120 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



AMHERST COLLEGE AND EVOLUTION. 

 Messrs. Editors. 



AFTER the publication of President 

 Seelye's peculiar statement with re- 

 spect to the teaching at Amherst College 

 regarding the law of evolution, feeling a 

 graduate's interest in the matter, I made 

 careful inquiry, and find that, at a meeting 

 of the faculty held a few years ago, the 

 present Professor of Geology was requested 

 by President Stearns to deliver a course of 

 lectures on evolution, and the faculty, with- 

 out any audible dissent, seconded the re- 

 quest. At the time, this Professor was 

 known to believe in the evolution law. 

 Since then, evolution has been taught in 

 the department of zoology, the Professor or 

 instructor giving such an exposition of the 

 facts favoring and seeming to militate 

 against the doctrine as would be suitable to 

 students. By vote of the faculty, also, Da- 

 na's and Le Conte's text-books are used, both 

 of which accept evolution, the second very 

 positively. There is now established an in- 

 structorship in biology. Moreover, I learn 

 that every professor in the scientific de- 

 partments of study believes in the doctrine 

 in question. The following language, with 

 which one of the professors is credited, 

 shows quite a different state of feeling in 

 the institution from what President Seelye 

 would lead us to believe : " Taking all the 

 relations, as I judge them from my stand- 

 point, it must.be concluded that the truth 

 lies somewhere within the lines of the evo- 

 lution theories. Such unquestionably is the 

 teaching of real science in nearly all places 

 where it has both freedom and intelligence. 

 As to its materialistic or atheistic tenden- 

 cies, I regard it as having none whatever, 

 except in the hollow brains of those would- 

 be sages who talk most concerning that of 

 which they know the least. The most im- 

 portant point is to find out the truth in na- 

 ture, and teach that, regardless of all bear- 

 ing it may have on any of our preconceived 

 notions." 



Upon this state of facts, certainly very 

 different from that which the ordinary reader 

 would infer from President Seelye's state- 

 ment (it is not entirely clear what he means), 

 it may be concluded that Amherst College is 

 working along abreast of the best thought 

 of the time, notwithstanding the unfavora- 

 ble reflection cast upon it by its President's 

 remarks. There was a period when Amherst 

 College had a reputation for its achieve- 

 ments in the field of science. Latterly, it 



has ceased to have much in that direction, 

 chiefly because dominated by the influence 

 of the teaching in its senior class-room, un- 

 der the name of mental and moral science, 

 of a collection of bizarre doctrines, expressed 

 in words which have no corresponding 

 thoughts, wholly unscientific and without 

 any philosophical substance or consistency. 

 Since President Seelye thinks he believes in 

 these doctrines, it is hardly to be expected 

 that he could apprehend the truth of state- 

 ments which express laws of nature scien- 

 tifically ascertained and verified. The only 

 way in which he could be made to see such 

 truth would be for him to follow the course 

 found necessary by some of his graduates, 

 namely, to unlearn everything taught at 

 Amherst as philosophy, before attempting to 

 take a step forward in the path of true phil- 

 osophical knowledge. 



Of course, to the world of scholars at 

 large, President Seelye's strictures, if they 

 were meant to have application broadly to 

 the doctrine of evolution, will not have the 

 slightest interest ; but it ought not to be 

 pleasant for those who have any especial 

 regard for the college to see its president 

 putting forth, in an apparently ill-tempered 

 fling, a statement characterizing unfairly a 

 doctrine which a large portion of the scien- 

 tific and philosophical world accepts as a nat- 

 ural law abundantly verified, and creating 

 an impression, with respect to the college 

 teaching, which does not seem to be true, 

 and which, if it were true, would only bring 

 discredit upon the institution. 



Daniel G. Thompson. 

 New Yoke City, February 10, 1880. 



A CONSIDERATION OF SUICIDE. 



Messrs. Editors. 



The article under this heading, in your 

 April number, is an ingenious discussion of 

 the subject, and one which also, consider- 

 ing the solemn matter of which it treats, we 

 must suppose to be ingenuous, although 

 through the entire argument runs the flaw 

 of an erroneous definition. " What is sui- 

 cide ? " asks the writer, and answers, " The 

 voluntary termination of one's own life." 

 Perhaps we should be content with calling 

 this definition imperfect. It has certainly 

 led the writer into error, and to a distinc- 

 tion between egoistic and altruistic suicide, 

 which has no foundation either in ethics or 

 in the definitions of criminal law. There 



