REVIEWS. 
187 
tion of the author’s inquiries reflect the highest credit on him, and will be 
read by those who work with the microscope ” with no small degree of 
pleasure and improvement. Authorities, ancient and modern, have been 
ransacked on all sides, and original and independent researches are added by 
the author. The literature of the wasp receives a fair share of attention ; 
and, withal, the style is so easy and scholarly, and the technicalities are 
so few, that we confess to regarding Dr. Ormerod as one of the best 
popularisers of science which it has been our good fortune to meet with. 
If we wished to cultivate a taste for Natural History pursuits, and a mode of 
rigid scientific observation in a pupil. Dr. Ormerod’s book is assuredly one 
which we should not fail to place in his hands. 
UR English Charivari once gave a popular definition of the relations of 
what are styled mind and matter, and it appears to us that it was but a 
happy satire on a certain class of metaphysicians. It was as follows : — 
“ What is mind ? — No matter. What is matter ? — Never mind.” Now the 
object of the author of this book gives Mr. Punch’s answer, but he does not 
make the assertion that mind is immaterial without going through a some- 
what elaborate process of demonstration. Mr. Wyld is by no means a 
writer to be despised. To a difficult and obscure subject he brings a clear 
style of expression, and a certain superficial acquaintance with physiological 
facts. With these powers, then, he strives to demonstrate a proposition 
utterly impossible to prove, and which, we may also remark, is absolutely at 
variance with the results of modern investigation. He thinks — so far as 
we can see — that he has started a novelty in questioning the existence of 
force and matter as united facts, but we think he will find that in this 
respect Faraday has been before him. We by no means admit the author’s 
conclusion, but we would not desire to bias our readers against him. Let 
them take up his book, and read it for themselves. It is instructive but 
Ave think it would be as well if, when next Mr. Wyld approaches the subject, 
he would, in limine, state distinctly what he understands by the term 
mind.” This Avould help to make the controversy a short one. 
D r. STIRLING’S essays hardly come within the range of our criticism, 
but, inasmuch as they include a chapter in which the opinions of 
* The World as Dynamical and Immaterial.” By R. S. Wyld, F.R.S.E. 
Edinburgh : Oliver and Boyd, 1868. 
t Jerrold, Tennyson, and Macaulay.” By J. H. Stirling, LL.D. 
Edinburgh : Edmonston and Douglas, 1868. 
VOL. VII. NO. XXA'IT. O 
MIND AND MATTER.* 
A WIT, A POET, AND A HISTORIAN.t 
