No. 466.] NOTES AND LITERATURE. 759 
palethnology and paleontology; (4) historical data concerning the 
progress, during long periods, of a single society; (5) ancient 
written laws and customs; (6) myths, popular traditions, archeologic 
monuments; (7) psychologic induction ; and (8) survivals of cul- 
ture of primitive age. In nearly all these lines the author apparently 
labors under the serious disadvantage of relying upon documentary 
evidence alone, lacking a thorough, personal, practical acquaintance 
with the subject, which is essential, even in the presence of good 
documents, to true reasoning and conclusions. 
The seventeen chapters of the book treat, respectively, of the 
object, róle and sources of genetic sociology; animal societies ; 
modern savages; human races and polygenism ; palethnologic data ; 
primitive man; primitive family; primitive society; primitive pro- 
priety (possessions); primitive ideas; mythologic conceptions; lan- 
guage and writing; religion ; morals; laws; politic organization and 
social classes; and art, industry and commerce. ‘The author is at 
his best in the divisions on animism (* primitive ideas”) and religion ; 
the exposition of these subjects is concise and clear, and the ground 
is better covered than elsewhere. 
The writer adheres to the polygenic theory of human evolution, 
and the matriarchal theory of the primitive family; he opposes the 
idea of society being derived from the family. The humble com- 
mencements of human society must be sought with man's immediate 
precursors. The actual societies of savages offer much analogy 
with that of primitive (early) man. Individual possessions followed 
"propriety in common, and, beginning with a few personal effects, 
developed particularly with the domestication of animals. e 
cosmic ideas of the primitive man were those of animism. Lan- 
guage was preceded by mimicry and its beginnings were imitations of 
animal sounds; the first words consisted of imitative sounds and of 
gestures; the first stage of language was monosyllabism. Religion is 
based upon animism, which constitutes the minimum of religiosity. 
Morals are developed independently of religion. Laws are but 
moral rules, admitted and sanctioned by groups of humanity. In 
politic organization the clan preceded the tribe, which latter was 
formed by an enlargement of one or a coalition of several clans. 
The first class in society was the military, which later on constituted 
fhe aristocracy; the next class was the sacerdotal, the third the 
plebeian, etc. The various grades of the civil society, manifested at 
the present in space, are living documents of successive transforma- 
tions accomplished in time. 
