THE PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY. By William James, Professor of
Psychology in Harvard University. In two volumes. New York: Henry
Holt & Co., American Science Series. Advanced Course.
In the present status of psychological science every attempt to gather
the diversified facts and views and present them in a single, though
extensive work, cannot but be scrutinised with great care and interest;
and when this work comes from the pen of one who has gained so wide and
appreciative a circle of readers, the interest becomes deeper and more
personal.
It was, perhaps, the professor of mental science, struggling for years
with text-books, inadequate, or antiquated, or narrow, or unscientific,
or dry, or unpedagogic, who most anxiously awaited the appearance of
Professor James's volumes; and his expectation was the more warranted,
as the work was announced in a series of text-books deservedly
successful and popular. To such a one, the work itself does not come
to fill the place of a text-book; not alone the great length (1,400
pages), but the general supposition of knowledge on the part of the
reader which it is the object of college courses to supply, together
with the selection of topics and the peculiar division of space amongst
them, limit the work to students of a much more advanced type than
(unfortunately, perhaps) American education as yet supplies. But while
our professor must still patiently hope for some work that will present
in brief and convenient form the main facts of Psychology, he will find
his task made easier and more interesting by these welcome volumes.
He will find in them an original and frequently brilliant treatment
of many of the deepest problems of modern Psychology: and it is as a
contribution to science and as an aid to the professional student that
a discussion of their contents and tenets will be pertinent in these
pages.
To begin with, the attitude of the author to his subject is that of a
professional scientist to his specialty. "I have kept close," he says,
"to the point of view of natural science throughout the book. Every
natural science assumes certain data uncritically, and declines to
challenge the elements between which its own 'laws' obtain, and from
which its own deductions are carried on…. This book, assuming that
thoughts and feelings exist, and are vehicles of knowledge, thereupon
contends that Psychology, when she has ascertained the empirical
correlation of the various sorts of thought or feeling with definite
conditions of the brain, can go no farther—can go no farther that is
as a natural science. If she goes farther she becomes metaphysical."
This position does not carry with it the condemnation of all matters
metaphysical, but simply excludes them from Psychology; nor does
this independence place Psychology in a position unrelated to other
sciences. Such relation is a cardinal fact in the mental world, and
nowhere is it more necessary to bear in mind that the division of the
sciences is largely an expression of the lines of men's interests and
the inevitable specialisation of knowledge. Those forms of adaptations
of means to ends which we study as forms of psychic action, while
theoretically distinguishable from other modes of action, in fact,
often resemble them; in other words, "the boundary line of the mental
faculty is certainly vague. It is better not to be pedantic, but to let
the science be as vague as the subject," and include all facts, whether
they are usually called physiological, or biological, or not, that shed
light on the main problems dealt with.
This conception accordingly views mind as distinctly related to and
an essential part of its environment; it views mental phenomena as
infinitely varied, as most intricately conditioned by and in turn
conditioning other natural phenomena. For the complete survey of
its domain, it calls upon experiment, observation, introspection,
comparison, analysis, hypothesis, deduction, each properly controlled
by the others, and limited by community of purpose to a firm foundation
of fact.
It is true that in the more intricate problems, those with the smallest
connection with sensation and the largest with inference and analysis,
the author will be regarded as more metaphysical than psychological and
plainly admits his fault; it is true that the personal leanings of the
author lead him to lengthy discussions of these more intricate points,
but none the less the positive, broad, and evolutionary spirit that
dominates the general view of the subject leaves a clear impress of
vitality, progress, and interest on every page.
Passing from point of view and purpose to content we do not look
for and do not find any 'closed system,' but "a mass of descriptive
details" in the selection of which personal interest has been the
controlling factor. The articles which Professor James has written from
time to time in the periodicals appear, sometimes a little remodelled,
in the larger work; each chapter is thus largely an independent essay
upon the topic printed at the head of it. On the physiological side we
have an admirable chapter on the functions of the brain, but elsewhere
the student is referred to other works for the physiological points
involved.
Following this is an excellent essay on Habit and Automatism,
whereupon without further ceremony the reader is invited to a somewhat
speculative series of chapters upon 'Mind Stuff,' 'Knowledge and
Reality,' and the like, and may resume the more concrete chapters on
Attention, Conception, Discrimination and Comparison, Association, only
after struggling with the complex picture of 'the Stream of Thought,'
'the Consciousness of Self,' and 'the Snares of Psychology.' Each
of these chapters presents a distinct problem, presents it well and
positively, and contributes much that is original to the discussion.
In all this there is strongly emphasised the subjective contribution
to Psychology,—the value of a discerning and critical introspection
and the importance of the subject in all processes of sense, judgment,
attention, association, and the like. The mind is not a passive
receptacle of experiences, but is continually active, making and
shaping, seizing and transforming, absorbing and assimilating the
stimuli of its environment.
A second series of topics take up the perception of those general
concepts, Time, 'Things,' Space, Reality, and Form, the largest and
heaviest chapters in the work, amongst which, as if to whet the
appetite, are distributed more concrete pages dealing with Memory,
Sensation, and Imagination. The former devote much space to criticism,
and would, perhaps, border upon the metaphysics that was to have been
avoided, were it not that they spring from considerations much more
concrete and provable; the latter group of chapters are amongst the
most interesting of the volume, and though treating but a small and
somewhat arbitrarily selected portion of each of the topics, treat them
in a suggestive and inspiring way. Discerning and ingenious sketches
of single mental traits and processes, happy illustrations, suggestive
side issues make these pages a striking contrast to the usual text-book
tone, and will attract students of all shades and grades of agreement
or disagreement with the author's views.
The remaining chapters deal with Reasoning, Movement, Instinct,
Emotions, Will, Hypnotism, Necessary Truths; in addition to the
characteristics already indicated, we find here a wise use of the
facts of Morbid Psychology, of the inferences from the abnormal to
the normal. This naturally stands out prominently in the discussion
of Hypnotism—so recent and yet so essential a department of mental
science.
When we close the cover of the second volume we do so with the feeling
that our mental horizon has been enlarged, our interests have been
quickened, our attention has been held, our time agreeably spent,—and
yet the result of all this reading seems intangible, diffuse,
scattered, unsatisfactory. The scholar and the professor always retain
the student feeling and the student habit of thought; and what is
unpedagogic for the one is uneconomical for the other. A logical order
of exposition, a unifying grouping of topics, a just perspective of
details, a painstaking selection of facts, constitute much to convert
useless knowledge into useful science; such works contain a large
element of drudgery, must be impersonal in one sense of the term, and
yet are not inconsistent with a high degree of originality, but it is
such works that are enormously helpful, that form landmarks by which
progress is measured and retained. These useful qualities we miss in
Professor James's work. True, it does not pretend to possess them,
but psychological text-books are not written every day, and when so
influential a one appears, the wish that its utility shall reach a
maximum demands expression. Finally, it is a work destined to be much
quoted, to arouse considerable discussion, to excite quite different
opinions from different critics, and so, every one interested in modern
Psychology will find it necessary and profitable to learn at first hand
this important American contribution to the science of Psychology.
