July 15, 1887.] 



SCIENCE. 



31 



nation's heart beat as one. Patriotism and national pride had 

 conquered sectionalism and personal selfishness. The era of good 

 feeling had dawned." 



It may seem to the general reader that the author regards the 

 beneficial effects of the war as wholly transient and temporary, — 

 good while they lasted, but soon to be entirely obliterated : in other 

 words, that the sentiment of nationalism which then made itself 

 apparent was a thing of present interest rather than of permanent 

 importance. "Although not destined to be perinanetit," %2Ly% Dr. 

 Butler on p. 26, " the national feeling it produced was something 

 entirely novel." " The ebb was to be greater than the flow," is 

 another expression that may mislead. But the author clearly does 

 not mean to ignore the fact that the war of 1 81 2 did, in truth, lay 

 the foundation for that imposing constitutional structure which 

 Webster and his followers were to build, and which fell not in the 

 time of trial, being founded on a rock. In fact, from the year 18 16 

 begins the true development of a party devoted to the preservation 

 of the Union ; and if Dr. Butler does not follow out this line of 

 thought, it is because he has distinctly limited his discussion to the 

 consideration of the immediate results, and declined to enter upon 

 investigations too extensive for the pages of a monograph. 



H. T. P. 



The Principles of Morals. By Professors Fowler and Wilson. 

 Oxford, Clarendon Pr. 



Treatises in ethics seem more numerous in the last decade than 

 in any other. The revival of interest in this subject reminds us of 

 the emergencies that called forth the moral earnestness of Plato. 

 Indeed, the revolution going on in present ethical speculations is a 

 repetition of the sophistic movement in Greece, and seems to pro- 

 voke similar reconstructive efforts. But the task this time is a 

 greater one than that with which earlier moralists had to contend. 



The successors of Professor Green follow that lamented author's 

 ' Prolegomena ' with a very different discussion of ethical problems. 

 The work is the joint product of two authors, and consists of two 

 parts. The introduction is mainly historical, but contains suffi- 

 cient criticism to determine the position of the writers. It is 

 admirably free from the long and labored discussions about pleas- 

 ure which make so many systems of ethics tedious and useless. 

 Only a few pages are devoted to methods of ethics, the authors 

 not being willing to repeat the satisfactory work of Mr. Sidgwick, 

 with whom they substantially agree. The second part is a 

 pointed and direct discussion of those questions having an immedi- 

 ate interest for present speculative morals. Theories of ethics, 

 that limbo of wasted energies, are entirely abandoned for the 

 psychological examination of moral facts as they appear in the 

 Hfe of the individual and of society. A characteristic feature of the 

 work is its unconscious betrayal of the immense influence exerted 

 upon ethical conceptions by modern scientific thought, and espe- 

 cially by the doctrine of evolution. 



The decline of theolog)', and of conceptions of life founded upon 

 it, has disparaged the theonomic view of morals as advocated by 

 men like Bishop Martensen ; and a re-action against such ethics, 

 led by the principle of evolution, has forced into great prominence 

 the consideration of self-regarding impulses to action. The first 

 chapter shows this very distinctly. The last completes the separa- 

 tion between theology and morals. 



There is an important remark in the chapter on self-regarding 

 feelings which is the keynote to all social and moral questions of 

 the present time. It is this: "While man lives from hand to 

 mouth, the want of the .necessaries of life, the hard struggle for 

 existence, leaves neither leisure nor inclination for the development 

 of the higher faculties." Professor Green makes a similar remark : 

