to take in the future. He has no special theory to advocate, and he promises no speedy renovation of society if only his advice be taken. He knows too much to be a visionary; he has too firm a hold on the actual to be carried away by the merely ideal or fanciful. He finds no fatal flaw in the present social system; he does not see, in fact, how, given human nature as it is, things could be very different from what they are. At the same time he is an earnest believer in progress; but he thinks that progress depends more upon individual adaptation to necessary conditions of existence than upon any cunningly contrived devices for an improved distribution of the products of industry. In a word, he is a man whom the devourer of contemporary socialistic romances would find a little dull, but whom the practical man of business would find both interesting and instructive in the highest degree. As a large part of Mr. Wells's book appeared originally in the pages of this magazine, we may presume that many of our readers have a more or less vivid recollection of the course of his argument. What Mr. Wells set himself chiefly to do was to trace to its cause or causes the present disturbed condition of the world from an economic point of view. Given such a problem, a writer who wished to create an immediate sensation would bring forward some theory about the land, or about the currency, or about monopolies, or about the waste involved in competition, and would declare with much emphasis and vainglory that he alone had the true key to the whole situation. Mr. Wells is more modest. All he professes to see is that the rapid pace of invention and discovery in the modern world is sufficient to account for enorinous vicissitudes both in the money market and in the labor market. Capital has been destroyed in huge blocks and recreated by new methods; labor has been forced to quit one employment after another and find new open | ings for itself. The course of business has become more and more difficult to calculate, and only the stronger heads and more resolute wills have been able to hold their own amid the changes and chances of the hour. Mr. Wells does not deal in mere generalities. He treats separately each aspect of his subject, and under every head gives facts in abundance-"modern instances," as Shakespeare expresses it. He shows what has been done in the way of opening new routes; and, in the case of the Suez Canal, he traces to that one cause the most momentous results as regards the course of trade. He discusses very fully the effects of the cheapening of transportation by land and by sea, showing how, to this cause, must be attributed much of the agricultural depression existing in different parts of the world. He dwells on the inventions and discoveries by which manufactures have been cheapened, and labor constantly displaced and again provided for. He shows how improved methods of farming render less efficient ones unprofitable, and how little good has been dore to the farming population by the homestead and other exceptional laws passed for their benefit-nay, how they have been injured by the overzeal of their friends in the Legislature. He discusses the effect of restrictions on trade, and shows in what idle fashion the governments of the world, with one or two exceptions, handicap their own commerce in the effort to injure that of their neighbors, and how the effect of the whole protectionist madness is simply to place a heavy drag upon the industrial energy, not to say upon the conscience, of mankind. We can not pretend, however, in this place to give even the most rapid summary of the contents of Mr. Wells's volume. Suffice it at present to say that he has described with great fullness and, so far as we can judge, with great accuracy, the conditions under which the business of the world is now being carried on, and the circumstances that have concurred to make the present epoch | with private liberty, including state reone of peculiar commercial and industrial strictions on trade and state encouragement of trade. unrest. 2. Constant inculcation of the doctrine of individual responsibility, and constant effort to mold better individuals. 3. An honest, vigorous, and simple administration of justice. These three conditions (to which many minor but still important ones might be added) are all intimately connected. For example, how can we preach the doctrine of individual re dividual is daily surrounded by a closer and closer network of arbitrary enactments, designed at once to abridge his liberty and to relieve him of the exercise of judgment and caution? And how can we have a really efficient adminis What is the lesson, then, we are to draw from Mr. Wells's pages, so far as the social problems of our own time are concerned? We learn from it that there is nothing radically unsound in our social system; and, further, that the total effect of all the changes of the last twenty-five or thirty years has been to improve materially the condition of the working classes. Hours of labor are not as long on the whole as they used to be; wages are higher; and the pur-sponsibility with any success, if the inchasing power of money is greater. What is the case, however, is that, in the rush of change which has marked recent years, there is a constant selection and reselection of the better men, and that the worse the less competent, the less efficient in every way-find them-tration of law, till law itself undergoes selves relegated to poorer conditions of a pruning, and is brought down to its life. There is an upward current and necessary elements? there is a downward current: those who move up do not spend much time or energy in singing the beauties of the present system; but those who are moving down waste no small amount of the little energy they have in bewailing its defects, and, with the help of a few liter'ary gentlemen of lively sympathies and facile speech, manage to create a wide-show." We shall only say in conclusion spread impression that a world in which they do not get all they would like must be a very badly governed world indeed. The whole social question seems to lie here, that some, through natural defi- | ciencies of one kind or another, can not, in any satisfactory degree, adapt themselves to the world as it is. We should be sorry to profess, or to feel, indifferIr is a long time since an earnest ence to the problem even as thus stated; thinker proclaimed that wisdom was the but what are we going to do about it? principal thing, and that with all a man's The true methods of reform are of slow gettings he should strive to get underapplication; and immediate suffering it standing; but whether the world to-day is impossible altogether to prevent. The -even those who regard the utterance path of social reform, we are strongly as carrying with it more than human persuaded, lies mainly along these three authority-can be said to pay due heed lines: to the maxim is more than doubtful. 