Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 52.djvu/577

Rh that too great uniformity proves injurious. Much attention is bestowed upon the hypnagogic condition or state of half-awakening; connection is found between this and some states of mental aberration, and it always denotes a weakened consciousness.

The point of view taken in examining the psychic life of sleep is that "the subjective method is of the first importance." Another divergence from scientific habit of thought is that "in attempting to explain facts by chemical affinity we still have to explain chemical affinity itself." Observations made by the author during five years on thirty-seven persons convince her that dreams increase with the variety and activity of intellectual life. The studies of an Italian investigator show that idiots rarely dream, criminals dream seldom and but little, the greatest criminals least of all. Whence she concludes that it is only under morbid conditions and among the uneducated that it is common to find an absence of dreams. Not only are the dreamless thus condemned to a low intellectual plane, but "old age comes on more swiftly in those who dream little."

Prof. J. Mark Baldwin Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development is a continuation of the studies in genetic psychology begun in the Mental Development of the Child and the Race. It is, however, independent of that work except in so far as the natural connection requires somewhat frequent reference to it. In view of the lack in English of a book on social psychology which can be used in the universities in connection with courses in psychology, ethics, and social science, the author has also endeavored to make his essay available for that purpose. This has led to such expansion of the fundamental ideas of the treatise as seemed necessary to a fairly complete working out of the social element in connection with each of the great psychological functions. The first part is, therefore, as far as its topics are concerned, a more or less complete study of social and ethical philosophy. The special object of the essay is to inquire to what extent the principles of the development of the individual mind apply also to the evolution of society. The study, therefore, falls into two main inquiries: What are the principles which the individual shows in his mental life—principles of organization, growth, and conduct; and what additional principles, if any, does society exhibit in its forms of organization, progress, and activity? Of the three methods by which the author conceives the subject may be investigated, he chooses what he calls the genetic, or that "which inquires into the psychological development of the individual in the earlier ages of his growth for light upon his social nature, and also upon the social organization in which he bears a part." The evidence is drawn largely from actual observation of children, and the main thought is the conception of the child's sense of personality. This is developed in Book I, which presents the person in public and private, as imitative, self-conscious, social, and inventive; his equipment, with instincts, emotions, intelligence, and sentiments; and his personal and social sanctions. The second book relates to society—the person in active and social organization—the social forces, social matter and process, and social progress. From the whole are deduced practical conclusions and rules of conduct. Some of the chapters in the second book