LITERARY NOTICES. 



117 



can now be found who will question 

 that the author of these articles is the 

 highest authority of our age upon the 

 Bubject. To deal with any thing so vast 

 and complex as society, by an original 

 method, so as to bring out the natural 

 laws of its constitution, requires rare 

 powers and attainments on the part of 

 him who undertakes it. He must have 

 an accurate and extensive acquaintance 

 with the higher sciences of life and 

 mind, as well as the various states and 

 phases of man's social condition. To 

 encyclopaedic knowledge, there must be 

 added originality, independence, and a 

 broad grasp of principles and details. 

 That Mr. Spencer possesses these in an 

 eminent degree, we are assured by au- 

 thorities who are both competent to 

 judge and cautious in the expression 

 of their judgment such men as Mill, 

 Hooker, Lewes, Darwin, Morell, Wal- 

 lace, Huxley, Masson, McOosh. In the 

 last number of the Contemporary Re- 

 view is an article by the acute essayist, 

 "Henry Holbeach," referring to what 

 Mr. Spencer has already written on 

 public and social questions, in which he 

 is spoken of as " holding the unique and 

 very eminent place as a great thinker, 

 which he does, in fact, hold," and these 

 writings are referred to as containing 

 " an arsenal of argument and illustration 

 never surpassed for range and force, if 

 ever equalled in the history of pliUoso- 

 phy." 



Mr. Spencer has now been engaged 

 twelve years on his life-work, a system 

 of Synthetic Philosophy, based on the 

 doctrine of evolution. Five volumes of 

 this work will be completed next au- 

 tumn, in which the foundations are 

 deeply laid in the sciences of life and 

 mind for the third great discussion 

 the Principles of Sociology, in three 

 volumes, treating of the development 

 of society in all its elements in accord- 

 ance with the theory of evolution. 



Before entering upon this part of 

 his undertaking, the author has thought 

 it expedient to make some observations 



concerning it, which will je outside of 

 the philosophical system, and indepen- 

 dent of it. Those who have familiarized 

 themselves with the former parts of his 

 system, are not as the stars of heaven 

 in number ; nor are those who under- 

 stand the nature and claims of sociolo- 

 gical science as the sands of the sea. 

 The term social science has indeed come 

 into vogue, and large associations have 

 assumed it ; but, as thus applied, it fails 

 to connote any distinctive or coherent 

 body of principles such as are necessary 

 to constitute a science. 



In this state of things, and before 

 proceeding to the systematic work of 

 developing the science itself, Mr. Spen- 

 cer will consider its claims as an object 

 of study, its subject matter, its method 

 of investigation, scope, and limits. The 

 article which is now published pre- 

 sents the need of the study, and the 

 next will answer the question, " Is there 

 a social science ? " The paper we now 

 publish tells its own story, and the sub- 

 sequent ones will not fall below it in 

 interest and instructiveness. 



LITERARY NOTICES. 



Instinct : its Office in the Animal King- 

 dom, and its Relation to the Higher 

 Powers in Man. By P. A. Chadbourne, 

 LL. D. George P. Putnam & Sons. 



This is a very interesting volume on a 

 fascinating subject. Dr. Chadbourne ia 

 well known as an able student of natural 

 history, which he has long cultivated both 

 by independent observation and in a philo- 

 sophic spirit, and in this little book he gives 

 the results of much study of instinctive ac- 

 tion as displayed in the lower animals, aud 

 of much reflection on its bearings upon the 

 mental and moral nature of man. Con- 

 ceding fully man's close relation to the 

 forms of life below him, Dr. Chadbourne 

 recognizes the scientific necessity of inves- 

 tigating the lower to get a true interpreta- 

 tion of the higher; or of tracing out the 

 workings of instinctive impulse in the sim- 

 pler creatures, in order to understand the 

 springs of movement in our own more coin- 



