\ -

EDWARD LIVINGSTON YOUMANS

Interpreter of Science for tbe people

A SKETCH OF HIS LIFE

WITH SELECTIONS FROM HIS PUBLISHED WRITINGS

AND EXTRACTS FROM HIS CORRESPONDENCE

WITH SPENCER, HUXLEY, TYNDALL

AND OTHERS

BY

JOHN FISKE

NEW YORK
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY

1894

COPYRIGHT, 1894,
BY D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.

ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED
AT THE APPLETON PRESS, U. S. A.

F5

TO

HERBERT SPENCER.

My dear Spencer :

It was thirty years ago this month that our personal ac-
quaintance began, in so far as the exchange of letters could
make such a beginning. It was at the time of my first visit
to Youmans, in this very street and within a stone's throw from
where I now sit writing ; and as the last of this memorial
volume goes hence to the press, recollections of days that can
never come again crowd thickly upon me. Our friend ex-
pressed a wish that, if his biography were to be written, I
should be the one to do it ; no sign from him is needed to assure
me that he would have been glad to have me dedicate it to you.
Pray accept the book, my dear Spencer, with all its imperfec-
tions, in token of the long friendship we have shared with each
other and with him who has gone from us ; and believe me,
as always,

Faithfully yours,

JOHN FlSKE.

Irving Place, New York, February 12, 1894..

M788183

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER PAGE

I. — BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD i

. II. — YOUTH AND EDUCATION 19

III. — YEARS OF BLINDNESS 35

IV. — YEARS OF BLINDNESS (continued). — THE CLASS-BOOK OF

CHEMISTRY 56

V. — THE SCIENTIFIC LECTURER 71

VI. — HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE 92

VII. — FIRST ACQUAINTANCE WITH HERBERT SPENCER . . 102
VIII. — MARRIAGE AND FIRST VISIT TO ENGLAND . . . 116

IX.— THE APOSTLE OF EVOLUTION 141

X. — SECOND AND THIRD VISITS TO ENGLAND . . . .185

XI. — POPULAR EDUCATION, AND OTHER MATTERS . . .221
XII. — APPLETONS' JOURNAL ........ 255

XIII. — THE INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SERIES .... 266

XIV. — THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 295

XV. — VARIOUS AFFAIRS 317

XVI. — WINTER IN THE RIVIERA 345

XVI L— LAST YEARS . . . . * 366

SELECT WRITINGS.

I. — MENTAL DISCIPLINE IN EDUCATION 399

II. — ON THE SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF HUMAN NATURE . . 451

III. — WHAT WE MEAN BY SCIENCE 486

IV. — THE RELIGIOUS WORK OF SCIENCE 491

. V. — HERBERT SPENCER AND THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION . 502

vi Contents.

PAGE

r/\tjc,

VI.— THE CHARGES AGAINST THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY .552
VII.— CONCERNING THE SUPPRESSED BOOK 562

APPENDIX A. Ancestry 585

B. List of Writings 590

INDEX ..,„,, 593

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

FACING
PAGE

Portrait at the age of sixty Frontispiece

Portrait at the age of thirty 56

Facsimile of handwriting 91

MEMOIR OF
EDWARD LIVINGSTON YOUMANS.

CHAPTER I.

BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD.

1821-1831. Age I-IO.

FORTY years ago scientific education had made but
little progress in the United States. There is certainly
room enough for improvement to-day ; but to those of
us who still remember vividly the decade that went
before the civil war, the contrast between now and
then is very striking. In the first place, there are the
wonderful strides that have been made in discovery.
A retrospect of forty years takes us back to the days
before The Origin of Species was published, the days
when the triumphs of spectrum analysis were still
hidden in futurity, when teachers of physics looked
askance at the " correlation of forces," and students
of medicine went through their whole " curriculum "
in blissful ignorance of bacteria. So with applied
science. Those were the days of wooden war-ships,
while railroad and telegraph were in their callow in-
fancy, and antiseptic surgery had never been heard of.
As for getting motive power out of electricity so as to
move heavy cars or wagons, I 'heard it conclusively
proved in 1862, by our Professor of Physics at Har-
vard, that no such thing could ever be done.

2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

This swift advance in scientific discovery has be-
come a commonplace fact ; there are few cultivated
people who have not felt it and remarked upon it.
But among the American people, in the days before
the war, scientific education was far from following so
briskly in the wake of discovery as it does to-day.
Information was more slowly diffused, and new ideas
were received with more distrust. People's minds
were less flexible and less cosmopolitan. A country
clergyman in Connecticut once said to me, in 1857,
" There is a great intellectual movement going on in
Europe of which scarcely anything is known or even
suspected in this country." There was much truth in
this remark. What the worthy minister had chiefly
in mind (for he used to read German books) was the
ludicrous ignorance of biblical criticism displayed in
American theological magazines and journals ; but
what he said was true of many departments of study.
Lyell's great work on geology was published in 1830;
a quarter of a century later I do not believe there
were five men in our town who had ever heard of
" uniformitarianism " ; it was only a very bold spirit
that ventured to allude to the earth as more than six
thousand years old. Science in general was regarded
as a miscellaneous collection of facts and rules, some
useful, some curious or even pretty ; as for looking
upon it as a vast coherent body of truths concerning
the universe and its interdependent provinces, few
minds, indeed, had grappled with such a staggering
conception. The sciences were studied in fragments,
and how crude were the methods is well shown by the
fact that Harvard students were set to learn physics
and chemistry by reading in books about magnets and
alkalis.

Birth and Childhood. 3

Few things at that time were more generally needed
in America than the kind of stimulus that no one can
impart but a public teacher enthusiastic and eloquent,
broad and tolerant, trained in the methods of modern
science, and brimful of its blithe and aggressive but
self-restrained and sober spirit. Such teachers are
not too common at any time. To produce one re-
quires a rare combination of qualities. One may meet
with a hundred men learned in science, a thousand
men who can skim over its surface in entertaining talk,
sooner than one will find this rare combination. In
our days it has been realized in no one so completely
as in the man to whose memory it is the purpose of
this volume to pay a brief word of tribute. It is but
a little while since that noble face was here among us,
and the tones of that kindly voice were fraught with
good cheer for us. No one who knew Edward Liv-
ingston Youmans is likely ever to forget him. But
for those who knew the man it will not be superfluous
to recount the main incidents of his life and work.
For those who knew him not it is desirable that the
story should be set forth, for the work was like the
man, unselfish and unobtrusive, and in the hurry of
modern life such work is liable to be lost from sight,
so that people profit by it without knowing that it
was ever done. So genuinely modest, so destitute of
self-regarding impulses was my friend, that I am sure
it would be quite like him to chide me for thus setting
forth, with what he would deem too much emphasis,
his claims to public remembrance. But such mild
reproof it is right that we should disregard ; for the
memory of a life so beautiful and useful is a precious
possession of which mankind ought not to be deprived.
We shall see how Edward Youmans, in spite of scanty

4 Edward Livingston Youmans.

schooling and long years of blindness, developed into
a teacher of science. I have called his work unobtru-
sive ; we shall see how multifarious and potent it came
to be, and what rare qualities of intellect and of char-
acter it required and displayed. We shall witness his
profound conviction of the value of scientific knowl-
edge in promoting the welfare of the people. He
found that most needful knowledge monopolized by
a few specially trained persons-; his warm, popular
sympathies urged him to do what he could to make
the multitude sharers in the priceless possession. By
tongue and pen, on the platform and through the
press, he worked with devoted energy in this noble
cause, until he had done more than any other Ameri-
can of his time to diffuse a knowledge of science and
an appreciation of scientific methods among the
American people. He did more than any one else to
prepare the way in America for the great scientific
awakening which first became visible after the publi-
cation of The Origin of Species. In Youmans the
approaching better era found its John the Baptist.