J. J.
THE SCIENCE OF THOUGHT. By Charles Carroll Everett, D. D. Boston: De
Wolfe Fiske & Co. Revised edition.
An excellent manual of that which is accepted as logic. The author
is a disciple of Hegel, and throughout conforms his treatment of
the topic to the lines laid down by his master, although in various
connections where these lines permit, the author contributes from his
own resources, and from other masters, much needed supplementary matter.
The appearance of late of so many essays, manuals, and treatises
professing to deal with logic and its affiliated topics is quite
noteworthy, and is the manifestation of a need that has become, not
merely a crying, but an absolutely groaning one. It is scarcely a
metaphor to say that to-day the intellectual world is in great travail
over its need of an organon. We are crying unto our logical desire
from the depths of our souls and waiting for it as they that wait for
the morning. This intensity of our want makes us intolerant of the
old incompetences and sets us to fault-finding in the hope of better
insight when the current obscurities shall have been dissipated. We
scan each effort as it appears, and as it discovers no even single
clear organic general principle around which the wealth of knowledge
now ascertained can set in order we lay it aside with a feeling of
being merely tantalised. We cannot but assimilate our condition to that
of the Haunted Man in Bret Harte's clever travesty of Dickens: "'Here
again?' said the Haunted Man. 'Here again,' assented the phantom, in a
low tone. 'Another novel?' 'Another novel.' 'The old story?' 'The old
story.' 'It won't do, Charles! It won't do!' and the Haunted Man buried
his head in his hands and groaned."
When the singular difficulties of the search are considered, all
this is, no doubt, void of that sweet reasonableness that should
obtain. Still the interests of progress are too supreme to permit any
compromise with error or incompetence.
So, although the excellent manual under notice makes no pretensions
that are unwarrantable, according to the customs usually observed
in such cases, it yet affords salient features, apt as texts for
a course of comment that applies, not merely to the doctrine and
treatment adopted in it but to the doctrine and methods of the accepted
logic-books in general.
The book is entitled, "The Science of Thought." This exposes an
incompetent comprehension of the topic. The Science of Thought should
be a mere branch of psychology. In logic, we of course, have an almost
prime need of information concerning the anatomy and physiology of
thought. But this is not the peculiar motive of logic. The raison
d'être of logic is not the general economy of thought, but the
phenomena of untrue, incompetent, or fallacious thought, or,
in other words, erroneous thought. Did but the mind of man always
supply him with true and competent thoughts he would find no need of
seeking logical criteria, however much he might be interested in the
phenomenology of thought in general.
Man being, however, what he is, informed by a mind, prone to error,
and he, in consequence, frequently subjected to evils and misses that
better information would have enabled him to avoid or mitigate, he
naturally seeks to solve the causes of his errors, and to discover
means of testing the worth of his thoughts and of deriving thoughts
that are true and competent. This search is the study of logic; the
true information relevant thereto is logic, and no other device of
man ought to trespass upon the name. Using for this turn the word
truth in a broader sense than usual, so as to include the sense of
competence, we may say that Logic is the Science of Truth and Untruth
in Thought,—take notice, in thought—for we are supposing that there
neither is, nor can be, any other or further means of becoming aware
of aught of the nature or features, of aught that is pure alternate to
mind, than thought merely, and that, therefore, truth and untruth in
thought exhausts all the proper possibilities of truth and untruth.
Following Hegel, and concurring with so many others, our author
starts with Being as the proper primordial universal notion. Is this
not taking note merely of the comprehensive meaning of thought, in
ignorance of its denominate meaning? Prior, at least logically, to
Being, Form, Mode, Limit, Relation, and the like, must there not
be posited or supposed somewhat to be, to be formed, to be
modulated, to be limited, to be related, etc? Must not Quality
be quality of somewhat, and Quantity, quantity of somewhat? So it
seems to us and we therefore posit Ground as primordial in thought.
Ground as intended here is not the same as the Absolute Being of Hegel.
It is in general independent of the notions either of existence or
reality, being in general that of which aught is predicative either
in discourse or thought. It is pure logical denomination free of all
logical comprehension. The imaginary number and the ideal number of
mathematics are each just as truly grounds according to this intent as
is a house or a tree.
Ground is the seat or basis of Being, Mind, Form, Mode, Limitation,
Relation, etc. Behind any momented thought, say Sun shines, Mind
thinks, or It is, lies, it may be latent, but all potential, the
mere thought stripped of all comprehension: Sun, Mind, or It. It is
wholly irrelevant that a ground is manifest only by means of its
comprehension if it be true that it must be supposed as the seat of
that comprehension. Undistributed and therefore unrelated or absolute
ground from its very nature admits of no other predicate than mere
being. It is in general at once the All and Existence. Its negative
or Naught has no ground, being, or comprehension whatever, and no
proper denomination, its name being only quasi-denominative and for
convenience of notation merely. Form or Thought breaks this barren
universe of mere Ground and Being by the formation of modes of Ground
and by the more or less arbitrary fiats and finds of Limitation.
By the formation of Mode emerge Form, Time, and Extent, and perhaps
Cause and Aim. By Limitation emerge Part and Whole, Number, and
Relation in all their manifold involutions. Attribute being only
degraded Relation, and Quantity being only one power of Relation.
It is a most notable peculiarity of thought that it has the ability and
that it is its custom to take any form or phase of Being, and regard
and deal with it as a ground.
Hence every momented thought (which in effect embraces every thought
properly speaking) makes two distinct references, its ground reference
and its being or predicate reference. This seems to be the bottom truth
in respect to the much vexed topic of extension and comprehension.
There would seem to be, therefore, in reality only two ultimate
categories, Ground and Being.
As to how the categories, usually taken as such, and their complements,
should be distributed between Ground and Being, would seem to be a
matter requiring much pondering to arrange. Owing to the double quality
of so many of the mental alternates, as in one regard Being and in
another regard Ground, much difficulty might well be anticipated.
Neglecting this distribution we may say that very universal terms of
thought are Ground, Being, Form, Mode, Limit, Number, Part, Relation.
Epoch, Place, Alteration, Event, Cause, Effect, Aim, and the like.
The cardinal mental activities which produce thought seem to be, in
order, Attention, Conception, Recognition, Induction, and Deduction.
In all these operations there is opportunity for not only true, but
erroneous thought, and logic in its office as the inspector and judge
of thought in respect of its truth or error, should study all these
operations and those which are subsidiary to them, and ascertain the
causes of error and the means of truth, and perfect methods of deriving
truth with certainty and ease.
