LITERARY NOTICES. 



*35 



The indoor relief lacks humanity and the 

 outdoor relief encourages improvidence. Mr. 

 Booth therefore suggests a universal compul- 

 sory system of state aid supported by taxa- 

 tion — a sort of pension, beginning, at the age 

 of sixty-five, at five shillings per week for the 

 central class of English workingmen, which 

 he computes at one fourth of the whole num- 

 ber. The vagueness of this demand is tacit- 

 ly admitted by our author when he grants 

 that such questions might be asked as, Have 

 the people at large made any such demand ? 

 Have they any grievance on this subject 

 which calls for redress ? Would they be 

 willing to be taxed to provide pensions for 

 the old ? We all know how thoroughly the 

 social science associations of England have 

 discussed all phases of the pauper question 

 in the United Kingdom, and of the plans of 

 relief past and present proposed. The name 

 is legion. Rich and poor are now taxed to 

 this end, indirectly if not directly; and it 

 were extremely doubtful, if Mr. Booth's plans 

 were not less direct than his well-known zeal 

 and warmth of heart and interest in the cause 

 of humanity, whether it would avail more for 

 the subject he has at heart than this well- 

 written, well-intentioned, but rather imperfect 

 book. 



Distinction and the Criticism of Beliefs. 

 By Alfred Sidgwick. London and New 

 York : Longmans, Green & Co. Pp. 279. 



The object of this book is chiefly to seek 

 the means of giving more accurate and ade- 

 quate expression to our thoughts. In the 

 discussion of many questions we come to 

 points where we are at loss concerning the 

 exact significance of the terms we use, or to 

 find words clearly to mark our thought. This 

 is because many important and necessary 

 terms involve ambiguity, leaving, at the best, 

 doubt as to the precise sense in which they 

 are to be taken. One of the first things to 

 ask is, what we shall mean by ambiguity. An 

 ambiguous word may be roughly defined as a 

 word with two or more meanings ; it is not, 

 however, the bare fact that a word has two 

 or more meanings that makes it ambiguous 

 in any effectual sense, but the fact that its 

 two or more meanings are in practice con- 

 fused. The author in his argument attempts, 

 first, to discover the part that is actually 

 played by ambiguity (or rough distinction) in 



confusing our judgment. In the process of 

 getting to understand exactly the error that 

 rough distinction creates, it becomes neces- 

 sary to discuss the excuses that may some- 

 times be made for vagueness. At every 

 level of our thought we are soon brought up 

 against the difficulties that arise out of the 

 attempt to define our words — or to draw 

 sharp distinctions where the things distin- 

 guished shade off into one another — difficul- 

 ties familiar to every one. Hence the author's 

 purpose includes an attempt to find a more 

 philosophical method of dealing with- rough 

 distinctions, in place of the happy-go-lucky 

 tact that every one uses, more or less, by the 

 light of Nature ; and in connection with this 

 a considerable number of questions arise, 

 and suggest lines of further inquiry. An- 

 other interwoven subject is the everlasting 

 struggle that language carries on against, 

 difficulties of expression. A third incidental 

 subject is the way in which language acts as 

 a drag upon the progress of knowledge, do- 

 ing this through " a certain over-conservative 

 tendency in our thought " that keeps us more 

 under the slavery of words than we need be. 



Cathcarfs Literary Reader, compiled by 

 George R. Cathcart, and first published eight- 

 een years ago, now appears in a revised 

 edition (American Book Company, $1.15). 

 It combines the function of an advanced 

 reading-book with that of a manual of Eng- 

 lish literature. Besides the selections from 

 writers of the Elizabethan period, the Com- 

 monwealth and the Restoration, the eight- 

 eenth century, and the nineteenth century, 

 the book contains introductory remarks on 

 each epoch, biographical and critical infor- 

 mation concerning the authors represented, 

 explanatory foot-notes, and a large number 

 of portraits. While poetry, oratory, and fic- 

 tion make up the body of the selections, his- 

 tory and modern science are not ignored. 



PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED. 



Ayers, Howard. The Ear of Man : its Past, its 

 Present, and its Future. Pp. 44. — The Vertebrate 

 Kar (Journal of Morphology for May, 1892). Pp. 

 354. with It Plates. Both Boston : Ginn & Co. 



Benwell, J. Leon. The Religion of Humanity : 

 a Philosophy of Life. Buffalo : H. L. Green. 

 Pp.28. 



Bennev, G. E. Induction Coils. New York • 

 Macmillah & Co. Pp. 231. $1. 



Burke, Charles G. Cosmography and the Cos- 

 mograph. New York : Peck & Snyder. Pp. 24. 



