SCIEXTIFIC LITERATURE. 845 



want to hear about will increase with ! educational influence of the associa- 

 them, and if the technicalities are t tion on the people at large can not 

 permitted to crowd out the more ' fail to be seriously impaired, if it is 

 popular and edifying features, the I not altogether destroyed. 



SPECIAL BOOKS. 



^Ir. Lester F. Ward, in the book whose title is indicated below,* gives 

 a very readable summary of his views upon sociological science. He still 

 holds, as he tells us, to the theories enunciated in his Dynamic Sociol- 

 ogy, published in 1882; but he does not seem to have obtained in the last 

 sixteen years any additional light as to the form social evolution is likely 

 to take under the influence of the psychic forces which he has described. 

 Thei-e is to be a social evolution, so we are given to understand, determined 

 by a social consciousness of social needs ; but he is not able as yet to indi- 

 cate any distinct dawning of such consciousness. He apologizes for the 

 democratic governments which are to be organs of the expected progress. 

 They will be all right some day, but up to date they are the " most stupid "' 

 of all governments. "They have to rely on brute force. They are short- 

 sighted, and only know how to lock the door after the horse is stolen. 

 They swarm and 'enthuse,' and then lapse into a state of torpor, losing all 

 that was gained, and again surge in another dii'ection, wasting their ener- 

 gies. In fact, they act precisely like animals devoid of intelligence." Lest 

 the picture should be too dark, the author adds that " under exceptional 

 circumstances they have displayed signs of collective intelligence." To 

 their credit, however, be it said that democracies are " benevolent," while 

 autocracies are always " rapacious." The democratic legislator knows 

 what his constituents want and tries to get it for them. This is benevolent 

 on his part, and the benevolence of the constituency, we suppose, will be 

 shown in re-electing him. Dr. Pangloss himself could not have imagined 

 a more beautiful illustration of the general perfection of the scheme of 

 things. 



The great trouble, however, is that so little mind beams through this 

 benevolence. Mr. Ward acknowledges that this constitutes '' the problem 

 of sociology." He has wrestled with it, he says, for many years, and sees 

 no way to increase the intellectual status of democratic governments save 

 by improving that of the people at large. " If," he adds, " the social con- 

 sciousness can be so far quickened as to awake to a full realization of this 

 truth in such vivid manner as to induce general action in the direction 

 of devising means for the universal equalization of intelligence, all other 

 social problems will be pitt in the way of gradual but certain solution." 

 It really seems to us as if in this sentence the stream of Mr. Ward's argu- 

 ment were losing itself, like an Australian river, in the sands of a highly 

 Latinized, and all but unmeaning, verbiage. May we not, however, ask the 

 question whether, with a marked increase in the general intelligence and 



* Outlines of Sociology. By Lester F. Ward. New York : The Mficmillan Company, 1898. 



