The Physiology and Pathology of the Mad. By E. Koosa, M.D., London. London: Macmillan and Co.

There have been at least three views extensively held wind word to the nature and relation of mind and matter, each of which has had stout defenders. According to one, matter is the cly subvare in the universe, and what we call spirit-phenomena are caly the motifcations, or results of modifications of matter. This is the position vanally held by all sensationalists, from Parmenides down to some philosophers of the present day. Such do not hesitate to make brain the secreting began of thought in exactly the same way as the liver secretes be. A second theory, which goes to the opposite extreme, treats matter as only a theory, which goes to the opposite extreme, treats matter as only a subjective creation of spirit. It is mind projected into an chjective form. This has been virtually the position of all modern idealists, but has been systematically developed in the German post-Kantian philosophy. A third class of thinkers hold that matter and spirit are not primary, simple elements, but that each is only a modification of a third and primal principle superior to both. According to this extending opinion, all forms of existence are but manifestations or modifications of force; one class of its modications is called spirit, the other is styled matter. The above remarks will enable us to understand Dr. Maudsley's position. The successful pursuit of the physical sciences, and especially of physiology, has given rise to many attempts to solve the problems of philosophy by the facts of sensible observation. Physiological observation had been already introduced into the investigation of mental phenomena by Abercrombie, Bain, and Spencer, but the volume before us is the first attempt in this country, by a professed physiologist, to grasp under one view the normal and abnormal phenomena of the nervous system, and to treat them exclusively as observed facts. For the first time the phenomena of sound and unsound mind are made inseparable parts of one and the same inquiry. Hitherto they have been handled by two different classes of persons, but here they are united in one common science. Dr. Maudsley treats the psychological method of interrogating consciousness in the same way as Bacon did the physics of the schools. He maintains that metaphysics have long been sinking into merited contempt, and that they are cultivated only by dreamers in professorial chairs, by ambitious youths who have an attack of metaphysics as children have an attack of measles, and by dabblers in the science, who remain youths all their life long. The rest of mankind have as little regard for metaphysics as they have for scholastic theology. He moreover renounces empirical psychology, so successfully pursued from Descartes to Sir W. Hamilton, and regrets that J. S. Mill, while an expositor of Comte, should have committed himself to the psychological method. According to our author, self-consciousness is too narrow a basis for a truly inductive psychology, inasmuch as its revelations extend only to conscious states, while there exist also pre-conscious and extra-conscious facts, of which it takes no cognizance. Mind and consciousness are far from being co-extensive. Nay, more; consciousness is not reliable in the testimony it bears. Descartes' fundamental proposition is refuted by the madman's delusion. The metaphysical notion of mind as a peculiar entity is to be carefully discarded as a mere abstraction, an imaginary substance. The opposite proposition, that brain secretes thought, as the liver secretes bile, is not a correct expression of facts. Mind, he says, is best described as a natural force or energy, manifested to us only

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through certain changes in matter. The modes of force vary with the kinds of matter. The highest kind of matter with which we are acquainted is nerve-tissue, and its corresponding force is nerve-force. This highest development of forces necessarily implies the existence of all the subordinate natural forces. Man, as the highest development of nature, implicitly contains all lower developments, and the history of mankind is the history of the highest and latest organic development of nature. 'Idea' as well as 'mind' is a metaphysical entity. The socalled fundamental ideas have no permanent value or absolute truth as expressions of certain fundamental relations between man and nature. An idea is the result of an organic evolution in the appropriate nervecentres, gradually completed by a succession of kindred experiences. The cells of the cerebral ganglia form the sensory perceptions into ideas, by shaping them into an organic unity, after they have grasped the essential and rejected the unessential. In treating of the emotions, physiological observation yields no new light. The author is compelled to assume an organization of the nervous structure so delicate as to elude the survey of the senses. We find him here guilty of doing the thing against which he is constantly exclaiming. Is it less erroneous to assume the existence of a nervous than of a metaphysical entity ? Moreover, in adopting and praising Spinoza's account of the passions, he is paying homage to the old psychology, which is certainly inconsistent with his constant denunciations of it. When treating of volition, he urges us to dismiss from the mind the metaphysical conception of it as an entity of constant and uniform power. What is generally called will is the final reaction after deliberation, and, like other modes of action of nerve-element, is a resultant of molecular change in some one nervous centre. What we call design in volition is purely a physical necessity, being the result of cerebral adaptation to the varieties of external impressions, and not a mental act evincing a power transcending experience. The will is the highest force in nature, the last consummate blossom of all her marvellous efforts. It represents,' he says, not very lucidly, the exqui'sitely adapted reaction of man to the best insight into the relations in 'which he moves.' Having concisely described our author's leading positions, we must briefly express our misgiving in regard to the soundness of some of his doctrines. We think him wrong in rejecting any one of the above-mentioned views of the nature and relation of mind and matter, because there is in each of them an element of truth, and because each has rendered important services. The first has established the truth that our spirit-nature is closely connected with and greatly affected by the physical; the second has served to save us from the gross materialism which would make us but a part of the vast mechanism of the material universe, bound and governed by the same laws; the third teaches us that the two realms are linked together by the closest ties, and constitute an organic whole. We deny, however, that either is a sublimation or concretion of the other, and that each of these elements is but a different form of one essence superior to both. Again, even if it be true that metaphysics have fallen into the neglect depicted by the author (which we beg respectfully to deny), is it so long ago since physics have set out on the right course, that it is hopeless that metaphysics should ever make a similar start? May not metaphysics, Achilles-like, start and overtake its former companion in bondage, receive the torch which physics, through mere impotency, is compelled to surrender, and carry it into regions of being where the latter cannot plant its foot? Physiologists ought to be the last to prophesy.

