livelihood, (3) concentration of wealth in industry, and (4) great intellectual transformations. In two concluding chapters of the second part there is a brief review of political and economic forms of unrest, including anarchism, socialism, etc., and an account of the modern movement for social betterment.

The first sentence strikes a chord that is sounded often throughout the book: "Among careful students of Western civilization there is a growing apprehension of impending disaster." The causes are bound up in historic and prehistoric developments, but particularly in the social changes, mentioned above, of the last few hundred years. Society has lost its old controls in the rapidity of modern change, especially the control of morals. The remedy hoped for is the re-establishment of religious organization, ideals, and influences; all of the broadest and the most scientific kind, but strictly religious. The treatment is that of armchair philosophy, of appreciation of the needs of the ordinary individual, rather than of the scholar.

Each of the thirteen chapters is followed by a bibliography of thirty or more references, and there are footnote references, not to page citations, but to the general argument of the books in question.

This work is not rigidly scientific. Too great reliance is placed upon the efficacy of intellect as a social force, too much of disaster read into social change, but perhaps, too, the experiences in the course for which this material was prepared led to an overemphasis on these points because they aroused interest in the students.

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

LEROY E. BOWMAN

The Conflict between Liberty and Equality. BY ARTHUR TWINING HADLEY. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1925. Pp. vii+135. $1.50.

This is a series of three lectures delivered as the Raymond F. West Memorial Lectures, at Stanford University.

The main thesis is that liberty and equality are often opposed to one another; that liberty in one field may lead to such inequality as practically to take away the liberty of the lower class. Liberty is defined as the freedom to use intelligence in the solution of problems. Primitive people were great conformists, and therefore had no liberty in this sense. In Colonial America people had both liberty and equality. But with the development of industry, industrial liberty brought economic inequality.

Many groups have been so subordinated that they now have little liberty, i.e., little opportunity to solve their problems through the exercise of intelligence. This condition can be corrected through our representative government. We now need a new political party with "liberty" as the fundamental plank in its platform.

JAMES ALFRED QUINN

UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI

Changes in the Size of American Families in One Generation. By RAY E. BABER and EDWARD ALSworth Ross. "University of Wisconsin Studies in the Social Sciences and History." University of Wisconsin Press, Madison: 1924. Pp. 99. $1.00. This study of the size of families of native stock living in the Middle West shows that there has been a shrinkage of 381⁄2 per cent in fertility between the past and present generations. In contrast with this is the finding of Miss Jeanette Halverson, whose study occupies the last chapter, that one hundred dependent families (unselected) in the same area averaged families twice as large.

The families were reached through questionnaires sent home by students of the University of Wisconsin. The "past generation" (the students' grandparents) averaged 5.44 children per family; the "present generation" (the students' parents), 3.35 children.

While many of the conclusions are not new, there are occasional surprises. The size of the family was studied in relation to age of marriage, occupation, education, dependency, and the mortality of children in the two generations.

Although this is one of the best studies of its type in recent years, it is not without defect. Statistically it is satisfactory; inductively and deductively it is incomplete and at times erroneous. When causation is discussed it is confused with correlation. Higher education is assumed to cause a lower birth-rate. All we know is that they go together. The discussion of the causative factors of the decline is inadequate; the causative factors of childless marriages receive some attention, but this is irrelevant, since there had to be at least one child in the family to have a son or daughter in college through whom the families were reached. The motives for the practice of birth control reflect poor analysis. Fecundity is at times confused with fertility.

There are unhappy applications of the observations and conclusions of others. The authors seem to agree with Popenoe and Johnson that late

marriages, caused by an extended educational period, are causing racial deterioration, and yet they conclude, in another place, that in this particular group, late marriages have been but an insignificant factor in the decline. It is rather their low marriage rate and restriction in the married state. Equally poor analysis is found in the discussion of the high fertility of foreign-born women in relation to "competition."

The authors have done well, however, in adding their own voices to the voices in the wilderness warning that the stock from which we have been drawing our college material is not reproducing itself. No mention is made, though, of the most fundamental fact of all-that voluntary parenthood for the "lower" classes would go a long way toward correcting an evil the existence of which all intelligent people deplore.

NORMAN E. HIMES

CORNELL COLLEGE MT. VERNON, IOWA

Personality in Politics-Reformers, Bosses, and Leaders: What They Are and How They Do It. BY WILLIAM BENNETT MUNRO. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1924. Pp. 114. $1.50.

