went mad.  She would die five years later under the care of Jean-Martin Charcot, the great French psychiatrist.  He became very depressed and retired from his professorship.  For a while, he promoted Social Darwinism (see below), but backed away years later to say, with Darwin, that humanity is best served by promoting ethics, rather than instincts.

He died of a heart attack during a speech, June 29, 1895.