Herbert Spencer is a philosopher of a wider range. A believer in organic evolution before Darwin published his epoch-making work, he accepted at once Darwin's useful idea, and incorporated it as a minor part in its fitting place in his own system. But that system itself, alike in its conception and its inception, was both independent of and anterior to Darwin's first pronouncement. It certainly covered a vast world of thought which Darwin never even attempted to enter. To Herbert Spencer, Darwin was even as Kant, Laplace, and Lyell - a laborer in the special field who produced results which fell at once into their proper order in his wider synthesis. As sculptors, they carved out shapely stones, from which he, as architect, built his majestic fabric. The total philosophic concept of evolution as a cosmical process - one and continuous, from nebula to man, from star to soul, from atom to society - we owe to Herbert Spencer himself, and to him alone, using as material the final results of innumerable preceding workers and thinkers...
May I begin with a passage which I quoted from one of Mr. Spencer's own early works no less than eleven years since, in my little monograph on Charles Darwin? It occurs in an essay on The Development Hypothesis, in that long-defunct paper, the Leader.
"Even could the supporters of the development hypothesis merely show that the origination of species by the process of modification is conceivable, they would be in a better position than their opponents. But they can do much more than this. They can show that the process of modification has effected, and is effecting, great changes in all organisms, subject to modifying influences... They can show that any existing species - animal or vegetable - when placed under conditions different from its previous ones, immediately begins to undergo certain changes of structure fitting it for the new conditions. They can show that in successive generations these changes continue, until ultimately the new conditions become the natural ones. They can show that in cultivated plants, in domesticated animals, and in the several races of men, these changes have uniformly taken place. They can show that the degrees of difference, so produced, are often, as in dogs, greater than those on which distinctions of species are in other cases founded. They can show that it is a matter of dispute whether some of those modified forms are varieties or modified species. They can show too that the changes daily taking place in ourselves - the facility that attends long practice, and the loss of aptitude that begins when practice ceases - the development of every faculty, bodily, moral, or intellectual, according to the use made of it, are all explicable on this same principle. And thus they can show that throughout all organic Nature there is at work a modifying influence of the kind they assign as the cause of these specific differences, an influence which, though slow in its action, does, in time, if the circumstances demand it, produce marked changes; an influence which, to all appearance, would produce in the millions of years, and under the great varieties of conditions which geological records imply, any amount of change."
Now, by most readers at the present day, this passage would undoubtedly be at once set down as "Darwinian." But when was it written?...
"An analysis of the number systems of many races scattered all over the globe shows that such a similarity exists, and there is no reason to suppose that our own ancestors followed any other method. Indeed, such evidence as it is now possible to bring forward all goes to support this view.Counting begins when man first forms the idea of two as distinct from one and more than two. We may perhaps go back even one step further, and say that it begins when the idea of one, as distinct from more than one, is formed..."
"It is held that the health of the body may be affected, beneficially or injuriously, by certain states of the mind, as of hope or despondency. Or, more in detail, medical men have observed that certain mental states affect certain functions in certain definite ways. As, for instance, sudden anxiety, as of the non-arrival of a friend when expected, may cause an increase of the peristaltic action, while prolonged anxiety is apt to cause the contrary effect. Joy over good news or at the return of long-absent friends diminishes gastric secretion and causes loss of appetite. The feeble hold on life of the suicidal, and the surprising recoveries from serious diseases and after apparently fatal injuries, in persons whose mental characteristics are hopefulness and determination, are often-recurring facts, familiar to all..."
The Origin of Fruits and Cultivated Plants.
"To the attractive hues of fruit, I believe, we must ultimately trace back our whole artistic pleasure in the pure physical stimulation of beautiful colors, displayed by natural objects or artificial products.
Our present inquiry, then, will yield us some account of that primitive delight in red, purple, orange, and yellow, which we usually take for granted as an innate instinct of humanity, savage or civilized. When, some few months back, we analyzed the various elements of pleasure which make up our aesthetic enjoyment of a daisy, we were compelled, for the time being, to leave the original beauty of its pink-and-white rays wholly unexplained..."
This book deals with the evolution of human and organic forms.
"That men, or thinking beings akin to man, exist only on that minute fragment of the universe we call the earth is a conception so highly improbable, in view of the vast multitude of planets which we may logically conceive to exist, that it seems as if no reasoning being could entertain it. It is true, indeed, that in our own solar system perhaps only two or three of the planets, perhaps only the earth, are in a condition suitable for human habitation, and that the earth has been so for a comparatively brief period. It may well be, therefore, that only a very small percentage of the planets of space are in a similar condition. But in view of the vast multitude of planets that presumably exist, the number of those that possess reasoning beings is probably great. If we deal with this question from the point of view of actual evidence, the fact that the only planet whose conditions we know is inhabited by man is a strong argument in favor of his wide-spread existence. On the other hand, the fact that man's existence upon the earth is dependent upon a certain limited range of temperature, of brief duration in the earth's total history, is an argument on the opposite side, and goes far to narrow the possible domain of life in the universe. Yet if we extend our view to embrace the past and the future as well as the present, we cannot avoid the conclusion that the realm of life and thought in the universe is an immense one..."