The approach to social science through the study of personality types is well illustrated by this volume. Three outstanding types found in American politics are described the reformer, the boss, and the leader. The materials on the boss are the best. Ten well-known political bosses were studied, and these materials served as the basis for this section of the volume. The characteristics of these bosses were found to be so diverse that few generalizations could be made concerning them. The important thing about the boss is that he knows how to control. The reformer, painted as a generalized type, is an uncompromising person who is anxious to put across an ideal, but is ignorant of practical methods of control. He is unsuccessful in politics. The leader is the ideal person who can apply the successful methods of the boss in the service of unselfish ends and high ideals.

These materials were presented as a series of lectures at the University of North Carolina. They represent an attempt to attack problems of social control through personality studies of successful and unsuccessful leaders. JAMES ALFRED QUINN

UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI

Social Organizations Working with Rural People. BY WALTER A. TERPENNING. Kalamazoo, Michigan: The Extension Department, Western State Normal School, 1925. Pp. 125.

This book is a report of a survey of rural institutions in Hillsdale and Lapeer counties, Michigan. The result is a repetition of the old story: The agencies are inefficient. Some of the findings follow: (a) lack of correlation between agencies; (b) jealousy of church representatives; (c) duplication of work; (d) organizations without plans; (e) promises, especially of farm bureaus, not fulfilled; (f) leaders lack knowledge of general principles.

The study, which checks activities against advertising, should prove suggestive for further detailed studies.

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

BRUCE L. MELVIN

The Problem of Immortality. By R. A. TSANOFF, Professor of Philosophy, Rice Institute, New York: The Macmillan Co., 1924. Pp. viii+418. $3.00.

Things and Ideals. By M. C. OTTо, Department of Philosophy, University of Wisconsin. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1924. Pp. xi+320. $2.50.

Here are two books thoroughly worth reading-both dealing with the idealistic interpretation of life from much the same point of view. Both root their confidence in a world which justifies man in a life-long personal venture, in the part which ideals, personal and cosmic, play in girding man for the task.

Professor Tsanoff deals with the problem of immortality. He says: "The guiding idea in our whole inquiry is not so much to ascertain whether a particular kind of human destiny is fact or fancy, but rather to understand the significance of a man's claim to a specific destiny." After giving us a very interesting review of the ideas of immortality held by different men and groups in successive ages, he comes to a very significant final statement in a chapter entitled "Value, Personality, and Destiny." Here we have statements like the following:

The moral career of man, which most adequately expresses his character as a value and himself a system of values, exhibits man as working on the supposition that in the world spiritual aspiration is appropriate and significant. . . . The moral individual demands that the universe be conceived as one in which moral aspiration and spiritual activity in general are integral, and to this

end it also proposes hypotheses, it presents demands on the universe and seeks assurances of their justification. Such a hypothesis and such a demand is the belief in immortality, the hope of life eternal.

Otto says, "It is inevitable, therefore, that America, historically the foremost exponent of the democratic 'urge' and 'outreach' of the universe, and only yesterday the leader in making the world safe for democracy, shall presently engage in the larger task of making God safe for democracy. This is the heart of the new theology." Thus both men, starting from what is valid in the experience of men, work out to what that experience demands for its fulfilment in cosmic terms on the basic assumption that the universe justifies a personal venture on the part of man. Of course man cannot prove his basic assumptions except through acting upon them-this is the only way to prove any hypothesis; but when the action justifies the hypothesis it is proved that it is worth acting upon. And what other proof is needed?

A.E. HOLT

CHICAGO THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

Behind and Before. By W. E. HEITLAND. Cambridge: The University Press, 1924. Pp. xv+166. 6s.

The Trend of History. BY WILLIAM KAY WALLACE. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1922. Pp. xi+372. $3.50.

Professor Heitland essays the part of Janus. With one face toward the past, he confronts the question of whether (and what sort of) history can help the practical statesman. He answers yes, recent history properly analyzed and taught to an orientated mind, shaped for leadership, can function as practical politics. With his other face turned toward the future he tackles the biological pessimist or eugenist, recognizes the degenerative influences at work, argues for improved living conditions, finds that permanent specialization of classes has never succeeded, and depends finally upon emotional influences chiefly religious to overcome the evil prognosticated. His conclusions somewhat resemble Kidd's (which, however, he accepts only with ample reservations). The author applies happily his own theory of the value of history to derive lessons from the tragic laissez-faire policy of the last century. He displays an unusual familiarity with American social science and its problems. For theoretical sociology the appendix on "Body Politic and Body Natural" is particularly interesting. The frank sizing up of our Madison Grants and