Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 12.djvu/277

NEW BOOKS. 263 constant reference to Aristotle. It is strange, however, that he should have in this connexion omitted to explain the meaning of " essence " and to discuss the Aristotelian doctrine on the subject (without which Aristotelian logic is really unintelligible), especially as he himself is constantly speaking of "essential" qualities, etc. As for his relation to modern philosophy Dr. Mellone gives, in the main, a good popular state- ment of the criticism of empiricist logic initiated by Mr. Bradley, and it is, of course, a considerable service to beginners to have a door opened into a region as arduous as it is fertile. And I find also in Dr. Mellone distinct glimpses of something still more interesting and important. There are symptoms that the results of the psychological study of actual human thinking are at last beginning to percolate into the rigid repre- sentations of logical norms, and to act as solvents of many indurated technicalities. So at least I interpret Dr. Mellone' s emphasis on the selectiveness of observation (p. 264), and the arbitrariness of practical purpose which selects the antecedent which shall be regarded as the " cause " (pp. 256, 259). It is true that he appears to exclude the 4 scientific ' notion from the scope of his remarks, but it is easy to see that the scientific conceptions of causation are no less relative to the purposes of the various sciences. And if Dr. Mellone will allow himself to think the matter out, he will see that he has inserted between the joints of the traditional logic : s harness the thin end of a very long wedge. To recognise the omnipresence of selective attention in our thinking, is to admit its fundamentally purposive character ; to admit this, is to admit the conditioning of our thinking by volitional and emotional pro- cesses, and therefore, in principle, to banish from logic the cumbrous fictions of " pure thought ". Thus " selective attention " means, inevit- ably, " pragmatism," and pragmatism means a far-reaching transforma- tion and extensive simplification of the traditional formulas. But, perhaps, Dr. Mellone at least suspects a good deal of this, which will be found to be nothing less than the promise (or threat) of a logical reformation. F. C. S. SCHILLBR. Mutual Aid. By P. KRAPOTKIN. London : William Heinemann, 1902. Prince Krapotkin's argument may be briefly summarised as follows : Huxley's comparison of the animal world to a gladiatorial show, " where the creatures are fairly well treated and set to fight ; whereby the strongest, the swiftest and the cunningest live to fight another day " is not a true representation of the observed facts of animal life : such a struggle, assuming it to exist, would tend to exhaust and weaken a species, and could not alone lead to its progressive improvement : mutual aid is as much a law of animal life as mutual struggle, and as a factor of evolution has probably had a far greater importance, inasmuch as it favours the development of such habits and characters as insure the maintenance and further development of the species, together with the greatest amount of welfare and enjoyment of life for the individual, with the least waste of energy. In support of his first position Prince Krapotkin brings forward a considerable mass of evidence, in the face of which Huxley's famous comparison, already quoted, undoubtedly goes too far. It has always Jbeeri regarded as too sweeping, by many British naturalists, but the most vigorous opposition to it has come from Russian observers of animal life on the large scale afforded by the steppe lands. In Prince Krapotkin's view far too little importance has been attached to environmental checks on overpopulation. Their action, he thinks, has not merely sufficed to