Popular Science Monthly/Volume 20/February 1882/Literary Notices
The Concepts and Theories of Modern Physics. By J. B. Stallo. International Scientific Series. D Appleton & Co. Pp. 313. Price, $1.75.
We last month called attention to this work as one of the ablest in the series to which it has been contributed. It is not devoted to the extension of any branch of science, but is an inquiry into the validity of some of the conceptions which are commonly accepted as at the foundation of all science. It is therefore, as might be expected, a profound book. Dealing not with the operations or results of the special sciences, but with the laws of thought by which science is created, and showing how radical scientific conceptions require to be still further corrected and clarified, and presenting the case with a closeness of reasoning that can not be further compacted, the volume would be discouragingly difficult but for the perfect art of its exposition and the crystal clearness of its style. It is much easier to characterize this book than to analyze or review it. In a brief notice, we can convey only a general idea of its purpose, and this may perhaps be best done by referring to some of the circumstances in which it originated.
It may be proper to say that the author is a German by birth, and came to this country at about the age of seventeen. He was early familiar with science, and after his arrival in the United States, as we are informed, he lectured on chemistry for some years in an Eastern college. But he at length concluded to adopt the profession of law, and chose Cincinnati as his residence. Pursuing his profession successfully, Judge Stallo became widely known as a gentleman of scholarly accomplishments, of independent opinions, and liberal politics.
But he is also remembered by many as an author, having a number of years ago written a metaphysical treatise of such marked ability for one of his youthful years, that the most brilliant expectations were formed of his intellectual future. But as time passed, and nothing further was heard from him in the way of book-making, it was thought that he had abandoned his scholarly studies and, German though he was, had succumbed to the American passion for money-making. So much, at least, we have heard said by the disappointed admirers of his early work.
Yet Judge Stallo had neither lost his interest in philosophical studies nor relinquished their pursuit. Though business, public duties, and the care and culture of a growing family, had imperative claims, all his leisure hours were given with great assiduity to the work of systematic original inquiry—an inquiry, moreover, that was strictly in the line of his early intellectual efforts.
Our author has therefore not been idle. Yet there were obviously strong reasons connected with the nature of his investigations which compelled delay in the publication of his views. The task which he assigned to himself was not only one that involved comprehensive research and prolonged reflection, but it was the result of a profound revolution in his own mental history. Judge Stallo's two books, though separated in their dates by a generation of time, are far more widely separated in their ideas and purposes. They represent opposite schools of doctrine, opposite poles of thought, and different stages of mental growth in the race. The first was thoroughly metaphysical and the last is even more rigorously scientific. Judge Stallo has passed from one method of thought to another by slow processes of intellectual growth which required time as well as exertion, and he has pushed further on in the scientific direction and away from the metaphysical position than perhaps any other writer. How complete has been the revolution in his own mind is well illustrated by a passage in his preface referring to his former work.
He says: "I deem it important to have it understood at the outset, that this treatise is in no sense a further exposition of the doctrines of a book ('The Philosophy of Nature'—Boston: Crosby & Nichols, 1848) which I published more than a third of a century ago. That book was written while I was under the spell of Hegel's ontological reveries—at a time when I was barely of age, and still seriously affected with the metaphysical malady which seems to be one of the unavoidable disorders of intellectual infancy. The labor expended in writing it was not, perhaps, wholly wasted, and there are things in it of which I am not ashamed, even at this day. Cut I sincerely regret its publication, which is in some degree atoned for, I hope, by the contents of the present volume."
