86 SCIENCE IN " BONDAGE " 



it. " There exists a certain class of mind," he 

 commences, " allied perhaps to the Greek sophist 

 variety, to which ignorance of a subject offers no 

 sufficient obstacle to the composition of a treatise 

 upon it." It may be rash to suggest that this 

 type of mind is well developed in philosophers 

 of the Spencerian school, though it would be 

 possible to adduce some evidence in support of 

 such a suggestion. " In the volume before us," 

 he continues, " Mr. Grant Allen sets to work 

 to reconstruct the fundamental science of 

 dynamics, an edifice which, since the time of 

 Galileo and Newton, has been standing on what 

 has seemed a fairly secure and substantial basis, 

 but which he seems to think it is now time to 

 demolish in order to make room for a newly 

 excogitated theory. The attempt is audacious 

 and the result what might have been expected. 

 The performance lends itself indeed to the most 

 scathing criticism ; blunders and misstatements 

 abound on nearly every page, and the whole 

 thing is simply an emanation of mental fog." 

 It would occupy too much space to reproduce 

 this criticism with any fullness, but one or two 

 points exceedingly germane to our subject can 

 hardly go without notice. Alluding to a certain 

 question, which seems to have greatly bothered 

 Mr. Allen and likewise Mr. Clodd, who, it would 

 appear, was associated with him in this perform- 

 ance, the reviewer says : " The puzzle was solved 

 completely long ago, in the clearest possible 

 manner, and the c Principia ' is the witness to 

 it ; but it is still felt to be a difficulty by be- 



