LITERARY NOTICES. 



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LITERARY NOTICES. 



Fragments of Science : A Series of De- 

 tached Essays, Addresses, and Re- 

 views. By John Tyndall, F. R. S. 

 Fifth edition. New York : D. Apple- 

 ton & Co. Pp. 625. Price, $2.50. 



Prof. Tyndall's position in the world 

 of thought, at the present time, is one of 

 very marked individuality, and there go 

 several strong factors into the composition 

 of that wide and powerful influence as a 

 thinker which he has exerted upon the 

 mind of the period. In the first place, the 

 age is scientific to so great a degree that 

 all human interests are more disturbed by 

 this agency than ever before. Prof. Tyn- 

 dall's scientific acquirements and training 

 are therefore in harmony with the great in- 

 tellectual movement of which he has be- 

 come a leader and representative. His 

 chosen field of labor, moreover, that of 

 physics, is the one which people generally 

 are best prepared to appreciate, while his 

 ingenuity and fertility in devising new and 

 striking experiments for the illustration of 

 facts, and the proof of principles, always 

 compel attention to what he lias to offer. 

 Again, his consummate mastery of the arts 

 of exposition, the clearness and beauty of 

 his statements, and the high literary finish 

 of all his work, give him the command of 

 cultivated minds wherever English is read. 

 Equally important, also, in any estimate of 

 Prof. TyndalFs power, is that fearlessness 

 of spirit, and unflinching allegiance to what 

 he considers the truth, that give boldness 

 to his utterances, and carry him to the front 

 of the conflict, in which science struggles 

 with the forces of ignorance, prejudice, and 

 superstition. These elements, of course, 

 are not equally combined in all his produc- 

 tions. In his scientific memoirs we have 

 only the record of laborious and painstak- 

 ing researches, but they are always elegantly 

 written. In his volumes upon " Heat " and 

 " Sound " we are chiefly struck by the lu- 

 cid and methodical exposition, interspersed 

 with poetic touches and expressions of fine 

 feeling, awakened by the study of Nature's 

 deeper harmonies, and which are a con- 

 stant source of pleasure to the student. 

 But it is in his various miscellaneous pa- 

 pers, some of them didactic, some contro- 



versial, and others devoted to the develop- 

 ment of advanced opinions in which he is 

 deeply interested, and all of them with a 

 scientific substratum, and exhibiting the 

 best excellences of his eloquent style, that 

 we shall find the chief secret of the hold he 

 has obtained upon all classes of readers. 

 These papers were collected, a few years 

 ago, in a volume entitled " Fragments of 

 Science," which proved one of the most 

 popular of his works. It passed through 

 four editions, and the fifth now appears, 

 greatly enlarged by recently-published arti- 

 cles, and containing one hundred and nine- 

 ty-three pages of matter not found in the 

 former American edition. Prof. Tyndall 

 has rearranged the work, grouping together 

 the more scientific articles in Part I., and 

 the controversial discussions in Part II., to 

 which there is a special and able intro- 

 duction. All the articles have been care- 

 fully revised, with a view to making them, 

 in the highest degree, clear and accurate. 

 Commendation of this work is superfluous, 

 but it is one of the volumes that wide- 

 awake readers cannot well do without, and 

 which is always ready to furnish instruc- 

 tion and entertainment for an odd hour. 



Tollhausen's Technological Dictionary. 

 Part L, French-German-English ; Part 

 II., English-German-French ; Part III., 

 German -English -French. New York: 

 Holt & Co. Price, $3.50 per vol. 



The compilers of general dictionaries of 

 two or more languages have hitherto given 

 but little thought to secure either fullness 

 or accuracy in their vocabularies of techni- 

 cal terms, especially those employed in the 

 useful arts. Such terms having no place in 

 literature proper, and the existing diction- 

 aries being designed mainly as keys to the 

 literature of the various languages, the defect 

 of which we speak becomes, under the cir- 

 cumstances, venial. But we are from day to 

 day coming into closer industrial relations 

 with the outer world, and the need of such 

 a work as that before us has long been felt. 

 The author of this work has spared no 

 pains to make his dictionary complete and 

 accurate, and he is to be congratulated upon 

 the success with which he has performed 

 his very difficult task. The first part of 

 the work (French-German-English) em- 

 braces some 65,000 technical terms and 