Having slowly recovered from his serious Hegelian attack and mastered in a very thorough manner the principles and methods of modern physical science, it was inevitable that Judge Stallo's attention should be forcibly drawn to the relations of these two systems, and to the question how far science is still dominated by the old metaphysical method. It is his opinion that the metaphysical influence lingers and rules in scientific thought to a greater degree than is commonly suspected. It is generally supposed that physical science, at any rate, has quite freed itself from the mischievous tendencies of metaphysical speculation, and that Newton's admonition to the physicists, "to beware of metaphysics," has been so effectually heeded that this branch of investigation may be taken as illustrating the true scientific method in its purity and perfection. The author of the "Concepts and Theories of Modern Physics" holds that this assumption is but partially true, and the present work is devoted to a comprehensive examination of what may be regarded as basal theories of physics, to the evidence that may be given of their errors, and to tracing out the metaphysical origin of these errors. We can not here do better than to restate his position as given by himself in the preface to his book: "It will be seen at once, upon a most cursory glance at any one of the chapters of this little book, that it is in no wise intended as an open or covert advocacy of a return to metaphysical methods and aims; but that, on the contrary, its tendency is throughout to eliminate from science its latent metaphysical elements, to foster and not to repress the spirit of experimental investigation, and to accredit instead of discrediting the great endeavor of scientific research to gain a sure foothold on solid, empirical ground, where the real data of experience may be reduced without ontological prepossessions. An attentive perusal of these pages will make it clear, I think, that this endeavor is continually thwarted by the insidious intrusion into the meditations of the man of science of the old metaphysical spirit. This fact having been established, it was incumbent on me to ascertain, if possible, its causes and, within the narrow limits at my command, to develop its consequences."
The first or introductory chapter of Judge Stallo's book is devoted to a statement of those theoretical ideas which are maintained to be fundamental in physical science. These involve the mechanical conception of the constitution of matter, or the atomomolecular theory. A large number of the most authoritative writers are quoted, who agree that, in the language of Du Bois-Reymond, "the resolution of all changes in the material world into motions of atoms, caused by their constant central forces, would be the completion of natural science." The author sums up the doctrine as follows: "The mechanical theory of the universe undertakes to account for all physical phenomena by describing them as variances in the structure or configuration of material systems. It strives to apprehend all phenomenal diversities in the material world as varieties in the grouping of primordial units of mass, to recognize all phenomenal changes as movements of unchangeable elements, and thus to exhibit all apparent qualitative heterogeneity as mere quantitative difference."
The second chapter is devoted to an exposition of the general principles of the mechanical theory, which may! very briefly summed up in four propositions, as follows:
1. The elementary units of mass being simple, are in all respects equal.
2. They are absolutely hard and inelastic.
3. They are absolutely inert, and therefore purely passive.
4. All potential energy, so called, is in reality kinetic.
In the next six chapters these propositions are taken up in their order, with the view of ascertaining to what extent they are consistent with each other, and how far they serve as explanations of the facts of scientific experience. It here comes out that there is a profound anarchy in the views of the ablest scientists regarding ultimate scientific questions. Judge Stallo discusses the accepted theories with great critical skill and logical force, showing their short-comings and contradictions, and proving conclusively that what is now most needed is a thorough-going re-examination of the grounds of what is currently regarded as established scientific theory.
The eight chapters of the work to which we here refer are worthy of being very carefully studied on their own merits as expositions and criticisms of scientific theory. But the author's analysis brings out a group of errors, of which he finds it necessary to seek the sources and parentage. This opens to him (Chapter IX) the interesting problem of the relation of thoughts to things, the formation of concepts, and the consideration of metaphysical theories. He then passes, in Chapters X, XI, and XII, to an examination of the character and origin of the mechanical theory, and points out successively how it exemplifies four radical errors of metaphysics. The nature of these errors we have no space here to explain, but the author shows that they extend much further in their vitiating influence than to the mechanical theory of the constitution of material nature. In Chapter XIII he still further develops the general argument by explaining how the same metaphysical fallacies that taint our theoretical physics have given rise to modern transcendental geometry and the new doctrine of space, with four or more dimensions. In Chapter XIV this subject of meta-geometrical space is pursued in the light of modern analysis, and by an examination of Riemann'a celebrated essay upon this subject. The further ramifications of metaphysical error in science are then followed out in Chapter XV into cosmological and cosmogenetic speculations, with a consideration of the nebular hypothesis. Chapter XVI concludes the work, with a summary of important portions of the previous discussion, and some further interesting reflections on the present attitude of chemical philosophy.
