persed, and its name a mockery and reproach, these very words and phrases, by which it signified the identity of its own tradition with the loftiest of the world's cultivated thought, were emblazoned on the victorious creed of Christendom.

ART. II.. - THE PRACTICAL STUDY OF THE HUMAN SOUL.

1. The Biographical History of Philosophy, from its Origin in Greece down to the Present Day. By GEORGE HENRY LEWES. Library Edition, much enlarged and thoroughly revised. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1857. 8vo. pp. xxxiv, 801.

2. Anthropologie. Die Lehre von der menschlichen Seele. Neubegrindet auf naturwissenschaftlichen Wege für Naturforscher, Seelenärzte und wissenschaftlich Gebildete überhaupt. (Anthropology. The Doctrine of the Human Soul. Newly grounded on the Scientific Method for Naturalists, Physicians to the Insane, and Men of Scientific Culture in General.) Von IMMANUEL HERMANN FICHTE. Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus. 1856. 8vo. pp. xxviii, 609.

THE Volumes which we name add much to the great weight of proof, now accumulating on every side, that the grave problems of philosophy are to be studied anew because of the altered aspects of metaphysical inquiry and the curious questionings of the popular mind. The champion of the Positive School who is the author of the Biographical History of Philosophy will probably do far more to awaken interest in Philosophy by utterly denying its worth, and setting up what he calls Positive Science in its place, than if he had brought forward a new theory of existence, and undertaken to unseat Hegel from his metaphysical throne. He will do this, not only by the natural spirit of opposition which all sweeping negation like his awakens, but also by challenging the philosophers of the soul to legitimate their essential principles according to the new method, and to show that ideas quite as well as material things can stand the test of Positive Science. The work of Mr. Lewes, although in its way quite

able, is of course to us wholly unsatisfactory in its spirit and conclusions, since it ignores what we are in the habit of regarding as the most reliable sources of intelligence, and ranks among dreamers the sages whom we look upon as the lights of the human race. Viewed, too, merely as a Biographical History, it is very defective; for it not only slights the more characteristic personal traits and experiences out of which the philosophical systems of ancient and modern times in great part sprung, and treats the theorists more as calculating machines than as living men, but it also omits wholly from its list not a few of the great masters of philosophy, and, under the plea of not meddling with matters of mere faith, it leaves the noted Schoolmen of the Middle Ages upon the shelf. Yet many a wholesome rebuff is given to false philosophizing, and we are far less troubled by the author's preference of the Positive over the Theological and Metaphysical method, than by his narrow interpretation of the Positive Method. Philosophy, we too believe, has been too much ruled by theological traditions and metaphysical figments, and the spiritual realities with which it deals need to be studied as boldly and practically as the principles and powers of the material world. We do not quarrel wholly with the new nomenclature which Lewes and the school of Comte wish to introduce, and we are willing with them to name Biology and Sociology among sciences. But in our view Biology, or the science of life, must cover all the facts of life, mental as well as physical, religious as well as moral, and thus serve the cause of Him who is the Resurrection and the Life; whilst Sociology, or the science of society, must cover all the facts of social being, whether domestic or political, educational or ecclesiastical, industrial or devotional. Interpreting the terms thus, we find our old friends with new and not more euphonious names; and already the doctrines and duties of religion are urged upon a somewhat sceptical generation, not seldom according to the new nomenclature.

The work of Fichte (a son, we believe, of the noted philosopher of that name) is an attempt to apply the Positive method to the study of the human soul. The present volume seems to be introductory to a treatise more directly

psychological, and to deal with the soul in its objective existence in order to present subsequently a view of its subjective experience, or the facts of its consciousness. The first book is a Critical History of Psychology in its various phases of Spiritualism, Materialism, Pantheism, and Individualism. The second book treats of the general nature of the Soul, of its Reality, Elements, Embodiment, of Death and Futurity, Clairvoyance, Ecstasy, and the other marvellous phenomena which have been called the "Night Side of Nature." The third book treats of the Soul and the Spirit, the Process of Life, Origin in Time, the Spirit and Nature of Man, and closes with a summary of the whole survey. The work is full of learning, both new and old, and is especially valuable from its careful review of the new psychologists who have sought to throw light upon the soul from the facts of physical science. The author writes very religiously, and although dealing mainly with physiological laws, he leaves us at the close on the high ground of religious faith and divine illumination. In his view, " Anthroposophy can find its conclusion and rest only in Theosophy. So certain are we, that God is in us and we in him. As surely as we are spirits, God is the highest spirit, since we breathe and think in him." We might make some criticisms upon Fichte's work which should deal with its more important views, and perhaps show its relations to the higher forms of modern spiritualism; but we prefer to take a less presuming path than this, and try to illustrate the practical method of studying the soul, which is called for alike by the demands of the age and the nature of Christianity.