Edward Livingston Youmans was born in the
town of Coeymans, Albany County, N. Y., on the 3d
of June, 1821. From his father and mother, both of
whom survived him, he inherited strong traits of
character as well as an immense fund of vital energy.
His father, Vincent Youmans, was a man of independ-
ent character, strong convictions, and perfect moral
courage, with a quick and ready tongue, in the use of
which earnestness and frankness perhaps sometimes
prevailed over prudence. The mother, Catherine Sco-
field, was notable for balance of judgment, prudence,
and tact. Her maternal grandfather was Irish ; and,

Birth and Childhood. 5

while I very much doubt the soundness of the gener-
alizations we are so prone to make about race charac-
teristics, I can not but feel that for the impulsive — one
had almost said explosive — warmth of sympathy, the
enchanting grace and vivacity of manner, in Edward
Youmans, this strain of Irish blood may have been to
some extent accountable. Both father and mother
belonged to the old Puritan stock of New England,
and, excepting a Dutch great-grandmother, the father's
ancestry was purely English.* Nothing could be more
honourably or characteristically English than the name.
In the old feudal society the yeoman, like the frank-
lin, was the small freeholder, owning a modest estate
yet holding it by no servile tenure, a man of the com-
mon people yet no churl, a member of the state who
" knew his rights, and knowing dared maintain." Few,
indeed, were the nooks and corners outside of merry
England where such men flourished as the yeomen
and franklins who founded democratic New England.
It has often been remarked how the most illustrious
of Franklins exemplified the typical virtues of his class.
There was much that was similar in the temperament
and disposition of Edward Youmans — the sagacity and
penetration, the broad common sense, the earnest pur-
pose veiled but not hidden by the blithe humour, the
devotion to ends of wide practical value, the habit of
making in the best sense the most out of life.

Into the mother's skein of heredity there had en-
tered a silken thread of romance. Her grandmother,
Catherine Moore, when a child of three or four years,
had landed at New Haven, after a stormy voyage
across the Atlantic. Family tradition has it that the

* See Appendix A.

6 Edward Livingston Youmans.

little waif had embarked in charge of a woman who
seemed to be her nurse, and who died during the voy-
age. On his arrival in port, the captain, following an
ordinary custom under such circumstances, put little
Catherine up at auction for her passage money. She
was bought by a physician of New Haven. Her
clothing, her delicate features and graceful manners,
all betokened refined parentage — but who could her
parents be ? Her purchaser, who became fondly at-
tached to her, endeavoured time and again to ascertain.
But in days of slow and infrequent ocean voyages, of
inland travel slower still, his efforts proved fruitless.
As Catherine Moore grew to womanhood her graces
of mind and person increased the interest felt in her
origin, but the mystery was never cleared up. At the
age of sixteen she was wooed and won by Philip Ken-
nedy, a native of Ireland. Their eldest daughter be-
came the mother of Catherine Moore Scofield, who
married Vincent Youmans.

At the time of this marriage Miss Scofield's family
were living at Westerlo, in Albany County. Vincent
Youmans was brought up on a farm in the neighbour-
ing town of Coeymans. The market for the Coey-
mans farmers was at Albany, some fifteen miles dis-
tant, and hence there was urgent need of " lumber
wagons," as they were called, for carrying farm prod-
ucts. One Jabez Burrill, a shrewd and energetic
wagon maker of Sheffield, in the Berkshire Hills, was
foremost in supplying this demand, and not unfre-
quently visited Coeymans to deliver wagons and get
fresh orders. He was in the habit of stopping at the
house of Jeremiah Youmans, and made a great im-
pression on the minds of that farmer's sons, John and
Vincent. Both were eager to accept his offer to take

Birth and Childhood. J

one of them as an apprentice. After due deliberation
it was decided that Vincent should go with Mr. Bur-
rill, and that after his return home he should set up a
wagon shop and communicate the mysteries of this
handicraft to his brother. Accordingly, in the au-
tumn of 1808, having nearly completed his fifteenth
year, Vincent Youmans went to Sheffield. His art
was learned with conscientious thoroughness. Upon
his return to Coeymans he opened a wagon shop
and worked early and late, from daybreak until
nightfall, and then by candlelight. He took great
pains in gathering his materials, and his work was
done with most scrupulous care. No detail was
neglected, and it used to be said that Youmans's
wagons lasted forever. But his profits were small ;
and besides the three or four wagons which he
could make by hand in the course of a year, it was
necessary to eke out the scanty income by more
or less repairing and tinkering, and by shoeing
horses.

While he was engaged in these avocations Miss
Scofield was teaching school in the neighbourhood. A
favourite sister of Vincent Youmans was about to be
married ; and while he was speaking one day of the
loneliness that would come upon the household when
she left it, one of his sisters told him he had better get
married himself, and added, that if he could only get
" the school-teacher at Uncle Levi's " it would be the
luckiest thing that could ever happen to him. This
remark made, a strange impression upon the young
man. Though he had never seen Miss Scofield, he
had " a feeling at his heart which he could not mis-
take," and which he interpreted as a sign by which
God gave him to know that she would one day be his

8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

wife. Soon afterward, at a Sunday afternoon meet-
ing, she was pointed out to him, but some months
elapsed before he sought her acquaintance. From the
first he seems to have had no misgivings as to her be-
coming his wife, but it was left to Providence to de-
termine the manner of meeting. One day, having
hurt his hand in the shop so that he could not go on
with his work, the spirit moved young Vincent to pay
a visit at Uncle Levi's. There he found a quilting
party and met Miss Scofieid, in whose good graces
he made rapid progress. In 1820 they were mar-
ried. Vincent was twenty-six years of age, and
his bride twenty-two. Their long union was brok-
en by the death of Mrs. Youmans in February,
1888; her husband survived her nearly a year. At
this great age both remained in full possession of
their mental faculties, and some of these incidents
were related by Vincent Youmans after his wife's
death.

About a month before the wedding day the wagon
shop caught fire and was burned to the ground, and
about four hundred dollars worth of finished work,
just ready for delivery, was destroyed. But this bitter
calamity did not postpone the marriage, for Miss Sco-
fieid had saved two hundred dollars from her earn-
ings, and with this sum the young husband's business
was again set going. He rebuilt his shop, and the
first housekeeping of the newly married pair was in
a little old log house that stood near by. It was
here that my friend Edward was born in the follow-
ing June. On the day of his birth his maternal
grandmother came to see the happy parents, and was
permitted to name the child. She wished to give
him the name of her revered pastor, Robert Living-

Birth and Childhood. 9

ston, of Coxsackie, but as the father objected to double
names it was agreed to call him Livingston simply.
In after years he himself assumed the forename Ed-
ward, by which most of his friends soon came to
know him, though his mother always called him Liv-
ingston till the end of his days.