In regard to the atomic theory in chemistry, Judge Stallo does not deny its usefulness as a graphic device for representing chemical and physical transformations. He recognizes it as "a fact beyond dispute that chemistry owes a great part of its practical advance' to its use, and that the structural formulas founded upon it have enabled the chemist, not merely to trace the connection and mutual dependence of the various stages in the metamorphosis of 'elements' and 'compounds,' so called, but in many cases (such as that of the hydrocarbon series in organic chemistry) successfully to anticipate the results of experimental research."
But the convenience of hypothetical devices can not prove their truth. In the advance toward higher science, erroneous views are often the efficient instruments of progression. The history of science is full of the utilities of erroneous theory. Early astronomy, as so well shown by Whewell, was mainly developed by the help of the false theory of epicycles. Experimental chemistry, as pointed out by Liebig, originated under the influence of the false notion of the transmutability of the metals; while its later advances were largely due to the erroneous hypothesis of phlogiston. So the atomic hypothesis has carried it on still further, but this no more proves it to be true than it did the preceding hypotheses. The scaffoldings of construction, important, indispensable as they may be, arc not to be identified with the edifice.
This scanty outline of the author's argument will serve only to suggest the nature of the problems with which he is engaged. The book must be read deliberately, must be studied to be appreciated; but the students of science, as well as those of physics, are certain to be deeply interested in its logical developments. It is a timely and telling contribution to the philosophy of science, imperatively called for by the present exigencies in the progress of knowledge. It is to be commended equally for the solid value of its contents and the scholarly finish of its execution.
The French Revolution. By Hippolyte Adolphe Taine, D. C. L., Oxon. Translated by John Durand. Vols. I, II. New York: Henry Holt & Co. 1878, 1881. 8vo. $2.50 per vol.
Of the three volumes which are to complete M. Taine's "French Revolution" two are now published, continuing the study which was begun in his preceding work on "The Ancient Régime." The two works form parts of a continuous series, which the author calls "The Origins of Contemporary France." Of this extensive subject M. Taine says that he has limited his treatment, primarily, to the consideration of its governmental aspects. In the work he tells us: "There will be found only the history of public powers. Other historians will write that of diplomacy, of war, of the finances, of the Church; my subject is a limited one."
What are the themes of the two volumes before us? Briefly: the first shows how "popular insurrections and the laws of the Constituent Assembly end in destroying all government in France"; the second, how "a party arises around an extreme doctrine, gets possession of the power, and exercises it in conformity with that doctrine." That doctrine was found in the generalizations of Jean Jacques Rousseau. The philosopher who generalizes must forget a great many facts. In a vein of delicate irony M. Taine says of his countrymen: "Almost all of them, more fortunate than myself, have political principles which serve them in forming their judgments of the past—I had none; if, indeed, I had any motive in undertaking this work, it was to seek for political principles. Thus far I have attained to scarcely more than one, and this so simple that it will seem puerile. It consista wholly in this observation: that human society, especially a modern society, is a vast and complicated thing."
In this order of M. Taine's method; in this limitation to a definite aspect of the phenomena presented; in this avoidance of stock conceptions; and in this perception of the infinite differentiation of the phenomena—we may already perceive that we have come upon something quite different, in the way of written history, from anything that the merely literary method ever presented. M. Taine has spared no trouble to get his facts at first hand. "The most trustworthy testimony is that of the eyewitness, especially when this witness is an honorable, attentive, and intelligent man, writing on the spot at the moment and under the dictation of the facts themselves—if it be manifest that his sole object is to preserve or furnish information." In the national archives M. Taine has had access to a great amount of manuscript testimony of this sort. On the other hand, the Jacobin documents, infinite in quantity, the vast masses of "polemics planned for the needs of a cause," of "eloquence arranged for popular effect," are worthless, except as they show the character of their sources; and yet they must be examined. "Never has so much been said to so little purpose. The historian may read kilometres of it, but he rarely finds one fact, one detail of interest, one document which calls up in his mind a physiognomy, the actual sentiments of either villager or gentleman, a graphic picture of the interior of an hôtel-de-ville or a barrack, of a municipal council-chamber, or of the character of an insurrection."
