Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 12.djvu/146

 NEW BOOKS. 133 later chapter (now xii.) where he sets out his general psychological interpre- tation of cerebral processes. The chapter just mentioned gives some little expansion to his earlier suggestion connecting Attention with the frontal lobes, but does not otherwise advance towards determining the physiological conditions of the higher mental functions, and in general is not much altered from its previous form. On the other hand, the foregoing chapter (now xi.) on the "Basal Ganglia" is wholly recast ; with which fact may be noted the suppression of the old chapter xii. that gave, with formidable nomenclature, a " diagrammatic summary " of his whole view of the relations, internal and external, of the different grades of centres. In that summary, with the diagram drawn to illustrate it, the most questionable feature was the unhesitating assumption of a direct con- nexion between the optic thalami and the corpora striatn, as if these constituted between them one relatively distinct sensori-motor mechanism. No sufficient anatomical or physiological ground was adduced for the connexion in the first edition, and still less is any now supplied in the new chapter, which shows with great care and candour how little is yet really made out concerning these great ganglionic masses. It might be supposed then that the author has withdrawn his old summary chapter, if for no other reason, in order not to prejudge the question of their relations ; but he sur- prises us by, after all, at the end of c. xi. (p. 422), putting it forward as at least " probable " that " they constitute together a sensori - motor mechanism, subservient to the manifestation of all those forms of activity which do not imply conscious discrimination or true volition ". Here it would seem the doctrine of the first edition might with advan- tage have been left wholly aside. The remarks now made are intended merely to give the barest notion of the changes in a book of established importance. There will be opportunity later on to examine with the neces- sary care some of Dr. Ferrier's positions, which he has now spared no pains to render as strong as, upon new investigation and farther reflexion, he can make them. Nobody that set store by the first edition can afford hence- forth not to have the second rather at hand for study and reference. Types of Ethical Theory. By JAMES MARTINEAU, D.D., LL.D,, late Prin- cipal of Manchester New College, London. Second Edition, revised. 2 Vols. ("Clarendon Press Series.") Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1886. Pp. xxxii., 512 ; viii., 596. Dr. Martineau's work, of which the main thesis is subjected in the present number to a more special handling than it formerly received, here already re-appears, in two volumes of a reduced and very handy size. In the way of revision, " a few passages are modified or annotated in order to guard against misconceptions occasioned by their inexact form ". Otherwise, the author contents himself, in a second preface (pp. xix.-xxx.), with defending his designation of Plato's theory as " unpsychological," and now extending it more expressly than he had done before to Aristotle's theory also, which has no place in the scheme of the work ; with a short justification of his antithesis of " idio- " and " hetero-psychological " ; with a promise that the question of free-will is to be discussed in the complementary work to follow on Religion ; and with some farther remarks on the necessary implication of "personal relation" in the notion of "moral authority". In an Appendix (ii. 569-75) are given four letters that passed between the author and Mr. H. Spencer on the interpretation put, in the first edition, on the latter's conception of evolution. Studies in Ancient History, comprising a Reprint of Primitive Marriage, <c. By the late JOHN FERGUSON MCLENNAN. A New Edition. London : Macmillan & Co., 1886. Pp. xxxi., 387.