560 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



definition and explanation whicli implies this 

 idea. He says: "Taking tins view of illu- 

 sion, we may provisionally define it as any 

 species of error which counterfeits the form 

 of iuimediate,solf-evident,or intuitive knowl- 

 edge, whether as sense-perception or other- 

 wise. "Whenever a thing is believed on its 

 own evidence and not as a conclusion from 

 something else, and the thing then believed 

 is demonstrably wrong, there is an illusion. 

 The term would thus appear to cover all 

 varieties of error which are not recognized 

 as fallacies or false inferences. If for the 

 present we roughly divide all our knowledge 

 into the two regions of primary or intuitive, 

 and secondary or inferential knowledge, we 

 see that illusion is false or spurious knowl- 

 edge of the first kind, fallacy false or spu- 

 rious knowledge of the second kind. At the 

 same time, it is to be remembered that this 

 division is only a very rough one. As will 

 appear in the course of our investigation, 

 the same error may be called either a falla- 

 cy or an illusion, according as we are think- 

 ing of its original mode of production or 

 of the form which it finally assumes; and 

 a thorough-going psychological analysis of 

 error may discover that these two classes 

 are at bottom very similar." 



It will be obvious that this is not a 

 technical work, but one of wide popular in- 

 terest, in the principles and results of which 

 every one is concerned. The illusions of 

 perception of the senses and of dreams are 

 first considered, and then the author passes 

 to the illusions of introspection, errors of 

 insight, illusions of memory, and illusions of 

 belief. The work is a noteworthy contribu- 

 tion to the original progress of thought, and 

 may be relied upon as representing the 

 present state of knowledge on the important 

 subject to which it is devoted. 



LiTERAHY Style and other Essays. By 

 William ]\Iathkws, LL. D. Chicago: 

 S. C. Griggs & Co. Pp. 345. Price, 

 $1.50. 



A MOST readable volume, full of common 

 sense and practical wisdom on a great num- 

 ber of important and interesting subjects. 

 The author is evidently an omnivorous and 

 careful reader, and has well cultivated the 

 art of turning his varied studies to good 

 literary account. Ilis pages are loaded, we 



might almost say overloaded, with refer- 

 ences to the best writers, and quotations 

 of their trenchant and suggestive sayings. 

 The first paper, on *' Literary Style," from 

 which the volume takes its name, is not a 

 scientific or philosophical analysis of the 

 subject, but is a formidable array of argu- 

 ments, illustrations, and authorities to prove 

 that literary form is the main thing in the 

 art of authorship. Dr. Mathews shows that, 

 in literature, ideas, facts, and the substance 

 of thought go for next to nothing, while the 

 style of verbal dress determines the place 

 and permanence of literary productions. 

 The following passage on Carlyle will ex- 

 emplify the fundamental idea of the essay, 

 and illustrate also the author's lively and 

 earnest style of discussion : 



Perhaps no other writer of the day has 

 more powerfully influenced the Enjjlii^h-speak- 

 ing race than Carlyle. Beyond all other living 

 men he has, in certain important respects, 

 shaped and colored the thought of bis time. As 

 an historian, he may be almost said to have revo- 

 lutionized the French Revolution, so different is 

 the picture which other writers have given us 

 from that which blazes upon us under the lurid 

 torch-light of his genius. To those who have . 

 read his great prose epic, it will be henceforth 

 impossible to remember the scenes he has de- 

 scribed through any other medium. As Hel- 

 vellyn and Skiddavv are seen now only through 

 the glamour of Wordsworth's genius as Jura 

 and Mont Blanc are transfigured, even to the 

 tourist, by the magic of Byron and Coleridge 

 so to Carlyle's readers Danton and Robes- 

 pierre, Mirabeau and Tlnville, will be for ever 

 what he has painted them. No other writer 

 equals the great Scotchman in the Rembrandt- 

 like hghts and shadows of his style. While, as 

 Mr. McCarthy says, he is endowed with a marvel- 

 ous power of depicting stormy scenes and rug- 

 ged, daring natures, yet, at timt-s. strange, wild, 

 piercing notes of the pathetic are heard through 

 his fierce bursts of eloquence like the wail of a 

 clarion thrilling beneath the blasts of a storm. 

 His pages abound in pictures of human misery 

 sadder than poet ever drew, more vivid and 

 startling than artis^t ever painted. In his con- 

 flict with shams and quackeries he has dealt 

 yeomen's blows, and made the bankrupt insti- 

 tutions of England ring with their own hollow- 

 ness. What is the secret of his power? Is it 

 the absolute novelty of his thoughts? In no 

 great writer of equal power shall we find such 

 an absolute dearth of new ideas. The gospel 

 of noble manhood, which he so passionately 

 preaches, is as old as Solomon. Its cardinal 

 ideas have been echoed and reechoed through 

 the ages till they have become the stalest of 

 truisms. That brains are the measure of worth ; 

 that duty, without reward, is the end of life ; 



