Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 51.djvu/727

Rh to the family, demoralizing to the workman, and making his future uncertain; and by the institution of rents and the system of day's work, the peasant is made as proletary, as separate from his family, and as destitute of a morrow as the workman in the shop. Thus pushed out of society, such individuals demand a new social order. Society dismayed contrives laws to meet the demands of the workmen for relief, and thus assists in establishing the collectivism which the socialists invoke. Socialism is consequently an evolution or degeneration of capitalism. This evolution is right if it conforms itself to the laws of being, wrong if it does not take account of them. The author's purpose is to show how the necessary, evident, and near evolution of capitalism may take just forms, which, not depriving any, will give their rights to all, particularly to the disinherited; creating a new judicial and social order upon the existing physical order, but unknown to it.

The New York State Library has just issued its seventh annual Comparative Summary and Index of State Legislation, covering the laws passed in 1896. Each act is briefly described or summarized and classified under its proper subject head, with a full alphabetic index to the entries. Perhaps the most important legislation of the year was that enacted by the people directly through their votes upon the numerous constitutional amendments submitted to them. The bulletin records the amendments defeated as well as those adopted, a special table arranged by States being inserted for convenient reference. It is of interest to note that of fifty-seven separate constitutional amendments voted on only twenty-four were adopted. It is proposed that the eighth bulletin shall consolidate into a single series with the legislation of 1897 the summaries for the preceding seven years.

A History of Ancient Greek Literature, by Gilbert Murray (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1897, $1.50), forms the initial volume of the Literatures of the World Series. Edited by Edmund Gosse, who writes the general introduction, the aim of the series is to present "a succession of attractive volumes, dealing with the history of literature in a single country," not from the point of view of the specialist treating certain epochs, but giving a survey of the general evolution of thought expressed in artistic form. The object being primarily to give a biography of the intellectual life of a race, "an effort will be made to recall the history of Literature from the company of sciences which have somewhat unduly borne her down—from philology in particular, and from political history. . . . Literature will be interpreted as the most perfect utterance of the ripest thought by the finest minds, and to the classics of each country rather than to its oddities, and rather than to its obsolete features, will particular attention be directed." Homer stands, then, at the head of Greek literature, as being the oldest classic extant in the language. Much attention is given to the historians, and the drama, of course, is extensively treated, as are also the song-writers, whereas less space is accorded to philosophic and political writings. The author has in every case endeavored to get at the personality of the Greek writers and to set down their work as the result of the strenuous life of the people. The chapter on the later literature, Alexandrian and Roman, showing the rich fruitage of its declining years, in poetry up to the sixth century ., and in prose to the fall of Byzantium, proves that Greek literature by no means died with the loss of Greek independence, as is commonly assumed.

Dr. George A. Williams has prepared a revised and enlarged edition of his Topics and References in American History. The topics begin with the prehistoric period and come down to the election of 1896. Each has one or more references to standard works or to leading magazines, and lists of questions are inserted from time to time. In choosing his references the author has recognized the recent demand that students of history shall go "back to the sources." (Bardeen, $1.)

In a pamphlet on The Energy of Living Protoplasm, Prof. Oscar Loew, of the Imperial University, Japan, seeks to define that elusive mystery, the source of vital activity. Starting from the observation that the chemical properties of dead and living cells are totally different, and that certain substances, toxic to living protoplasm, have no