Further, notwithstanding the author's profession to adhere to facts, we find him guilty of making important assumptions. At the outset he assumes principles which are given neither by physiology nor experience. How could he move without them? How could he discover the causes, modes, and ends of the physical processes which he examines, except by the conviction that every phenomenon is produced in a specific manner, by specific causes and for specific ends? Is not his favourite force also as much a figment as any of the metaphysical entitles against which he is everlastingly raving? If we are to reject all but phenomena, must we not also, by the same inexorable law, reject force? We find him, moreover, in the case of the emotions, coolly assuming the existence of a delicate organization, for which, according to his own confession, there is not a shadow of proof. He is here surely napping. Again, the identification of the cause of phenomena with its organ is purely arbitrary. Because force cannot operate without an organ, physiclogists have confounded the cause and the condition. Is not the organ itself the unknown cause of physiologists? When we ascribe to an organ the power of producing certain phenomena, we ascribe to it what we cannot discover. The only thing we perceive is a connection between the material organization and the phenomena produced, and this would equally exist, whether it be an organ or instrument. The identification of the two, therefore, is purely arbitrary, and the metaphysician has as much right to make the brain the instrument of thought as the physiologist has to make it the organ of thought. Do not the marvellous revelations of the mind, when least dependent upon the bodynay, even insanity itself-favour the opinion that it is merely an instrument? Analogy is decidedly in favour of distinguishing the cause and the organ; for while all admit that the organs of sense and the nerves are essential to perception, yet all are agreed that they are but instruments. We further maintain that the difference of opinion among metaphysicians regarding the facts of consciousness is no greater than among physiologists respecting cranial convolutions. We have as yet no satisfactory theory with regard to the functions of the different parts of the cerebral convolutions. They cannot even agree on any convolutions as peculiar to man. All they can say is, that his convolu tions are less symmetrical and more complex than those of the monkey. It will be time enough for them to point the finger at the disagreement of metaphysicians when they have come to an understanding among themselves. Finally, Dr. Maudsley has committed an error common to most of the followers of Bacon, viz., that of limiting all certainty to physical facts and the inductions to which they lead, of inferring that all human science is reducible to sensible facts, and of concluding that natural sciences are the only possible sciences. But the realities which fall under our senses are not the sum-total of realities. There are facts which neither the microscope nor the scalpel can discover nor the senses reveal, which are as real as natural facts, and admit of no less rigorous induction. If the philosopher has erred in neglecting sensible facts, the physiologist has committed as grave and fatal an error in ignoring these nonsensuous facts. The impression made upon the sense-organ, transmitted to the brain by some nerve-organ, is entirely different from its results. These latter escape entirely all sense-observation, and no manipulation of nerves and tissues can ever reveal them. These physiologists would have us turn away from the revelations of consciousness (the very light, by-the-by, in which they are walking) to pronounce that glorious old principle yvwo σeavrov, which produced the wonderful

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systems of Plato and Aristotle, and all that was most valuable in the middle ages, that principle so fecund in the social and intellectual history of the ancient world's highest civilization, a delusion, and to substitute for it the manipulation of our neighbour's ganglionic furniture. They teach us to read the mysteries of life in a network of nerves and tissues. We might as well fancy that we can read the entire nature of the lightning's flash in the devastation it has caused.

While there is so much that is obscure and uncertain in the present state of nervous physiology as to render it impossible for the present volume to be complete or final, yet it contains enough that is valuable, sound, judicious, and practical to constitute it the most important work upon the subject. To professional men it will be essential, while some parts of it have an interest far beyond professional circles. Any contribution towards preventing or alleviating the sad and blighting cloud of insanity will be welcomed by every friend of philanthropy. The present volume is calculated to render such services. The work is evidently the production of one of the most learned and accomplished pathologists of the present day.

