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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ganize thoroughly the work of the 

 Observatory, and to adapt the Cross- 

 ley reflector for his purpose, taking 

 photographs of the nebulae that have 

 never been equalled. His discovery that 

 most nebulae have a spiral structure is 

 of fundamental importance. It is not 

 easy to overestimate what might have 

 been accomplished by Keeler in the next 

 twenty or thirty years, both by his own 

 researches and by his rare executive 

 ability, for it must be remembered that 

 his genius as an investigator was 

 rivaled by personal qualities which 

 made his associates and acquaintances 

 his friends. 



Henby Sidgwick, late Knight- 

 bridge professor of moral philosophy at 

 Cambridge, died on August 28, at the 

 age of sixty-two years. There are usu- 

 ally not many events to record in the 

 life of a university professor, but Sidg- 

 wick had an opportunity to prove his 

 character when he resigned a fellow- 

 ship in Trinity College because holding 

 it implied the acceptance of certain 

 theological dogmas. Liberalizing influ- 

 ences, however, were at work, of which 

 he himself was an important part, and 

 he was later elected honorary fellow of 

 the same college, and in 1883 became 

 professor of moral philosophy in the 

 University. Sidgwick published three 

 large works — 'Methods of Ethics' 

 (1874), 'Principles of Political Economy' 

 (1883) and 'Elements of Politics' 

 (1891) — in addition to a great number 

 of separate articles. All these works, 

 especially the 'Ethics,' show an intel- 

 lect to a rare degree both subtle and 

 scientific. There was a distinction and 

 a personal quality in what he wrote 

 that made each book or essay a work 



of art, as well as a contribution to 

 knowledge. Those who knew Professor 

 Sidgwick — and the writer of the pres- 

 ent note regards it as one of the for- 

 tunate circumstances of his life that he 

 was for several years a student under 

 him — realize that the qualities of the 

 man were even more rare than those of 

 the author. His hesitating utterance, 

 always ending in exactly the right 

 word, but represented the caution and 

 correctness of his thought. Subtlety, 

 sincerity, kindliness and humor were 

 as happily combined in his daily con- 

 versation as in his writings. It is said 

 that he was never 'entrapped into an- 

 swering a question by yes or no,' but 

 his deeds and his influence were posi- 

 tive without qualification or limitation. 



Fkiedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, 

 who died on almost the same day as 

 Sidgwick, was also a writer on ethics 

 and once a university professor, but the 

 life and writings of the two men pre- 

 sent a strange contrast. Where Sidg- 

 wick's touch was light as an angel's, 

 Nietzsche trampled like a bull; the one 

 was the embodiment of reason, caution, 

 consideration and kindliness, the other 

 represented paradox, recklessness, vio- 

 lence and brute force. Still Nietzsche 

 deserves mention here, as his ethical 

 views, based on the Darwinian theory 

 of the survival of the fit, are not un- 

 likely to be urged hereafter by saner 

 men, and to become an integral part of 

 ethics when ethics becomes a science. 

 As a matter of fact, after resigning his 

 professorship at Zurich, and even while 

 writing his remarkable books, Nietzsche 

 suffered from brain disease, and during 

 the past eleven years his reason was 

 completely lost. 



