Books of the Month

Science. The Ice Age in North America, and its Bearings upon the Antiquity of Man, by G. Frederick Wright, with an Appendix on tin Probable Cause of Glaciation, by Warren Upham. (Appleton.) An exceedingly interesting work of original research presented in a form which need not appall the ordinary student. Dr. Wright covers a wide range of topics in his discussion, and is especially interested in those facts which hear upon animal and vegetable life. His own personal investigation of the Muir Glacier in Alaska is not the least interesting feature of the work. Thu illustrations are from photographs, and though marked by the defects of process work where tone is ail important element, are helpful to the student. The maps are excellent, and the entire book indicates painstaking. — Dr. Wright’s frequent references to James Croll make us ready to glance at that author’s little work, Stellar Revolution and its Relation to Geological Time. (Appleton.) It considers the probable origin of meteorites, comets, and nebula;, and the real source from which our sun derived its energy, namely, from the colliding of dark stellar masses. The theory is supported further by the evidence derived from the testimony of geology and biology as to the age of the sun’s heat. -Darwinism, an Exposition of the Theory of Natural Selection, with some of its applications, by Alfred Russel Wallace. (Macmillan.) Very few incidents in the history of science are so striking as the deliberate subordination which Mr. Wallace adopts in his attitude toward Darwin. His own share in the theory of evolution is scarcely less than Darwin’s, yet there is an entire absence of any appearance of jealousy or envy. The closing pages of his work are of a high order. They present the firm faith of a scientist who regards scientific explanation of evolution as witnessing to and confirming an independent spiritual life, having its source in spirit. Mr. Wallace does not obtrude his special views as regards modern spiritualism, and his work will fortify the faith of some who might, if they knew his belief, be a little shy of his science. — Sewerage and Land Drainage, by George E. Waring, Jr. (Van Nostrand.) The general reader will remember Colonel Waring’s charming work on Holland, and how he was allured into reading of pumps and drains and model farms, never suspecting that he was not engaged in making the acquaintance of a very good piece of literature. The obverse is true of this comprehensive and well-illustrated hook. The sanitary engineer and the anxious householder will read it for its abundance of satisfying information, never suspecting that they are enjoying the work of a man whose literary faculty would itself ventilate a cesspool. One follows Colonel Waring as he leads one serenely through sewers and drains, and becomes so interested in the problems presented and cleared as to be quite oblivious of his actual surroundings.

Philosophy and Theosophy. Fundamental Problems, the Method of Philosophy as a Systematic Arrangement of Knowledge, by Dr. Paul Carus. (The Open Court Publishing Company, Chicago.) The papers which make up this volume were originally published as editorial articles, but have been set in order so as to make a progressive philosophic statement. Nevertheless, there is a fragmentary character to the work which seems inseparable not only from its origin, but from the scintillating character of the author’s mind. Thus the book is suggestive rather than comprehensive. — An interesting little pamphlet reaches us in The Problem of Personality, by Eliza Ritchie, a thesis presented at Cornell for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The logical method employed does not exclude the notion of a warm sense of life, and the author is plainly satisfied with thought undetached from experience. — Light on the Path, with Notes and Comments by the Author. (Theosophical Book Company, Boston.) This, we believe, is a famous little book, — famous among the neophytes of theosophy. It is a sort of propylæa to the temple, being a " treatise for the personal use of those who are ignorant of the Eastern wisdom, and who desire to enter within its influence.”As the author remarks in the course of her work (whatever the sex of the writer may be, the mind is feminine, and we feel at. liberty to say She), " an intolerable sadness is the very first experience of the neophyte in occultism. A sense of blankness falls upon him, which makes the world a waste and life a vain exertion.” if these things he done in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry ? Before we reach the stage of neophytism, even while we read these pages without the fear of Karma before our eyes, we feel profoundly the vanity of exerting ourselves to fathom this little volume. — The Light of Egypt, or the Science of the Soul and the Stars. (Religio-Philosophical Publishing House, Chicago.) Dear, dear! here is a schism already in the new Buddhistic church. Progressive Buddhism, this appears to be. Reader, would you know what man is ? Spell him with capitals, and we can tell you what he does. “MAN stands upon the central rung of the cyclic ladder, as the meeting point of the equilibrium between the upper and the lower manifestations of the great ONE LIFE.”Rather a ticklish position. — Christianity and Agnosticism. (Appleton.) In this composite volume, a paper on Agnosticism, read by Dr. Henry Wace at the Manchester Church Congress, 1888, is followed by a series of blows and counter-blowS:delivered by Huxley, Bishop Magee, Mallock, and Mrs. Humphry Ward. The air is thick with the missiles, and each comes out a little battered, but unconvinced.

