It would be a rude shock to such a reader to suggest that the system which his author so skillfully defines is substantially the same with the doctrines of Hume-" A sensation is a strong impression, a recollection is a weaker impression, an imagination is an impression still weaker;" and sensations, recollections, and imaginations are subjective tendencies, that attract or repel one another, according to molecular relations, and so account for all the varieties of psychological phenomena. The large support which these views are supposed to receive from the discoveries of physiology, is readily disposed of to the mind that reflects that a mind with intuitions and beliefs must be pre-supposed, in order that a science of physiology itself may be possible, or that analogies from physics and physiology may be transferred to the processes and combinations of the human spirit. These primary intuitions and beliefs, it would seem, cannot be explained by any molecular theory such as Taine adopts when he declares that: "All that observation detects psychologically in the thinking being are, in addition to sensations, images of different kinds, primitive or consecutive, endued with certain tendencies and modified in their development by the concurrence or antagonism of other simultaneous or contiguous images."

While we reject as unsatisfactory the theory of the Intelligence which is maintained in this volume, we find the volume itself most abundant in its suggestions. The facts and illustrations are various and interesting, and they are set forth with the eloquence and spirit in which the author is surpassed by few living writers. The work is one which all students of psychology will find it necessary to read and desirable to possess.

MANSEL'S METAPHYSICS* is a reprint, with a few alterations, of the very comprehensive treatise under this title in the Encyclopedia Brittanica, which is familiar to and greatly prized by all students of philosophy. For the general reader it is perhaps the best treatise in the language which aims to give a general outline of the topics and questions embraced under this title. It consists of an introduction, explaining the significance of the appellation and the principal topics which it covers. I. An outline of Psychology, in which the several divisions are briefly but concisely treated. II. Ontology, in which the questions appropriate to metaphysics pro

* Metaphysics; or, the Philosophy of Consciousness Phenomenal and Real. By HUGH LONGUEVILLE MANSEL, B.D. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1871.

per are explained and discussed, the relations of the finite to the infinite are set forth, and the ground of our belief in the several kinds of reality are also explained. For the general reader and the advanced student, the treatise has some important advantages, and it may be recommended as a very convenient book of reference. The Kantian proclivities of the author are not concealed; but they are not offensively obtruded, and do not especially interfere with the usefulness of the volume as a class or reference book.

PROFESSOR BASCOM'S LOWELL LECTURES* treat of the following topics, viz: 1. Mind, the Seat and Source of Knowledge; 2. Primitive Ideas. 3. The Field of Physical Facts. 4. Resemblance not the Sole Connection of Thought. 5. Matter: its Existence and Nature. 6. Consciousness the Field of Mental Facts. 7. Right the Law of Intellectual Life. 8. Liberty. 9. Life: Nature and Origin.-The Mind. 10. Interaction of Physical Forces and Spiritual Forces. 11. Primitive Religious Conceptions. Classification of Knowledge; Form of Development.

12.

These topics will readily be recognized as fundamental to Science, Philosophy, and Religion, and they are all treated by the author with his usual energy and comprehensiveness. Though he has expressed his views in respect to some of them in his Principles of Psychology, he has broken new ground in the present volume, so far at least as to discuss these topics in new relations, and from points of view before unoccupied by himself. Upon some questions we should dissent from the views which he propounds; but we commend the volume most warmly as an important contribution to fundamental Philosophy in its two-fold application to Science and Religion.

JOWETT'S TRANSLATION OF PLATO.-Prof. Jowett's long expected translation of Plato follows not long after Mr. Grote's elaborate and voluminous paraphrase of the Platonic Dialogues, which, with the dissertations appended, fills about as much space as would a full version of the works which are thus minutely analyzed. No English scholar has surpassed Grote in the judicial

* Science, Philosophy, and Religion. Lectures delivered before the Lowell Institute, Boston. By JOHN BASCOм, Prof. in Williams College, etc., etc. New York: G. P. Putman & Sons. 1872.

tions.

The Dialogues of Plato, translated into English, with Analyses and IntroducBy B. JOWETT, M.A., Master of Baliol College, Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford. New York: Charles Scribner & Co. 1871. 4 vols.

fairness with which he weighs evidence and presents a verdict, or in the impartiality of his representation of another's views. Few have equaled him in breadth and exactness of erudition, on all matters pertaining to Greek history and literature. But Mr. Grote was not a Platonist. In the cast of his mind, in his philosophical predilections, he belongs to the opposite school of thought. He was one of the earliest of the distinguished advocates of positivism in England. Hence although Plato finds in him a just and candid, he does not find in him a sympathetic or applauding, critic. Mr. Jowett is more Platonic in his own philosophical convictions. His reputation as a philologist authorizes the presumption that he has correctly rendered his author. It is plain to all that he has translated the original into lucid, forcible, unaffected English. Taylor, the old translator of Plato, was so great an admirer of the ancient philosophy that he made it his religion; but his knowledge of the Greek language was insufficient. The translations in

Bohn's Library are unequal, being made by different hands; and some of them are detestable, so far as their English style is concerned. In many cases where they are not incorrect, they are as clumsy as the first attempts of a dull schoolboy upon the classical authors. It is refreshing, therefore, to meet the immortal philosopher in so comely an English dress;-the philosopher who has done more to stimulate the most gifted and spiritual minds than any other uninspired author; who has been the bridge over which so many thinkers, from Augustine to Neander, have passed into the kingdom of God. We observe that Mr. Jowett stands mid-way between Mr. Grote and the skeptical school of German critics, on the point of the genuineness of disputed dialogues. He does not go so far in believing, on the testimony of the ancients, as Grote, nor so far in the opposite direction as Schaarschmidt.

