846 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



insurmountable obstacles, makes appear more 

 practicable the contention of those who are 

 warring upon the abuses and tyrannies of 

 the present. 



Psychology. By William James. New 

 York: Henry Holt & Co. (American 

 Science Series, briefer course). Pp. 4*78. 



The author's chief aim in preparing this 

 abridgment of his larger work on the Princi- 

 ples of Psychology has been to make it more 

 directly available for class-room use. For that 

 purpose he has omitted several chapters and 

 rewritten others ; has left out the polemical 

 and historical matter, the metaphysical allu- 

 sions and purely speculative passages, the 

 book references, and most of the quotations 

 of the larger work ; and has added brief chap- 

 ters on the various senses. By these changes 

 he believes that his presentation of the sub- 

 ject as a " natural science " has gained in 

 clearness by its extrication from so much 

 critical matter and its more simple and dog- 

 matic statement. His definition of psychol- 

 ogy is " the description and explanation of 

 states of consciousness as such." As a nat- 

 ural science it, in common with the other 

 natural sciences and in spite of the fact that 

 further reflection leads to idealism, assumes 

 that a world of matter exists altogether in- 

 dependently of the perceiving mind. Be- 

 sides this it assumes additional data pecul- 

 iarly its own, and leaves it to more developed 

 parts of philosophy to test their ulterior sig- 

 nificance and truth. These data are thoughts 

 and feelings, or transitory states of con- 

 sciousness, and knowledge, by these states of 

 consciousness, of other things. Mental facts 

 can not be properly studied apart from the 

 physical environment of which they take cog- 

 nizance. Mind and world have been evolved 

 together, and in consequence are something 

 of a mutual fit. The special interactions be- 

 tween the outer order and the order of con- 

 sciousness, by which this harmony has been 

 brought about, have been the subject of 

 evolutionary speculations, which, though they 

 can not so far be said to be conclusive, have 

 refreshed and enriched the subject, and 

 brought all sorts of new questions to the 

 light. The conception that the immediate 

 condition of a state of consciousness is an 

 activity of some sort in the cerebral hemi- 

 spheres, which underlies the physiological 



psychology of recent years, is the working 

 hypothesis of this book. After the chapters 

 on the senses, structure and function of the 

 brain, and general conditions of neural ac- 

 tivity, the subjects of habit, the stream of 

 consciousness, the self, attention, conception, 

 association, the sense of time, memory, imagi- 

 nation, perception, the perception of space, 

 reasoning, emotion, instinct, will, and psy- 

 chology and philosophy are discussed ; and 

 the conclusion is reached that psychology does 

 not yet stand on solid ground, but is waiting 

 for its Galileo and Lavoisier. 



Abraham Lincoln. The True Story of a 

 Great Life. By William H. Herndon 

 and Jesse W. Weik, with an Introduc- 

 tion by Horace White. New York: 

 D. Appleton & Co. Two vols. Pp. 331 

 and 348. Price, $3. 



Mr. Herndon's theory of a biography is 

 that it should tell the whole truth ; not give 

 prominence to certain traits or events which 

 flatter a little or brighten the glory of the 

 subject, and withhold others which may have 

 been equally potent in determining the char- 

 acter and fortunes because they are of a 

 darker nature, and may infuse a little un- 

 pleasantness into the picture ; but to give 

 both sides, and to each incident, whether 

 pleasant or unpleasant, its due prominence, 

 according to the magnitude of its effect on 

 the life as a whole. To him the biographies 

 in the Bible are models, in which none of 

 the faults and offenses of those who are 

 otherwise held up as noble characters are ex- 

 tenuated, but each is related in all its enor- 

 mity. Mr. Herndon was the life-long inti- 

 mate friend of Mr. Lincoln and his law 

 partner for many years. He regarded him 

 with a genuine, enthusiastic, personal ad- 

 miration. He contemplated the book for 

 twenty years, but not being a literary man 

 made little progress in composing it till he put 

 it into the hands of Mr. Weik, whose habits 

 and training were favorable to its successful 

 execution. His purpose is to deal with Mr. 

 Lincoln individually and domestically — as a 

 lawyer, as citizen, and as statesman. Espe- 

 cial attention is given to the history of his 

 youth and early manhood ; and in this to give 

 some things that other biographies do not 

 have. " The endeavor is to keep Lincoln in 

 sight all the time ; to cling close to his side all 

 the way through — leaving to others the more 