The Life and Letters of F. W. Robertson, M.A., of Brighton. Sermons Preached at Brighton by the late F. W. Robertson, M.A. New Edition. Smith, Elder, and Co. 1868.

The Christ of History. By JOHN YOUNG, L.LD. Strahan and Co. 1868.

The cheaper publication of these volumes is a great boon to those who would understand some of the highest religious thought of the present generation. We have often expressed our opinion of the extraordinary preacher whose early death was God's way of making him the secret and solemn counsellor of myriads. In certain respects we have differed from him and disputed his theology, but for the most part we entertain intense and profound admiration for his genius, his holy life, his insight into the truth of the Bible, his glorious hatred of all that was mean and dishonest, his sympathy with goodness, his godly earnestness, and his selfsacrifice. The republication of Dr. Young's Christ of History,' with an appendix on Rénan's Vie de Jésus,' is well-timed. The argument is irresistible and unanswerable. Dr. Young, moreover, takes up a position where he can claim some of the praise of originality. We trust that this reappearance of a work of such great excellence, eloquence, and logical compactness will give fresh impetus to its study, and lead those who persist in approaching Jesus of Nazareth on the strictly human side to cry with the Apostle-My Lord and my God.'

Essays from Good Words.' By HENRY ROGERS. London: Alexander Strahan & Co.

The topics on which Mr. Rogers has here descanted are so various, and the mode in which he has handled them is so idiosyncratic, that it would be impossible to convey any idea of them to those who are not familiar with his delicate banter and hard-hitting, and occasionally riotous and hilarious triumph over his opponents. Now and then he bundles Strauss, Rénan, or Colenso, like so many Falstaffs into a clothes'-basket, and one hears a very chorus of Mistresses Ford and Page crying, Help, and

'cover your master, boy!' and then with crushing severity he opens fire upon all incredulity that is based on insufficient grounds and on the mere prejudices of the age. The paper on 'Les Apôtres of M. Rénan, originally contributed to the Fortnightly Review,' is worthy of a place by the side of the author's own criticism of Kenan's Vie de Jésus 'in a recently published volume. The ingenious paper on Novel Antiquities' grapples with the curious but often prejudiced scepticism of these days with much originality, and is of a piece with the often-quoted dream of the Blank Bible' in the Eclipse of Faith.' The article on Public Executions' reappears very opportunely, and is a triumphant answer to many of the arguments used in a recent debate on the supposed edifying and salutary influence of these disgusting exhibitions. Mr. Rogers has in the paper on 'Railway Accidents' made some very admirable suggestions on a theme of universal interest. The most crying evils on which he dilates are the interruption to ordinary traffic inflicted by excursion trains, the absurdity of compelling passengers to obtain their tickets at the last moment before starting on a journey, and above all, the crowded state of the lines which necessitates annoying and perilous unpunctuality. It would be well if, when as often occurs, accidents arise from such unpunctuality, rigorous inquiry were made into its cause. We happen to know that on the very night which followed an alarming accident at the Bugsworth incline on the Midland Railway-when nothing, but the minute punctuality that had then been observed saved passengers from a still more terrific catastrophe the most grievous unpunctuality was permitted, in deference, it was allowed, to the convenience of some sporting gentlemen, for whom the train was delayed. The consequence was that all the trains were disarranged and various lines embarrassed far on into the night. We hope this sensible and vigorous essay of Mr. Rogers will arrest the attention of some of those inscrutable powers on which, in so many ways, the lives of millions of our fellow-countrymen continually depend.

Human Society: its Providential Structure, Relations, and Offices. Eight Lectures delivered at the Brooklyn Institute, Brooklyn. By F. D. Huntingdon, D.D. London: Arthur Miall.

Readers of American theological literature will be familiar with the name of Dr. Huntingdon, as being that of a man of keen, sagacious intellect, whose theological views some few years ago underwent a change from Unitarianisin to Orthodoxy, and who has since published two or three volumes of sermons marked by great freshness, spirituality, and religious power. In many of his intellectual characteristics Dr. Huntingdon resembles his better-known compatriot Dr. Bushnell, to whom he is in no wise inferior in power, while he is a less fitful, unequal, and perilous thinker. There is a marked individuality about Dr. Huntingdon which makes all that he writes attractive. He is not free from the literary incontinence-sometimes audacity-which both in thought and style mars so many American writers and preachers-Theodore Parker, Ward Beecher, Dr. Bushnell, and others, and which seems almost a national characteristic. The sense of congruity, the power to balance and limit thought, and to subdue strength and brilliancy of imagi nation to harmony and beauty, seem defective.

These eight Graham Lectures are devoted to a consideration of the divine idea of Human Society as ordained by God for our weal and