LITERARY NOTICES. 



553 



and not only an ass but an actual aider 

 and abettor of fraud, seeing tbat it is 

 just tbe silly persons who expect to get 

 something for nothing who keep the army 

 of cheats in provender. 



This idea of getting something for 

 nothing is indeed the main-stay and sup- 

 port of far the larger part of the fraud 

 that exists in the world ; and the first 

 lesson in practical wisdom is to learn 

 that the thing is impossible, and that 

 nobody professes to give something for 

 nothing, or large value in exchange for 

 small value, except for some selfish and 

 dishonest purpose. "We have discussed 

 the subject before in these columns, and 

 again we ask, Why could not a special 

 effort be made in our educational insti- 

 tutions, not merely to put the young on 

 their guard against being deceived, but 

 to call forth their contempt for all the 

 dishonest and semi-dishonest devices 

 which now exercise so great an attrac- 

 tion over the masses? "Why should not 

 the lesson be taught with iteration that 

 the best way to get what we want is to 

 give an honest equivalent for it, and that 

 if this principle were more generally 

 recognized everybody would get better 

 value for his money or his labor than is 

 now the case ? The promoters of fraud- 

 ulent enterprises are mere social para- 

 sites ; they give no value, or at least no 

 decent value, for the money they rake in, 

 and the real workers of society have to 

 tax themselves that these men may flour- 

 ish. As to the word-making, text-find- 

 ing, bean-guessing plans and devices 

 which are so freely advertised, they 

 ought to be beneath the contempt of all 

 but the very weakest intellects in the 

 community ; yet how many people who 

 can not be placed in that category take 

 more or less interest in such things! 

 " With all thy gettings," said one of 

 old, "get understanding." Doubtless he 

 meant common sense ; and, if he spoke 

 at all in the spirit of prophecy, he prob- 

 ably foresaw the time when, under a 

 state-stimulated system of education, 

 the intellectual gettings of people would 



be greatly increased in number, and yet 

 common sense be very frequently left 

 out. 



LITERARY NOTICES. 



Social Statics, abridged and revised ; to- 

 gether with The Man versus The State. 

 By Herbert Spencer. New York : D. 

 Appleton & Co. Pp. 420. Price, $2. 



Social Statics was Mr. Spencer's first 

 book. As originally issued, in 1850, it bore the 

 title Social Statics : or, the Conditions essential 

 to Human Happiness specified, and the First 

 of them developed. It was put forth as, in 

 the words of the author, " a system of politi- 

 cal ethics absolute political ethics, or that 

 which ought to be, as distinguished from 

 relative political ethics, or that which is at 

 present the nearest practicable approach to 

 it." Mr. Spencer affirms at the outset that, 

 living as they do in the social state, men can 

 attain the greatest happiness only by seek- 

 ing it indirectly. He then reasons out as a 

 first principle controlling the pursuit of hap- 

 piness that " every man has freedom to do 

 all that he wills, provided he infringes not 

 the equal freedom of any other man." Ap- 

 plications of this first principle constituted 

 the rest of the original volume. Many of 

 these applications, in a matured and com- 

 pleted form, have been comprised in the 

 division of Mr. Spencer's Synthetic Philos- 

 ophy dealing with Justice, hence they have 

 been omitted from the new edition of the 

 present work, or presented only briefly. The 

 last eight chapters of the book, however, 

 which treat of the regulation of commerce, 

 education, currency, postal arrangements, 

 and some similar functions commonly per- 

 formed by governments, remain substantially 

 as first published. 



Besides the duplication of a large part of 

 this work in Justice, another reason for re- 

 vising Social Statics was that, in the years 

 that have passed since it first appeared, Mr. 

 Spencer had relinquished some of the con- 

 clusions drawn from its first principle, and 

 had given up also one of the bases upon 

 which he had formerly made that principle 

 to rest. The omission of some parts was ac- 

 cordingly necessary in order to check mis- 

 representations of the views which he now 

 holds. 



