Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 40.djvu/286

274 resemble insulated wires, or that a dynamo can confer any degree of immortality. The growth of electric knowledge is recent; for twenty-two hundred years it was dormant. The seventeenth century witnessed investigation of electrical phenomena and of the properties of magnets, but for two centuries thereafter no connection was realized between them. It was only after Oersted's discovery, in 1820, that a magnetic needle is deflected by the electric current, that electro-magnetism became a science. Its subsequent progress was correspondingly rapid, and its offspring are the crowning inventions of to-day. Three propositions are especially emphasized by Mr. Kennelly: 1. All electricity tends to flow in closed curves or circuits. 2. The conductivity of the surrounding ether. 3. The production of light by electro-magnetic vibration.

The development of botany and the brilliant progress of electricity are as unlike as a flower and an electric spark. In his lecture upon the Evolution of Botany, Mr. Wulling shows that the accumulation of botanic knowledge was nearly as gradual as vegetable growth. The primitive needs were food and clothing, and an acquaintance with plants supplied these. Herbs were also found to be noxious or healing, and skill in remedies was sought and venerated in the early ages. In time so many species were described that various attempts were made to classify them, and at length the natural system of Jussieu prevailed. Investigation of the structure and anatomy of plants followed the introduction of the microscope. The establishment of botanical gardens facilitated the study of foreign flora; plant morphology and physiology were differentiated as branches of research; and, finally, geological, paleontological, and pathological botany constituted separate departments of this complex science. Mr. Wulling refers to the labors of many American botanists, and applies the formula of evolution to an analysis of botanical history.

Each of the foregoing lectures is preceded by a list of collateral readings useful to the student, and followed by a brief discussion of the subject by members of the Ethical Association.

book comprises a series of lectures that were delivered and first published fifty years ago, or before the present methods of investigation were instituted, and before the existing theories of development had begun to prevail. Yet it is not antiquated, and the claim of the editor is supported that "the rapid movement of the world in all departments of thought, the changes of opinion and sentiment in doctrinal theology, and in philosophy, have not distanced nor superseded the ideas herein presented." The author regards the study of anthropology as chiefly valuable as an introduction to the science of Deity, and tries whether he can not trace in man, "the image and likeness" of God, "some of the more majestic elements of the original." He does not attempt any formal science of human nature, or any theory which might deserve the name of anthropology, "for such theory or perfect science, I imagine, would be premature still, by many hundreds of centuries." Yet, while he approaches the subject from a wholly different point of view than that from which contemporary philosophers regard it, and considers a different side of it, his thoughts lead him in the same direction as they take, and his work presents many foreshadowings of the doctrine of evolution. He might be described as a theological anthropologist. In the lecture on the origin and use of language he says that "the arguments drawn from the sacred scriptures, to establish a system of uniform sounds and modifications of voice to designate ideas, are of a kin with the systems of astronomy and geology drawn from the same book; all of which, after being fanatically maintained for a time by arguments supported by passion rather than philosophy, are compelled by degrees to give place to the solid truths of observation and experience." Not that anything in science militates against the authority of the scriptures; "but these books do not purport to deliver to us a system of science, but only to reveal the Author of Creation, and the established series of its epochs." Thus in the accounts of events, as In that of the creation, the statements are to be interpreted, not in the literal,