Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 12.djvu/478

 NEW BOOKS. 465 Elements of Physiological Psychology. A Treatise of the Activities and Nature of the Mind from the Physical and Experimental Point of View. By GEORGE T. LADD, Professor of Philosophy in Yale Univer- sity. London : Longmans, Green & Co., 1887. Pp. xii., 696. Critical Notice of this important work, published simultaneously in Eng- land and in America, will presently follow. Let it suffice for the present to state that, after a short Introduction (pp. 1-14), it is divided into three parts : i. The Nervous Mechanism (pp. 17-236) ; ii. Correlations of the Nervous Mechanism and the Mind (pp. 239-582) ; iii. The Nature of the Mind (pp. 585-613). The Problem of Evil. An Introduction to the Practical Sciences. By DANIEL GREENLEAF THOMPSON, Author of A System of Psychology. London : Longmans, Green & Co., 1887. Pp. viii., 281. Mr. Thompson here follows up his System of Psychology, reviewed in MIND, Vol. x. 115, with a treatise on Ethics, or, more exactly, on Ethics and Politics. Starting from a basis of hedonistic psychology, and adopting the utilitarian criterion of " the maximum happiness of the greatest num- ber," he puts his general problem in the form, By what method or methods shall we seek to eliminate evil ? The book is divided into six parts : i. " The Nature of Evil " ; ii. " The Elimination of Evil " ; iii. " The great Theological Superstition " ; iv. " The Institutional Fetich " ; v. " The Socialistic Fallacy " ; vi. " The Root of Moral Evil ". The " two comple- mentary precepts " which " must for ever govern all effective effort for the elimination of evil and consequent amelioration of mankind " are (1) " Aim at the minimum of extrinsic restraint and the maximum of liberty for the individual " ; (2) " Aim at the most complete and universal development of the altruistic character ". Socialistic proposals for the reform of society are rejected on account of their collision with the first of the two precepts. " The root of moral evil " is egoism ; and this is to be attacked by altruistic action on the part of individuals. The author, while still remaining at the point of view of the older experientialism unmodified by evolutionary or other later ideas, shows himself anxious to meet the objections of Green to utilitarian ethics ; devoting a chapter (pt. ii., ch. 9, pp. 45-77) to an examination of the Prolegomena. As in the System of Psychology (though Green was not there referred to), a real if partial answer is at some points given to his objections to English philosophical method. In the former work, for example, the notion of "the self-distinguishing subject" as not identical with particular objects of consciousness was arrived at by psycho- logical analysis. It was similarly shown how, consistently with hedonistic psychology, desires arise for objects instead of for pleasures directly. The analysis of desire is now repeated, and application of it is made against Green's contention for the priority of desire to pleasure. " The hedonists are wrong," it is concluded, " where they assert that the object of volition and action is always pleasure, but right in their claim that it is always the end of volition and action." Mr. Thompson protests against Green's view "that a Benthamite would repudiate as unintelligible the notion of an absolute value in the individual person," and would maintain instead the absolute value of every pleasure in itself. " Whatever a Benthamite ought to believe," he says, " I do not imagine one has been actually found who claimed that pleasure meant anything at all, save with reference to a person enjoying pleasure." " In the most egoistic form of hedonism, the personal Ego is of the supremest value," and, by sympathy, the hedonist may transfer this idea of value to all other persons. These arguments are in one way the more deserving of attention because Mr. Thompson remains so com- pletely at the unmodified utilitarian standpoint. There is special interest 30