 " Until life has been so organized as to afford some regular relief 

 from the pressure of animal wants, an interest in what Aristotle 

 calls TO tv Lfiv, as distinct from to C^"; cannot emerge." This 

 means that moral life requires relaxation from perpetual and ex- 

 hausting toil in order to be realized ; and modern ethics have be- 

 come conscious of the fact that large portions of the human race 

 have not, and perhaps cannot expect, this exemption. What, 

 then, about moral hfe where the industrial classes are condemned 

 to employments that make it impossible? There is a tincture of 

 pessimism latent here, and the unfortunates of modern social life 



are learning the real causes of their deplorable condition : like 

 Enceladus, they are trying to turn over, and to relieve themselves in 

 their uneasy position. The inequalities of the present cannot be 

 postponed to the future for adjustment, and egoistic instincts are 

 likely to assume an arrogance which theological beliefs once 

 effectually suppressed. Modern civilization is slumbering upon a 

 volcano, and reminds us of Carlyle's allusion to Vesuvius : " The 

 earth, green as she looks, rests everywhere on dread foundations 

 were we further down ; and Pan, to whose music the nymphs 

 dance, has a cry in him that can drive all men distracted." Self- 

 regarding impulses may become dangerous : still no progress is 

 possible without them, and the marvellous recuperating forces of 

 human nature will always bring up the unexpected and the im- 

 possible ; so that, amid impending consequences of the most 

 threatening kind, there may be the promise of escape and security. 

 The discussion of the sympathetic, the resentful, and the semi- 

 social feelings is able and suggestive. The freedom of the will is 

 dismissed in much the same way as it is disposed of by Bain and 

 Sidg^vick. There is an interesting chapter on the relation of the 

 imagination to moral ideals. The style is like that of most Eng- 

 lish writers at present, except Mr. Martineau, heavy, and uninter- 

 esting, — a great fault in subjects which are fast acquiring such 

 supreme importance. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



At the recent Royal Academy banquet, Professor Hu.xley con- 

 cluded his speech thus : " Art and literature and science are one ; 

 and the foundation of every sound education, and preparation for 

 active life in which a special education is necessary, should be some 

 efficient training in all three. At the present time, those who look 

 at our present systems of education, so far as they are within reach 

 of any but the wealthiest and most leisured class of the community, 

 will see that we ignore art altogether, that we substitute less profit- 

 able subjects for literature, and that the observation of inductive 

 science is utterly ignored. I sincerely trust, that, pondering upon 

 these matters, understanding that which you so freely recognize 

 here, that the three branches of art and science and literature are 

 essential to the making of a man, to the development of something 

 better than the mere specialist in any one of these departments — I 

 sincerely trust that that spirit may in course of time permeate the 

 mass of the people ; that we may at length have for our young peo- 

 ple an education which will train them in all three branches, which 

 will enable them to understand the beauties of art, to comprehend 

 the literature, at any rate, of their own country, and to take such 

 interest, not in the mere acquisition of science, but in the methods 

 of inductive logic and scientific inquiry, as will make them equally 

 fit, whatever specialized pursuit they may afterwards take up. I 

 see great changes : I see science acquiring a position which it was 

 almost hopeless to think she could acquire. I am perfectly easy as 

 to the future fate of scientific knowledge and scientific training : 

 what I do fear is, that it may be possible that we should neglect 

 those other sides of the human mind, and that the tendency to in- 

 roads which is already marked may become increased by the lack 

 of the general training of early youth to which I have referred." 



— Simultaneously with the appearance of the report of the Sey- 

 bert Commission on Spiritualism, the J. B. Lippincott Company 

 publish a volume by John Darby (Dr. Garrettson) with the rather 

 peculiar title, ' Nineteenth-Century Sense : the Paradox of Spiritual- 

 ism.' The first fifty pages of the book are printed in small type, 

 and describe a series of very wonderful experiments in ' transcen- 

 dental physics,' the writing on slates by unseen hands, the slipping 

 of iron rings upon firmly bound arms, the tying of knots in an 

 endless rope, materializations and visions, and so on, all performed 

 with the assistance of a member of the Seybert Commission. These 

 are recorded with all the enthusiasm and interest of a believer, 

 when suddenly we are told that his confrere confided to him how 

 all had been done : it was sense-deception, trickery and nothing 

 else. From this on, such manifestations have nought to do with 

 Spiritualism. We now enter a higher sphere and a larger type. 

 The author is a Rosecrucian (so he tells us), and uses the word as 

 meaning an illuminatus. He has had revealed to him the inner 

 meaning of things, and lives in a different world. He then ex- 



