LITERARY NOTICES. 



^7Z 



ject upon those engaged in education, to 

 show its disciplinary value, and to give im- 

 portant hints and suggestions as to how it 

 may be most successfully pursued. Notwith- 

 standing all the discussion there has been as 

 to whether political economy is a true sci- 

 ence or not, or as to the validity or relative 

 superiority of its different methods, the sub- 

 ject is one which engages wide attention 

 and is of foremost interest and importance. 

 It deals with what is going on and must con- 

 tinue to go on in society under good or bad 

 guidance, and where knowledge is certainly 

 better than ignorance. The author iias 

 therefore done an excellent and necessary 

 thing in showing students how they can best 

 proceed in informing themselves on politi- 

 cal economy, whether they wish merely to 

 get an acquaintance with its rudiments or 

 to master the subject. He gives the list of 

 a teacher's library selected from English, 

 French, and German authors, which can not 

 fail to prove useful. 



Philosophic Series. By James 5IcCosh, 

 D. D., LL. D. Nos. I to VIII, 50 to 70 

 page pamphlets. New York : Charles 

 Scribner's Sons. Price, 50 cents each. 



It was a very happy conception of the 

 able President of Princeton College and dis- 

 tinguished metaphysician, Dr. McCosh, to 

 take up the most urgent and interesting 

 philosophical questions of the time, and 

 treat them in the popular way here adopted. 

 There can be no doubt that philosophical 

 speculation has a good deal about it that 

 is progressive. As long as thinkers shut 

 themselves up to such pure metaphysical 

 elaborations as they can carry on in the 

 restricted sphere of consciousness, the re- 

 sulting movement will be round and round 

 rather than an advance or ascent ; but, 

 when they seize the conception of philoso- 

 phy in its broader aspects, and connect it 

 with those large questions of Nature and 

 life which have come into such prominence 

 in recent times, a distinctively forward 

 movement is the result. When such great 

 new principles as the conservation of en- 

 ergy or the law of development are pro- 

 jected into the philosophical field, and their 

 import is recognized by the speculative 

 mind, onward movements which can be re- 

 garded as nothing less than a new departure 

 are the inevitable consequence. Dr. McCosh 

 VOL. XXVIII. — 18 



is not the narrow type of man to blink or 

 to belittle the significance of these mighty 

 ideas which have been forced upon philoso- 

 phy by modern science ; he not only meets 

 them, but he welcomes them as priceless 

 contributions to knowledge, to be perhaps 

 yet further interpreted and qualified, but, 

 neither to be feared nor resisted. Aside 

 from his mastery of general philosophical 

 subjects, and his familiarity as a scholar 

 with the history of speculation, his knowl- 

 edge of science and his sympathy with it, 

 and his thorough acquaintance with the 

 critical issues which have become prominent 

 in the thought of this generation, especially 

 qualify Dr. McCosh to give instructiveness 

 to such a series of essays as he has here 

 undertaken. 



No fonnal review of the work is here 

 practicable ; we can only indicate his suc- 

 cessive topics. No. I considers " Criteria 

 of Diverse Kinds of Truth, as opposed to 

 Agnosticism." No. II, " Energy : EfBcient 

 and Final Cause." No. Ill, "Development: 

 What it can do, and what it can not do." 

 No. IV, " Certitude, Providence, and Prayer," 

 No. V, " Locke's Theory of Knowledge, with 

 a Notice of Berkeley." No. VI, " Agnos- 

 ticism of Hume and Huxley, with a Notice 

 of the Scotch School." No. VII, " A Criti- 

 cism of the Critical Philosophy." No. 

 VIII, " Herbert Spencer's Philosophy as 

 culminated in his Ethics." 



President McCosh is a Doctor of Di- 

 vinity, and the course of topics in this dis- 

 cussion shows that it has been prepared 

 with reference to its theological bearings. 

 But the controversial element is moderate 

 in tone, and is subordinate to the expository 

 element. We commend the pamphlets for 

 the clearness and instructiveness of their 

 teachings on philosophical questions, with- 

 out being at all committed to the author's 

 conclusions respecting theology or morality. 

 On these points he seems often to betray 

 the weakness of the thorough-going parti- 

 san of a dogmatic system. 



Special Report of the State Inspector 

 (Minnesota) of Oils on the Illuminat- 

 ing QuALiTT of Oils. By Henry A. 

 Castle. St. Paul. Pp. 24. 

 The inspector relates that frequent and 

 numerous complaints came to him during 

 1884 of the inferior illuminating powers and 