How has M. Taine applied his methods to the facts thus garnered? In the first place, he has grouped the events of which he treats according to their causal relations, and often, therefore, in anything but the close sequence of dates. Nothing has puzzled his critics so much as this feature of his treatment: his book has been much the worst stumbling-block in the path of the routine reviewers, American and English, that has fallen in their way for years. M. Taine is not now writing a school-book, with a new date for each new paragraph: he is writing for readers to whom a formal knowledge, at least, of the most important crises in modern history is a matter of course. To recite dates in sequence is, indeed, not only the schoolmaster's idea of history: it is the old, popular, easy way, which nearly all the English historians have followed until very recent times. In France, Montesquieu was probably the first great writer who saw that the schoolmaster's idea of history, as a series of dates, and the merely literary man's idea of history, like Carlyle's, as a succession of tableaux, were alike insufficient. Burckhardt, in his recent history of the "Italian Renaissance," seized the true idea; to discriminate, namely, the important lines of tendency in the given era, and to group the facts which bear upon each line, whether causally or consequentially. Burckhardt has pushed the method perhaps too far, making his work as much a group of essays as a history. But M. Taine keeps to clearly discriminable phases of the movements which made up the great Revolution; as indicated, for instance, in the book-divisions of these two volumes: I. "Spontaneous Anarchy"; II. "The Constituent Assembly"; III. "The Application of the Constitution"; TV. "The Jacobin Conquest."
We have dwelt thus long upon M. Taine's method because it is a feature which has been appreciated, so far as we know, by none of his critics in America—a country little given to historical studies; and, also, because that method is clearly associated with modern English philosophy. It remains to ask what M. Taine's conclusions are upon a theme which has occupied and baffled so many English historians before him.
As a visible thing the French Revolution began with the dearth of crops in 1788-'89. The "Reign of Terror" included the sixteen months from March, 1793, to July, 1791. The Revolution ended in October, 1795, with the suppression, by Napoleon, of the insurrection of the sections against the Convention. The present narrative includes the events of 1792. Under the old régime, two acres out of every five in France, as Voltaire expressed it, were in the hands of the clergy; and those two acres were generally the best of the five. A half of the peasant's earnings, or more, went to the church, the nobility, and the state. That was the substantial grievance which prepared the way for the Revolution. But other countries have had equally substantial grievances without any subsequent revolution. What, then, determined the Revolution of 1789?
By far the most important second cause, as a determinant, was a single book, Rousseau's "Contrat Social." That book was a triumph of the literary method in social science; it made the worse appear the better reason, and with such lucidity, such fatal persuasiveness, as even France had never known before. In a few words the orators—the mass of the people could not read—had made its principles familiar throughout Fiance. The "Social Contract" defines the modern citizen by "eliminating the differences which distinguish a Frenchman from a Papuan, a modern Englishman from a Briton in the time of Cæsar. The resulting essence is very meager: it is 'a being with a desire to be happy and the faculty of reasoning'"—after Jean Jacques Rousseau. The French agitators consider the nation as composed of twenty-six millions of equal, free, and independent entities of this description, without obligations, institutions, or history; and free at any moment to make a social contract, de novo, of their own. Physical oppression, followed by this intellectual hallucination, disintegrated the most elaborate social structure of modern times. The fabric stood after it had lost the power to sustain itself, awaiting the first chance shock to topple it over. That shock was given by the failure of the crops in 1788, and the consequent half-starvation of the laboring-classes. The Revolution, begun in moderation, went rapidly on to madness; the power fell into the vilest hands. The general course of events is summarized in M. Taine's comparison as follows:
"A workman, overtaxed, in misery and badly fed, takes to drink. After a few years his nervous system, already weakened by spare diet, becomes over-excited, out of balance. An hour comes when the brain, under a sudden stroke, ceases to direct the machine; each limb, acting separately and for itself, starts convulsively. Meanwhile, the man thinks himself a millionaire, or a king; he sings and shouts; he drinks more than ever. At last his face grows dark; radiant visions give way to monstrous phantoms; he sees nothing but menacing figures, murderers ready to cut his throat. Then he makes a spring: in order that he may not be killed, he kills. No one is more to be dreaded, for his delirium sustains him; his strength is prodigious. . . . So France, exhausted by fasting under the monarchy, made drunk by the drug of the 'Social Contract,' and other fiery beverages, is struck by paralysis of the brain. She is about to enter upon the period of somber delirium. Behold her capable of daring, suffering, and doing all, capable of incredible exploits and of abominable barbarities." It remains only to add that Mr. Durand's translation aims primarily at accuracy, but that he has preserved much of the effectiveness, also, of M. Taine's vivid style.
