Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/149

 REVIEWS 137

Individualistic ideals in industry, politics, and religion have been so over-emphasized, as in Benjamin Franklin's gospel of salvation by savings banks, and the popular revivalist's method of salvation by indi- vidual escape from future torments, that the ideals of social ethics find us unprepared and perplexed in face of the peremptory claims of solidarity.

This perplexity is finely illustrated in the chapters on charitable effort, domestic relations, industrial amelioration, educational and political reforms. The careless reader is likely to miss the point of view in this delicate and indirect treatment of our egoism. Out of a multitude of personal observations made upon a heterogeneous popula- tion and upon a host of philanthropists who have crossed her path, Miss Addams selects her illustrations of our mental distress and fumbling in the dark. Readers who do not already know the author and her work may be inclined to conclude that she is too much in sympathy with the socialistic tendencies of her neighbors ; that, instead of lifting them up, she has fallen to their level of social philosophy. The rarely sympathetic interpretation of the support of a corrupt ward politician by her neighbors at times almost reads as if she were condoning a crime. But if the "bourgeois" reader penetrates the chapter, he will, perhaps to his dismay and confusion, discern that the "upper classes" are doing precisely what the Italian laborers are doing, and with far less excuse.

The chapter on " Education" is full of illustrations of the fact that the employing and successful classes have hardly a suspicion of the real needs of a working population ; and that the public-school system itself is held down because it is regarded as a tool of trade and manu- factures, and a means of making efficient instruments of employers. The demands of social ethics are slowly and grudgingly accepted. A critic of this book says: "What are those who have the requisite sen- timent to strive for in industrial, political, social, and other relations? Social ethics must answer these questions. Miss Addams ignores them and renders no conclusion." To which Miss Addams might well reply that she has made many suggestions of a positive character as to things which a community ought to do ; and, further, that we already have many volumes on social policies which go wide of the mark because they lack insight into the ideals and aspirations of the people and their real needs. One who writes a book of less than one hundred pages can assume that the works of program -makers are already acces-