1. Diminution of state interference Instead of wisdom, men exalt opinion, To return, however, to Mr. Wells's book. We are glad to see its merits very frankly acknowledged in an article published in the March number of Macmillan's Magazine, the writer declaring that Mr. Wells deals with his subject "in a manner altogether superior to anything which this country (England) can that the book is an eminently useful one to-day and will remain so for many years to come. A careful perusal of its pages would clear infected brains of many sickly fancies. TRAINING IN REALITIES. and traditions are taught where truth | lead them on from stage to stage in the should be explored. We have large and acquisition, not of sham but of real influential schools decrying the use of knowledge. A child in course of edureason, and we have millions of people cation should never be removed from to-day trying to think true what their actual contact with the world about him. common sense tells them is not true. He should be made to feel that every All this does not make for the world's general rule given to him is merely a peace or stability. It will not be really summary expression of a number of conwell with society until men generally crete examples. He should be early are brought to recognize that there is familiarized with the method of proof, such a thing as truth, and that its claims and in every possible way encouraged upon them are paramount. Our systems to ask for proofs. He should be made of education need to be revolutionized. to realize the activity of his own senses; When a young person leaves school or to feel that knowledge is coming to him college nowadays, do we expect to find through those avenues; and that, only that his or her judgment has been de- as it so comes, is it entitled to be conveloped in practical things? Do we ex-sidered real knowledge. pect to find a keen sense of what is true, a quickness in distinguishing shams from realities, and a well-established habit of yielding, upon all disputed questions, to the greater weight of evidence? Nothing of the kind. We look for a little knowledge of arithmetic and mathematics generally, a modicum of geography and grammar, a smattering of literature, a few confused notions of natural science, a discontinuous skeleton of historical knowledge, and not much else. The judgment has not been trained, the sense of truth has not been trained, nor has any insight worth mentioning been given into the realities of life and duty. We do not blame the teaching fraternity for this; society as a whole is responsible. The want of interest in truth as truth, the lack of perception of its importance, is a broad social characteristic of the time, and floods the schools just as it floods the market-place, the press, and the pulpit. But, while we do not in any special manner blame the teaching profession, we feel like summoning all serious men to consider whether a very decided and vigorous effort should not be made to place our schools upon a higher level in this respect. No one can doubt that, if our minds were set upon it, a simple gymnastic might be devised which would, from the outset, train childish minds in the perception of truth and Such a system of education as we have hinted at would banish the intellectual poverty and squalor of our time; and this could not be done without an immense improvement of general social conditions. The sentimentalists of our day bestow a huge amount of sympathy upon the victims of poor wages; but they do not grieve as they might over the victims of poor thoughts and disordered imaginations. The dust and dirt heaps that obstruct the entrance to thousands of minds are not visible as material masses; but they are there all the same, and the injury they cause is greater than any due to mere limitation of material conditions. The land is full of delusions, and scarcely anywhere do we see any clear consciousness of the grand possibility open to the human race of co-operating in the discovery and application of truth, including, of course, and in the first place, the laws of social well-being. We too readily resign ourselves to the idea that men's opinions must differ by the whole circle of possible thought, and that a common standard of truth is unattainable. Well might the reproach be launched against this genération, "O ye of little faith!" Amid the manifold and ever-widening discoveries of science we resign ourselves to intellectual chaos, as if there were no common heritage of truth for us all, or as if human minds were not all made essentially on the same pattern. What the times seem to call for is some association of men and women bent on nothing else than the introduction, primarily into our educational systems, but as much as possible into social life generally, of a supreme regard for that which is real. LITERARY NOTICES. PRACTICAL HINTS FOR THE TEACHERS OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS. By GEORGE HOWLAND. International Education Series, Vol. XIII. New York: D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 198. Price, $1.50. THIS volume deals with the practice rather than with the theory of education. It tells what to do, and does not concern itself with any comprehensive scheme of educational philosophy. The author is superintendent of the public schools of Chicago, and the several chapters of this volume are based upon papers read before the teachers of that city and vicinity. The author has not aimed to produce an exhaustive and systematic treatise, but has confined his attention to the following ten topics: Moral training in city schools, the character of the teacher, the place of memory in school instruction, elements of growth in schoollife, the scholarship aimed at in the school, the teacher in the school-room, how the school develops character, the class recitation, the school principal, and the work of the superintendent. The pages of the book are dominated by the personality of the author, and the things and practices recommended are such as his experience tells him are good. In regard to moral training, the subject that he treats first, he has no faith in text-books or special instruction; he would trust entirely to "the quiet suggestion, the fitly chosen word, the interested inquiry, the look, the unfeigned sympathy, the favored opportunity, the firm but calm decision of the loved and loving teacher." In other subjects, however, he would depend altogether upon books. The sesame to all progress, he says, is found inscribed on the printed page. In the six years before the child comes to