As the good grandmother Scofield was taking leave
of the newcomer that day she tenderly breathed over
him the prayer that he might become as good and as
useful a man as the minister whose name he was to
bear ; which in her mind, of course, was equivalent to
praying that he might become a minister. In later
years, when hopes that had been encouraged by his
rare gifts of mind and heart were seemingly thwarted
by the unforeseen line of development which he
began to follow, his mother sometimes reproachfully
reminded him of this early consecration to the work
of saving souls. Edward always met this mood seri-
ously, assuring her that he felt his responsibility, and
should certainly employ such powers as he had in the
way his loving and beloved grandmother had pointed
out. But in order to clear his own path, and to widen
the scope of his mother's perceptions, he never failed
to insist that in order to take part in the work of sav-
ing souls it was not necessary to be a clergyman. It
was difficult for Calvinists and Puritans, like Vincent
Youmans and his wife, to understand any other classi-
fication of pursuits than that of sacred and secular,
and what they regarded as Edward's religious defec-
tion was a source of keen disappointment and worry.
But after he had reached middle life it was an un-
speakable comfort to him that they came to recognize
their error, and to see that his career was a true answer
to the grandmother's prayer. Even if they did not

io Edward Livingston Youmans.

quite admit his claim concerning the sacredness of his
chosen work, and if they were unable fully to appre-
ciate its extent and importance, they could well under-
stand the singleness of purpose with which it was pur-
sued, and the lofty moral qualities which it revealed
from day to day.

To the religious experiences of the family we shall
have occasion to return. At present we are concerned
with the circumstances of Edward's childhood. When
he was a babe of six months his parents removed from
Coeymans to the town of Greenfield, in Saratoga
County, finding a home three miles west of Saratoga
Springs, at the Four Corners, where for half a century
there had stood a Congregationalist meeting-house, a
district schoolhouse, a store, and two or three dwell-
ings. On one of the corners was a little estate of three
acres, with its comfortable house, where Vincent You-
mans set up his wagon shop and smithy, and for a short
time kept a tavern. The situation was favourable for
thirsty customers at election times and when law-
suits were in progress, but this source of income was
soon abandoned. The first temperance society es-
tablished in the United States whose members were
required to sign a pledge to abstain from intoxicating
liquors was organized by the pastor of the neighbour-
ing Congregational church, and within its walls the so-
ciety still holds its regular meetings. One Sunday
his pastor preached so moving a sermon on the evils
of intemperance, that next morning Vincent Youmans
pulled down his tavern sign, spilled the contents of
his kegs and bottles on the ground, and never dealt in
liquor again.

His. neighbours, mainly farmers, were chiefly of
Connecticut stock. On soil none too generous, many

Birth and Childhood, n

of these men were obliged to eke out a livelihood as
carpenters, masons, shoemakers, and blacksmiths. A
Yankee versatility had been developed in their race by
sheer necessity. It was not only common, for example,
to weave cloth at home, but also to build the loom for
it at home. Adaptability and ingenuity had an earning
power denied to routine work of any kind. " Handi-
ness" was universal; machinery had as yet made but
small encroachment on handicraft skill. Capital was
then the junior partner of labour, and these men were
more independent, more individualized, than men of
similar grade to-day. Special aptitudes were not sel-
dom discovered in the wide variety of work set before
every man as a farmer, builder, machinist, repairer.
Yet while intelligence was undoubtedly quickened
by this almost total absence of division of labour,
the financial results then and there were not en-
couraging. Times were very bad in rural New York
when Vincent Youmans came to settle in Green-
field. His house and lot had cost him four hundred
dollars, of which he had had to borrow two hundred
and forty dollars. His trade of wagon making did
not prove particularly profitable. Money was not to
be had for wagons, so as opportunity offered they
had to be traded for supplies, or for articles which on
occasion could be exchanged for supplies. Making
ends meet involved much planning, incessant toil,
ceaseless anxieties. At the end of ten years four sons
and a daughter had been born to the parents,* who
in the meantime had united with the Congregational
Church. The easily satisfied personal wants, the pref-

* Then, after an interval of nine years, the sixth child. William Jay
Youmans, the present editor of the Popular Science Monthly, was born in
1839. The seventh and last child, Eliot, was born in 1841.

12 Edward Livingston Youmans.

erence for simplicity of living to cumbrous luxury,
which marked Edward Youmans through life, had
their origin, no doubt, in his natural good sense, but
they were fostered by his early circumstances and
early discipline. As the firstborn, he was soon im-
pressed into helping to bring up his sister and broth-
ers ; there was to the end something paternal in his
solicitude for them and all their concerns. When ab-
sent on his European journeys his remembrances to
family and friends were as manifold as those at the
close of a Pauline epistle. His mother, in the last year
of her long life, the year following his death, used to
tell what a good boy Edward was — he would never go
to play without first asking if there was anything he
could do for her, and he would often leave play to
come in and repeat the question. When company was
entertained it was his pride to set the table and serve
the guests. The schoolhouse was close by, and at
three years of age Edward was tempted by his play-
mates to take a place beside them there. Sixty years
ago infant classes in country schools ran little risk of
undue brain excitement, and no very severe strain
was put upon Edward's dawning mind. He quickly
learned to read, write, spell, and cipher, but beyond
these acquirements there was little else gained than
the useful discipline a child gets by coming into con-
tact and collision with other children. It was less
in the formal lessons of this primitive district school
than in home influences that his real education pro-
ceeded. His mind and heart were drawn out by
the example of God-fearing parents, who lived indus-
triously, soberly, and kindly. He had all the recrea-
tion his buoyant nature demanded, and with access to
books soon showed a passion for reading. His home

Birth and Childhood. 13

life, if it had its hardships, had also much genuine
pleasure.

Narrow means gave every member of the house-
hold a score of opportunities for helpfulness where
wealth would have begrudged one. If the strain to
earn and save was never relaxed, it was largely be-
cause the parents persisted in giving to their children
educational privileges better than were enjoyed by
neighbouring families in much easier circumstances.
Small as the store of ready cash might be, there was
always enough for the purchase of books and news-
papers, as well as for some aid to religious and social
reforms.

Vincent Youmans was a man who liked to talk
and hear others talk ; his home was a centre where
neighbours were wont to gather and exchange views.
Gossip was, perhaps, the staple of conversation ; but
topics of moment and dignity were often discussed.
Labour-saving appliances, improved farm implements,
the best manner of utilizing manure, and kindred mat-
ters, were duly canvassed. In a community where
mechanical ingenuity was general, there was much
to stir the deepest interest when the first steamboats
were plying the Hudson, and when experimental loco-
motives were being built by Trevithick and Stephen-
son. At times, instead of dwelling on these inventions
and picturing the wonders they were likely to usher
into the world, questions of politics, theology, and re-
form were briskly and keenly argued. Whatever
might be the topic, Vincent Youmans used to bear his
part as pithily as anybody, and was wont to speak
with the tone and emphasis of a pulpit exhorter. To
listen to his father and the visitors was Edward's de-
light. Sometimes his interest in the subject overcame

14 Edward Livingston Youmans.

his timidity, and he would nervously contribute a re-
mark. On such occasions his mother, who was a reti-
cent woman, was apt to restrain him ; she did not like
forwardness in little boys. It is evident that Vincent
Youmans was one of those men who supplv an intel-
lectual stimulus to the whole community in which they
live. For a lad of bright and inquisitive mind listen-
ing to such talk is no mean education. It often goes
much further than the reading of books. From an
early age Edward Youmans appropriated all such
means of instruction. He had that ravening, insatiable
thirst for knowledge which is one of God's best gifts
to man ; for he who is born with this appetite must
needs be grievously ill-made in other respects if it
does not constrain him to lead a happy and useful
life.