Poetry and the Drama. The fifteenth volume of the Poetical Works of Robert, Browning (Smith, Elder & Co., London) contains both series of Dramatic Idyls and Jocoseriat. It is to be noticed that as Browning draws near the end of his series of writings be makes fewer changes. — In the series of Canterbury Poets (Walter Scott. London) is a little selection from the poems of Landor, made by Ernest Radford. The preface lacks the moderation which its author praises in Landor.— Of the Imitation of Christ, by Thomas à Kempis, a metrical version, by Henry Carrington. (Kehn Paul, Trench & Co., London.) Entirely correct in form, but somehow the sweet gravity of the original has turned into mere seriousness. — The Siege of Syracuse, a poetical drama in five acts, by William A. Leahy. (D. Lothrop Company.) Tiiis seems to be the shell of a dramatic creature from which the living animal has somehow disappeared. — Spiritual Evolution, by Warren Holden. (J. B. Lippincott Company, printers, Philadelphia.) Mr. Hidden opines that the sacred scriptures have suffered from a too liberal interpretation, and in this little volume be undertakes to give some examples of symbolism. Still, it, was not necessary, to prove his case, to give them in halting verse. — Madeline and Other Poems, by James McCarroll. (Belford, Clarke & Co.) A readiness marks these verses, which sometimes rise into poetic light, as in the pretty poem The Humming Bird. — The Merry Muse, Society Verse by American Writers, edited by E. De L. Pierson. (Bedford, Clarke & Co.) it is a pleasure to come upon a collection of verse all in the major key, and there is this to be said for these trifles, that the writers who never go further at least do no mischief ; those who try deeper deeps are apt to do their work better for this light practice.—Late Lyrics and Other Poems, by William Wilfred Campbell. (J. & A. McMillan, St. John, N. B.) There is genuine fire here as well as flames which answer to the bellows. How pretty is the Canadian Folksong ! and there are poems which are more than pretty.

Biography. Father Damien, a Journey from Cashmere to his Home in Hawaii, by Edward Clifford. (Macmillan.) Possibly Mr. Clifford’s sketch will serve a better purpose than a formal biography would, for he has given with a certain artistic felicity such a view of this nineteenth-century martyr and saint as will surely fix his character and bearing in the reader’s mind. Father Damien, as the world knows, — and the world is as quick now to recognize an uncauonized saint as it over was, — deliberately shut himself out from the world to minister to the lepers at Molokai, one of the Hawaiian group, and after years of cheerful service fell a victim to the loathsome disease. Mr. Clifford is an artist who heard of his sacrifice, and was also confident that he had found in the East a cure for the disease. Accordingly he visited Father Damien, and this book is the result. It Ls a little pity that he should have thought it necessary to give other, rather feeble sketches from his note-book. His description of the Hawaiian volcano, indeed, is excellent, but. his thumb-nail sketches of traveling bores are cheap and needless. Nor does it much matter that Mr. Clifford should explain why he, a Protestant, should signalize Roman Catholic heroism. — Eli and Sibyl Jones, their Life and Work, by Rufus M. Jones. (Porter & Coates.) Eli Jones was one of the Society of Friends, and his wife also was of the same society. They lived man and wife for forty years, Sibyl dying in 1873 ; the husband yet lives, we infer from this book, which is an interesting record of the harmonious life of two kind-hearted persons who went in the utmost simplicity to Africa and the East, sowing the seeds of a spiritual Christianity. They helped to plant schools ; they labored unostentatiously and ceaselessly in every kind of philanthropic work. There is something delightfully ingenuous in these simple-hearted missionaries, without any board of missions behind them.