DR. MARTYN PAINE'S PHYSIOLOGY OF THE SOUL AND INSTINCT* is the third and greatly enlarged edition of his physiological treatise on the Soul and Instinct (1848). The additions are largely physiological, and bring down to the present time the results of the author's own reading, which seems to have been liberal and pains

* Physiology of the Soul and Instinct, as distinguished from Materialism. With Supplementary Demonstrations of the Divine Communication of the Narratives of Creation and the Flood. By MARTYN PAINE, A.M., M.D., LL.D., etc. New York: Harper & Brothers.

1872.

taking in most of the works accessible in the English language. From these writers he makes abundant and extended quotations, and he subjects their doctrines to a rigid but not unfair criticism. While we agree with the author in most of these criticisms and in the positions which he adopts, we do not sympathize altogether with the decidedly polemical spirit with which he inveighs against the materialistic theories. The volume is, however, very valuable as containing a tolerably complete collection of modern physiolog ical theories on these subjects, with many acute and earnest protests against them. As a book of reference it will claim for itself a place in all libraries.

The "supplementary demonstrations," etc., in the Appendix, are regarded by the author with a fond and fervent interest, which seem to us entirely misplaced. The attempt to account for all the changes in the crust of the earth by a single catastrophe like the Noachian deluge, seems to us so utterly preposterous as to be unworthy of serious criticism. We can only regret that a physiologist of such industry and ability, and a Christian philosopher of such devout purposes, should imagine that he has the knowledge or insight which qualify him to succeed in so hopeless an enterprise.

MR. C. G. DAVID'S POSITIVIST PRIMER* is dedicated "to the only Supreme Being man can ever know, the Great but imperfect God, Humanity, in whose image all other Gods were made, and for whose service all other Gods exist and to whom all the children of men owe labor, love, and worship." It is a little volume of 141 pages, in a series of fourteen conversations, and exhibits with great clearness and without reserve the principal doctrines of the Positivist Faith, with a conciseness and point which are decidedly refreshing by contrast with the dreary sand-wastes of Comte's expanse of dogmatism and dullness. Those who are not repelled by the bald and inane blasphemy of the dedication may find much instruction in brief compass concerning the practical teachings of this much noised system, of which we are not forced to deny that it contains some instruction, in order to be justified in asserting that some of the noise which it makes is owing to the rattle of dry dogmas in the empty heads of many of its adherents.

* A Positivist Primer: Being a Series of Familiar Conversations on the Religion of Humanity. By C. G. DAVID. New York: David, Wesley & Co. 1871.

To read "THE INFINITE AND THE FINITE,"* by the excellent Theophilus Parsons, after attempting to read the Positivist Primer, is to pass from an arid sand-waste to a green and quiet valley by the side of a rippling stream. The style is lucid, the sentiments are elevated, the thought is weighty, and yet falling as quietly, noiselessly as snowflakes. The very slight tincture of Swedenborgian doctrine and the exaggerated estimate of the claims of Swedenborg as a discerner and revealer of spiritual truth, do not greatly detract from the value of the greater portion of the contents of this volume, nor do they weaken our recommendation of it to all those who are attracted by thoughtful and meditative essays on themes of Christian philosophy.

RELIGIOUS AND THEOLOGICAL.

HODGE'S SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY† (Vol. II.)—The second volume of Dr. Hodge covers the topics of Anthropology and Soteriology. We have already referred to the learning, perspicuity, and ability of his discussions. In this volume he enters on a field where he has often appeared before as a polemic; but, wisely, as we judge, he abstains from special controversy with Dr. Taylor and his other former antagonists. Dr. Hodge's system is that form of Calvinism which founds the whole doctrine of human sin and condemnation on an alleged covenant of the Creator with Adam, who represents vicariously the human race. It is not the Augustinian conception, but the subsequent Federal theory that was devised in the seventeenth century. Dr. Hodge, in our judg ment, fails to represent correctly the historical aspects of this doctrine of original sin. All that he says of Placæus, Rivetus, and "Mediate Imputation," needs revision and essential qualification, in order to conform it to historical fact. What a precarious foundation for Christian theology, for the great doctrines of sin and redemption, to rest upon, is this theory of a covenant! It is not surprising that Dr. Hodge should expend so much time in confuting Darwin, Huxley, and other physicists, when Adam is compelled to bear such a tremendous weight on his shoulders,-a weight compared with which the burden sustained by Atlas is a feather.

*The Infinite and the Finite. By THEOPHILUS PARSONS. Brothers.

1872.

Boston: Roberts

+ Systematic Theology. By CHARLES HODGE, D.D., Professor in the Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey. Vol. II. New York: Charles Scribner & Co.