When Edward was about nine years old an event
took place which greatly agitated the district. A new
schoolhouse had been built, and part of its cost was
assessed on a family named Wheeler, which refused to
pay. It was then the custom for the cost of maintain-
ing district schools to be levied on the families who
sent children to them. Families who sent four chil-
dren paid twice as much as those who sent two ; child-
less families paid nothing. With regard to the manner
in which the contributions necessary for building the
schoolhouse should be gathered, the law wras not
clearly understood. The Wheelers pleaded that, as
they had no children to send to school, it was as
unjust to make them pay toward building a school-
house as it would be to oblige them to help maintain
a school. Through two years litigation dragged on,
when these sturdy " village Hampdens," much out of
pocket and quite out of temper, lost their case. In

Birth and Childhood. 15

its progress the suit furnished the neighbourhood with
topics of comment and denunciation for months and
years. The resulting feuds affected every family in
the district, and friendships were broken, never to be
healed. Every debate was spiced with general and
hearty dislike of the Wheelers. Greenfield was a
thorough democracy, in which, by some side wind of
fortune, that family of aristocratic tastes and manners
had been stranded. Their demeanour toward neigh-
bours quite their equals in intelligence and refinement
was pervaded by a condescension that was more than
Greenfield human nature could bear. These Wheelers
lived much like a squire's family in Yorkshire ; they
called their " help " " servants " ; and they kept fox
hounds of English breed, whose depredations so ag-
grieved Mrs. Youmans (who lived in the next house)
that to the end of her life she detested dogs, classing
them all as " hounds," in remembrance of Greenfield
days.

In the general ill-will felt toward this family, Ed-
ward, child as he was, did not join. His sunny face
and lively ways had given him the free range of their
demesnes. He was sorry to see people who had been
kind to him contemned and humiliated. Their lawsuit
about the school, with all the discussion it aroused,
made a deep impression on his mind, and served as a
nucleus for observation and thought. As years went
on, this early implanted interest in the rights and
wrongs of State education deepened and widened.

In the Wheeler household there was a humble
inmate to whom Edward became strongly attached.
This was a negro boy about five years his senior, Joe
Gundy by name. Joe did chores for the family ; but
his duties were so light that he had a good deal of

1 6 Edward Livingston Youmans.

leisure on his hands. He was the local organizer of
boys into bands bent on fun and mischief, so that his
popularity among his playmates was equaled only by
his unpopularity with their mothers. He formed a
company of boy soldiers, Edward among the number,
and much pomp and flourish attended their stated
drill. Joe was an imaginative and superstitious Afri-
can, whose chosen reading book at school was the New
Testament; and his juvenile hearers would listen with
bated breath when he read favourite chapters from
the book of uRevelation. Joe was so daring, amusing,
and resourceful that his influence over Edward almost
amounted to fascination. Although mischievous, Joe
was in the main a good boy. Nobody followed his
leadership or gave him readier obedience in all schemes
and excursions than Edward, and no harm came of it.
Thus as a child did he manifest his trait of generous
admiration for superior gifts, for natural ability of any
kind — a trait which in mature years much extended
his usefulness by making him the loyal second and
supporter of men whom he justly deemed worthy of
leadership. No one can be a friend, a trusted lieuten-
ant and apostle, unless he is first a man — honest, hon-
ourable, capable of disinterested attachment. Such a
man in the making was the little fellow who saw and
acknowledged more talent and goodness in a negro
servant than in any boy of white race he then knew.
His memory in after years often reverted to Joe, and
with sorrow, for there came a report that in early
manhood that humble friend had been sold into slav-
ery.

Another trait of character — individuality and the
love of individuality — found a favouring nursery in
Greenfield. Just because it was a sparsely settled

Birth and Childhood. 17

community did every man in it have a clear percep-
tion of his rights and responsibilities as a man and
a citizen. No man's vote or influence was indistin-
guishably merged with those of thousands of other
men. A unit was not so petty a fraction of the so-
cial or political total as to be in danger of regarding
himself as practically a cipher. There was no local
magnate who, by wealth, office, or superior education,
could keep any of his neighbours in eclipse, or subdue
any of them to be echoes of his mind and will. As
appointers of school trustees, of town and county offi-
cers, as voters in the State, every man had a " say,"
which he said, and which he acted upon with clearly
perceived effect. Greenfield was a fair sample of
thousands of such communities then extant — substan-
tially American in population, homogeneous, demo-
cratic ; communities fast disappearing (alas !) before im-
migration of low type, before the disparities of fortune
created by steam, electricity, and modern methods of
trade and manufacture, — most of all, doubtless, by the
iniquitous tariff laws of the last thirty years. Whole-
some as much of the life in Greenfield was, it had its
inevitable little battles between progress and tradition.
Of this, let one example suffice. At a certain State
election party feeling ran high, and for the first time on
record the Congregationalist minister dared to vote.
His political opponents, especially those in his own
church, were furious, and years passed before the act
was forgiven. Edward much admired this plucky
clergyman — Rev. Mr. Redfield — first, because he liked
and drove a fast horse ; secondly, because he had the
courage of his convictions.

Small as Greenfield was, it nevertheless contained
a freethinker or two, who stayed away from church

1 8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

and read Voltaire and Paine. Between these men and
divers champions of orthodoxy was waged constant
war, to Edward's great instruction. He was early
made familiar with the stock criticisms directed
against organized Christianity, yet his essentially re-
ligious nature forbade his ever joining in an attack
on institutions which, however faulty, he held to con-
tain a core supremely true.

CHAPTER II.

YOUTH AND EDUCATION.
1831-1837. Age 10-16.

AFTER living in Greenfield ten years, Vincent You-
mans determined to leave it and buy a farm, where he
could add to the very limited gains of wagon making.
At Milton, two miles away, he was offered at a low
price a farm of eighty acres. He bought it and re-
moved there in the fall of 1831. The place had been
owned by a widow, and worked at much disadvan-
tage ; the soil, originally thin, had been pretty well ex-
hausted ; the fences were dilapidated, and of timber
little was left. The house was much smaller than
the one in Greenfield. It had been erected the
previous winter by a " bee," to replace a house de-
stroyed by fire, and its hasty workmanship and make-
shift materials afforded much incidental ventilation
through walls and roof. However, the removal to
Milton was advantageous in many ways. Farming
gave the father employment when wagons were not
in demand ; the boys, as they grew up, were helpful ;
a dairy and poultry yard, managed by the mother,
yielded a small but certain cash income, which was
carefully hoarded to pay the debts. Food and shel-
ter, so costly in cities, were supplied by the farm, and
gave no concern ; but there were the doctor's bills,
school bills, church subscriptions, and so forth, to be

(19)

2O Edward Livingston Youmans.

met, so that the question of ways and means was ever
urgent. The children were early taken into the fam-
ily counsels, as each one for himself, through individ-
ual needs, had a living interest in the issue of these
deliberations. The educational effect of this, though
unthought of at the time, was manifold. Keeping
their minds active about practical matters and their
wits at work to achieve desired ends, supplied to these
children a needed supplement to the abstract and un-
applied teaching of the school. They were vitally in-
terested in promoting domestic and farm operations,
and in intervals when work at home was not pressing
the boys gladly " hired out " to the neighbouring farm-
ers. The situation had also its moral reactions. The
painful consciousness of defective dress or other ap-
pointments led to reflection, and to the feeling of the
relative unimportance of such things. Nor did this
discipline diminish self-respect, for it led to an early
classification of the interests of life in which good
character and intelligence were most honoured. And
so, by common consent, although the family income
was larger at Milton than at Greenfield, if any increase
in expenditure was afforded, it was for the purchase
of more books, in subscriptions to church and reform
funds, rather than in any outlay for matters of mere
fashion or appearance. There was no relaxation of
toil or economy. Constant improvements demanded
outlay, interest had to be met, the mortgage gradu-
ally paid off. Careful tillage and good management
brought their reward. When Vincent Youmans had
wrorked his farm eight years he was able to sell it
for three thousand dollars ; it had cost him originally
but a third of that sum.

