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to deal with the real and the commonplace, and he is a more genuine educator in consequence.

This book is a scholarly exposition of the subject. It is at the same time clear and attractive in mode of expression. It is to be hoped that every state in the Union will soon have a similar text-book. ALBION W. SMALL.

Les syndicats industriels de producteurs en France et à l'étranger. Par PAUL DE ROUSIERS. Paris: Librairie Armand Colin, 1901. Pp. 287.

M. DE ROUSIERS traces the influence of the modern systems of steam manufacture and transportation on the concentration of capital and trade management. He shows the limitations of this tendency in respect to industries whose products are not uniform and staple articles. In this part of the discussion the argument is not new. Perhaps his most suggestive contribution is the acute comparison of the American trust, the German Cartell, and the French comptoir. He gives interesting details from a first hand study of the Comptoir de Longwy.

The general conclusion reached is given in the last paragraph: "Neither producers, consumers, nor wage-workers are menaced by the syndicates when they retain their character as merely private associations. The political danger has been made clear. It is very real when any syndicate seizes a part of the public authority; when it corrupts legislators, or when it lays its hands on public means of transportation, as in the United States; when it is openly protected by a strong power, as in Germany; when it is favored by an extreme fiscal policy, as the refiners of sugar in France. On the contrary, the danger disappears when the authority of the state is not controlled by individuals, nor directed by the partiality of the sovereign, nor employed by the legislature to unburden the consumers of a product. In other words, there are political abuses which alone render the syndicates of producers dangerous and oppressive. In themselves the syndicates are a normal manifestation of industrial liberty and of the freedom of association." C. R. HENDERSON.

MAN.

The Economic Interpretation of History. By EDWIN R. A. SeligThe Columbia University Press. Pp. ix + 166. PROFESSOR SELIGMAN has packed into this little book a history, a bibliography, an interpretation, and an estimate of the economic clue

to human experience. He has made it easier for people who cannot believe that a socialist may have had, on other subjects, thoughts worth considering, to reflect in a judicial temper upon Marx's historical philosophy. He has shown that the theory is not necessarily fatalistic. He has strengthened the prima facie case for the theory by his frank exhibit of considerations against it. He has left the argument where it would be extremely difficult to maintain dissent from his conclusion. Professor Seligman does not attempt to reduce all stimuli of human action to terms of the physical environment, but he shows that this environment always furnishes primary conditions among which other stimuli must operate. The essay is almost a model of clear, dignified, thorough, and temperate historical and philosophical discussion.

A. W. S.

1444

NOTES AND ABSTRACTS.

Authority-Its Origin, Establishment and Limits.—1. The existence of Authority. Authority and anarchy represent the positive and negative poles of human association. Between these two extremes has oscillated the human race from its beginning. The transition from the wandering tribes without leadership to the civilized condition of more advanced peoples is the work of authority. Among these authorities I include not merely gods, leaders in war, chiefs, the oldest men of the group, the sachem, priest, and sorcerer, but especially the founders of religion (Confucius, Laotse, Zarathustra, Buddha, Moses) and lawgivers (Draco, Solon, Lycurgus), givers together with laws and institutions. Human civilization without these authorities is unthinkable. Without the control of the unbridled instincts and impulses of the individual there can be no order in society.

In the more primitive societies the rulers are tyrants, and control is through fear on the part of the subjects toward the ruler. With the development of a higher civilization follow more refined forms of authority. The second stage may be characterized as that of belief. In order that the subject may continue to be ruled by fear, the conditions must be such as to allow personal oversight by the ruler. Fear is a ruling motive only under the influence of the visible authority. With extension of the group comes the impossibility of direct oversight on the part of the ruler and fear gives place to a belief in the omnipresence of the unseen authority. Consequently, with the progress of civilization, the gods become more and more unseen beings, the kings more unapproachable, and institutions and laws more abstract. This middle stage of authority based upon belief characterized the patriarchal condition of church and state up to the time of the French Revolution. Authority resting upon belief was shaken by the revolution, and the third stage or modern period may be characterized by an authority based upon insight.

2. Origin of authority.—The tendency to the constructing of authority may be traced back to the animal kingdom. Wherever in the struggle for existence there is need of a common activity, there arises the function of leadership. This tendency is found among the more primitive human societies, though in some cases it resolves itself into mere authority of the oldest men.