It is very presumptuous and hazardous to essay a definition of truth,
yet since such a definition is a great desideratum, and since it will
not be effected except by earnest trial, and since also, in such a
matter, even failures that are consequent on devoted attempts are
instructive to subsequent attempts, we venture our submission:
A thought is true which while representing its applicate (that is
whatever to which it is directly applied) also, in so far as its
purport implies, represents in mind a thorough and respective parity
and ratio, through which each thought-analyton and thought-syntheton
(whether ground, mode, limit, number, part, relation, etc.) corresponds
to its proper applicate-analyton or applicate-syntheton. Truth is this
representative and correspondent parity and ratio in general. A thought
may be true and yet incompetent, that is unfit to serve some assigned
purpose or turn in view, by reason, it may be, of its irrelevancy, or
it may be of its restricted application or purport. It is a question
that has been much mooted whether or not our sensations are true to
their mind-alternate excitants. The argument towards showing that they
are would be prolix and must be passed. If however they are not true it
would be interesting to hear by what quality or nature they are to be
characterised in respect to their verity.
Attention is a mental activity of considerable importance in logic in
connection with that very fruitful source of error, mal-observation.
But by far the most important mental activity to be studied and
thoroughly known for the behests of logic is Conception, with its
all important adjunct of denomination. The verity or error of all
other mental operations that generate thought depends largely on the
truth or untruth, the competence or incompetence of Conception. On
our conceptions as a basis is erected and must ever be erected every
scheme of our notation, and in so far as our conceptions are untrue
or incompetent, so probably is, and so will be, in perhaps a multiple
measure, all our knowledge. Very much more ought to be said in this
connection, but space will not permit.
The mental operation which is here called Recognition, but which has
been called hypothesis and otherwise, and which the author reviewed
calls Identification, has not received the attention from logicians
in general which its importance requires. It is a true variety of
inference, as Mr. C. S. Peirce has fully shown. Our conceptions which
are the central facts of logic would be of little value to us were
we not able truly to subsume our perceptions under them. A variety
of facts are available to show how very often we do this wrongly,
imperfectly, or not at all.
Induction, and its rationale, depends also very largely upon conception
and its intimate consequences, denomination, attribution, and
relationising. Deduction and the Syllogism are trite themes, although
the part that attribution plays in the process has been insufficiently
noticed, and although the rules of deduction from relation-terms,
the most important and fruitful of all, are as yet very partially
ascertained. What is needed as an indispensable prerequisite to
this last, seems to be a census and classification of the manifold
relations that are known, after the model of say Roget's Thesaurus,
and then a determination of the consequences of such combinations and
constructions as are admissible and fruitful, and a tabulation of the
same as our multiplication table is a tabulation of the consequences of
the multiplication of numbers. The Logic of Relatives as it is called
suffers from its having been formed thus far on so very abstract and
formal a plan that its formation lacks the check and correction of
frequent comparison with concrete knowledge, while its results are
almost if not quite useless owing to their extreme generality, which in
defect of the mediate formula leaves them inapplicable to aught that
can manifest their utility or power.
F. C. R.
THE TIME-RELATIONS OF MENTAL PHENOMENA. By Joseph Jastrow. New York:
N. D. C. Hodges.
The accomplished Professor of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin
gives in this publication, which forms one of the series of "Facts
and Theory Papers" issued by Mr. Hodges, the results of numerous
observations by Cattell, Münsterberg and other observers. His object
is to present a general view of what has been done already in this
department of research. The study of the time-relations of mental
phenomena is of importance in various connections. As Professor Jastrow
remarks:
"It serves as an index of mental complexity, giving the sanction of
objective demonstration to the results of subjective observation; it
indicates a mode of analysis of the simpler mental acts, as well as
the relation of these laboratory products to the processes of daily
life; it demonstrates the close interrelation of psychological with
physiological facts, an analysis of the former being indispensable to
the right comprehension of the latter; it suggests means of lightening
and shortening mental operations, and thus offers a mode of improving
educational methods; and it promises in various directions to deepen
and widen our knowledge of those processes by the complication and
elaboration of which our mental life is so wonderfully built up."
The results of the observations referred to by Professor Jastrow are
given in Tables of Simple Reaction Times and of Complex Reaction Times.
One of the most important points considered is "the overlapping of
mental processes," as to which Cattell made a special study. From the
fact that the time needed for the performance of complete operations,
as multiplying numbers and reciting a verse or two at the same time, is
shorter than the sum of the times required to do each separately, it
is inferred that the mind should be likened not "to a point at which
but a single object can impinge at one time, but rather to a surface
of variable extension." Moreover, "the performance of a complex and
extended mental task is not the same thing as the separate performance
of the several elements into which that task may be analysed." The
addition of a classified Bibliography adds much to the value of
Professor Jastrow's interesting little work.
Ω.
ON SAMENESS AND IDENTITY. By George Stuart Fullerton. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press.
Mr. Fullerton's psychological study is the first of a series of
contributions to Philosophy to be issued by the University of
Pennsylvania. It is truly entitled a "contribution to the foundations
of a Theory of Knowledge," and is an attempt to arrive at an accurate
conclusion as to the several senses in which the word same is
used; with an historical and critical statement of the use of the
word in a wrong sense. Mr. Fullerton finds that same has seven
different meanings according to the mode in which it is applied. In
the first case it has the sense of identity, and in the second that
of similarity. Thirdly, the "external" bundle of qualities may be
regarded as being the same at two different times, while in a fourth
sense, two "external" things, or "external" qualities, existing at one
time, may be called the same to mark similarity. Again, an "external"
thing or an "external" quality may be called the same with its
external representative, as the identification of a thing with its
reflection in a mirror. This is the fifth sense; the sixth is where
the same "external" object is said to be perceived by different
persons. Finally, an "external" thing may be said to be the same "with
its representative in consciousness or with the substance or noumenon
assumed to underlie it."
On searching for the reason why such various experiences are expressed
by the use of one word, Mr. Fullerton discovers that the common notion
which unites them is the idea of similarity. But how can we speak of
similarity when strictly only one thing is in question? The answer
given is that we have "a series of experiences, beginning with one in
which two objects are recognised as similar and yet are very clearly
distinguished as two objects, continued in others in which the sense
of duality falls more and more into the background, and ending in one
in which there is no consciousness of duality at all." The last of
these experiences is not wholly different from the others. It differs
from them "not in the element which has led us to declare two objects
similar—the element which they have in common—but in that which has
led us to declare them two and different. It is by adding to this last
experience, so to speak, that we get the others. They contain it and
more." The experience in which two things are not distinguished, is
at the bottom of all our experiences of similarity. The use of the
expression "X is X," then, emphasises the fact that one is not to
pass from X to any Y or Z, and it, moreover, puts a period to one's
thinking, and fixes the thought upon X alone. When the words "identity"
and "sameness" are intended to be used with some degree of precision,
the former word indicates "sameness in which there is no consciousness
of duality, or in which the consciousness of duality has fallen into
the background and may easily be overlooked."
More than half of Mr. Fullerton's work is occupied by an historical and
critical consideration of the use of the word same in a wrong sense,
beginning with Heraclitus and coming down to Prof. W. K. Clifford.
The examples he has given of that confusion of thought justifies the
assertion of "the need of much greater care and exactitude than one
commonly finds in metaphysical reasonings," and at the same time the
hair-splitting for which Mr. Fullerton needlessly considers himself
called on to plead guilty.
Ω.
