Feb. 20, 1879] 



NATURE 



361 



I 



the chemical part ; for a treatise having the pretensions 

 of the book we are reviewing, it is notably incomplete. 

 EngUsh students and medical men who wish to inform 

 themselves in the chemistry, of the animal tissues will find 

 far more to their purpose in Prof. Gamgee's annotated 

 edition of Hermann, or Mr. Lea's Appendix to Foster, 

 than they will find in Mr. Kingzett's Manual. 



The last chapter but one of the book is devoted to a 

 discussion of " Character." This, not being a chemical 

 subject and not a physiological one, we presume Mr. 

 Kingzett includes under the title " philosophical." Why 

 Mr. Kingzett should select " character " out of the multi- 

 tude of extraneous subjects ; why "character" should be 

 called specially a " philosophical " subject ; and why it 

 was deemed advisable to serve up scraps of philosophy at 

 all in a " Manual of Animal Chemistry ; " are difficulties 

 which at once arise in our mind as we peruse the list of 

 contents, and which are nowhere fully explained on closer 

 inspection of the book. It is true that when we come to 

 find that by " Character " Mr. Kingzett does not exactly 

 mean character, but the whole mental and moral nature 

 of man and its, at present, inexplicable connection with 

 his physical nature, the difficulties recede if they do not 

 diminish. They are certainly not entirely effaced. If 

 the pure physiologist is content for the present to leave 

 such subjects to the psychologist, the chemist must 

 recognise, when he takes them up, that he does so quite 

 gratuitously. But whether or not it is expedient to under- 

 take discussions on psychology in chemical books, it is at 

 least expedient, if they are undertaken, that they should 

 be sensible and to the purpose ; that they should not be 

 encumbered by commonplaces or crude analogies ; and 

 that they should be got over as quickly as possible. 

 Although it is a pity to disturb the order of Mr. Kingzett's 

 reflections with the scissors, only space is granted us for 

 a paragraph or so. They shall be neither worse nor 

 better than the rest ; and we strongly advise those 

 readers who are in search of amusement to borrow the 

 book and read the whole chapter. 



He begins : " Character is almost universally regarded 

 as something apart from the body of man himself ; some- 

 thing for which man is individually responsible, something 

 which, bom with man, is developed and cultured into 

 matvu-ity by education and training, be that mature state 

 one for evil or one for good." Mr. Kingzett does not 

 appear to believe this, whatever it may mean ; for he 

 continues by way of antithesis, " Let first causes be what 

 they may, and so also let us hide our face from the 

 infinite future and regard man as an intelligent machine, 

 complete, so far, in himself." This resolution having 

 been taken, the difficulty of justly judging men's thoughts 

 leads up to a magnificent simile : " And thus man never 

 imderstands his fellow-man aright ; he picks out a few 

 crystalline threads of an individuality ; he sees a few 

 bright or black bands in the spectrum of his neighbour' s 

 life, and without touching the colloid mass which will 

 not crystallise, and being blinded to those parts of the 

 spectrum which are not revealed {sic\ man judges his 

 fellow." 



The characteristic of man among living animals is then 

 summed up in the following startling epigram : " In short, 

 man is a cerebrating creature, as the cow is a ruminating 

 creature ;" and we immediately afterwards learn that he 



cannot help cerebrating. Nor, it appears, can he help 

 being a genius— or the reverse — if his brain-cells are fitly 

 formed and he has been judiciously trained, — " and it is 

 quite true that brain-cells do differ in form and composi- 

 tion just in a similar sort of way(!) as lungs and hearts 

 differ." 



This naturally leads to the question of moral responsi- 

 bility, and the difficulty of the materialist is thus stated : 

 " Man, the result \i.e., * of a predetermining influence hi 

 the very foetus '], steps on to the platform of life in some 

 measure at least an automaton. He is bom of others, 

 and finds himself with a head upon his shoulders, but the 

 quantity and quality of brain-matter in the head is not 

 ordained of himself. He may be a genius ; but, horror ! 

 he may prove a fool ! " 



We then reach what appears to be \ike'raison[d'etre of 

 the chapter, viz., a conclusion which however nowise 

 follows from any premisses before stated : " Thus even 

 mundane chemical science has a part to play in the role 

 of what poor mortals call their souls j it has something to 

 do with every poeism {sic) originating in the mind of the 

 poet, with every transcendent hope of the philosopher, 

 with the logic of a Mill, and the teeming intelligence of 



aU." .. :■. 



Mr. Kingzett is then arrested by the thought that all 

 the body, brain-cells included, are elaborated from food — 

 a thought which leads him to exclaim, " Eat, drink, and 

 be merry, for verily that which we eat and drink takes 

 part in that with which we think !"' 



This is Mr. Kingzett's treatment of "character'' as a 

 philosophical subject ! We can only say, as Dryden once 

 said in a criticism of a play of Elkanah Settle's, " I am 

 mistaken if nonsense is not here pretty thick sown." 

 We challenge any one to find us five such pages of silly 

 reflection and irrelevant twaddle in any other seriously- 

 intended work. 



At the end of the book there is an " Index of 

 Authorities Quoted" — not, of course, the Index of tTw* 

 bont- Ttu^ing «iJ the K'o, wcnnaMr. Kingzett's own 

 name, and under it we discover that Mr. Kingzett is an 

 "authority" on Character— the reference to the- book 

 being to p. 462, the very chapter we are discussing. As 

 it nowhere appears that Mr. Kingzett has, in other places, 

 treated of this subject, we have the happily rare spectacle 

 of an author endeavouring to take time and the critics by 

 the forelock by writing himself down an " authority " ere 

 he knows his book will live. Sure self-complacency never 

 touched a loftier pinnacle ! 



After this, a good anti-climax might have been regarded 

 as hopeless ; but Mr. Kingzett has achieved one. He 

 closes his book with a list of " Suggested Matters for 

 Research," in the hope and belief (as he tells us in his 

 preface) that they may be a guide to the "scientific 

 chemist." The "scientific chemist," if he has but a 

 smattering of physiology, will know how to shrug the 

 shoulder at such puerile, general, and useless suggestions 

 as the following : — . ;_^ 



" (i) The chemical composition and formula of ptyaline; 

 its chemical relationship to albumin ; a proper explana- 

 tion of its ferment-power, and a better study of its general 

 nature." • • \a« 



" (7) An explanation of the oft-recurring deposition 6i 

 I biliary matters near the pyloric end of the stomach. 