The races which remain in primitive anarchism do not have the capacity for taking on civilization. In the struggle for existence they are overcome by others which are under the dominion of authority, for discipline is the soul of struggle and authority is the soul of discipline. Races do not remain in the stage of anarchy because they lack intelligence, but rather they have not attained a higher intelligence because they have remained anarchical. Reason does not create the state, but, on the contrary, the state creates reason. Isolated or roaming peoples nowhere reach a high degree of civilization. It was in the cities, or rather city states, that a higher intellectual civilization was first produced. The close intermingling of men stimulates especially the mental qualities. It is in this way that the proposition is to be understood that the state forms reason. Without the building of the state, without authorities, without a firm structure of superiority and subordination, we should not have passed beyond the stage of mere primitive life.

The principle of authority is permanent, but the motives upon which it is based change. The oriental ruler possesses absolute authority; he is feared because the subject believes in his power. In the Middle Ages there is blind belief in gods and men. In the modern civilizations of western Europe and America authority in religion and state is based upon reason, intelligence, and insight.

3. The establishment of authority.There is no civilization historically known to us that does not have hierarchical divisions, superiority and subordination, organization by means of authority. The first ground of authority, therefore, lies in its natural

growth. Without reflection, and motivated only by the instincts of self-preservation and of preservation of the species, authorities have been established. But while Nature commands a subjection to the principle of authority, she does not proclaim the kind of authority to be established. The latter function belongs to history, which teaches that the nature of the authority shall conform to the stage of the civilization. The steps in the development of authority are as follows: for the savage and barbarous peoples it is a natural necessity; for religious natures and sincere believers it is a necessity of feeling; for the utilitarian it is the necessity of purpose; finally, for the idealistic philosopher it is a necessity of reason.

It is to authorities, political, religious, scientific, and artistic, that we owe our order and progress. The highest formula in the promotion of progress is found in the proposition: No civilization without authority.

4. Limits of authority.— The exaggeration of authority leads to as great evils as the absence of it. The former suppresses individuality, the latter means dissolution and disorganization. Egypt furnishes an illustration of the stifling effects of despotic authority in ancient history, Byzantium in the Middle Ages, Spain in the modern period. Absolute authority everywhere has led to intellectual death, the destruction of all individual initiative, and to the stagnation of civilization.

From the positive side the solution of the problem of the limits of authority has been found by the Germanic peoples in the reconciliation of the principle of authority with the principle of freedom in the securing of authority in connection with the highest possible degree of freedom. The peculiar characteristic of the Germans is represented in this impulse for freedom, in the struggle for individuality. They formed families, clans, tribes, but no state. It was through contact with Rome that there arose the idea of the state among the Germans. At first the universalism of Rome in both political and religious realms conquered the individualism of the Germans. Then began the struggle between individualism and universalism, promoted by the Reformation, the conflict between church and state, the discoveries of science, the advance in philosophy, art, and invention, resulting in the principle of the equilibrium between authority and freedom.-LUDWIG STEIN," Autorität: ihr Ursprung, ihre Begründung und ihre Grenzen," in Jahrbuch für Gesetzgebung, Verwaltung und Volkswirtschaft im Deutschen Reich, Heft 3.

E. M.

The Power of the Social Mind in War.-If one takes into considerati on the wars of recent times, such as the success of Germany, the brilliant victory of the United States in 1898, or the military progress of Japan; or if one attempts to penetrate into the spirit of the nations as portrayed in their different histories, he will find that the ruling force in these struggles has not been military fatalism or individual genius, but rather the esprit de la nation — a force as invisible as it is irresistible.

Wars have two different effects upon nations. In the one case, after the war the victorious nation sinks into a quiet condition again, while in the other it is aroused to a desire to continue the conflict. After the defeat of the Greeks in 1898 the Turks entered upon a peaceful and profound repose, whereas after the war of 1866 the Germans retained an ardent desire for war, searching for an occasion for its continuance elsewhere. The reason for this is that in the former type the excitation to war is from without, only a portion of the people being aroused, and that in a mechanical way; whereas in the second type inspiration for the war comes from the very heart of the nation, emotionally the whole nation is aroused, and a spontaneous reaction of the whole body of the people is the result. In the first category belong all the wars of the allies of Napoleon, in the second the barbarous invasions of all times.