Until his sixteenth year Edward helped his father

Youth and Education. 21

at work in summer, attending the district school in
winter, where he learned quite as much from inter-
course with his fellow-scholars as from either teacher
or book. Fifty years ago such schools enjoyed more
of the interest and attention of parents than now.
Each voter's school tax was larger, proportionately
to his means. Keen interest was taken in the autumn
election of school trustees, whose selection of teachers
was justly regarded as a matter of weight, worthy
of careful discussion. Sometimes the majority of
trustees — and voters, for that matter — would be con-
tent to take a mediocre teacher at a small salary.
Under such circumstances it was not uncommon for
a few dissatisfied heads of families to secure better
talent by supplementing the voted salary from their
own pockets.

These engagements of teachers were usually short;
men taught in winter, women in summer. A teacher
who found favour in the sight of trustees and pupils
was sometimes engaged for a second season. If the
pupils failed to get excellence of tuition, they did not
lack variety of it, and were not permitted to subside
into any sluggish habit of respect for those set in tem-
porary authority over them. Rarely did one teacher
succeed another without fully and freely criticising
the predecessor's methods; and such criticisms, heard
on the benches, were sure to be carried home and to
keep alive the parental interest in school matters. No
uniformity of text-books was required ; all sorts of
grammars, geographies, and arithmetics, new and old,
met together on friendly terms. Not seldom one book
economically served two pupils. At the advent of a
new teacher proficiency was measured and position in
the classes defined. A free-and-easy mutual criticism

22 Edward Livingston Youmans.

abated any pretense ol knowledge where knowledge
did not exist. If a boy dishonestly claimed to be
"away up" in any subject, he was sure to be search-
ingly examined by his comrades, and merciless ridi-
cule greeted the pretender's silence or his blunder-
ing answer. Public opinion among the scholars was
strong, and a stringent standard of honour was en-
forced. Fewness of rules and scantiness of machinery
favoured the individuality that could render a reason.
It was a school of democracy quite as much as a
place for learning arithmetic and grammar. The
most wholesome feature in the district school of
those days was this absence of over-regulation. It
was a feature that Edward learned early to appre-
ciate, and he always cherished a distrust of excessive
organization, and a dislike to machine methods with-
out elasticity of adaptation to pupils with special gifts
or tastes.

It was then common for boys to visit schools in
districts adjoining their own, and the practice tended
to the advancement of learning in two ways: abroad,
the boys were ready enough to tell wherein their own
schools might excel, and if they could bring home any
new light wherewith to criticise their teacher, they
did so cheerfully. On visits of this kind Edward went
to a school at Greenfield Centre attended by his cous-
ins. There he saw a teacher who had a decided " call "
to his office, and who retained his charge for many
years. Jeremiah Goodrich, or Uncle Good, as he was
always called, had originally studied law, but, disliking
the contests of the courts, had, early in his practice,
abandoned the bar for the schoolroom. He had all
the elaborate courtesy of a gentleman of the last cen-
tury. Because he loved children they loved him, and

Youth and Education. 23

so the exercise of his uncommon gifts as a teacher was
easy. Uncle Good held that the mind needed rather
to be provoked than informed. He cared little for
rote learning; his aim was to develop the thinking
faculty in his pupils by well-considered questions and
suggestions. Grammar was his strong point and a
parsing lesson his delight. He would start a question
of syntax, stimulate the expression of independent
opinion, and then show that the right answer proved
good grammar to be nothing else than good sense. Of
order, as commonly observed, there was little in Uncle
Good's school ; the pupils sat where they liked, moved
about freely, talked aloud if they chose, but seldom
lost sight of the work for which they had come to-
gether. The utmost familiarity subsisted between
pupils and teacher, but respect for him was never for-
gotten. He had his well-understood rules of conduct,
any breach of which drew down not the ferule but
something more dreadful still, his displeasure. He
gave pet names to the pupils, many of which, from
their aptness, stuck to them through life. From a
cross-beam above his chair — he had no desk — after a
lesson he would shake raisins and candy to the floor,
to be scrambled for by the children in the abandon-
ment of delight.

For all their unconventionally, Uncle Good's meth-
ods proved sound, his pupils learned quickly and thor-
oughly, and illustrated the value of his great principle
—the right guidance of spontaneity. His fame not
only brought him all the children in the district, but
many candidates for the teaching office sought his
instruction. Edward plainly saw that it was Uncle
Goad's rare personal qualities that enabled him to
dispense with the rigid rules needed by ordinary

24 Edward Livingston Youmans.

teachers. In after years he used to say that it was
Uncle Good who first taught him what his mind was
for.

Through intercourse and training of this sort he
learned to doubt, to test the soundness of opinions, to
make original inquiries, and to find and follow clews.
After the schooldays were over Edward used often to
visit this admirable preceptor, and their friendship
ripened into warmth. When he gave Edward the
range of his little library he freely expressed his own
preferences, but drew out those of the lad, and courte-
ously suggested that they were probably the lines on
which he could read and study with most profit. This
deference to even a boy's individuality made a deep
impression on Edwrard's mind ; it confirmed his own
high valuation of a quality which he was to express
in later years in suggestive words. When Darwin
showed that organic evolution proceeds upon the
spontaneous variation of individual plants and animals,
Youmans declared individuality among men to be in
the realm of mind the same precious manifestation,
to respect and foster which was to give the race its
best opportunity of advancement.

Would that every community of school-children
might find its " Uncle Good ! " But even the best of
teachers can effect but little unless he finds a mind
ready of itself to take the initiative. It is doubtful if
men of eminent ability are ever made so by schooling.
The school offers opportunities, but in such men the
tendency to the initiative is so strong that if oppor-
tunities are not offered they will somehow contrive to
create them. When Edward was about thirteen years
old he persuaded his father to buy him a copy of Corn-
stock's Natural Philosophy, and studied it at home in

Youth and Education. 25

his leisure hours. He repeated many of the experi-
ments with crude appliances of his own making, for
Vincent Youmans always encouraged the use of tools
by his sons. Edward's most striking experiment was
with a centrifugal water wheel. He first made one
with arms not more than three inches long, and poured
the water into the vertical shaft from a teakettle.
When the wheel began to revolve in a direction oppo-
site to that of the stream he was exultant, and at once
entered upon the building of a larger and better model,
moved by raising a small dam in a spring-fed stream
near the house. This machine was a source of interest
to all the boys and not a few of the men in the neigh-
bourhood, and Edward was happy in explaining to
them the principle of its motion. It was his earliest at-
tempt at giving scientific lectures. It was natural that
one who had become interested in physics should wish
to study chemistry. The teacher (who was not Uncle
Good) had never so much as laid eyes on a text-book
of chemistry ; but Edward was not to be daunted by
such trifles. A copy of Comstock's manual was pro-
cured, another pupil was found willing to join in the
study, and this class of two proceeded to learn what
they could from reading the book, while the teacher
asked them the printed questions — those questions the
mere existence of which in text-books is apt to show
what a low view publishers take of the average intelli-
gence of teachers ! It was not a very hopeful way of
studying such a subject as chemistry ; but the time
was not wasted, and the foundations for a future knowl-
edge of chemistry were laid. The experience of farm
work which accompanied these studies awakened an
especial interest in agricultural chemistry, and explains
the charm which that subject had for Youmans in later

26 Edward Livingston Youmans.

years. He came to realize how crude and primitive
are our methods of making the earth yield its produce,
and it was his opinion — I believe most profound and
farsighted — that, when men have once learned how-
to conduct agriculture upon sound scientific prin-
ciples, farming will become one of the most whole-
some and attractive forms of human industry.

