726 



NA TURE 



[December 2, 1922 



Religio Chirurgi. 



WE have received an address to theological 

 students by that famous and well-beloved 

 old surgeon, J>r. W. \V. Keen of Philadelphia, the 

 master and" the representative of American surgery, 

 whose work; has long been honoured over here. He 

 gives to his address the title u Science and the Scrip- 

 tures " ; but, ofjcourse, he is concerned with that 

 hardship of thought which all of us confess. In 

 America, he says, there is a mischievous " recrudesi 1 n 

 of the warfare over Evolution " : and he sets himself, 

 by sixty-two years' study and teaching of anatomy 

 and surgery, to confute such people as look for their 

 science to the Book of Genesis, and say that man was 

 " a separate direct creation." He finds it easy enough 

 to establish a more reasonable view, and we over here 

 can only wonder that it should now be necessary to do 

 so. The distinctive mark of this address is. however. 

 Dr. Keen's determined will to be as strong in the 

 Christian faith as in his reasons touching evolution. 



"II lelieve that man. himself, will only attain his final 

 development in the future life beyond the grave. In 

 that wondrous life I believe as fully as I do in my own 

 present existence. . . . Body wise, man is an animal, 

 but, thanks be to God, his destiny is not the same as 

 that of the beasts that perish. To develop great men. 

 such as Shakespeare, Milton, Washington, Lincoln, and 

 then by death to quench them in utter oblivion would be 

 unworthy of Omnipotence. To my mind it is simply an 

 impossible conclusion. Man's soul must be immortal." 



Therefore, Dr. Keen invents a phrase that the moral 

 and spiritual life of man has been " engrafted upon " 

 his natural life. The phrase is, however, unsatisfying. 

 Man's likeness bodywise to animals is acknowledged, but 

 Dr. Keen evades the animal's likeness conductwise to 

 man. What is the use of Shakespeare and Milton to us 

 who do not admit any great difference or gap between 

 animals at their highest and man at his lowest ? 



Doubtless, in this quandary, it may advantage us 

 to remember that no science has anything to say about 

 personality. There is a lot of slipshod talk about 

 organisms ; but not a word about the animal itself, 

 the inscrutable person which is the cat or the dog, the 

 very self which is " engrafted upon " the animal 

 organism. Until we understand — which possibly we 

 never shall — the mystery and secret of the creation of 

 animals, we shall remain in a quandary that is too 

 deep for scientific analysis. The only way of escape 

 seems to be that which Dr. Keen has taken. It 

 reconciles no difficulties. It holds things apart, not 

 brings them together. Still, he is not the only man, 

 full of age and experience, who has taken this way ; 

 and we may get, from his outspoken declaration of 

 faith, a touch of that delight which Socrates always 

 found in talking to old men. 



NO. 2770, VOL. I IO] 



Chemical Technology. 



(1) The General Principles of Chemical Engineering 

 Design. By Hugh Griffiths. (Chemical Engineering 

 Library.) Pp. 63. (London : Benn Brothers, Ltd., 

 1922.) $s. net. 



(2) Materials of Chemical Plant Construction — Non- 

 Metals. By Hugh Griffiths. (Chemical Engineering 

 Library.) Pp. 64. (London : Benn Brothers, Ltd., 

 1922.) 3.9. net. 



(3) The Weighing and Measuring of Chemical Sub- 

 glances. By II. L. Malan and A. I. Robinson. 

 (Chemical Engineering Library.) Pp.63. (London: 

 Benn Brothers, Ltd.. 1022.) 35. net. 



(4) The Flow of Liquids in Pipes. By Norman Swindin. 

 (Chemical Engineering Library.) Pp. 64. (London : 

 Benn Brothers, Ltd., ra22.) 3s. net. 



(5) Pumping in the Chemical Works. By Xorman 

 Swindin. (Chemical Engineering Library.) Pp. 80. 

 (London : Benn Brothers, Ltd., 1922.) $s. net. 



(6) Recent Progress in Rubber Chemistry and Technology. 

 By Dr. P. Schidrowitz. Pp. 64. (London : Benn 

 Brothers. Ltd.. 1922.) 35. net. 



IT was, we believe, Pascal who observed that 

 knowledge tends to concentrate itself in little 

 books. The half-dozen monographs, published by 

 Messrs. Benn Brothers, of which the titles are given 

 above, are at least an exemplification of the truth of 

 this aphorism. They form members of a series intended 

 primarily for the use of the chemical engineer. The 

 information they afford is given in what may be called 

 " tabloid " form. They are small octavo booklets 

 of some sixty or seventy pages, and are suitably illus- 

 trated. The actual amount of letterpress is, therefore, 

 very small. Still, small as they are, they are packed 

 with useful data, and as they are compiled by authori- 

 ties and are brought up-to-date, they will no doubt 

 be found useful by the class of technologists for whom 

 they are more particularly designed. 



(1) " The General Principles of Chemical Engineering 

 Design," by Mr. Hugh Griffiths, treats of the essentials 

 of a successful chemical plant : its physical, chemical, 

 and mechanical factors ; its practical and economic 

 factors ; and the settlement of the final design in the 

 light of experience of the working of these factors — a 

 matter frequently of no small difficulty in view of the 

 complexity of the problem. The book may be regarded 

 as introductory to the series. It deals simply with 

 first principles and generalities, illustrated here and 

 there by facts based upon practical experience. It is 

 well written and suggestive, but contains little but 

 what a chemical manufacturer is already well aware 

 of, from, it may be, a more or less painful experience. 

 The little book would serve admirably as the intro- 



