Concerning the Suppressed Book. 583 



the edition. For the Introduction, the bad taste with 

 which the notes were embellished, and the newspaper quo- 

 tation describing the doings in a branch of the positivist 

 church in London which Mr. Harrison does not like, he is 

 not to be held to account. 



For his offence in correcting some injurious misrepre- 

 sentations in a controversial volume published for the use 

 of a people three thousand miles away, the London Times 

 declares that Mr. Spencer has made the amende honorable 

 by destroying the book : and this is the general English 

 view. The equally general American view is, that this ex- 

 treme'proceeding was ridiculous, that it benefited nobody, 

 and gratuitously deprived many readers in this country of 

 a valuable work on an important subject. It is, at any 

 rate, desirable that the responsibility for this result should 

 be fixed where it justly belongs. Mr. Spencer made two 

 proposals to Harrison looking to the preservation of the 

 work, both of which were absolutely fair, but neither of 

 which was accepted. Mr. Spencer would have been justi- 

 fied in making a stand upon either of these propositions, 

 and refusing further concessions ; but Mr. Harrison's re- 

 jection of his overtures left the matter in so unsatisfactory 

 a shape that nothing remained for Mr. Spencer but to cut 

 the knot by ordering the book to be suppressed. 