It was chiefly during the summer intervals, when
he did not attend school, that Edward helped his
father on the farm. His younger brother Warren, an
untiring worker, used sometimes to find him in a shady
corner with a book in his hand instead of a hoe, and
was known to utter candid criticisms upon such kind
of farming. The offending book was apt to relate to
subjects widely remote from agriculture. Edward
read quite as much for pleasure as for profit. One of
the Wheeler boys lent him, when nine years old, a
copy of the Iliad containing an English translation, and
this interested him so deeply that after a while his
father bought it for him, along with the Odyssey, the
^Eneid, and Ovid's Metamorphoses. The minister, the
doctor, and the whole neighbourhood were brought
under contribution to satisfy this thirst for knowledge.
Edward was from his earliest childhood a borrower of
books. In later years, after I had come to know him,
I thought I had never seen a man so generous with
books ; it was his delight not so much to lend as to
give them outright wherever he saw that they could
do good. His mother used to allude to his supreme
disgust, at the age of ten, when an old woman in the
neighbourhood refused him the loan of Pilgrim's Prog-
ress on the ground that he could not understand it.
To his persistent researches things often turned up in
queer places. His sister, Miss Eliza Youmans, says the

Youth and Education. 27

first book she ever read through was the old-fashioned
popular romance of Alonso and Melissa, which Ed-
ward had borrowed of " a coloured farm labourer at
Deacon Thomas's." He found Don Quixote in posses-
sion of a half-witted man who had never thought of
reading it, but was very willing to lend and ultimately
to barter it for a trifle. It was in four small, closely
printed volumes bound in sheepskin, and in the years
of blindness that were to come, at times when all other
means of diversion failed to relieve the gloom that
settled so deep and thick over poor Edward, his sister
found that she had only to open one of these volumes
and read from it to call forth a smile or a laugh. In
the never-failing interest in Sancho and his master his
own miseries were forgotten.

When a small circulating library was organized at
Milton he became a subscriber, paying the subscrip-
tion from a potato patch his father allotted him in the
corner of a field. The only scientific book on the
shelves of this library was Buffon's " Natural History,"
and this he read again and again.

This constant reading not only informed Edward's
mind, but developed his natural powers of expression.
In the family circle he would often repeat the substance
of a chapter or book he had been reading, and could
not fail to find how much the effective worth of a
thought is multiplied when it is told clearly and forci-
bly, and with adaptation to the hearers.

As a youth Edward was very strong and athletic, a
capital sportsman. His sight was the keenest and his
aim the surest. He would often, in a shooting party,
bring down a bird before any one else had so much
as descried it. His enjoyments afield were, however,
to be cut short just as he was entering upon manhood.

28 Edward Livingston Youmans.

In the fall of 1835 and the succeeding winter he was
attacked by inflammation of the eyes. This was the
prelude to those long painful years of blindness that
were to defeat all his plans of study and largely deter-
mine his career. His persistence in reading and writ-
ing when his eyes needed rest did much to aggravate
their malady. He had always a newspaper, pamphlet,
or book in his pocket to read at every spare moment.
At the noon dinner hour he would hurry through his
meal so as to have the more time to write in his cham-
ber. Imprudence and neglect prevented his recovery.
About this time, in his sixteenth year, his father's
house was extended and substantially rebuilt. Edward
mixed mortar, and fetched and carried generally. The
master mason, Ephraim Child, liked the bright, willing
lad, and in the evenings taught him to play the fife.
Years afterward, when blind, he became proficient on
the violin also, and his musical capacity brought him
both recreation and solace.

In those days, as always, Edward pursued his ends
with puritanical energy. He was as uneasy as his
father at " neglect of work" and "loss of time." In
later years, while he sympathized with modern opin-
ions concerning the value of amusements, and could
give good advice to other people on the importance
of "intermittent activity" and of sometimes taking a
rest, nevertheless his inborn disposition was apt to
overpower his judgment in such matters, and the re-
sult for him was too much like " all work and no play."
Not dullness, but blindness, was the catastrophe partly
brought on, or at all events seriously aggravated, by
the unremittent application of his youthful days.
From his fourteenth year until his eighteenth his
life was a conflict between bad eyesight on the one

Youth and Education. 29

hand and the passion for reading on the other. When
warned by friends, he did not seem to realize his dan-
ger, and would either reply carelessly, or perhaps ex-
claim, with the rash warmth of youthful blood, that he
would rather be a blind man than an ignoramus. Nor
did the parents understand the seriousness of the situ-
ation. In the minds of people in Saratoga County, or
any other rural neighbourhood sixty years ago, there
was little or no idea of inflexible laws of nature ruling
our lives and bringing upon us the consequences of
our actions. A summary reference to the dispensa-
tions of Providence was apt to dispose of such matters.
We are thus brought once more to the religious
experiences of the family, to which I have briefly al-
luded. The father and mother were very unlike in
their way of looking at things. Vincent Youmans
seems to have been a born doubter and rationalist,
with clear ideas and a ready flow of language. His
wife was a marvel of common sense, along with a deep
religious tendency. Outside of her daily duties and
the practical questions involved in the maintenance
of the family her religion explained all the problems
of life ; and she exerted a powerful influence over her
husband, who otherwise might perhaps never have
become a member of the church. There was much
that was interesting in the reaction of those two strong
natures upon each other. They were in the habit of
discussing all sorts of questions in the presence of the
children ; and in regard to political and social matters
much freedom of speech was indulged, for in that little
rural world the leaven of great moral reforms was
working. Between husband and wife there was com-
plete harmony on the " temperance question," and
they belonged to the dominant and most respectable

3O Edward Livingston Youmans.

party in the community — a circumstance which count-
ed for much with Mrs. Youmans, but for little or noth-
ing with her husband, who cared not if he stood alone,
so long as he satisfied himself that he was right. For a
long time questions of religious belief were not dis-
cussed in the family ; for in that one field the father
had abdicated his reason, while the mother had no
temptation to exercise her reason. But as the chil-
dren grew up the case was altered. All seemed to
have inherited the father's mental tendency, and thus
there was awakened in the mother a painful solicitude
for their religious welfare, which kept the subject
alive and ready at any moment to be brought forward.
A political situation, here as in many an American
family at that time, came in to complicate matters. In
the eastern counties of New York the antislavery agi-
tation was just beginning. Vincent Youmans was the
first man in his town to declare himself an abolitionist,
and he gave hearty support to any friend of that cause
who came in his way. Antislavery speeches, pam-
phlets, and books — of many of which the acrid and
violent tone was an index of the intensity of ill-nature
that opposition to great reforms is sure to evoke —
soon formed the staple of his reading and added fresh
pungency to his talk. This marked and isolated atti-
tude of the father at once put the family on the de-
fensive everywhere. They were obliged to sustain
themselves against ridicule and abuse by their own in-
ward sense of what was right. For a while Mrs. You-
mans had little to say on the subject of the antislavery
crusade, but presently it assumed a shape that aroused
her antagonism. The Church was assailed by the abo-
litionists— and not without much reason — as afraid to
oppose slavery and indifferent to the fate of the negro.