The Harrowgate Waters: Data, Chemical and Therapeutical, with Notes on the Climate of Harrowgate. By George Oliver, M. D. London: E. Lewis. Philadelphia: Presley Blakiston. Pp. 224.
Harrowgate is a kind of British Saratoga, having within a district of two miles eighty medicinal springs, no two of which are alike, and some of which are asserted to be, both from a chemical and from a therapeutical stand-point, unrivaled elsewhere. For these, and for certain climatal advantages ascribed to the place, it is claimed to be far superior to all other English health resorts. The volume, which is addressed particularly to medical readers, aims to give a scientifically correct account of the qualities of the waters, the diseases they are good for, and the most efficient methods of application.
Report of the Commissioner of Education for the Year 1879. Washington: Government Printing-Office. Pp. 757.
The commissioner is able to report a continually increasing demand upon his office for information, the present demand being greater than ever before. The multitude of details embraced in the report do not admit of collation into a paragraph, and we can only refer to a few isolated facts. The colored schools numbered 14,472, and their pupils 700,360, of whom 1,933 were college and 903 were professional students. Normal schools were established in all the States except Delaware, Florida, and Nevada; and they sent out during 1879 3,347 graduates. The Kindergartens were increasing, but under private enterprise, while the attempt to introduce them into the public-school system was attended with embarrassment. The condition of scientific and technical schools was promising; and the institutions, having excited the people to an appreciation of scientific methods and processes in their application to agriculture and the mechanic arts, were rising in favor. Regarding original investigations and publications by professors in American schools, the commissioner remarks that "it is a matter of just pride that our institutions are extending their activities in this direction, and that their publications and their positive contributions to the progress of science receive honorable recognition from the scholars of other nations."
Mechanics' Liens, how Acquired and Enforced. A Treatise referring to and citing the latest Statutes and Decisions, and designed for General Circulation among Lawyers, Builders, Mechanics, and Owners. To which is added an Appendix of Forms. By James T. Hoyt, of the New York Bar. New York: P. F. McBreen. Pp. 310. Price, $2.25.
The subject of this book is of immediate interest to every property-owner and every workman, for every owner's property may become the object of a lien, and the workman of nearly every class may be in a position to hold a claim of that nature. It is therefore important to both classes to be able to know what a lien is, under what conditions it may exist, and what is the law relative to it. This the book aims to tell, as briefly as is possible consistently with giving a satisfactory statement. The author has examined more than a thousand legal authorities on the subject, and has arranged the whole mass of information which he has collected covering the whole case, so far as has been decided, in chapters, each of which covers a particular department. The points are presented briefly and clearly, and each one is enforced by a reference to the particular law or decision by which it is made effective. The work has been prepared with especial reference to the city and the State of New York, but the principles it embodies are of general application.
Report upon United States Geographical Surveys west of the One Hundredth Meridian, in charge of First-Lieutenant George M. Wheeler, Corps of Engineers, U. S. Army, under the Direction of Brigadier-General A. A. Humphreys, Chief of Engineers, U. S. Army. Published by authority of the Secretary of War. Vol. VII, Archæology. Washington: Government Printing-Office. Pp. 497, with 22 Plates.
