Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/280

268 which were prepared for that particular purpose, and are published only at the solicitation of successive classes of students. The treatise is original in the sense that it embodies the author's own independent thoughts, with free criticisms of the writers of the esoteric school who have preceded him, and from whom he differs widely on several important points. It usually, however, has those in view, and, however freely his own theories may be presented, those of the others are not far away t Among the more important points of difference from other standard works are the endeavor to avoid the perplexity arising from the practice of formally accepting any given analysis of the mind, and then practically disregarding it in attributing to one faculty the functions of another; it rejects the doctrine of complex faculties, complex feelings, and complex action, and opposes to it the principle that these features are all simple, though interdependent; it also rejects the doctrines that consciousness is cognitive; that there are a voluntary consciousness, a latent consciousness, and unconscious influences exercised over the mind by unknown objects; that there is an involuntary attention, and the mind can attend strictly to a multitude of objects at the same time; and of the objectivity of time, space, beauty, and sublimity in the form in which those phenomena are generally stated. It differs from the more common theories concerning identity, memory, and the laws of association or mental suggestion. The doctrine of sensibility is discussed briefly; and the textbook presentation of the will is supplemented by a review of the prominent teachings concerning it of a number of the more popular authors from Augustine to the present time. The study offered in this book is wholly from the interior, the author holding, with all who have treated of the subject prior to the rise of the evolutionist school, that "in mental science the mind deals exclusively with itself, or rather studies itself through the facts given in consciousness." We are not disposed to belittle the value of the esoteric study. It has been well attended to by the authors of the past, to whom Prof. Burney often refers, and whom he often also criticises; but the publications of Spencer, Maudsley, Sully, and Ribot have shown that the study from the outside is even more valuable, and has already furnished a large volume of data essential to a full knowledge of the subject, and competent to answer some of the questions which the esoteric theories still leave open. While the adherents of this school may not accept all the conclusions of the evolutionists, they will find that they can not be ignored, and that no treatise can in this day be considered complete that does not take account of them.

present portion of this work, the first part of which has been noticed in the Monthly, is devoted to sound, dynamics, magnetism, and electricity. The measurements relating to sound are merely the conclusion of the subject. Under dynamics are included experiments on the pendulum, the measurement of force, elasticity, and cohesion, and the determination of work done. The measurement of the distance between the poles of a magnet, the deflections of compass needles, and magnetic dip are among the experiments under magnetism. Several methods of measuring electrical currents, electrical resistance, and electro-motive force are given. In the concluding pages there are a few experiments for advanced students in various departments of physics, and the use of certain instruments of precision is described. The volume is illustrated with many diagrams and cuts of apparatus.

author divides this treatise into four parts, dealing respectively with the principles of social progress, of economic production, of economic distribution, and of practical statesmanship. He defines social progress as "the movement of society toward the realization of the highest material, intellectual, and moral possibilities in human life," and states that it "consists in a series of changes from a relatively simple to a relatively complex state of social organization." Its cause is "man's