INDUCTION AND DEDUCTION. WITH OTHER ESSAYS. By Constance C. W. Naden.
Edited by R. Lewins, M. D. London: Bickers & Son.
The chief of the essays comprised in this volume is an "historical and
critical sketch of successive philosophical conceptions respecting the
relations between inductive and deductive thought." It was awarded
the Heslop Gold Medal as the best dissertation by a student of Mason
College, Birmingham (England), in 1887, and Miss Naden was also
rewarded for it by being made an Associate of the College, an honor she
well deserved. The dissertation displays a wide knowledge of scientific
facts with a rare capacity for dealing with them in a philosophical
spirit, and a power of acute reasoning such as few other women have
ever possessed. Whether her opinions are always correct is another
question. It is a profound remark that we are obliged to regard nature
as a system, "because we can consider its multiplicity only in relation
to one thinking subject." But we must challenge her statement that we
have no certainty for assuming that the laws of nature will always
remain unchanged. A change in the laws of nature would be the replacing
of it by a different nature of which man could not take cognisance, and
which therefore we cannot reasonably conceive to be possible. There
might be a change of conditions which would introduce other laws, but
these must be in conformity with, and not in opposition to, the present
laws of nature, as otherwise they could not exist for us, seeing that
"experience is possible in virtue of the original constitution of the
mind," and therefore, according to the views of which Miss Naden is an
exponent, they could not exist at all.
The most interesting of her essays are those which explain the system
to which her editor Dr. Robert Lewins gives the name of Hylo-Idealism.
This is described as the "brain theory of mind and matter," and it is
so described because it asserts that every man is the maker of his
own cosmos, all his perceptions having merely a subjective existence
and being generated by the brain, "which focuses converging rays of
sense from all parts of the body, and unites them into the white light
of consciousness." It would be a mistake, however, to think that,
according to this theory there is nothing outside of the percipient
subject, that is, beyond man himself. The real existence of matter is
not denied and, indeed, "so far from being a nonentity, matter is the
fons et origo of all entities." Hylo-Idealism deals only with the
relative, "ignoring the absolute as utterly beyond human gnosis."
While asserting that "the only cosmos known to man, or in any way
concerning him, is manufactured in his own brain-cells," it affirms the
existence of another cosmos, the external universe of other systems.
The mind does not however passively apprehend external objects, but
actively constructs them. "We make the mountains, and the sea, and the
sun himself; for sunshine is nothing if not visible, and if there were
no eye and no brain, there could be no sunshine." The defect of this
reasoning is that it makes man the only measure of all things. Because
our senses are necessary to us to distinguish certain phenomena, it
does not follow that the same phenomena cannot be distinguished under
other conditions. The protozoa which have no organs of special sense
are affected by the vibrations of light, sound, and probably smell,
which would not be possible if those phenomena are "constructed" by the
human mind.
The utmost that can be said with any show of reason is that the
imaging in our consciousness of external objects does not give an
actual representation of them. This is required by the theory of
Hylo-Idealism, which goes still further, however, and declares that
the universe does not exist as we know it. It seems to us that this
view is not consistent with even the principles of Hylo-Idealism. Dr.
Lewins specially points out that this system "in no sense denies the
objective, but only contends for identity of object and subject,
proved as it is by natural Realism itself, from the doctrine of
molecular metamorphosis, which shows the Ego continually undergoing
transubstantiation with the 'Non-Ego,' and vice versâ, so far as
to form one indivisible organism." He compares the Ego and the
Non-Ego, that is, subject and object, or our bodies and the "external
universe," to a porous vessel of ice, filled with water, immersed in
an infinite ocean. "What is within and without, and the septum that
seems to divide the two, are all three consubstantial or identical."
If they are identical, however, they must perfectly respond to each
other, which would not be the case if the object in the mind did not
give a true representation of the objects in external nature. Otherwise
the identity of subject and object can be predicated, on the condition
only of abolishing the "external universe," and affirming of it, as
Dr. Lewins affirms of the stars, "What you see is a vision, or organic
function, of your own sensifacient organism."
We have not space to critically consider Miss Naden's essay on
"Evolutionary Ethics," which is a valuable study in Sociology. She
gives logical form to Mr. Herbert Spencer's quasi-utilitarian system
in the words, "the inclination is always in the direction most
pleasurable or least painful; the results of the action, if it
be a moral one, are such as in the long run and on a large scale,
must increase happiness; but the object of the action need not be
connected in the mind of the actor with any thought of happiness,
personal or general." The practical objection to this view of moral
conduct is the reference to personal happiness. This should be
excluded altogether as an actual motive of such conduct where self is
the chief object concerned. Here duty or virtue should be the guiding
principle, as it should be ultimately in all moral conduct. This
indeed is really admitted when it is said that rational utilitarianism
"aims, not straight at happiness, but at the essential conditions
of happiness." The weak point in Mr. Spencer's system of ethics is
the origin it assigns for the altruistic sentiment. This is based in
sympathy, the germ of which, says our author, is to be found in the
fact that the ideal or "representative" world possesses an emotional
aspect and therefore "the thought of a fellow creature carries with it
the thought of his feelings." This thought is not necessarily, however,
accompanied with an active feeling of sympathy. It requires some other
influence to give it external expression, and this must be sought in
the activity of the sexual instinct. Traced to this source we can
understand how the altruistic sentiment may become instinctive, giving
rise through parental and fraternal affection, to the higher love of
country and of race, which in time will also become instinctive.
In taking leave of Miss Naden's work, we must say that, much as we
disagree with its Hylo-Idealistic views, it deserves to be read by all
who are interested in the search for the key to the great problem of
nature. Its examination of the logical system of Kant is slight, and
it is not surprising, therefore, that the name of the great German
philosopher is omitted from among the precursors of Darwin. Miss Naden
is in error, too, in describing Haeckel as a pronounced Materialist. He
is no more so than was Darwin himself. Such mistakes were probably due
to the bent of the mind of our authoress, whose too early death is a
loss to the cause of truth and to humanity itself.
Ω.
EMBLEMATIC MOUNDS AND ANIMAL EFFIGIES. By Stephen D. Peet. Chicago:
American Antiquarian office.
The author of this work is well known, not only as the editor of
the American Antiquarian, but as a careful explorer of aboriginal
monuments in the Northwest. His attention has not been limited,
however, to the results of personal observation; he has utilised the
researches of other explorers, and is thus able to present to his
readers an amazing amount of information, which is rendered doubly
valuable by the profuse use of maps and illustrations. The points which
Mr. Peet has sought to bring out in his book are, that (1) the works
described as effigies were imitations of the wild animals which were
once common in the region where they are found, which is chiefly in
Wisconsin and Ohio, and were also totemic in their character; (2) the
effigies were used for practical purposes, such as screens for hunters,
guards for villages, foundations for houses, heaps on which sentinels
were stationed; (3) they embodied "certain superstitions and customs
which are rarely found, but which are suggestive of the religious
system prevalent in prehistoric times."
The consideration of the first and second of these points does not
come within our province, but it will be interesting to see what
light the curious monuments described throw on the religious ideas
of the aborigines. Mr. Peet states that the location of the effigies
gives the idea of the prevalence among their builders of a kind of
nature-worship. They are closely associated with the natural features
of the earth, "the streams and lakes, hills and valleys, woods and
prairies," being overshadowed by them. The animals represented were
divinities to the people, and the effigies were intended to be symbols
of such divinities, associated for particular reasons with special
localities. In support of this view, Mr. Peet refers to the fact that
the "myths which fix upon scenes in nature are those which remind one
of the animal divinities which were worshipped. The figure of the
moose and the turtle and other animals have been recognised in certain
strange and contorted figures in the rocks and mountains, and myths
have been connected with them, the myth having evidently been made to
account for the resemblances." The most remarkable example of this kind
is the great serpent mound of Adams County, Ohio. Serpent mounds are
found in various other localities, and usually they correspond with the
natural features of the ground on which they are placed.
But if the effigies are to be regarded as symbols of a totemic
animal-worship, it may be thought that they cannot be taken as evidence
of the existence of nature-worship. Mr. Peet remarks, however, that
the symbolism of Ohio was that of sun-worship, and the existence of
this phase of nature-worship among the American aborigines is an
important fact. It connects their religious ideas with those which
were at one time almost universally prevalent in the Old World. The
Sun as the source of life and energy was from an early date the object
round which centered the religious ideas of the ancient world, and the
serpent occupied a chief place as symbolical of the most important of
those ideas. The veneration for deceased ancestors represented similar
ideas with those embodied in sun-worship, and the animal totemism of
which the effigy mounds are symbolic was connected with the latter
superstition through ancestral worship, the mythical ancestor being
identified with the totem. If this is so, the study of the mythology
of the aboriginal inhabitants of this country may be expected to throw
light on the origin of Old World superstitions, and Mr. Peet may be
congratulated on having done so much to make known the symbolical
and other works which will soon be the only relics of an ancient and
wide-spread race.
Ω.
LIFE. By M. J. Savage. Boston: Geo. H. Ellis.
In this volume of sermons we have a most interesting series of studies
on a subject which is probably attracting at the present time more
intelligent interest than at any past epoch. The views entertained
by Mr. Savage are so well known that it is not necessary to give any
elaborate review of the present work. Among other themes he treats of
the Nature and Origin of Life, Goodness and Moral Evil, Life's Meaning,
Nationalism and other social dreams, Morality and Religion. Everywhere
we find much material for thought, and, although from the very nature
of the case many of Mr. Savage's conclusions will not be generally
accepted, his words will be read with more than a passing interest.
His statement that right and wrong "are to be understood by studying
the progress, the development, of the race, just as we find out
any other truth," cannot well be contested by the advocate of any
ethical theory. When he affirms this life "to be only manifestations
as the years go by, out-blossomings everywhere of that life which is
God,—the mystery and yet the explanation of all things," he expresses
an opinion that most men who have given the subject serious thought
will accept—subject only to the reservation that they are allowed to
understand "God" in their own way.
The answer given by Mr. Savage, in his concluding discourse, to the
question "What is it all for?" will meet with less acceptance. He
remarks that all the theories which can be found as to the outcome
of things are only variations of three chief theories: (1) that of
a future life of rewards and punishments, the theory of Milton's
"Paradise Lost"; (2) that of M. Comte, which is well named the religion
of humanity; (3) that which regards spirit as having the pre-eminence
over matter. As to the first theory, Mr. Savage declares it to be
condemned by the intellect, the heart, and the conscience of men. He
affirms that the second theory ends in nothing, and he endorses the
statement of Mr. John Fiske, that "considered intellectually, such a
theory puts the world to permanent intellectual confusion." Mr. Savage,
therefore, accepts the third theory which "makes immortality a wholly
rational thought." He sees the proof of it in the existence of the
brain, the conscience, the heart of man, which "are prophecies, since
they are the expression of the nature of things, and since they demand
the perfect thought, and love, and right."
Ω.
PROTOPLASM AND LIFE. By Charles F. Cox, M. A. New York: N. D. C.
Hodges.
The first part of Mr. Cox's contribution to the study of what may be
termed the literature of the interesting subject he discusses, treats
of the Cell doctrine. He traces clearly the changes that have taken
place in the protoplasm theory, to which that doctrine belongs, with
particular reference to Doctor Beale's germinal matter and Prof.
Huxley's physical basis of life. In his summary of conclusions,
Mr. Cox shows that the original idea of the cell, as propounded by
Schleiden and Schwann, has gradually faded away. As he states, the
attention of the defenders of the cell doctrine has been forced from
one position to another until it is fixed on a germinal point. The same
fate has befallen Dr. Beale's ideal living matter, which if an actually
visible thing is reduced to "a mere skeleton of his original bioplasm,"
an attenuated reticulum; while Huxley's physical basis of life, like
his Bathybius, is relegated to the realm of the imagination. Thus
there is "no one visible and tangible substance to which the name
protoplasm is rigidly and exclusively applied." Mr. Cox's conclusion as
to the nature of the basal life-stuff is that "the only admissible
alternative is matter plus vitality or matter minus vitality." This
brings us to "the impassable gulf between the not-living and the
living"; which we would observe, however, might cease to be impassable
if we could properly define the terms "matter" and "vitality."
The second part of Mr. Cox's brochure is devoted to a consideration
of the spontaneous generation theory, and its relation to the general
theory of evolution. Mr. Cox's personal conclusion is, that, to the
better part of the scientific authorities, "the spontaneous generation
theory is a necessary part of the general theory of evolution, but
that no experimental evidence has as yet been produced in support of
the belief in the occurrence of abiogenesis, and that therefore the
evolution theory hangs upon a link of pure faith." Mr. Cox finds in the
gap between lifeless substances and living forms the veritable "Missing
Link."
Ω.
NOUVEAUX APERÇUS SUR LA PHYLOGENIE DE L'HOMME. By Madame Clémence
Royer. Extracted from the Bulletin de la Société d'Anthropologie
for 1890.
Madame Royer, in this admirable memoir, taking for a text the fact
that an Australian lizard was seen by M. de Vis walking on its hind
feet, criticises severely Haeckel's genealogy of man, whose line of
descent she declares to be distinct from that of the apes. The first
terrestrial ancestors of man and of other anthropomorphous animals
issued from pelagic forms of distinct origins, whose evolution had
been parallel, but the human ancestors acquired the upright position
in a phase of amphibious ichthyophagy, while the ape ancestors adapted
themselves directly to an oblique position. This original difference of
attitude adapted men from the first to an entirely pedestrian motion,
and the apes to a life more or less arboreal, but neither men nor apes
have had any terrestrial ancestor adapted to the horizontal position.
Ω.
LE MONDE COMME VOLONTÉ ET COMME REPRESENTATION. Par Arthur
Schopenhauer. Traduit en Français par A. Burdeau. Tome
troisième. Paris: Félix Alcan.
M. Burdeau's translation of the chief work of the renowned philosopher
of pessimism is the only perfect translation into the French language.
It is made with a scrupulous exactness, and its style is said to be as
clear as that of Schopenhauer himself, "by which he is distinguished
from all other German philosophers and is recognised as a disciple
of Voltaire, Rousseau, and Chamfort." The present volume contains
important appendices in which Schopenhauer recapitulated and developed
various points treated of in the first edition of his work. We may
refer particularly to the chapters on Instinct, Genius, Insanity, the
Metaphysic of Music, and the Metaphysic of Love.
DIE HYPNOSE UND DIE DAMIT VERWANDTEN NORMALEN ZUSTAENDE. Vorlesungen
gehalten an der Universität Kopenhagen im Herbste 1889. By Alfred
Lehmann, Ph. D. Leipsic: O. R. Reisland.
This little book will in one respect be of special interest to
psychologists. The author confesses in the preface that when he
commenced his hypnotic investigations, he attempted to explain the
facts under consideration by the Cartesian theory which hitherto, he
says, had proved perfectly sufficient to explain the data of normal
soul-life. What the author understands by the Cartesian theory appears
from the following passage:
"The popular conception of the relation between soul and body is, that
the soul is a being distinct from the body and endowed with certain
faculties. This conception is still defended by a certain, not very
numerous school of philosophers whom we may briefly call Cartesians
from the fact that their theory can be traced back to Descartes,
although in the lapse of time it has been considerably modified."
In a word the Cartesian theory is the theory that still accepts the
existence of a mythical or metaphysical soul-unity called the ego. Dr.
Lehmann says:
"It was argued since 'I' in spite of a constant change of my
consciousness, am in possession of the certainty that it is the same
identical 'I' that has all these states, sensations, feelings, this
'I' or the soul must be a unity. And this unity must stand in a causal
connection with the outside world, with the domain of nature in the
widest sense of the word," etc.
It is perhaps exceptional that a teacher at a University of Protestant
Northern Europe has been under the influence of Cartesianism, but it
is highly commendable that he openly confesses his change of opinion
because the facts under observation demonstrate its erroneousness.
Dr. Lehmann no doubt will find that the normal phenomena of psychic
life are by no means in accord with the Cartesian doctrine. Indeed
by showing how the abnormal and normal states agree, he implicitly
confesses that the theory that proves untenable for the former ought
to be regarded as untenable for the latter. We have instances of
men who believe in the Cartesian doctrine, or at least by a natural
predisposition have a tendency to believe in it, wavering in their
belief, because the data of the normal states of psychic life so little
favor the dualism of the great French philosopher. Now it almost
seems as if the discoveries and the strangeness of hypnotic phenomena
had contributed a great deal towards turning the tendency toward a
monistic solution of the psychological problems back to the almost
abandoned dualistic solution. We are fully confident that this reaction
will not last, because in spite of all the strange mysteries that
surround modern hypnotism, it will after all only find a satisfactory
interpretation in some monistic conception.
Dr. Lehmann in abandoning the Cartesian theory, says: "The bodily and
psychical states are as a matter of experience given as two series
intimately connected the one with the other. Their connection can be
explained in two different ways: Either the phenomena of the one are
effects of the other, or both series are effects of one and the same
unknown cause."
Dr. Lehmann considers either solution as a priori equally acceptable,
yet he favors the latter, which might briefly be called (although
the author does not use the expression) "the agnostic solution." Dr.
Lehmann characterises it as "die Spinozistische Annahme" and calls it
Psycho-physical Materialism.
One of his colleagues, Professor Kroman has proposed in his "Logik and
Psychologie" a theory that is called by the same name. Yet Kroman's
psycho-physical materialism, Dr. Lehmann declares, is widely different
from his own; the former being "a mutual causal relation between the
Physical and Psychical within the limits of the Atom," which, says Dr.
Lehmann, "would make the explanation of complex psychical phenomena
impossible."
The psycho-physical materialism of Dr. Lehmann, our author maintains,
agrees in all essential points with the views of Professor Münsterberg
(Freiburg in Baden).[65]
[65] The observations of Professor Münsterberg were reviewed
in The Open Court No. 134.
The laboratory work done by Professor Münsterberg was published after
Dr. Lehmann had finished his lectures. A certain similarity between Dr.
Lehmann's views and those of the Freiburg Professor cannot be denied,
yet it is more than doubtful whether Professor Münsterberg would
recognise this similarity in the same measure as Dr. Lehmann does. The
fact is that Dr. Lehmann has progressed in the direction which the
German school of Wundt has taken; yet he has not as yet reached the
same clearness; he is still entangled in Cartesian ideas, as is shown
by his way of proposing problems: for instance in his treatment of the
problem of will, which he justly calls "der eigentliche Probirstein
der Hypothese," and of Attention, "the most enigmatic of all states
of the soul" (der räthselhafteste aller Seelenzustände). In these
and in other considerations Dr. Lehmann shows that he is still far
from the positive standpoint by which Münsterberg's investigations
are distinguished. It is very strange that in speaking of Attention
M. Ribot's name has not even been alluded to. If the author had
shown a familiarity with some of the monographs of this great French
psychologist, he might have saved himself much work.
κρς.
DER HELIOTROPISMUS DER THIERE UND SEINE UEBEREINSTIMMUNG MIT DEM
HELIOTROPISMUS DER PFLANZEN. By Dr. J. Loeb. Würzburg: Verlag von
George Hertz.
The object of this work is to fill a gap in the treatment of the
subject of animal movement depending on light, and to explain it by
a consideration of the actual facts. After stating that the effect
of light upon animal movement is purely mechanical, and that it is
governed partly by the action of the light as the exciting cause,
and partly by the structure of the sensitive organisation, Dr. Loeb
proceeds, "I will now prove that the direction of the light rays
determines quite generally the movements induced in animals by the
light, no less than the direction of plant movement, and that the
orientation not only of plants but of animals, depends upon the bodily
form of the latter, in so far as the dorsiventral animals themselves
move with the median plane in the direction of the light rays," etc.
The more refrangible are the rays of light the more efficacious is its
mechanical action upon animal and plant movement, which is affected
also by the constant intensity of the light and its temperature. Thus
it appears that the moth's flight into a flame must be considered
as the same mechanical process as, for instance, the motions of
sunflowers, the growth of the sprouting axis in buds, etc. Dr. Loeb's
conclusion that the circumstances which govern the movements of animals
towards the light are conformable to those which have been already
recognised in relation to plant-movement, is supported by numerous
facts, which appear to fully establish the accuracy of his observations
and deductions.
The diligent author who is at present engaged in scientific
investigations at the stazione zoologica in Naples, has in the mean
time published a series of further observations on the same question,
all of which, as was to be expected, corroborate the propositions
set forth in the above mentioned little book. We have before us two
reprints, one from the Biologische Centralblatt, Vol. X, Nos. 5 and
6, 1890, the other the Archiv f. d. ges. Phys., Vol. XLVII, with one
plate and two wood-cuts, the former treating of the heliotropism of
the nauplii of Balanus perforatus, whose periodical migrations are
shown to depend upon the action of the light, the latter discussing the
common features of heliotropism in animals and plants.