This volume, which is put forth in a style and with a character of illustration worthy of the work to which it relates, and of the government under which the work is carried on, includes reports upon the archaeologically and ethnological collections from the vicinity of Santa Barbara, California, and from ruined pueblos of Arizona and New Mexico, and certain interior tribes, which have been prepared by Mr. Frederick W. Putnam, of the Peabody Museum, assisted by Drs. C. C. Abbott, S. S. Haldeman, A. C. Yarrow, and Messrs. H. W. Henshaw and Lucian Carr; and an appendix of Indian vocabularies, revised and prepared by Albert S. Gatschet. The vocabularies have been gathered from forty distinct localities, and are divisible into seven distinct stocks. The entire contribution represented by the book, says Lieutenant Wheeler, "has resulted from the incidental labors of members of several expeditions, and but points the way to a large and almost untrodden field of research among aboriginal remains."
English History for Students: Being the Introduction to the Study of English History. By Samuel R. Gardiner, Hon. LL. D., Professor of Modern History in King's College, London. With a Critical and Biographical Account of Authorities, by J. Bass Mullinger, M. A., St. John's College, Cambridge. New York: Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 424. Price, $2.25.
In the first (Professor Gardiner's) part of this volume are considered the growth and development of English civil and political institutions from their origins; which origins, as the introductory chapter shows, are ultimately found at the beginnings of history. The principle is kept in view throughout that the bearing and meaning of every event are largely determined by the events that preceded it, and that it in turn exerts its influence on the events that follow. "By knowing this relation, the inquirer learns not merely what took place, but why it took place." Moreover, "the personalities of history are not merely figures flitting across a stage, of whom it is enough to learn the motives and the actions. They are themselves the result of causes which existed generations before they were born, and influence results for generations after they die." We can not, therefore, "study a generation of men as if it could be isolated and examined like a piece of inorganic matter," but must bear in mind that it is a portion of a living whole which is under observation. Professor Gardiner regards his part as really an introduction to Mr. Mullinger's account of authorities, which forms full half of the volume. It has been Mr. Mullinger's aim in this part carefully to distinguish the contemporary sources of information for each period from the sources of later times, and to supply, where practicable, such an amount of comment as will enable the student to form a fairly accurate notion of each author's value as an authority.
First Annual Report of the United States Geological Survey to the Hon. Carl Schurz, Secretary of the Interior. By Clarence King, Director. Washington: Government Printing-Office. Pp. 79, with Map.
The present report reviews the operations of the survey during 1879-'80 in the four geological districts into which Mr. King has divided his work, and which are described in the text and clearly defined in the map as the divisions of the Rocky Mountains, the Colorado, the Great Basin, and the Pacific. Special attention is given to some particular feature or features in each district, so that the report may be regarded as consisting in large part of monographs on Leadville, Lake Bonneville, the Uinkaret and Grand Cañon districts of Colorado, and the San Francisco, Eureka, and Bodie districts of California and Nevada, and the Comstock Lode, each by the assistant geologist in whose particular field the subject fell. Information of a general character respecting mining resources and industries has been derived from officers of the Census Bureau, whose co-operation Mr. King enjoyed, and is added to the special reports. A pica is made for the extension of the system of Government surveys over all the States—a step which political economists would deprecate, and which men of science are not disposed to believe would be of any real advantage to the cause they serve.
A Manual of Sugar Analysis: Including the Applications in General of Analytical Methods to the Sugar Industry. With an Introduction on the Chemistry of Cane-Sugar, Dextrose, Levulose, and Milk-Sugar. By J. H. Tucker, Ph. D. New York: D. Van Nostrand. Pp. 353. Price, 3.50.
This book supplies a want, there being no work in English that treats of sugar analysis, and only a few scattered and incomplete dictionary articles. Yet a great amount and variety of analytical work are required for the various interests connected with sugar, and it is not always convenient for the chemist to have to depend upon German and French treatises, numerous and good though they may be. The author, in endeavoring to fill this gap in chemical literature, has brought the matter up to the present time, and believes that he has given fuller treatment to some points than can be found elsewhere.
