Thomas Henry Huxley, The Advance of Science in the Last Half-Century (1889)
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Agassiz... was doomed to help the cause he hated. Agassiz not only maintained the fact of the progressive advance in organisation of the inhabitants of the earth at each successive geological epoch, but he insisted upon the analogy of the steps of this progression with those by which the embryo advances to the adult condition, among the highest forms of each group. In fact, in endeavoring to support these views he went a good way beyond the limits of any cautious interpretation of the facts then known.

— Thomas Henry Huxley

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "Agassiz... was doomed to help the cause he hated. Agassiz not only maintained the fact of the progressive advance in organisation of the inhabitants of the earth at each successive geological epoch, but he insisted upon the analogy of the steps of this progression with those by which the embryo advances to the adult condition, among the highest forms of each group. In fact, in endeavoring to support these views he went a good way beyond the limits of any cautious interpretation of the facts then known." in the context of "Thomas Henry Huxley, The Advance of Science in the Last Half-Century (1889)" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Louis Agassiz" (Quotes about Agassiz) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
Louis Agassiz

About Louis Agassiz

Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz (28 May 1807 – 14 December 1873) was a Swiss-born American zoologist, glaciologist, and geologist and one of the first world-class American scientists. He was the husband of educator Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz.