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    September 15, 1855,] TUm LHlB;tB^ $91

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    _ .;,,_. „—aaofrthe legislators, but tfc...

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    In the Dublin University Magazine there ...

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    Wo are now at the very dullest part of t...

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    THE PHASIS OF MATTER. The Phasis ofMatte...

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    September 15, 1855,] Tum Lhlb;Tb^ $91

    September 15 , 1855 , ] TUm LHlB ; tB ^ $ 91

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    W & txuktm ,

    _ .;,,_. „—Aaofrthe Legislators, But Tfc...

    _ . ; ,, _ . „—aaofrthe legislators , but tfcejuclgea and police of literature . They -dp notj Cri ^^^ k | law ^ -they internet a » d try to enforce thexn . —Ediy , b # r ( rfr & epzm ,

    In The Dublin University Magazine There ...

    In the Dublin University Magazine there is a very curious and suggestive essay on the "Mystery of the Beasts , " which treats of the strange conceptions formed by the ancients of the moral and intellectual nature of anupa & ls , conceptions strange , indeed , yet not more absurd than those held by many modern philosophers , who draw a line of demarcation between instinct ( of which they know little ) and reason ( of which they know less ) , and make animals automata moved by quite different strings from those moving men . The essayist now under notice says : — Though modern science yields its unwilling assent to the undoubted and melancholy fact , that the material : appetites and instincts of man are onl y too identical with those of the brute , yet it refuses to admit of this analogy in the moral sentiments . A

    profound and even infinite difference is clearly recognised , though to define what this difference consists in is a task of which modern science is incapable . It knows and proclaims , however , that the sacred ray which enlightens and warms man has . not reached the lower animals . Now , antiquity was blind to this distinction . To the lower animals it attributed not merely the passions which agitate , but the moral sentiments which dignify , and the affections which console , mankind . Rivals are found among the beasts and birds for the heroes of tragic passion , such as Phaedra , Orestes , Pylades , & c . A goose , according to Pliny , fell desperately in love with a youth named Egius ; and in Egypt a tender passion was conceived for the beautiful Glauce , a female musician of distinguished merit in the court of Ptolemy , by an amorous ram . A sublime constancy in friendship has been manifested from time to time by horses , eagles , and dolphins .

    A young girl in Sestos reared and fed an eagle , which , upon her death , was inconsolable ; it rushed into her funeral pyre , and perished upon her ashes . A dolphin died of grief for the loss of a child , during the reign of Augustus . This child was accustomed , on its way to school , to cross the Lucrine lake every day , which the dolphin observing , approached the child and bore it on its back , safely depositing its burden on the opposite shore . One day the child failed to appear , and the dolphin was seen waiting with evident uneasiness . The dolphin came the next day , and the next , but the child was dead , and the sympathetic fish , as if it were " A crime in Heaven to love too well , " sickened and perished of grief . One smiles on reading such stories ; yet who that has lived with a dog will not echo Sir Walter Scott's declaration that there is scarcely anything he could not believe of a dog ? Our great difficulty is to understand the language of animals . This did not much trouble the imaginative ancients : —

    The narratives of the fabulists are only dramatic versions of universally accredited traditions . That JEsop ' s fox should converse with the stork , or that a philosophic discussion should beguile the leisure of the town rat , when visited by an acquaintance from the country , is not to be wondered at , when history itself teems with similar examples . On the fall of Tarquin , a dog , in the open streets , could not contain his political sentiments , but gave expression to his republican opinions by loudly vociferating his congratulations . When Domitian was assassinated , an observant crow , perched on the Capitol , favoured the city with its regicidal views by applauding the murderers . " It ' s a good deed , " screamed the crow ; " it is right well done . " When Otho oppressed Rome , and Vitellius threatened the walls , the golden reins , to the terror of the alarmed city , dropped from the hands of the statue of "Victory , and the oxen , in a low tone , were overheard exchanging private opinions on public affairs . When Lepidus and Catullus were consuls , a cock , in the farm-yard of Galerius , conversed like a human being ; and Pliny , animadverting on this fact , gravely remarks , that " speaking cocks are very rare in history . "