Book of the Black Bass: Comprising its Complete Scientific and Life History, together with a Practical Treatise on Angling and Fly-Fishing, and a Full Description of Tools, Tackle, and Implements. By James A. Henshall, M. D. Fully illustrated Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co. Pp. 463. Price, $3.
The author is regarded as an authority on the black bass, and is an expert angler. He has apparently embodied in this volume all the lore on the subject, giving the color of justice to the publisher's assertion that it is the most complete and exhaustive monograph ever published upon any game-fish. The fish itself deserves the most respectful treatment, for it is a game-fish of the highest order, is pre-eminently American, inhabits the whole United States cast of the Rocky Mountains, except New England and the Atlantic waters of the Middle States, and is found also in Eastern Mexico. Its scientific treatment has hitherto been unsatisfactory, for different authors have not been able to agree as to whether there should be two or four or more species, in what the specific differences should consist, and what the names should be. The author gives one hundred and thirty-two pages to the consideration of what has been written on this subject, and adds his own views that there are two species, the large-mouthed (Micropterus salmoides) and the small-mouthed (Micropterus dolomicu), which are apt to sport into indefinite varieties. He gives his own descriptions of the fish and its habits, and fills half the volume with descriptions and suggestions respecting bass fishing tackle, and the methods of fishing.
An Artistic Treatise on the Human Figure: Containing Hints on Proportion, Color, and Composition. By Henry Warren, K. L., author of "Artistic Anatomy," etc. Edited by Susan N. Carter, Principal of the Woman's Art School, Cooper Union. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 82. Price, 50 cents.
A manual of suggestions, adapted to practical application, in one of the most important departments of art. The author seeks to point out errors in the present systems of drawing the figure—errors arising out of unconsidered conditions of placement and pose; to explain what is natural and what is merely conventional. Color and chiaro-oscûro, handling and manipulation, are touched upon. Generally, enough is attempted to set the student thinking upon the best means of economizing the time which he has at his disposal.
The Wandering Jew. By Moncure Daniel Conway, author of "Demonology and Devil Lore." New York: Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 292. Price, $1.50.
Mr. Conway in this work considers the legend of the Wandering Jew in all the forms which it has assumed in different countries. As reasons for undertaking the work he offers: no other treatise on the same subject exists in our language; in the pamphlets that have appeared in other languages, the relations of the legend with Eastern mythology have been little considered, and its connection with Hebrew and Christian mythology almost ignored; and those studies of it which In 1 has read consider it mainly as a curiosity. "But the subject," he adds, "as it appears to me, possesses a larger significance. Even the poems and romances it has suggested fail to render the still, sad music of humanity pervading the variations of the folk-tale itself." He regards the legend as a kind of a mirror, "wherein may be seen by reflection things that few eyes can look upon directly"—among them an aspect in which Christianity has appeared to believers of former generations. From the immediate subject he is led to a consideration of the character, condition, and probable destiny of the Jewish race and religion.
An Introduction to the Science of Comparative Mythology and Folk-lore. By the Rev. Sir George W. Cox, Bart., M. A., author of "Popular Romances of the Middle Ages," etc. New York: Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 380. Price, $1.75.
The purpose of this volume is to give a general view of the vast mass of popular traditions belonging to the Aryan nations of Asia and Europe, and of other tribes so far as the conditions of the subject may render necessary. Its starting-point, says the author, is the principle that "the popular traditions of no one Aryan people can be really understood except in their relations to those of other tribes and nations of the same family, and that the epical and dramatic literature of these races has been constructed from materials common to all branches of the Aryan stock, and furnished by popular sayings, stories, and tales, many of which have never had the good fortune to be more than the talk of nurses and children." An immense number of stories are condensed or referred to in illustration of these views.
