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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



have occupied chairs in its Faculty may be 

 mentioned Professor Henry D. Rogers ; Pro- 

 fessor Spencer F. Baird, now at the head of 

 the Smithsonian Institution; and the celebrat- 

 ed Dr. Thomas Cooper, who subsequently be- 

 came a judge and President of South Caro- 

 lina College. Judge Cooper, as Professor 

 Himes aptly remarks, was " one of the most 

 remarkable products of the complexity of 

 moral and intellectual forces of the closing 

 quarter of the last century." He was a man 

 of great erudition and independence, and 

 a forcible writer. " A native of England, 

 educated at Oxford, on terms of intimacy 

 with Pitt, Burke, and other leading English 

 statesmen, a resident of Paris during the 

 four months of the Reign of Terror, and 

 enjoying its excitement to the full, he was 

 a radical in politics and a materialist in 

 creed. A friend of Priestley, he shared with 

 the latter his exile from his country, and en- 

 joyed the use of his library and laboratory 

 in Northumberland." Dr. Cooper was elect- 

 ed to the chair of Chemistry and Mineralogy 

 in Dickinson College in 1811, and occupied 

 it for four years. His introductory lecture 

 on chemistry was remarkable for being one 

 of the first scientific lectures published in 

 the country. It was exhaustive, and dis- 

 played a wonderful range of information. 

 The lecture itself filled one hundred pages, 

 octavo, and its accompanying notes one 

 hundred and thirty-five pages more. He 

 purchased the telescope, air-gun, and burn- 

 ing-lens used by Dr. Priestley, which are 

 carefully preserved in the college collection. 

 Professor Himes's account of the growth 

 of the scientific department of the college 

 is interesting as a chapter in the history of 

 education. A revolution is there sketched 

 which it is proposed to consummate in a 

 century of collegiate experience. Although 

 science was becoming active when the col- 

 lege was founded, yet scientific study as a 

 part of education was in its infancy, while 

 theology and cognate subjects were all-pre- 

 vailing. The first question in regard to 

 science, therefore, was, how it would affect 

 religion. The first President was Dr. Nes- 

 bit, an able Scotch divine ; and we are told 

 that, on a visit to Governor Dickinson, an 

 evening was spent in the discussion of the 

 theological relations of science, in which 

 Nesbit maintained that, "unless the grace 



of God produced a different effect, the more 

 intimately men became acquainted with the 

 works of nature, the less mindful were they 

 of their great Author." Theology, therefore, 

 led one way and science another ; and yet, 

 under the act of incorporation, of the forty 

 members comprising the Board of Trustees 

 more than one third were required to be 

 clergymen ; while every one of the fourteen 

 presidents which the college has had has 

 been a doctor of divinity. It is therefore to 

 be expected that the college would favor the 

 kind of learning that has proved of utility 

 in the avocation of preaching. Important 

 concessions have, however, been made in 

 the direction of liberal studies. There is 

 the ordinary four years' college course with 

 its load of two dead languages, and which 

 is probably much the same as it was a hun- 

 dred years ago. But there is also a Latin- 

 scientific course from which half the dead 

 weight has been unloaded, and so it is 

 brought into three years. But the scien- 

 tific spirit has made great progress, as is 

 shown by the fact that the centennial of 

 the institution in 1883 is to be crowned by 

 the dedication of a new and elegant build- 

 ing devoted entirely to scientific purposes. 



Die Entwickxung des Menschengeschlech- 

 tes. Von Dr. Adelrich Steinach. New 

 York : The Author, 122 Allen Street. 

 1S78. Pp. 681. Price, $2.50. 



This treatise forms the second volume 

 of a " System of Organic Evolution," but 

 the first volume, " The Evolution of the 

 Plant and Animal World," is not yet pub- 

 lished. The author adopts the Darwinian 

 (or evolutionist) point of view throughout, 

 but, unlike most of the German followers 

 of Mr. Darwin, he adheres to that school of 

 philosophy which is opposed to materialism. 

 The present installment of Dr. Steinach's 

 work, " The Evolution of the Human Race," 

 is marked by profound learning and no 

 small degree of originality. We have not 

 space to review it at length, and must con- 

 tent ourselves with briefly indicating its 

 contents. It is divided into three parts, 

 entitled "I. Man in Space"; "II Man in 

 Time"; and "III. The Evolution of Mind." 

 In Part I. the author considers man in his 

 relations to his environment, and strives to 

 show how his mental and physical develop- 



