New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1871-06-06

times The metaphysical method of interpretive
observation and subjective analysis having been the
main reliance in mental inquiries these were neces-
| sarily limited to their adult manifestations,
and il has thus happened that the most
! complex thing in the universe has been habtualy
| contemplated in its most complex FORM As a con-
sequence of this course the results arrived at have
been so conflicting and unsatisfactory that many
have denied psychology TO be true science. IL has
been like studying zoology entirely in the admit
forms and structures of animals. But we can only
| get the explanations of effects by going back 10
! causes; we can only understand how things arc by
ascertaining how they came to be. Zoology OILY w
came proper science by including embryoloey as
part of it; that is, by studying the laws VI ois""0
development; and so as mind also develops we ca',
| only have n trpe mental science by the study OF
mental entomology or evolution Something mas
| undoubtedly been formerly done in this direction;
| something also nv the study Of comparative psy-
cbologv which traces the mental manifestations IN
| the lower animals and something further sui III
cerebral physiology, the organic CONDITION OF heh-
tal action All these are indispensable helps 10 the
subjective method, but they have all been pursued
| in detached and fragmentary way, without method
| or methodical result Mr.. Spencer Is the hrst 10
| have seized the great principle by which all these
phenomena are traversed and inter-related, and to
have given the whole subject the unity which that
! principle makes possible.
The object of the science of mind, Ike any othef
science is to trace the relations of phenomena
There three classes of elements that have 10 he
here taken into account: the objects and relations
in the outward world or the environment; the parts
and relations of the living organism which is acted
| upon by the environment and which maniiests men,
tai effects: and the relations of the parts OF con-
sciousness or the phenomena of ideas and feelings.
There is an order of relations in the environment
answering to this, and determined by It, there is a
second order of relations i'll the nervous mechanism
| of animated beings; and again, answering to TINS
and dependent upon it, there is third order OF re-
lations in the realm of consciousness. This, as we
understand him. Is the point OF view of Mr. Spencer,
and the problem of scientific psychology, as under
taken by him. is not only 10 eucidae the relations
of structure and action in the nervous and the
psychical fields but to out the relations Of
correspondence among these several orders OF
phenomena.
Ii will be seen that have here opened too large
a subject to carry out in a newspaper article we
can give no idea Of the philosophy of that mar
veous subtlety of analysis or that wonderful grasp
by which these systems of complex and diverse re-
lations are held steadily before the readers conem-
plstion. OF the first edition of the Psychology pub
|
first examples we possess of the psychological method
in its full power" That exposition has been ampll-
fed and strengthened by sixteen years of unremttng
attention to the questions ii involves; and II MI.
Mill rightly estimated the first effort it is hardly too
much 10 say that the present work Is the clearest
and profoundest presentation of mental science that
has vet been produced. OF course the reading OF
Spencer's Psychology is no pastme but 1t Will an
| swer admirably for those thousands of eymnastlc
students who, having trained in college for the ac
quremen of mental discipline, desire to preserve
the tone of their mental muscle by the use of heavy
| weights.
There is one question, however, upon which the
public mind is Just now much agtated, and which
it is proper to notice in connection with this work
it is the question of materialsm Mr.. Spencer is
charged with being the arch matenalist of the
master of the school because he is the philosopher
of evolution, aud undertakes 10 explain the universe
in terms of matter, motion, and force. lie denies
| the charge. Let us see how the case stands.
In the first place to charge Spencer with beng
material because he believes in evolution absurd
| Everybody knows, a matter of fact. that mind IS
developed the mental growth of each individual Is
| a proof of it. Spencer only aims TO find the law OF
what all know to be fact Of nature. But as he has
put himself spon explicit record in regard TO the
general question. let us ascertain his position
bottom everything is material; that matter is the
ultimate and eternal reality while mind spirit is
dependent OF transient effect. The spritualst, on
| the other hand, maintains that at bottom every
| thing Is spirit; that spirit is the ultimate and
eternal reality, of which matter is but passing
| phase.
To get the argument fully before the reader, Mr..
Spencer presents the case as put by the matenasts
in reply to the spirualsts-rst, the grosser form Of
the argument, and then It's more subtitle and skllful
statement. The materast puts his case on the fol-
| lowing grounds: Why should matter be degraded and
held incompetent to produce all the effects we see
Who has found the limits TO its powers cold mo-
tionless insensitve bit of steel acted on by mag
| net has wrought within it an invisible change by
which il is almost animated, and which enables 1t
not only point north and SOUTH but to show to an
instructed eye the rise and progress of cyclone in
the sun. In The mnutes fragments of this steel are
| millions of units, each oscatng with unimagina-
Bile speed their oscillations varying from moment to
| moment as the temperature of surrounding things
varies Each of these units is cluster of molecules
| differing in weights and Thythms. In InOlecue of
oxide or acid the chemist one of these systems
united with one, two. three or more systems OF an
other kind similarly involved In organic matter he
! comes TO molecules each of which contains literally
more atoms than the visible heavens contain stars.
The uncomfortable ether is composed of units which
move in conformity to physical laws. Each complex
oscillating p0nderable mOlecule causes responsive
| movements in adjacent ethereal molecules and these
| in remOter ones without limit. Units of sodium on
which sunlight falls beat in unison with their kin
bred units more than 9OO0O,OO0 miles off. Nay the
clements OF the earth connected in bonds of i'll
! ter-dependent action with the elements Of stars so
remote that the diameter of the earhs orbit scarcely
seems as unit of measure to express their distances
These powers and sympathies of matter are as Won
derfu says the materalist those called spiritual