The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1914-06-07
SOME NEW BOOKS.
Rome and America.

CuTlbSlty tnt NOluIne OF essays entltltu
Rome and America by GuoLrELMo FER
RERo Putnams). The author Is so well
known as scholar who knows all
qualities with learned spirit OF human
dealings that his observations on Amer
lea have been awaited with interest, ever
since he appeared upon these shores,
ns sure to be very different from those
OF the mob OF English and other gentle
men who continue to write with ease
on the differences between the Old
World and the New. AS to all other
Natins, North America is not to this
Latin the only America. In fact he
paid two extended visits to South
America. including Argentina and
Brazil, before he ever saw the harbor of
New York. and ii his generalization he
Jumps the two continents as being so
much more like one another than either
is like Europe in a manner which will
he somewhat dlsconccrtlng to his read
ers in Latin as we'll as to his readers in
Anglo-Saxon America. one observes
with an internal smile that the gem
civilizations seem TO have been made
before the ocular proof OF them had
been furnished, and that some OF the
ESSAYS have the marks of having been
composed or at least thought out before
the travels began. But that was to be
expected from any reflective man deal
ing with such a subject. HE who
brings home the wealth of the Indies
must. take the wealth OF the Indies out
with him" Not to have any prepos-
sessions on so big and important
subject as these essays discuss were to
have a mind too blank to give much
promise OF the results of its operation
on go extensive a field. prepossessions
are not only not bad things, they are
necessary part of the equipment or
European tourist in America who takes
notes with n view to "prent IT. All
that we have a right to require OF such
n tourist IL that he shall also travel
with enough candor to see and ac-
knowledge the facts which go counter to
his prepossessions. And there are null
tiplied in these pages the evidences that
such candor was a part or this trav-
eller's outfit. in the shape OF retractions
or notifications of what he had thought.
a priori, must he characteristics OF
cisatlantlc society. Walter Bagehot
notes that whereas Macaulay's first
speech in the House of Commons on
India showed such an astonishing ac-
auaintance with the subject, for a man
who had never been there, Lord
Canterbury, "who must have heard a
million speeches" said II was the best
ne ever heard. yet after he had actually
been there and returned Macaulay
spoke on India no better, but rather
worse: experience rather puts him
out" Similarly. Matthew Arnold had
generalized and philosophical a good
deal about America before he had ever
seen it, When he saw 1t, although ac-
knowledging that his preconceptions had
been Inaccurate in some details, he In
effect repeated what he had said before.
irsomuch that he never took the trouble
TO collect and republish the fugitive
magazine papers in which his actual i'm
pressons were recorded. There Is a
publishers note" prefixed to the pres
ent volume in which 1t Is set forth that
the author has already published in
Europe a book entitled Between the
Old World and the New" although 1t
has not yet appeared in English. but
IL to appear in that language next
autumn. There are frequent illusions
TO II in this volume. of which 1t Is APP
parently a distillation. In that case 1t
must be highly distilled, for even In
these pages the reader can hardly omit
to notice how much the faculties OF re-
Election predominant over those of OBJ
servation. You will look In vain here,
or almost In vain, for "reisebilder," for
pictorial impressions OF things seen. 1t
is the meaning of visual objects which
alone seems to interest the traveller,
and indeed the theory to which the de-
tails are made to contribute Is one
which may very well have been excogi-
Nnly .f Too
and Americanizing tendencies as the
theorist had accumulated in Italy be-
fore he ever left II.
That theory Is outlined in the essay
Quantity and Quality" II begins with
a story told by Suetonius about the
Emperor Vespaslan, of how an inventor
brought him a model OF machine
which would save much labor on an
important public work then in progress
The Emperor praised the man and paid
him, but afterward destroyed the model
upon the ground that he would not
countenance any invention the result OF
which would be that any of his people
would have to go hungry. Surely this
is quite the opposite OF the modern
spirit The spirit of Vespasian was ex-
emplified In England when the agri-
cultural laborers combined to destroy
the agricultural machinery which was
taking the bread out Of their mouths
This spirit can hardly be said to survive
at all in this country, unless II be In the
organizations which maintain that their
members have a vested right In their
casual employments. The american
answer to Vespasian's fears would be
let the people turned out OF work by
machinery find something else to do
Machinery has usurped 80 many prov
.nces of what used to be manual labor
that ours may very well be called, In
contradistinction to any OF Its prede'
cessors, the mechanical age. 1t follows
that an unprecedented number OF
articles of common use can be turned
out at an unprecedented rate of speed
and sold upon unprecedentedly easy
terms. Never before were they In such
abundance, and never before were Sc
many OF them within the reach OF sc
many persons This Is Quantity
But equality" correspondingly suffers
Men and women can afford to buy
clothes twice as often as before and
change their furniture every ten years
with the consequence Of increasingly,
rapid changes of fashion to accelerate
the demand But the desire for leisurely
and enjoyed workmanship has departed
and VIC, ii the power OF producing
works Of art. Modern literature Il
O., aIA f.vl,o