UNTERSUCHUNGEN ZUR PHYSIOLOGISCHEN MORPHOLOGIE DER THIERE. 1. UEBER
HETEROMORPHOSE. By Dr. Jacques Loeb. With 1 plate and 3 figures.
Würzburg: George Hertz.
Julius von Sachs, Vöchting, Noll, and other botanists have successfully
opened the way to a knowledge of the growth of plants in their causal
conditions. This method has been applied to the physiology of animals
by Pflüger. The present pamphlet is a contribution to this endeavor by
Dr. Loeb, whose special object has been to determine the laws of the
restoration of lost organs in animal organisms. Botanists have found
that if a plant that has undergone the loss of an organ has to build it
up again, the new organ will be different from the original organ, and
this difference can be determined by law. Dr. Loeb inquires whether the
same can be said of the reconstruction of the lost organs of animals.
There are, as a rule, in animal organisms two poles, viz. the oral
pole, forming the head, and the aboral forming the tail. It has
been generally supposed that living animal substance possesses the
tendency to develop in one special direction oral organs, and in the
other aboral organs. This was called Polarity and is based upon the
experiments of Allman, Trembley, Dalyell, and others. The experiments
of Dr. Loeb, made with the view of testing the polarity theory, show
that it is possible to develop in animals possessing physiologically
distinct heads and tails, heads instead of tails in the aboral pole,
and to do so without any serious interference with the vitality of
the creature. The experiments have been made chiefly on Tubularia
mesembryanthemum, Aglaophenia pluma, Plumularia pinnata, and other
species.
Dr. Loeb proves by his experiments that external conditions control the
reproduction of organs, so that artificially oral organs can be made
to grow where aboral organs have been, and vice versa. It is this
faculty of animal organisms which Dr. Loeb calls heteromorphosis.
κρς.
DIE ETHISCHE BEWEGUNG IN DER RELIGION. By Stanton Coit, Ph. D.
Uebersetzung von Georg von Gizycki. Leipsic: O. R. Reisland.
This series of Sunday lectures by Dr. Stanton Coit, the speaker of the
South Place Ethical Society of London, England, has been translated
into German, in the shape it is now before us, by Dr. Coit's friend
and teacher Prof. George von Gizycki; they have not yet appeared in
English. The South Place Ethical Society is not directly affiliated
to the Ethical Societies of North America, but it stands with them in
friendly relations. Dr. Coit, a native American, is strongly biased
in his views by his American co-workers; he is the youngest among
them, and is, I believe, to be considered as a disciple of Professor
Adler. He has inherited from Professor Adler the idea that we can have
ethics without a world-conception or a religion; yet this idea has been
considerably modified, and an approach to more positive and practical
views is perceptible in many passages of his sermons.
In the lecture "Which Ethics?" Dr. Coit says: "We need (bedürfen) a
theory concerning the universe and our position in it instead of the
old faith." Yet in contradiction to this, he declares that theories
are of little use. He adds: "If two men come down from their abstract
theories into real life and to the forces which create action, it is as
if they descend from two opposite mountain peaks into a warm and rich
valley where rivulets run down from both sides to unite their waters
inseparably into one continuous stream."
Is not this beautiful allegory, true as it certainly is in one sense,
after all misleading? Is not theory and theory different? If theory
means mere speculation, we heartily agree with the proposition to keep
clear of and far away from theorising. It is at best a harmless play,
and certainly a loss of valuable time. Yet if theory means methodical
systematisation of facts, it is not mere waste of time; in that case it
is the indispensable condition of all truly practical work. And it is
this latter kind of theory which also in the practical work of ethical
culture must be sought to be established. We must at least be clear as
to basic principles so that the efforts of ethical teachers may not be
at random, but directed by the progressive spirit of the age in harmony
with our best scientific and philosophic thought.
Concerning religion Dr. Coit says (p. 19) in his article "Why Ethics
Instead of Religion": "My own opinion is that there is one feature
which distinguishes Religion from all other doctrines, ceremonies,
and rules. This feature characterised Matthew Arnold's view. For he
insisted not only upon morals and their importance, and thought of
means for their propagation, but he proclaimed also that there was a
power above the will of man to which he must bow. In the very moment
he proposed that power which we have to obey, his ethics became
religious…. But the recognition of this higher power, if I am allowed
to propose my own views, appears to me of very little importance."
If there is such a power, and we have sufficient reasons not to
doubt its existence, I should say that for ethical purposes it is of
paramount importance to recognise it and to obey it. In another and a
more recent lecture, Dr. Coit pronounces a very different view, he says:
"Anybody who has ever reflected a moment, must have discovered how
dependent he is upon a power outside of his own will. He has no
strength either for good or for evil, which he has made himself. The
more he thinks about it, the deeper must become the feeling of his
dependence. And being aware that God, or whatever we call that power
in all things, does not mind his whims, he will find it easier not to
mind, himself, his own whims. The constant thought that we are not
the powers of life and death, will take away conceit and vanity and
foolishness. And in this way, it brings us in times of tribulation to a
quick resignation. It makes us loving brothers and sons."
Dr. Coit indeed aspires to make of ethical culture a religion for the
people. He speaks on this subject in his last lecture. He opposes
the Churches for mixing their ethics with theology, and he speaks
with great enthusiasm about the poetry of ethics, which is much more
powerful than the prose of ethics. He does not seem to see that the
influence of the churches is mainly due to their poetry of ethics.
Would it not be advisable to point out the prosaic truth in this poetry
for the purpose of freeing the human mind of the obnoxious elements of
a misunderstood poetry? Would it not be advisable to investigate the
poetry of the basic idea in ethics, viz., of the God-idea, so as to let
the ethical movement develop itself historically from the past. Dr.
Coit's method of dealing with the God-idea is far from satisfactory. He
is neither a theist nor an atheist. Sometimes he appears to appreciate
the moral importance of the God-idea in its purified shape, and then
again he seems to consider it as an ethically indifferent idea. Should
not this problem be settled by every one who undertakes to preach
ethics. It appears almost as if all the leaders of the ethical culture
societies underrated the ethical importance and indispensableness of
thought in general and of science and philosophy in particular.
The contradictions which appear in Dr. Coit's lectures show that he is
still developing. The book is full of promise and we have every reason
to hope that its author will overcome the unclearness that is still
lurking in his mind, and that he will grow with the work he is doing.
κρς.
FREMDES UND EIGENES AUS DEM GEISTIGEN LEBEN DER GEGENWART. By Prof. Dr.
Ludwig Büchner. Leipsic: Max Spohr.