    But while beasts spoke with Attic and Koman purity , few men acquired the art of speaking the language of beasts . Four lucky men and one woman are mentioned as having attained this proficiency : Tibesias , Helen u 8 , Afoiaonius , and Melampcs among men , Cassandra among women . In our own days the researches of zoologists and physiologists have also taught us something respecting the language of animals , taught us to interpret the signs by which they express themselves ; but great as are the advances made in Comparative Anatomy , one must confess that little more than the initial steps towards a Comparative Psychology have been taken . Nor will any good results be achieved so long as man isolates

    himself from all spiritual connexion and kindred with animals . The Unity of Composition which underlies all organic forms , underlies alfeo all mental forms . Prejudice may shriek at the idea of man having anything in common with animals . But fact disregards the shrieks of prejudice , and science has to discover and interpret fact . We arc not less men , less gifted , less noble , because animals arc more gifted than wo fancied thorn to be . We are not "degrading man to the lovel of the brute . " Wo cannot alter fact , we cannot alter man ' s level , we cannot degrade him by our theories . What he is ho is , what animals are they arc ; and that they remain in spito of all our theorising .

    Wo Are Now At The Very Dullest Part Of T...

    Wo are now at the very dullest part of the year for Literature . The unhappy reviewer has great difficulty in finding any matter upon which to exorcise his craft . Yet books , or no books , his office remains . Reviow ho must . He pounces on impossible books . He snatches at the remotest excuse . The mill must grind , and chaff" is bettor than the empty air . Anything is welcome , from German Philosophy to Greek tragedians : Seneca cannot be too heavy , nor Plautus too light for him . And this reminds us that J . H . and J . Paiikkh of Oxford arc publishing a , aorios of Greek texts , delightfully adapted for the pocket , though the typo is necessarily small . Here for a shilling you have the Antigone or the Philoctetc * to take down -with you to the sea-aide ; a useful analysis of the action and brief notes accompany tho text ; and to all who have not

    forgotten their G * e . ek ( wihjch , alasj is of very easy acccsmpUtO ^ n ^ , these little volumes will-be reall y acceptable . We may also intimate that the first volume of a novel called lies Petits Bourgeois , and said to be a posthumous work of De Bai ? aq ' s , has appeared in the Brussels Collection Helzel . From a glance at it , we disbelieve in the alleged authorship , of which , indeed , no guarantee is offered . The writer has too obviously imitated certain peculiarities of Balzac . Whether he has caught any of Balzac ' s wonderful spirit , we know not ; idle readers may like to ascertain .

    The Phasis Of Matter. The Phasis Ofmatte...

    THE PHASIS OF MATTER . The Phasis ofMatter ; being an Outline of the Discoveries and Appliealiotis of Modem Chemistry . By T . Lindley Kemp , M . D . Two Vols . Longman . The first and most important question asked respecting such a book as this will be : Shall I buy it t for it professes no other aim than that of utility . There is no novelty in it , of fact , arrangement , or philosophy . This may be a merit in a compilation , if the compilation itself be excellent . At any rate it limits the business of the critic to an answer of the simple question : Was the book wanted , or was it not ?

    Dr . Kemp thinks there was the want of some such book ; for , although he admits the existence of more than two or three very excellent manuals of chemistry , and one or two elementary books for schools ( a dozen would be nearer the mark ) , he thinks that we still need " a treatise on chemistry more extended than the latter , but less minute than the former , and intended for the wants of the general scholar and of men of the world , whose active occupations are more or less based upon a knowledge of chemical principles and chemical facts . " His purpose is , therefore , " to supply this numerous class with a manual of chemistry having a moderate bulk