school he has had a training without books which, as Mr. Howland affirms, has been very effective. "He has early learned that fire will burn, that cold will freeze, and knows, beyond the power of Webster or Worcester to tell him, the meaning of burn and freeze; and by many a bump has the force of attraction been impressed upon him." He has learned a language, and has acquired much other knowledge. By similar means the Indian acquires a wonderful training of his senses, his hands, and his mental powers. "He learns to do," says Mr. Howland, "in the only true way, by the doing." In acquiring knowledge of language the author recommends this same process. Correct use of words and a nice appreciation of their meanings and force are to be secured, he says, "not from dictionary, but from use alone." That the teacher should learn by this method, however, he deems inadmissible. In his chapter on "The School Principal" he says: "We learn to do by doing, is one of those aphoristic half-truths well suited to catch the ear and delude the mind of the unthinking. We may acquire a mechanical facility by repeated doings of what we already know how to do, but we learn to do by learning how other people do, and by the aid of this knowledge striving to do someThe volume is especially thing better." marked by an energetic character and a confident tone which assure the reader of the real interest of the author in the work of the teacher. FIRST LESSONS IN POLITICAL ECONOMY. By FRANCIS A. WALKER. New York: Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 323. Price, $1.25. THE special purpose of this book is to bring political economy within the grasp of youth from fifteen to seventeen years of age. The author has not made it childish by restricting himself to "words of two syllables," or by any similar device. The character which he has aimed to give the volume in order to adapt it to young pupils consists in "a clear arrangement of topics; a simple, direct, and forcible presentation of the questions successively raised; the avoidance, as far as possible, of certain metaphysical distinctions which the author has found very perplexing to students of even a greater age; a frequent repetition of cardinal doctrines; and, especially, a liberal use of concrete illustrations, drawn from facts of common FUEL AND ITS APPLICATIONS. By E. J. MILLS and F. J. ROWAN. Illustrated. Philadelphia: P. Blakiston, Son & Co. Pp. xx+802. Price, $7.50. experience or observation." The fact that | Paper, etc.," "Coloring Matters and Dyes," one purpose of the treatise is to interest be- "Oils and Varnishes," "Brewing and Disginners in the subject of political economy tilling," "Sugar, Starch, Flour," etc. The has also modified its character. "The author present volume treats of "Fuel and its Aphas not held himself, as strictly as he has plications" generally; its special employsought in previous works to do, to the treatment in various branches of chemical manument of political economy as a science, to be facture being preserved for detailed considdistinguished from the art of political econ- eration in the volumes devoted to the special omy. He has allowed himself great freedom subjects enumerated above. In the chapters in assuming that certain results are desirable devoted to the production of fuel, tables are in themselves, and certain other results un- given showing the composition of the differdesirable; and he has sought to show how ent woods and coals, together with informathese may be avoided and those attained. tion concerning the formation of peat, ligMuch, which, in his other works, has been nite, and coal, the world's production of coal, treated as belonging to the applications of explosions in mines from fire-damp and coalpolitical economy, is wrought into the sub- dust, etc. The figures representing the outstance of the present treatise." The work put of coal in Britain and other countries is divided into two chief parts, one treating show the enormous development which has of "Production and Exchange," the other of taken place in the fuel industry all over the "Distribution and Consumption." Each world. Methods of burning charcoal, both section is numbered and has a title, and the in heaps and kilns; and methods of coking, volume is indexed. in heaps and in ovens, are described, with illustrative views and diagrams. On the continent of Europe, methods of cleaning, washing, and classifying coal have reached a great degree of elaboration, and the practice in Britain has progressed somewhat in the same direction. Considerable space is devoted to these methods, and the machines employed in them. The most marked advance in respect to the manufacture and application of fuels in the past generation has been in the control and utilization of gases. The waste gases from coking ovens are now collected for their ammonia, tar, and other by-products, the gases from blastfurnaces using coal and from gas-producers are also made to yield these products; and great advance has been achieved in the extraction of ammonia in shale distillation. More important than these is the use of coal-gas, and in America of “natural” gas also, as fuel. The methods and appliances for using gaseous and also liquid fuel receive a general representation in this volume, and copious references are given for specialists who may wish to study particular branches of the subject. The portion of the volume devoted to the application of fuel is introduced by chapters on the theory of heat and the nature of flame. The matters of chimney-draught, forced combustion, and smoke prevention are then taken up. The special application of fuel considered first Ir is one of the obstacles to gaining a competent knowledge of technology that its manuals become almost worthless when a few years old, but it is the glory of the sciences on which technology depends that they advance fast enough to make these books antiquated so quickly. This is especially true of the group of industries based upon the science of chemistry. In order to supply the lack of a comprehensive, authoritative new work dealing with these industries, a series of volumes has been projected, under the general title "CHEMICAL TECHNOLOGY, or Chemistry in its Applications to Arts and Manufactures." It will be edited by Charles E. Groves, F. R. S., editor of the "Journal of the Chemical Society," and William Thorp, B. Sc. As much of the matter of Richardson and Watts's "Chemical Technology" as is available, especially the historical portions, will be incorporated in the new work. Of this series the present volume is the first. The most important sections of the general field, to be covered in later volumes, are "Lighting," "Acids and Alkalies," "Glass and Pottery," "Metallurgy," "Textile Fabrics," "Leather, |