126 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



system. "We refer to this because there 

 is much misunderstanding of the bear- 

 ings of Spencer's various books on the 

 subject of sociology. Dr. Porter, for 

 example, has lately taken him up in the 

 " Princeton Review," and vre think, if 

 he had been a little more particular in 

 his reference to Spencer's sociological 

 works, he would have given increased 

 help to readers unacquainted with them. 

 He says: "Spencer's contributions to 

 this science are professedly only intro- 

 ductory to its study. They are to con- 

 sist of ' The Principles of Sociology,' in 

 two volumes, ' Social Statics' and 'The 

 Study of Sociology,' as also several vol- 

 umes of ' Descriptive Sociology.' " More 

 precisely " The Princii^les of Sociology ' 

 will comprise three volumes instead of 

 two. " Social Statics " is an old book, 

 that forms no part of his sociological 

 system, and only " The Study of Sociol- 

 ogy," an incidental contribution to the 

 subject, should be especially character- 

 ized as introductory to it. It is hardly 

 fair to an author to mix up his works in 

 this careless way, and it is especially 

 unfair to Spencer, because he has been 

 long engaged in developing his ideas in 

 various lines of work, and publishing 

 them in fragmentary parts, so that read- 

 ers are easily liable to become confused 

 in regard to them. President Porter's 

 critical essay is entitled " Spencer's The- 

 ory of Sociology," and he says, " The 

 only practicable method of discovering 

 the author's theory is to subject the 

 volume to a minute criticism." We 

 think the still more " practicable " 

 method would be an examination of 

 the works in which the theory is pro- 

 fessedly expounded rather than in a 

 volume which disavows all attempt to 

 formulate the principles of the sci- 

 ence. He has explained in the pref- 

 ace to the work that "The Study of 

 Sociology " was a side discussion, form- 

 ing no part of the systematic treatment 

 of social science. It was written with 

 main reference to those prepossessions 

 of the public mind which tend to hin- 



der a scientific study of social subjects. 

 Instead of explaining the science of so- 

 ciety, the book was designed to remove 

 objections to its possibility and to arouse 

 interest in its legitimate questions. Yet 

 Dr. Porter undertakes to judge Spen- 

 cer's " Theory of Sociology " by an 

 analysis of this book which does not 

 contain it. Spencer's works are tempt- 

 ing game for sensational criticism, be- 

 cause of their extent, incompleteness, 

 and comprehensive method, which make 

 misconception easy and misrepresenta- 

 tion easier, and for this reason we are 

 called upon to correct false impressions 

 more frequently than would be other- 

 wise necessary. 



SCIEXCE IN THE COLLEGES. 



We call attention to the correspond- 

 ence from Princeton and Ann Arbor 

 correcting alleged errors in our Septem- 

 ber article on " Sewage in College Edu- 

 cation." Dr. McCosh thinks it palpably 

 illogical to argue that they have had 

 typhoid fever because they do not teach 

 physiology to the students. Our stric- 

 tures -were based on an assumed state 

 of facts which is not contradicted, viz., 

 that the fatal fever resulted from causes 

 that were clearly preventable. We sim- 

 ply charged that the knowledge that 

 would have averted the catastrophe, 

 and which, as tending to self-preserva- 

 tion, is the most important of all knowl- 

 edge, is culpably neglected in the col- 

 lege, is subordinated to more worthless 

 studies, and not so taught as to yield 

 the beneficent results which it is capa- 

 ble of producing. And what are the 

 facts ? Dr. McCosh says that the chem- 

 ical professor reports as follows: "All 

 students of the college have a full course 

 of instruction in the outlines of human 

 anatomy and physiology, with so much 

 of hygiene as there is time for; and 

 this has been done in the college for 

 nearly half a century." That is, they 

 teach as much about the laws of life as 

 the old crowded classical curriculum 