Opinions admittedly are still divided with respect to the laudable
efforts of a large class of scientists and writers whose main object
is that of presenting the results of scientific research in an
intelligible, popular form. Every department of the natural sciences,
geology, astronomy, even psychology and comparative philology, each
and all, are now represented by able and ardent popular interpreters,
who at the same time by their aggressive style and by their polemical
methods not unfrequently seem to impart a kind of militant and
apostolic attitude to the cause of science. It must further be
admitted, that many of these writers, by the unanimous verdict of the
present age, are among the most instructive, readable, and actually
the most widely read authors of contemporaneous German, French,
and Anglo-American literature. At first glance, it accordingly may
seem rather strange, that these same popular authors should also be
subjected, not unfrequently, to their commensurate share of unfair, and
even offensive, popular criticism; and yet it could hardly be otherwise.
The well-known writer of these scientific and critical essays, Prof.
Ludwig Büchner, affords an exceptionally striking instance of the
unenviable lot of some of our most popular writers of science. In
one of these essays inscribed "Meine Philosophie," Professor Büchner
has been compelled to defend the arduous work of his laborious life
against a decidedly unfriendly and unappreciative criticism of his
philosophy and whole scientific activity, that some time ago appeared
in the American Freidenker of Milwaukee. Prof. Büchner, with a touch
of legitimate bitterness, repudiates the imputation of having been,
or still being, as he himself calls it, only the "popularisator,"
expounder and commentator, of the theories and systems of other
thinkers; that, on the contrary, in Germany and elsewhere, among
the highest representatives of science, for more than thirty years
Professor Büchner himself has been recognised and honored as an
original worker and thinker. His book on "Force and Matter" (Kraft
und Stoff) was published five years before Darwin's great work on the
"Origin of Species." Subsequently his well-known popular Lectures
in connection with Darwin's work claim the distinguished merit, of
having more widely generalised and extended the Darwinian theory by
embracing the origin and evolution of man, which had until then been
overlooked by Darwin himself. By the contemporary press of Germany
Professor Büchner was then charged with premature rashness, and with
being only a shallow, imitative scientific dilettante; but all this
vituperative criticism was for ever silenced, when in the year 1871
Darwin's own work appeared on the "Descent of Man," in which Darwin
himself accepted all the consequences of the theory of evolution,
as set forth in Professor Büchner's Lectures, and, somewhat later,
in Professor Haeckel's "Natural History of Creation" (Natürliche
Schöpfungsgeschichte). Professor Büchner, moreover, is the author
of the widely popular work "The Future Life and Modern Science"
(Das künftige Leben und die moderne Wissenschaft). To deny him,
accordingly, the rank and merit of a solid and original scientist
and thinker, as he himself says, is to do him a signal injustice, a
positive injury.
Let all this be willingly granted; but this concession, at all
events, does not settle his final, mediating attitude to the entire
satisfaction of philosophy, regarded as an independent science.
Professor Büchner openly declares himself in favor of popular science.
He maintains, that "Philosophy ought to step down from her lofty
state of independent science, and henceforth content herself with the
humble rôle of simply mediating the results of individual scientific
research; that science, in such case, would no longer run the risk
of being exposed to the scorn and contempt of the masses(!) … In
popular scientific writings, at all times, there can and must occur
contradictions, superficial estimates, even trivialities, but all this
is perfectly understood by any fair-minded reader." … These remarks
might almost tempt the reader to believe, that Professor Büchner,
in his eagerness to popularise science, really ignores the value of
philosophy as an independent science, and of philosophical research,
irrespective of all popular results, and that the Professor wishes to
inculcate a narrow and purely utilitarian estimate of philosophy. But,
the impulsive Professor, of course, knows better; his mental vision
embraces the entire field of the sciences, and he has written admirably
and entertainingly upon almost every scientific topic, and moreover he
admits, that possibly he sometimes contradicts himself.
One might further be inclined to ask, whether, in view of his
self-imposed, familiar contact with the popular mind, Professor Büchner
upon the whole displays the expected equanimity and broad-minded
consistency when resenting the harsh criticism of antagonists, which
he does with a singularly thin-skinned sensitiveness scarcely worthy
of a true philosopher. In all his other works and throughout these
critical essays, Professor Büchner himself shows no tender regard
for the feelings of his philosophical antagonists. In the critical
essay "Against Materialism," (Wider den Materialismus), for
example,—mainly directed against Prof. Harald Höffding,—he bluntly
affirms that Professor Höffding's works have produced upon him the
impression that the author is a man without the philosophical and
scientific knowledge requisite for the solution of the problems he has
ventured to approach.
From what has been said, the reader may expect to find much important,
instructive, and readable matter even in Professor Büchner's critical
essays, bearing upon the intellectual life of the period; but he also
must be prepared to find them leavened in no small degree with the
characteristic mental idiosyncrasies of their ever polemical author.
γνλν.
DEACON HERBERT'S BIBLE CLASS. By James Freeman Clarke. Boston: Geo.
H. Ellis.
This booklet is an unassuming little publication, but it is important
as a symptom of the times. It was written by the late Mr. James
Freeman Clarke many years ago as a series of papers for the Christian
Inquirer. Yet it is well that they should not be forgotten and the
lessons contained therein should be heeded by the clergy as well as the
laity of this country. It is an attempt to make religion practical and
to point out the true direction in which church-life has to develop.
There is a great truth in the general complaint made throughout the
world that the religion of civilised mankind, especially Christianity
in the shape it exists at present, has lost its life, its influence,
and its usefulness. Our religious views must be transformed, they must
be reconciled with the principles of science and must be adapted to the
real needs of the people. The problem is, how to do it.
If a solution of the problem shall be found, it is certain that it will
be first put into practice in the United States of America; for here
the church is free. The many different churches of our country, with
few exceptions (the Roman Catholic Church is perhaps the only one) are
in principle churches of the people. A change of opinion, of belief, of
religious conviction among the people will result in the appointment of
such pastors and leaders as are in agreement with their congregations.
Clergy and laity form here one organic body. The clergy are not imposed
upon their congregations by the state; they are the exponents of their
congregations, the representatives of the religious ideas (perhaps upon
the whole of the conservative religious ideas) of their churches.
How different things are in Europe, where the state-churches of England
and Germany, for instance, prevent all progress in religion, theology,
and church-life.
Mr. Clarke's book, if read with these considerations in mind, shows
the agencies that are at work in this country and that will (as we
confidently hope) result in a new phase of religious life. Among the
chapters of the book we note the following titles: "The way we helped
our minister to write good sermons"; "Aim of Life"; "Temptation of
Jesus"; "The Miracles"; "The Sermon on the Mount"; and others. The
spirit in which the book is written is not exactly rationalistic,
yet it shows in every line a strong monistic bias. For instance, the
usual definition of miracles as a suspension of the laws of nature is
discarded; and yet it would be erroneous to suppose that the style
of the book is marked by a radical tendency. Not at all. Every
faithful Christian can read it line for line without feeling the least
offence. But it is plain that herein lies the author's force. The
book is popular, but behind its popularity, unusual depth of thought
is noticeable. In a similar way St. Paul gave milk to his followers
because they were babes in Christ, and could not bear heavier food.
Mr. Clarke's book is written especially for babes in Christ, yet
every one who has given any serious thought to the religious problem
will appreciate at once the difficulty and the importance of such an
undertaking.
κρς.