LITER A R Y NO TICES. 



557 



try inhabited by a curious race, called 

 the Monalas, or the Monga Fants, a 

 people distinguished by their wonderful 

 proficiency in mechanical arts, but still 

 more by their preposterous domestic 

 habits, their singular ideas, and their 

 strange superstitions. The curiosities 

 of J/oinitistan rival the wonders of 

 Houyhnhnm Land, and the narrative 

 of the explorer abounds with incidents 

 and graphic descriptions as well as 

 with scientific intimations that throw a 

 suggestive light upon the origin of the 

 follies and vices of civilized life. The 

 translator is widely known as an origi- 

 nal, vivid, and fertile writer, who has 

 the secret of making science attractive, 

 and we venture the prediction that his 

 work will mark a new stage in the his- 

 tory of entertaining literature. 



LITERARY NOTICES. 



The Concepts and Theories of Modern 

 Physics. By J. B. Stallo. Interna- 

 tional 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 common- 

 ly accepted as at the foundation of all sci- 

 ence. It is therefore, as might be expected, 

 a profound book. Dealing not with the op- 

 erations or results of the special sciences, 

 but with the laws of thought by which sci- 

 ence is created, and showing how radical 

 scientific conceptions require to be still fur- 

 ther 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 origi- 

 nated. 



It may be proper to say that the author 

 is a German by birth, and came to this coun- 

 try at about the age of seventeen. He was 

 early familiar with science, and after his 

 arrival in the United States, as we are in- 

 formed, 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 independ- 

 ent 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 abil- 

 ity 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 relin- 

 quished 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 investiga- 

 tions which compelled delay in the publica- 

 tion of his views. The task which he as- 

 signed to himself was not only one that 

 involved comprehensive research and pro- 

 longed reflection, but it was the result of a 

 profound revolution in his own mental his- 

 tory. Judge Stallo's two books, though sep- 

 arated 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 thor- 

 oughly metaphysical and the last is even 

 more rigorously scientific. Judge Stallo has 



