100 MICHAEL A. LANE 



dings, more than any other one man in America has attempted 

 to lay down a complete sociology without once discussing 

 method. In this respect he differs from most of our sociolo- 

 gists who have not tried so much to do something as tried to 

 tell others how to do something. Giddings has been a great 

 gatherer of facts and he has assembled his facts with very 

 great power. He has suggested that a reduction of popula- 

 tion will be brought about — if it is not now being brought 

 about here in America — by the high tension under which 

 Americans, as a people, live. But perhaps this is his only 

 speculation on the future. His main thought has been 

 directed toward an effort to synthesize or systematize the 

 main facts of anthropology, so as to give us a complete social 

 interpretation of these facts ; in other words he has attempted 

 to construct a theory of social phylogeny, much as the zoolo- 

 gists have constructed an organic phylogeny. 



Another American sociologist who has made an attempt 

 to correlate human facts is Professor Ross of Nebraska. 

 Ross was a sufferer from democratic institutions, as noted 

 above, for he was closed out of his chair at Leland Stanford, 

 Jr., university because of his endorsement of the popular 

 prejudice against Chinese labor. Those who have an eye to 

 history can see in Ross the martyr of reform, who, in all times 

 and countries, suffers for his opinions. The impression I 

 have always received from the writings of Ross is that of a 

 young scholar entirely devoted to his work; realizing to the 

 utmost the perfect truth of a new iconoclasm, and endeavoring 

 like Des Cartes, to carry water on both shoulders. In short 

 Ross reduces God to an idea, and then goes on discussing 

 God long after everybody has forgotten his original definition. 



It is difficult to put an estimate upon his one work. 

 Social Control. I am not sure that I have been able to 

 understand that remarkable book. I read it in the install- 

 ments published in the American Journal of Sociology, 

 and subsequently reviewed it between its covers as a book; 

 but if Ross has done more than demonstrated his extraordi- 

 nary mastery of the English language, and his abilit}'' to say 

 the same thing in ten or fifteen wholly different periphrases, 

 I have not had the competency to take it in. He seems 