Every event, public or private, is attributed by some moralists entirely to the will of the individual, by other writers entirely to fate. On the one hand we see a small number of very successful men who attribute their success entirely to personal characteristics; on the other hand we have the views of the great leaders of all times: Alexander, Hannibal, and Cæsar believed in chance; Gustavus Adolphus and Cromwell, in a divine power; Napoleon, in his star; all the faithful, in the power of God; and finally the oriental fatalists, in the predestined lot of man.

To say the will alone suffices in attaining an end is to exaggerate its influence. No effect has a single cause, but rather there is always present a complexity of causes. There is a chain of circumstances, a collective will, a social mind, an environment that

favors the individual or restrains and thwarts his plans. The action resulting from the will of the individual and his environment we may call reasonable fatalism. This is difficult to comprehend or explain, because the second term "the social mind" and its phenomena are at present little understood, and especially difficult to measure. This makes the evaluation of this influence upon the individual a difficult matter.

Historians often attribute the success or decay of nations to certain persons. Especially in case of wars do they attribute victory or defeat to the commander-inchief, and upon the fortunate one is bestowed the name of genius. Upon what is this assertion founded?

In literature, art, and science we may say that the genius creates his work exclusively by means of his own ability; but are the troops of the commander-in-chief so docile or so much under control as the words of the author, the figures of the mathematician, or the reactions in the laboratory of the chemist? The phenomena of wars are so varied and complex that it is impossible for any human intelligence to control them. After the beginning of the battle the commander loses in large part the control of the conditions. He cannot follow the course of the movements, and in the tumult and smoke of battle even his orders are lost. Genius in war does not have the same significance as in literature or science. There is lacking the characteristic of absolute individuality both in conception and execution of the work. The execution is subordinated to the size of the armies and to a thousand circumstances, all of which may be summarized in the expression the collective spirit of the two armies.

There is then a greater force than that of man, whether general or emperor, and easier to study in the evolution of nations than an unknown fatalism. It is their mind, their spirit, with all the phenomena which it represents: intelligence, feeling, and will.

We do not desire to exclude the diverse external influences which act on the characteristics of this mind, such as the economic, religious, etc., but we are striving to establish the essence of this spirit which can determine the results independently of these conditions.

In the life of a nation, as in that of an individual, there is an evolution, a transformation, in which it gains a quality or a new property, or loses a characteristic of its personality. So, too, we see in certain epochs a nation seized with an irresistible desire to fight and giving itself up to a bloody internal revolution or to an aggressive external warfare. It is with this irresistible impulse that it is necessary to connect the expansion of the Macedonians under Alexander, the victories of the Romans under Scipio, the success of the French under Napoleon, etc. When this impulse leaves the people, this collective warlike spirit, then leadership, however strong, ceases to be successful in its efforts. Consequently the nation, being collective, in the evolution of its warlike feeling has an ascending course, an apogee, and a descending course; and the leader who does not follow this evolution of the collectivity will soon be punished. He will lose his influence and be crushed despite all his genius or his personal capacity. The most recent, as well as the most ancient, wars show that the social mind has exercised the primary influence; all other circumstances, including personal leadership, have been secondary.--Dr. CAMPEANO, "La force de l'âme collective dans les guerres," in Revue internationale de sociologie, October, 1902.

E. M.

Gas Leakage in American Cities.-There are very few American communities in which the facts of gas leakage in distribution, if known and comprehended, would not create a popular panic. Having studied this problem in every part of the United States and Canada, I am prepared to say that leakage ranges from 10 to 30 per cent. of output.

I will give the facts of one American city. The loss in distribution was about II per cent.; in round figures, three thousand millions of cubic feet. At 60 cents per thousand, this is $1,800,000 per annum, which the consumer must pay. This gas is known as water gas. It carries, on the average, 30.79 parts carbon monoxide, 30.14 parts hydrogen, 19.10 parts marsh gas, 10.69 parts olefiants; the remainder being nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and oxygen. This is a very formidable compound to go at large in a city. Most of the leakage is under measurably or absolutely impervious pavements. It cannot work its way up through the soil and escape, but most of it in one way or another gets into houses.

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