Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/624

 6 10 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

his view of the function of the pulpit seems to be in conflict with this statement, for he would exclude all technical discussions of method from the sermon. The lecture gives occasion for more practical and direct application of principles. In this collection of articles the author traces the influence of Christianity on political, domestic, and industrial life, and gives an exposition of his own convictions in regard to the duty of the churches and of Christian citizens in these spheres of activity.

The assertions about the unequal distribution of wealth (pp. 58-59) have been questioned by statisticians. The figures showing a startling increase in crime (p. 299) have been declared by Dr. F. H. Wines to be absolutely misleading, yet the protest is not mentioned. The census report is here used in a very uncritical way.

The value of the book lies in its wide range of suggestions, its earnest spirit of humanity, and the stimulus it will give to a wiser direc- tion of the studies of preachers. C. R. HENDERSON.

Endokannibalismus. By DR. RUDOLF S. STEINMETZ. Reprinted from Mittheilungen der anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien. Band xxvi.

A COMPARATIVE description of 'cannibalism as it occurs within the tribe is accompanied with a tabular exhibit of the tribes practicing endocannibalism, the motives assigned for the practice, and the relia- bility of the information in each case. Lack of food, longing for meat, special relish for human flesh, and animistic belief, are the particular motives to cannibalism ; and women, children, invalids, the aged, and criminals are, in the main, its objects. To cannibalism the following negative conditions are necessary : (a) lack of meat, (<) absence of aesthetic horror of the corpse, (c) absence of fear of resentment of the disturbed spirit of the corpse, (d) absence of fanciful sympathy with the corpse, (e) absence of feeling that the act will defile the person eaten or his memory. All these conditions are present among the lower races. Primitive man must have been omnivorous ; especially in the first steps of his development he was obliged to refuse no suitable food. All motives which deter civilized men from eating human flesh were wanting, and only our prejudices prevent our recognition of the fact that some form of cannibalism has characterized lower stadia of human development as universally as have animism, ancestor-worship,