    andprice . There is always need of a good book ; so that after all the question takes this shape : Is Dr . Kemp ' s Phasis of Matter a good book ? And our answer unhappily cannot be more than a very qualified affirmative . The reader he addresses will assuredly learn much from these pages , which have been compiled with pains ; but we cannot conceal the fact that he would learn more , and learn it better , in the pages of many existing works , which Dr . Kemp means to supersede . His manual is not a work to be

    preferred to existing works in respect of clearness , fulness , novelty , or philosophy . He is not a better expounder , a better thinker , or a more industrious compiler than those who have already treated the subject ; and the only attraction his book can be supposed to possess over any tolerable chemical treatise , is the extent of his plan , which embraces topics of chemistry , geology , and physiology . Thus he divides the work into four books . The first is devoted to Morganic Chemistry ; the second to the Chemistry of Geology ; the third to Organic Chemistry ; the fourth to the Chemistry of Life ; and the whole concludes with a long appendix on the applications of Chemistry to the Arts .

    For so large a scheme there was needed unusual mastery of the principles and facts of science , or else great philosophic power . Few men have the knowledge which would enable them to execute the scheme with success . Dr . Kemp has certainly no pretensions to this encyclopaedic wealth . But he has a worse vice than poverty—namely , a looseness and inaccuracy of statement , which , if it be not always the result of imperfect knowledge , isalways misleading . The mastery demanded by popular exposition of science is the cause why so few really popular works are written , and why those few are so attractive . Dr . Kemp has not this mastery ; and his language is frequently such as to lead an uncharitable reader to suspect bis ^ knowledge to be fragmentary and superficial . An example or two may be cited . At vol . i . p . 10 , in a strange jumble meant to stand for an historical introduction , he says that chemistry was formerly confined to determining the elements and the laws of combination of compounds formed in the inorganic

    world ; " but since the publication of Liebig ' s doctrines chemistry likewise describes the combination that the elements form in living structures and the various and rapidly succeeding changes that take place in them . " It would be difficult to understand anything by this statement but that Liebig is the father of organic chemistry , and that before him no one thought of chemical analysis of organic bodies ; but it would be difficult also to believe Dr . Kemp so ignorant of the history of chemistry as to have meant what he has said ; tho merest glance at the works of Fourcroy , Thdnard , Berzehus , Chevreuil , and Dumas , would suffice to rectify so gross an error . iven to this

    On the same page we are told that a now name should be g science created by Liebig , and for this reason : " tho laws of combination that prevail amongst the elements in the organic world ( i . e ., the laws of the old chemistry ) cease the moment these same elements enter a living structure ^ and other ones take their place . " And at p . 19 ho repeats and expands this monstrous error . Ho probably means that the combinations which take p lace in a living structure are more complex , and , occurring under different conditions , arc different from tho combinations occurring out of living structures . Ho cannot mean that tho laws of combination cease ; that the

    " vital affinity" he talks so much about replaces chemical affinity . But this is what the passages convey . . . Nor is tho inaccuracy of etatemont less in that section of his work wlucn treats of Physiology —n subject upon which an M . D . may be expected to be more precise than when touching on Chemistry . Tho opening pumm-auh of this section contains throe extraordinary statements : — lat . That living beings ¦ " do not obey tho laws of mechanics or ot wj "" ™* chemistry , but those of an altogether distinct science . " Ho inoijiit .. «< " - g of tho kind ; ho means that besides obeying the laws of meal '"^ ^ chemistry , they arc also subject to vital laws . Tho error is not ignomnco , but looseness of statement , which is ns bad for the reftder - . .. cryatals or 2 nd . "All these living beings , instead of , as is J ; ' ? . ^ ^ org am which rocks , possessing a homogeneous structure , arc PJ ° J tru 0 of the higher perform varied but definite functions . " This , which i ^ w « beings . " r > lunts and animals , is absurdly ^ ZTvlant ^ d animals of a single Sell , J ) x . Kemp must know perfectly well that plants anu

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 15, 1855, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_15091855/page/15/