Evening star., 1926-04-10
THE LIBRARY TABLE
By the BOOklOUer.

labOriOuSly to marshal the arguments
and set them forth as cogently as pos
slble in the hOre that the world VIII
read, be convinced and turn from err
ror. Another way is to satiriZe, rldl-
cule and laugh at in the hope that the
world will laugh with you and at the
evil and eschew it. The latter Is the
method employed by DIR. Morris Fish
bein, editor of the Journal of the
American Medical Association, in at
tacking what ne calls THE Medical
follies' of the past and especially or
the present. The earliest of these
'fOllies' ridiculed in the book were
the tractors OF Elisha Perkins, who
f1ourished in Connecticut at the end
of the eighteenth century. Made Of
brass and iron and costing shilling
to manufacture, the curative virtues
of these tractors-they could draw dis
eases from the body-made them
bring guineaS pair. Among the
purchasers We're George Washington
and Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth. BY
1871 tracturation was 'One of the fol
lies of the past" The other features
on the bill of DR.. Fishbeins "foilies'
include homeopathy. osteopathy, chi
ropractic. Dr. Abrams OScllloclast.
birth control regeneration, anti-vivi-
section and the physical culture OF
muscle boys The author also has
some good fun over the fads in health
legislation and the medical mistakes
of the press. There is much good fool
ing, but the purpose OF 1t is, OF course,
not to wound sensibiiities, but to cor
rect evils. With a good broad pen,
rather than u battle axe, the author
champions the cause of scientific medi.
cine.
The much-abused Victorians are
again held up TO contempt by one of
their modern successors in Floyd
Dens intellectual Nagabondage; An
Apology for the lntelligentsia." One
of the ultra moderns himself, Mr.. Dell
has little praise for those authors
whom most Of us have become accus-
toned TO call great. The literature
of the nineteenth century means TO
the twentieth century intelliSentsia
almost nothing at all. few
patronizing words are said of Brown
iug's rugged courage and Keats love
of beauty, but most of his appreciation
Is reserved for literary creators of his
own period. The feeling about nine
teenth century literature common 10
most Of the youth of today is eX-
pressed thus: 1t was an Intrusion OF
the past into our liyes-it was some
thing To be respected tolerated en-
dured-hut it was Il nuisance. We
had our own lives TO live--and all
these classical utterances of the nine
teenth century had no relation to our
lives. They were bore
y =
Every human life should be divided
into two periods, one of acquisition
and the other distribution. This
is the conclusion of Edward Box after
several years of retirement. following
an active life of money making. In
his book Dollars Only" he set forth
the not very new philosophy that
life should not be all made up of
getting money. There are other
things. he says There are the arts.
for example. There is also philan.
thropy. Municipal politics might with
profit receive Il little attention. too.
The man who has devoted himself
to business until he is So or Sc should
retire from that pursuit and give
society in general the benefit of his
ripe wisdom for the remainder of his
life, while having a very good time
himself. Mr.. Bok's theory is not strik-
insly original nor is it likely TO have
wide applicability. The great majority
of men have not sufficient private
means to stop work in the middle
fifties and enjoy the diversion OF phil
anthropy and patronage OF the arts.
However. Mr.. Bok'S program for the
hast 10 or 20 wears of life is an al
trui5tic one---Inuch more admirable
than that of the man or woman who
settles down TO q diScontented old age
without resources for pleasure or USE
fu!nesS.
When a critic says of a book. There
is more education in this book than
in college course" every one,
whether he has or has not had a col
lege course. feels that he should
acquire this large amount of educa-
ton offered in the space between the
two covers Of a book. This is what
Arthur Somers Roche says of DIR,
George A. Dorsey's book. why We
Behave Like Human Beings. 1t Is
a book which discusses many OF the
modern scientific discoveries applying
especially TO human beings. Evolu-
ton is the thread on which all the
significant facts are strung Heredity.
sex and other human instincts. Freud
ianism. regeneration, the chemical
basis of life. the emotions Of fear. love
and hate, fake psychology, the benefit
and danger of habits, morbid mental
states and spiritualism are some of
the topics which secure attention.
x x 4
Lille Langtry's THE Days | Knew
is a sketchy, anecdotal record of the
palnly days of one of the spoiled
darlings of society From a romping
childhood in the Channel Islands, i'll
a clerical home-her father was a
oh Sti trif ri n
be the reigning beauty of London. Her
stage career began only after her
fame as a beauty was world wide. She
was painted by Millais and Watts and
Burne- ones. Among the figures of
his painting, ""The Golden STAIR
Burne:Jones included her twice. She
set the fashion in hats, i'll shoes. in
hairdressing. Then, when her eX-
travagance and her Irish husba nd s
improvidence had brought them to
bankruptcy, she made her debut on
the stage in Goldsmith's she Stoops
to Conquer" From that time her sec
ond and more durable reputation was
assured.
The bearing on the problem of evo-
luton versus fundamentalism is not
hard to find in the book Almost HUI
man." by Robert NJ. Yerkes, professor
of psychology in the Institute of Psy-
chology Of Yale University Prof.
Yerkes describes colony of apes at
Havana, the property of Nine. Rosalia
Ahreu. The first chimpanzee which
ever grew up in captivity was born
at Quinta Palatino, her Cuban estate,
in 1915. Her collection has now grown
to over 80 monkeys, including a dozen
or more varieties. The gorilla, largest
of the monkey family, is not repre-
sented there. In 1924 Prof. Yerkes
visited this colony with three assist
ants. under the auspices of the Car
negie Institution. In his book he tells
many anecdotes illustrating similarity
of the mental traits of anthropoid
apes to those of man. One story is
that of a chimpanzee mother who ap-
piled first aid to her supposedly still