LITERARY NOTICES. 



3 6 9 



says, are of an explanatory and supplement- 

 ary nature. The improvements are here 

 manifest, and we cordially testify that the 

 second edition is much less intricate and 

 obscure in statement than the first. It will 

 be remembered, by those who happen to 

 have read it, that the book is rather 

 critical in character, and is devoted to an 

 examination of the grounds and sufficiency 

 of existing ethical methods, rather than to 

 the propounding of any new system. From 

 this circumstance, together with the infelici- 

 ty of statement which so marked the first 

 edition, there was often much perplexity to 

 know what Sidgwick himself believed, and 

 what he was driving at. In the preface 

 to the second edition, the author refers to 

 the character of his new matter, and indi- 

 cates various points in which his views have 

 been modified under the influence of the 

 critical attention his volume has received. 

 One thing is somewhat significant : Mr. 

 Sidgwick is a man given to highly-abstract 

 studies, and he therefore occupies a prov- 

 ince that has been thus far least affected by 

 the progress of physical and biological sci- 

 ence. He heard a great din in an adjacent 

 field about evolution, but as it did not seem 

 to affect him, he paid little attention to it. 

 When, however, the claim was made that 

 ethics, like almost everything else in this 

 world, must be influenced by evolutionary 

 doctrine, he put in a mild but decisive pro- 

 test ; and in an article in Mind maintained, 

 virtually, that it makes no difference as to the 

 present exposition of ethical science how its 

 phenomena came about. In the new edition, 

 however, this judgment is modified. In the 

 preface he says, " I have further been led, 

 through study of the theory of evolution 

 and its application to practice, to attach 

 somewhat more importance to this theory 

 than I had previously done ; " to which we 

 mayadd that, in his still further study of 

 that theory, he will attach still more impor- 

 tance to it. Possibly, indeed, his views 

 may become so much more evolved that 

 he will wonder how he could at first have 

 treated the subject with so little reference 

 to that doctrine. If ethics refers to the 

 obligations of conduct, and if the American 

 eagle and the American citizen are not re- 

 quired to conform to the same standard if 

 organization comes into the question, and 



VOL. XII. 24 



man himself, in his organic and racial modi- 

 fications, illustrates the same principle then 

 may it become a prime question in ethics 

 as to the right and wrong of conduct in 

 different stages of social unfolding. Should 

 it in fact turn out that the factor which Mr. 

 Sidgwick at first excluded from ethical in- 

 quiry, becomes, at length, its dominant fac- 

 tor, it will be but another illustration of that 

 inversion of values of which we have al- 

 ready so many examples in the history of 

 progressive thought. 



Isis Unveiled : A Master-Key to the Mys- 

 teries of Ancient and Modern Science 

 and Theology. By H. P. Blavatsky. 

 New York: J. W. Bouton, 187V. Two 

 volumes. Pp. 1365. Price, $7.50. 

 After a patient examination of these 

 massive volumes, we confess our inability 

 to find what it is that is " unveiled." The 

 dominant aim of the work seems to be to 

 establish the identity between ancient mag- 

 ic and modern spiritualism, and to show 

 that here alone is the ground of a possible 

 compromise in the contest between religion 

 and science. It is but fair to say that the 

 author declines to be considered an ordinary 

 spiritualist, which is certainly creditable to 

 her, but we must refer those who are cu- 

 rious to know in what manner she differs 

 from them to the book itself, with the hope 

 that they will be more successful than we 

 have been. The first volume professes to 

 be devoted to science, and the second to 

 theology ; and, in dealing with science, much 

 space is given to the refutation of the idea 

 that it is infallible. When that assump- 

 tion is set up, this part of the author's effort 

 will become pertinent, and will be, no doubt, 

 appreciated. Scientific men are scolded by 

 her, in a copious variety of diction, because 

 they will not " investigate " the spiritualis- 

 tic hypothesis. This is quite in the vein 

 of the ordinary spiritualist, and is far from 

 new. When the so-called spiritualist's hy- 

 pothesis is offered for investigation on the 

 same terms and conditions as the other prob- 

 lems of Nature, there will be no difficulty 

 in getting it investigated. Two or three 

 things are essential to a legitimate scientific 

 hypothesis : It must be expressed in intel- 

 ligible terms ; it must present a definite sub- 

 ject-matter for solution or determination; 

 and it must be one by which predictions can 



