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618 NEW BOOKS. which leads us to Virtue" " Now Virtue, with its correlated Duty and Obligation, is a part of Utility it is consistent with Utility : which Morality is not. In Virtue the interests of the individual and of Society are reconciled." Absolute Relativism; or the Absolute in Relation. By WILLIAM BELL M'TAGGART, late Captain 14th Hussars. Vol. I. London : W. Stewart & Co. Pp. viii., 133. The author's ultimate purpose is a reconciliation of the religious and the scientific philosophy of the day. " The fetiches of the hour are personality and intelligence of the ' All-upholder ' on the one hand, as against ' non- personality and mechanical necessities of the ultimate substratum '. . . . Both camps seem regardless that the other holds at least one aspect of the truth, and that a higher knowledge and a wider generalisation may unify the two into All-personality and All-theism." His purpose in the present volume divided into three parts, entitled " Prolegomena " (pp. 1-22), " Materialism " (pp. 25-86) and " Idealism " (pp. 91-133) is by succes- sively reviewing materialistic and idealistic philosophy, as stated by "their accepted representatives," to arrive at the unquestionable truths of each system in the form of certain ultimate " axioms ". What remains is to find out how the truths of these and other philosophies limit one another, and how they may yet "exist synchronously within Infinity". The result attained so far is this : " Having started with the postulate 1 = 1, in the endeavour to ascertain, by the avenues of experience and reason alone, what that Ego was or is, we have lighted upon the certain demon- stration that it is complex instead of simple, and that the postulate, the I, includes the postulate and demonstration of the existence of the Not-I also ". Life of Adam Smith. By R. B. HALDANE, M.P. ("Great Writers.") London : Walter Scott, 1887. Pp. ix., 161, x. More than half of this volume is devoted to the account and consideration of Smith's work as an economist ; his work as a moralist is disposed of in a short chapter (pp. 56-73), following upon a graphic sketch of the life. The author presses the charge of want of system too far against the Theory of Moral Sentiments, whether by itself or in comparison with Hume's ethical performance. Great as Hume's general philosophical importance is, it can hardly be said of him as a moralist that it was he " who first made it plain that Metaphysics and Ethics are inextricably intertwined " (p. 25) ; and if Smith was no metaphysician, it cannot therefore be said that he did not take up a position of permanent mark, after or by the side of Hume, in the ethical movement of his century. At p. 65, in reference to Smith's exclu- sion of " Utilitarian " considerations, it is somewhat loosely remarked that Hume also made light of such when he refused to find " the guiding principle of conduct in the tendency to seek self". And is Hume's pro- clamation of the principle of Utility well described (p. 66) as a " suggestion thrown out " in " somewhat cynical scepticism " ? Proceedings of TJie Society for Psychical Research. Part xi, London : Triibner & Co., 1887. Pp. 209-605. Since last notice in MIND, two Parts of these Proceedings have appeared. Part x., unfortunately, is not at hand for notice, but it would be a pity to therefore delay drawing attention to the excellent work that is to be found within Part xi. Whatever difference of opinion there may be as to some of the Society's lines of activity on the conclusiveness of the case for " Telepathy," in particular, see an article, " Where are the Letters ? " by Mr. A. Taylor Innes in The XlXtli Century for August there can be no