The soul surely is the great interest in human life, whether for this world or the world to come; and we ought to have little fellowship with those who banish it from its true place, either by the materialism that denies or ignores its existence, or by the spectralism that slights its living uses and cares only for its post-mortem condition. The modern Sadducee considers all time and money spent upon the soul as wholly a fancy investment. He places his summum bonum in a good digestion and large dividends. If he has a thought for his fellow-men who cannot have these advantages, and need

other ministry to their want or woe, he perhaps thinks himself a paragon of liberality if, after naming the almshouse and the prison for the poor and the criminal, he names the lunatic asylum and the Church for the refuge of the more or less extreme class of dreamers who persist in living in the cloud-land of visionary beliefs. He slights or denies the fact, that true power and abiding peace come from the wellbeing of the soul, that organ which he ignores; and that, without its true life and action, the rich man's emptiness is quite as sad and pitiful as the poor man's destitution. Now as of old he plays into the hands of the Pharisee, and sometimes becomes his convert; for by denying the worth of the soul for the uses of this present life, he virtually indorses the spectralism that throws contempt on living humanity, to give ghostly emphasis to the future resurrection. And if, moreover, the world goes ill with the Sadducee, without changing the spirit, he may try to change the place of his investments, and study in the bank of Pharisaic formalism how to accumulate treasure for futurity, - thereby exchang

ing his old this-worldliness for a next-worldliness, which is essentially the same thing with a new name. In the theological as well as geographical domain, "they change the heaven, but not the mind, who cross the great sea." The Pharisee may have the nobler error, and his ascetic accumulation of merit for futurity is better than the Sadducee's absorption in present good; yet it may be but the maturing of the same essential spirit, the same denial of the true office of the soul as the source of peace and power in actual life. Both rob the soul of its just place in living humanity. The one does not see the pearl of great price at all; whilst the other looks upon it very much as the pearl-diver looks upon the shell-fish that is his prey, - the pearl that it contains being of little use till the oyster is dead, and thus the globule which was the disease and torment of its life becomes a priceless gem by death.

The practical student of the soul will not countenance any such errors, but will regard the soul as the source of all true life. Instead of thinking spiritual interests opposed to practical interests, he will maintain that, without spiritual guidance,

there can be no practical welfare, - that from within us are the issues of life, like the fruits from the parent root. As familiar as this idea may be in name, its vital bearing is very little understood. Our Christendom needs no illumination and reform more imperiously than that which we should gain from asserting the just rights and duties of the human soul within the chief spheres of practical life, within the business, politics, pleasures, society, and education of men. The great victories of the Gospel have been won by asserting its present jurisdiction over men, and calling upon them now to enter upon the eternal life.

The clearer statement of this truth has been the vital principle of every great reformation. They are but half-way and childish reformers who have supposed that unsealing the covers of the Bible, to throw open to all men the secret of future salvation, is the crowning glory of Christendom. The right to live now under God's kingdom is the great gift that implies every other, and this gift is not thus great because the Bible says it, but the Bible says it because it is great. To enable men to live thus under the Divine kingdom, and to bring all the capacities of their being now into the immortal life of faith and love, is the just object of the practical study of the soul.

What the practical method of studying the soul is, we can only indicate by a few passing outlines. We need not stop to elaborate any careful definition of the soul's nature, that shall satisfy all critics, whether believers or sceptics. We are content to take our stand where we belong, within the sphere of Christian faith as well as of common sense. The human soul in its essential life is the human personality. In short, it is the man himself, and not an accident or appendage or fragment of him. This surely is the doctrine of the Master, who set forth the soul as the interior, essential, and imperishable man; and it answers to the common sense of humanity, as expounded alike by the healthy instincts of the race, and by the science of the wisest philosophers. The common feeling of all earnest minds is, that the real man is the hidden man of the heart.

The essential man, the true personality, being the subject of