Youth and Education. 31

Vincent Youmans could see that the clergy as a body
were culpable in this respect, but his wife could not
see it. To admit any faults or shortcomings in the
Church seemed to her to be undermining the founda-
tions of religion. As the children grew up the urgency
of friends and relatives concerning the condition of
their souls was constant. Edward especially was " la-
boured with," but apparently to little purpose. At one
time, when eleven or twelve years old, he was suffi-
ciently excited with the goings on at a Baptist pro-
tracted meeting to go forward to the "anxious seat."
But there was evidently nothing in this act beyond
momentary excitement, for a few days afterward, as
Edward caught a glimpse of the Baptist minister in
the unwonted act of coming in at the Youmans farm-
stead, he guessed his errand and carefully kept out of
sight. It is clear that from early youth Edward's mind
was inhospitably disposed, not indeed to religion or to
Christianity, but to the form of it that was offered him
for acceptance. He was wont to bring forward Qua-
ker arguments with regard to Sunday observances
and Calvinistic symbolism generally. Upon doctrinal
questions he was familiar with the positions of many
different sects, and had a way of setting off one against
another that was sometimes comical. Even at that
early time he had learned something about the attitude
of scientific thought with reference to the origin of the
earth, and used to urge geological objections to the
so-called Mosaic account of the creation. He also ex-
pressed skepticism about miracles, as infractions of
the order of nature requiring much more evidence to
make them credible than has ever been produced.
Such ideas seemed to the mother unspeakably dread-
ful, and, womanlike, she was disposed to attribute

32 Edward Livingston Youmans.

them partly to some subtle influence emanating from
the eccentric Uncle Good, partly to the antislavery
agitation, which seemed to be fast destroying all rever-
ence for the Church. Scarcely a Sunday passed but
the sermon just heard or the book last read gave rise
to animated discussion, which on her part often ended
in tears. Since among the evidences of Christianity
miracles were most relied on and most discussed, it
was almost inevitable that as time went on the trouble
deepened and the skepticism of the doubters was
strengthened. On the part of the young people there
was a painful urgency to make a clear defense of their
position to their own minds at least, even if they could
not convince their parents. This was no doubt a pow-
erful motive toward inquiry into the origin of things
and the causes of the natural processes going on around
us. For example, the mother's arguments confounded
the events of the gospel miracles with the mysterious
natural processes of birth and death, of growth and
decay, and the children were challenged to explain
any of these mysteries. Science studied under such
circumstances would not remain in their eager minds
in the fragmentary state in which it is apt to be pre-
sented in text-books. Its elements tended toward co-
ordination and organization into a coherent unity that
might help one's conceptions of how the world is made
and governed.

In such discussions the rationalistic freethinking
side was always represented by Edward, and he had
to bear the full responsibility of it. He was often
told that he was fast tending to " infidelity," and lead-
ing the other children along with him ; and " infidel-
ity " was of course the worst imaginable form of wick-
edness. The age has fortunately gone by (whatever

Youth and Education. 33

English clergymen may feel it necessary to declare
when hard pushed by Professor Huxley) when belief
in the historical character of the " Gadarene pig-
bedevilment," or any other miracle in the four gos-
pels, was regarded by intelligent people as an important
part of one's Christian faith. It is fast becoming diffi-
cult to comprehend the state of mind which attached
the highest value to the most barren parts of the
Scriptures, and visited with condemnation all attempts
to use one's reason and common sense about that lit-
erature as about any other subject. One thing, how-
ever, is clear — the struggle involved in gaining one's
intellectual freedom in those days afforded a most
valuable discipline for the mind and character.

Edward's freethinking did not make him unpopu-
lar. Unlike his father, whose plain speaking often
gave offense, Edward could maintain any opinion
without irritating his antagonists. Without being dis-
putatious, he was fond of argument, but there was
such disinterested search for truth in what he said,
such readiness to admit facts that told against him,
such utter absence of selfish desire to make a point,
such genuine respect for the individuality of other
persons, that he was the most genial controversialist
I ever knew. His powers of persuasion were of the
rarest order. Not long ago a younger brother, now
a man of sixty, remarked : " Edward always had his
way with me. I could not withstand him. If I knew
beforehand what he would be at, and were never so
certain that I could not agree with him, it was sure to
turn out in the end that I gave in with perfect concur-
rence of sentiment." With such qualities Edward
was always the leader among his comrades, and was a
favourite with all.

34 Edward Livingston Youmans.

This chapter may fitly end with a pleasant remi-
niscence in his sister's words :

Edward's habit of helping his mother resulted in great
handiness in domestic matters. When leaving home for a
day, his parents left the care of affairs with him. He pre-
pared the meals, and took responsible charge of things. A
sufficient comment upon his management is the fact that
his parents were satisfied with it, and the children always
greatly enjoyed such occasions. He was an amusing and
entertaining companion — full of interesting explanations,
kindly warnings, merry stories, and lively songs. I think
he kept us in tolerable order, but we certainly led a hap-
pier life than when our parents were with us. I do not re-
call any instance of rebellion against his authority. He
did not coddle us, nor was he assuming or authoritative.
He was simply faithful to the needs of the hour, and from
morning till night kept up our interest in whatever occu-
pied his mind at the time.

CHAPTER III.

YEARS OF BLINDNESS.
1838-1844. Age, 17-23.

IN 1838 Edward's long-cherished ambition to be-
come an educated man was in a fair way to be real-
ized. His talents, his parents felt sure, were such as
to fit him for a professional career, and law was
thought of as the profession which he might in due
season adopt. The way to the bar seemed clear
enough. Other young men in the vicinity no better
off than he were taking college courses of study, and
helping to meet the expense by school-teaching in
winter. But one obstacle to his ambition existed,
which unfortunately was not recognized in its full
seriousness. His eyes were still weak, and their con-
dition should have forbidden the protracted studies
which he undertook. He entered the academy at
Gal way, Saratoga County, New York, in May, 1838.
The term until the summer vacation was to be four-
teen weeks, and twice during that time he had to go
home with inflamed eyes for rest.

His appearance at this time is described in the fol-
lowing letter from one of his fellow-students :

ANN ARBOR, December sj, 1887.