The information which geologists derive from the evidences of organic remains does not wholly satisfy the keen appetite of educated minds for a knowledge of the mysteries of Nature and the revolutions of past times. The relics disentombed from our globe give no clew to its origin; and they throw but little light on the great physical events which transpired before life appeared on its surface. There are, however, reasonable hopes that the records which are wanting on this earth may be supplied from the heavens; and that some general cause, to which the numerous orbs of celestial space are indebted for their existence, may be revealed from the peculiar character of their movements, or from some of the mysterious phenomena which they occasionally exhibit. In associating his researches with those of the geologist, and in taking cognizance of the great events in the course of time, the astronomer may enhance the value of the inquiries which more commonly fall to his lot. A knowledge of the condition of the earth in past ages is calculated to give much insight into the state of similar orbs in remote space; and opinions of the habitability of other planets must be more valuable in proportion as geology and terrestrial physics show more definitely how our globe acquired and how long it can retain the conditions necessary for the maintenance of life.
This book treats of the origin and evolution of the
Stethoscope.
Instead of placing on the table every imaginary form of stethoscope manufactured out of every possible material gathered from the shops of the instrument-makers, I will carry you back to the origin of the stethoscope, and you will see how, on the principle of selection and the survival of the fittest, the primitive instruments have departed from the scene and are now only to be found among the fossilized curiosities, the relics of former ages, on the antiquated shelves of some very old medical practitioner. The stethoscope, as you know, was invented by Laennec. He relates how in the year 1816 he happened to recollect a well-known fact in acoustics of solid bodies conveying sound, and he goes on to say: "Immediately on this suggestion I rolled a quire of paper into a kind of cylinder and applied one end of it to the region of the heart and the other to my ear, and was not a little surprised and pleased to find that I could thereby perceive the action of the heart in a manner much more clear than by the application of the ear. . . . The first instrument which I used was a cylinder of paper formed of three quires completely rolled together and kept in shape by paste."...
History of Hypnotis, its Nature and Use.
It is perhaps unnecessary to state that the word hypnotism brings to the mind of the average person timid recollections of many criminal acts. That is because few people hear of hypnotism in its proper sphere. It is clothed with the garb of shame; it is surrounded with all the horror belonging to the age of witchcraft. Newspapers delight in depicting its bad sides, in painting to the world the crimes that have been committed under its influence, the fearful results of its all powerful spell. To most it means a giving up of one's will to another who is superior, the crushing of one's entity by the power of another, the total abstinence of individual self-control, the entire weakening of one's higher intelligence. Vivid imagination supplies the result-suffering, hardship, labor and total subservience.
The question arises, 'Why should hypnotism have been thus derided?' Simply and plainly because the ignorance of people in general has given it no opportunity to show its good sides. Unfortunately people are always looking for the 'eternal gullible' and are not satisfied until they get a taste of it. And as hypnotism was first practised solely and is now practised mostly by men who have made the world their dupes, the world has had to suffer in the advancement of hypnotism on a scientific basis...
This is a complete study of the cause and reasons of the migration of birds. What makes Birds Migrate? Migration is the act of changing an abode or resting place, the wandering or movement from one place to another, but technically the word is applied to the passage or movement of birds, fishes, insects and a few mammals between the localities inhabited at different periods of the year. The wandering of a nomadic tribe of men is migration; the mollusc, wandering from feeding ground to feeding ground in the bed of the ocean, migrates; the caterpillar migrates from branch to branch, even from leaf to leaf; the rat leaves the ship in which it has travelled and migrates to the granary; we pack our goods, hire a removing van and migrate to a new abode. The word migration thus applied may be literally correct but it fails to convey the generally accepted meaning, and the expression Bird Migration suggests periodical and regular movement, the passage as a rule between one country and another..."
The common barberry (Berberis vulgaris), being so abundant over the greater part of Europe, native to the soil, and at the same time both useful and beautiful, has naturally come to hold an important place in popular esteem. As a consequence it has received, in the course of centuries, a considerable variety of names in the different European languages, and some of these names, as might be expected, have undergone rather curious transformations...Our forefathers bring the plant to this country (largely for the sake of its fruit), and thus it finally returns to the ancestral acres. It would surely seem to be not a little invigorated by its journey around the world, since in the acquisition of American territory it appears to be in a fair way to outdo its stay-at-home relative, and has already fully justified with us its Old World name of "common barberry."
- Cholera : Mode of Propagation, Healing and Prevention -
"Cholera is an infectious disease. By infectious diseases are meant those diseases which are caused by the reception from without of specific infective material into healthy bodies, which material acts like a poison. To the list of infectious disorders belong such different maladies as small-pox and intermittent fever. Infective material differs essentially from lifeless chemical poison in being composed of the smallest possible units of living matter which when taken into healthy bodies rapidly increase and multiply under certain conditions and by their life-growth disturb the health of the body..."
In the great family of the animals, to which we ourselves belong, many different kinds of feet and hands are to be found. This book deals with the evolution of our feet and hands. "The succession of organic modifications which resulted in the formation of the human hand is part of the general process of evolution by which in the animal series the means of progression and of the taking of food were shaped by the environmental conditions under which life was carried on... The functions of life which call into service the bodily limbs are chiefly two-locomotion, an activity which has arisen in connection with the search for food and flight from enemies; and prehension, which is concerned primarily with the grasping and tearing of food, but secondarily also with processes assistive of locomotion and other biological functions, such as sexual congress, the care of the body, burrowing and climbing. Of these two functions, if we regard the vertebrate class only, the former is the more primitive. Upon the office of locomotion the prehensive and manipulative activities of the limb have been superposed as subsequent and more specialized adaptations...."
This book presents the Hippocrates treatise of the epidemics, followed by an essay on historic epidemics.
"Epidemic denotes a spreading disease which attacks great numbers of people at certain seasons. The term Epidemic derived from two Greek words, which signify "upon the people - prevalent among the people" - diseases which, at one and the same time, prevail extensively among large masses of the people..."
