And even if this be expecting too much,
hastiness, or want of opportunity for due deliberation, cannot now be
pleaded in extenuation of any shortcomings; for the propositions cited
were repeated two years afterwards in the Reade Lecture, delivered
before so grave a body as the University of Cambridge, in 1859.
When the assertions, which I have italicised in the above extract, first
came under my notice, I was not a little astonished at so flat a
contradiction of the doctrines current among well-indormed anatomists;
but, not unnaturally imagining that the deliberate statements of a
responsible person must have some foundation in fact, I deemed it my
duty to investigate the subject anew before the time at which it would
be my business to lecture thereupon came round. The result of my
inquiries was to prove that Mr. Owen's three assertions, that "the
third lobe, the posterior horn of the lateral ventricle, and the
hippocampus minor," are "pecular to the genus 'Homo'," are contrary to
the plainest facts. I communicated this conclusion to the students of
my class; and then, having no desire to embark in a controversy which
could not redound to the honour of British science, whatever its issue,
I turned to more congenial occupations.
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