On the Temperature of Fresh-Water Lakes and Ponds. By Professor William Ripley Nichols. Boston: Press of W. H. Wheeler. 1881. Pp. 28.
Thomas Paine was Junius. Washington, D. C. 1881. Pp. 28.
Thoughts on the Psychical and Physical Forces Physiologically Distinguished. By A. H. Lanphear, M. D. From the "Transactions of the State Medical Society of Kansas." 1881. Pp. 21.
Primer of Logical Analysis for the Use of Composition Students. By Josiah Royce. San Francisco: A. L Bancroft & Co. 1881. Pp. 77.
The Stereoscope and Vision by Optic Divergence. By W. Le Conte Stevens. From the "American Journal of Science." November and December, 1881. Pp. 14. Illustrated.
On Wheatstone and Brewster's Theory of Binocular Perspective. By W. Le Conte Stevens, From the "Philosophical Magazine," December, 1881. Pp. 8. Illustrated.
Atlantic City as a Winter Health-Resort. By Boardman Reed, M. D. Philadelphia: Press of Allen Lane & Scott. Pp. 22.
Classification of the Dinosauria. By Professor O. C. Marsh. From "American Journal of Science." 1881. Pp. 6.
Circulars of Information of the Bureau of Education, No. 4. 1881. Education in France. Washington: Government Printing-Office. 1881. Pp. 114.
Address of the Hon. George B. Loring before the Cotton Convention in Atlanta. Washington: Government Printing-office. 1881. Pp. 35.
Annual Report of the Chief Signal Officer of the Army for the Year 1881. Washington. 1881. Pp. 86.
Materia Medica as a Science. By J. P. Dake, M. D. Philadelphia: Press of Sherman & Co. 1881. Pp. 25.
The Genesis and Distribution of Gold. By Professor J. S. Newberry. New York: Trow Printing Co. 1881. Pp. 14.
The Electrician: A Monthly Journal devoted to the Advancement and Diffusion of Electrical Science. Edited and published by Williams & Co., New York. Vol. I, No. 1. January, 1882. Pp. 16. 50 cents a year.
Garrison in Heaven: A Dream. By William Denton. Wellesley, Massachusetts: Denton Publishing Co. 1881. Pp. 45.
The Names of the Gods in the Kiche Myths, Central America. By D. G. Brinton, M. D. Philadelphia: McCalla & Stavely. 1881. Pp. 37.
Proceedings of the American Society of Microscopists. Fourth Annual Meeting, held at Columbus, Ohio, August 9, 1881. Buffalo: Press of Bigelow Brothers. 1881. Pp. 102. Illustrated.
The Areas of the United States: The Several States and Territories and their Counties. By Henry Gannett. "Extra Census Bulletin." Washington: Government Printing-Office. 1881. Pp. 20. With Map.
The Verbalist. By Alfred Ayres. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1882. Pp. 220. $1.
The Opium-Habit and Alcoholism. By Dr. Frederick H. Hubbard. New York: A. S. Barnes & Co. Pp. 259. $2.
The Origin of Primitive Superstitions. By Rushton M. Dorman. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1881. Pp. 398. $3.
The Science of Mind. By John Bascom. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. 1881. Pp. 462. $2.
New System of Ventilation. By Henry A. Gouge. New York: D. Van Nostrand. 1881. Pp. 173. $2.
Documents relating 1 to the Colonial History of the State of New York. Vol. XIII. By B. Fernow, Keeper of the "Historical Records." Albany, New York: Weed, Parsons & Co. 1881. Pp. 617.
Suicide: Studies on its Philosophy, Cruises, and Prevention. By James J. O'Dea. M. D. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. 1882. Pp. 322. $1.75.
Contributions to North American Ethnology. Vol. IV. Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines. By Lewis H. Morgan. Washington: Government Printing-Office. 1881. Pp. 281.
Report on the Geology and Resources of the Black Hills of Dakota. With Atlas. By Henry Newton. E. M., and Walter P. Jenney, E. M. Washington: Government Printing-Office. 1880. Pp. 566.