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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



A similar thing has just been done 

 again. Max Miiller was allowed to 

 use the Academy columns to abuse and 

 misrepresent Prof. Whitney, of Yale 

 College, in matters of philology. The 

 American linguist replied to these 

 assaults in a letter to the Academy, 

 which again its editor refused to print, 

 and it found publicity, as before, 

 through the hospitable pages of the 

 Examiner. And this difference of fair- 

 ness between the two journals goes 

 along with other differences which will 

 be of interest to American readers ; 

 for, while the Academy is character- 

 ized by the amount of its pedantic rub- 

 bish and scholarly trumpery, suited to 

 the learned drones of Oxford and Cam- 

 bridge, the Examiner addresses itself 

 more to the living questions of the 

 day, and discusses subjects of universal 

 interest, with an ability and indepen- 

 dence that may commend it to Ameri- 

 can readers desiring an English weekly. 



LITERARY NOTICES. 



The Unseen World, and other Essays. By 

 John Fiske, M. A. LL. B. Pp. 349. 

 Price $2. J. R. Osgood & Co. 



To say that this volume is by the author 

 of the " Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy " 

 will be at once to commend it to a large 

 circle of readers ; but as a series of inter- 

 esting papers on a wide variety of topics, 

 scientific, philosophic, artistic, historical, 

 and critical, it will be commended to many 

 who have not been attracted to the earlier and 

 more solid publication. Most of the articles 

 of the volume will be remembered as they 

 appeared in the periodicals ; admirable in 

 style, bold in thought, and rich in scholarly 

 erudition. Mr. Fiske has views of his own 

 which he works out with freedom, and often 

 with great beauty and force of statement. 



The volume takes its name from the first 

 two essays, which lately appeared in the 

 Atlantic Monthly, and were read with inter- 

 est by many thoughtful people. They start 

 from the speculations of a recent book en- 

 titled "The Unseen Universe," which broke 

 into a somewhat new field of ingeuious sci- 



entific conjecture, and was read with aD 

 eager but rather perplexed curiosity by 

 those who are fond of transcendental in- 

 quiries. This work has been already no- 

 ticed in the Monthly, and is chiefly impor- 

 tant as an effort by thoroughly disciplined 

 scientific men to arrive at the conception 

 of immortality and a realm of future spirit- 

 ual life from the scientific point of view. 

 Mr. Fiske is in sympathy with this aspira- 

 tion, but deals with the problem by his own 

 methods, and perhaps in an abler way than 

 the authors who opened the discussion. 

 We cannot here reproduce his views, which 

 are only to be understood by a careful pe- 

 rusal of the essays in which they are pre- 

 sented. 



But, while cordially recommending this 

 volume as a whole, we must except the re- 

 view of Draper's " History of the Conflict 

 between Religion and Science," which we 

 think somewhat unworthy the author. Mr. 

 Fiske adopts a deprecatory tone in speak- 

 ing of Draper's books, which is construed 

 by the newspapers into contempt which 

 jumps with public prejudice, and is quite to 

 be expected from certain quarters ; but for 

 which he gives us no satisfactory reasons. 



He charges Dr. Draper with superficiality 

 and mental idiosyncrasy, in not understand- 

 ing Rome ; in not appreciating Greece; ia- 

 hostility to the Catholic Church ; in over- 

 rating semi-barbarous civilizations, "and 

 above all an undiscriminating admiration 

 for everything, great or small, that has ever 

 worn the garb of Islam, or been associated 

 with the career of the Saracens." ' But, after 

 indulging in a little sarcasm at Dr. Draper's 

 admiration of the "turbaned sage," Mr. 

 Fiske finds himself compelled to say : 



" Speaking briefly with regard to this matter, 

 we may freely admit that the work done by the 

 Arabs, in scientific inquiry as well as in the mak- 

 ing of events, was very considerable. It was 

 a work, too, the value of which is not common- 

 ly appreciated in the accounts of European his- 

 tory written for the general reader, and we have 

 no disposition to find fault with Dr. Draper for 

 describing it with enthusiasm. The philoso- 

 phers of Bagdad and Cordova did excellent ser- 

 vice in keeping alive the traditions of Greek phys- 

 ical inquiry at a time when Christian thinkers 

 were too exclusively occupied with transcenden- 

 tal speculations in theology and logic. In some de- 

 partments, as in chemistry and astronomy, they 

 made original discoverios of considerable value; 

 and if we turn from abstract knowledge to the 