Miss ELIZA A. YOUMANS: In complying with your kind
request to give my recollections of your late brother, I can

(35)

36 Edward Livingston Youmans.

only wish that they possessed some real value in propor-
tion to the usefulness that the faithful record of such a life
must have for all who find themselves compelled to strug-
gle with obstacles seemingly insurmountable ; but such as
they are I most willingly place at your disposal in the fol-
lowing sketch :

In the year 1838 a new academy was opened under the
presidency of Professor Morgan, at the small village of
Galway, Saratoga County, New York, and it was there,
during the summer months of that year, your brother and
myself became schoolmates together. As I remember it,
there was nothing in the peculiar advantages of the school
or in the character of its teaching specially fitted to call
forth or develop any talent not already struggling for spon-
taneous manifestation ; but to some minds only opportunity
is needed ; all other help is but adventitious, and not essen-
tial. Of such was your brother. Although fifty years have
come and gone since that time, I recall with great distinct-
ness the impressions then made upon me by our brief asso-
ciation as fellow-students, for from the very first there was
some genial attraction that drew us together and speedily
ripened our intimacy into a warm-hearted friendship.
Though we were born in the same year, there was in his
appearance a maturity of demeanour and expression which
made him seem my senior. He was less boyish and more
grave than myself and others of about the same age.
Yet was there nothing austere or repellent in his manner;
on the contrary, he was ever cordial and affable, and en-
tered with zest into our academic sports and jests. His
perceptions of the ridiculous were keen and appreciative.
When the matron's cockney English son-in-law requested
us one day to u hallow those birds to henter the gate," this
appellation of birds to some very common barnyard fowls
seemed to him such a sudden promotion that its funny
aspect fairly overcame his gravity, and ever after the sight
of those birds brought a twinkle into his -eyes. In sportive-

Years of Blindness. 37

ness he and I once thought to make a fellow-student the
innocent subject of a practical joke suggested by our find-
ing an old Independence ball invitation. This invitation,
with its date properly corrected, was by due course of mail
transmitted to one of the lady teachers, purporting to have
been sent by our intended victim, and, as we thought, was
sure to be returned at once with a dignified if not indig-
nant refusal. Alas ! the lady's logic had not arrived at the
same conclusion, as we learned to our consternation trie
next day, when the student showed us a polite acceptance
of the invitation and vainly wondered what it all meant.
Of course we lost our intended joke ; but the contretemps
put the whole thing, as well as ourselves, into such a ridic-
ulous attitude that we had many a good laugh over the
affair, though not at the other student's expense. The
teacher's tears of chagrin were a cause of deep regret to
us both ; but our share in the transaction prevented any
overt expression of sympathy.

At that time your brother was slight rather than frail of
figure, with a somewhat pallid, colourless complexion, and a
perceptible stoop in the shoulders. A weakness of the
eyes caused a partial closing of the lids in order to shield
them from the light, and his manly, symmetrical features
from this cause lost in part their naturally frank and at-
tractive expression. I believe his habits and speech were
exceptionally free from youthful improprieties and vulgari-
ty, and his intercourse with all showed the governing in-
fluence of a pure and generous nature. If I were asked
what peculiarity was most noticeable in him, I should say
it was his ready and apt use of words, both in composi-
tion and speech, which were not quite the ordinary and
commonplace forms of expression among students and
young men of his age. This did not take the appearance
of pedantry or of any conscious effort at display, but
rather of an intuitive love for nicety of expression and a
resulting habit of selecting and treasuring up in memory

38 Edward Livingston Youmans.

all such strong words as appealed to this peculiar taste.
And does not this, I may ask, seem almost prophetic of
that high place he subsequently attained as a writer, in
spite of the small aid derived from the schoolroom and of
obstacles that would have dismayed a soul less strong ?
Scarcely less noticeable also was the ample storehouse of
facts and observations he had accumulated upon almost
every conceivable subject, indicating a voracious hunger
for information and a natural ability to gratify it even out-
side the traditional means furnished by our systems of
education.

Having different studies and classes, I am not able to
speak of his standing or proficiency, except to state that he
seemed a diligent scholar and deeply interested in the dis-
charge of every duty. Between recitations it was our wont
to seek the shelter and shade of an open shed near by, and
in the comfortable seat of a cutter* standing there in sum-
mer quarters we passed many an hour with our books and
in the abandon of school-fellow talk. He spoke often of
his desire to fit himself for active life with the best educa-
tional training in his power, but expressed the fear that his
eyes would not permit him to accomplish all he wished. As
I was about to enter college, he frequently referred to the
advantages of such an opportunity, though I do not remem-
ber that he ever expressed any intention to enter upon the
acquisition of what is generally termed a " liberal educa-
tion." Its chief attraction to him seemed to be in the vast
storehouse of science, literature, and general knowledge to
which a college life was supposed to give access, and in
which his insatiate thirst for information could be fully
gratified. With the close of the first term our personal in-
tercourse was interrupted, never again to be renewed ; but

* For my British readers this word needs defining. A cutter is " a
small, light sleigh, with a single seat for one or two persons, usually drawn
by one horse." — Century Dictionary, s. v.

Years of Blindness. 39

considering the brief duration of our intimacy, the impres-
sions it made upon me have remained singularly indelible.
Following the usual practice of schoolmates who cherish
some mutual regard, we subsequently kept up a brief cor-
respondence. I regret to say that among the relics of that
far-off epistolary period I can only find two of your broth-
er's letters.

That of September, 1839, gives a sad picture of his pro-
found despondency, arising from ill health, disappointed
hopes, and blindness. To one of his intensely active mind,
longing for the contest upon the great arena of real life,
what a marvel had it been otherwise ! Yet did he not utterly
despair, but all the days of his appointed time would he
.wait.

In the letter of June 21, 1840, he draws a vivid con-
trast between his fortune and that which had fallen to my
own lot, and in it we discover the glorious vision a col-
legiate career spread out before him while he was left
" standing upon the strand of earthly enjoyment, in sight
of an eternity of tripled, yea, quadrupled misery." Mani-
festly, depression of spirits and mental suffering could no
further go, and it is a most pleasant reflection for me now,
as it was a profound satisfaction at the time, that amid ail
this gloom any words of mine could enable him to say that
the time spent in their perusal had been among the happi-
est moments of his life.

I must here close this imperfect sketch of my recollec-
tions of your brother. If anything here recorded can aid
you in a faithful presentation of his strangely diversified
life, making it an example and encouragement to any whom
misfortune or disappointment may be likely to overcome, I
shall feel amply rewarded ; and it is with grateful satisfac-
tion I can now turn from the sad impression his letters
would otherwise leave, to the many subsequent years of
his active and eventful life in a field so congenial and so
near to the ideal of his young ambition.

4O Edward Livingston Youmans.

Very sincerely, and with earnest wishes for the success
of the Memoir, I am yours,

JOHN M. WHEELFR.

Edward contrived to get through the fall term of
1838 without any break, and in November he began
teaching in a district school in North Greenfield. The
schoolhouse could not be properly warmed in the fierce
winter weather. The redhot stove in the middle of
the room and the cold currents everywhere made the
daytime a time of exposure, which the vicissitudes of
food and shelter attendant upon " boarding around "
among the farmers of the district did not tend to
counteract. After six weeks Edward was obliged to
relinquish his school and go to Ballston Spa for treat-
ment by a physician who had some reputation as an
oculist. Sharp caustics were applied to the eyelids,
and calomel was administered in large doses ; and as
the patient was not warned against exposure while
using this drug, he took a severe cold which settled in
his eyes, ulcerating one eyeball severely. Sight never
returned to this eye except to reveal a vague differ-
ence between darkness and light, and the other eye
became almost useless. After suffering cruelly at the
hands of the Ballston oculist, hope of relief through
him was abandoned, and in the spring of 1839 Edward
was brought home. His case was serious, and for the
first time he felt its full seriousness. He had not yet
been aware that the peril of blindness hung over him,
and the shock now depressed him profoundly. It
meant that it might be his hard fate to be shut out
from the chief joys of life, never to be able to study,
or even to earn a scanty livelihood without painful
dependence upon others. The blindness continued

Years of Blindness. 41

for months, but there was no cessation of mental work.
Much was done to relieve his tedium by reading to
him, and the reading took a wide range in newspa-
pers and books — news, fiction, verse. In agricultural
journals he took special interest, and he already began
to apply his smattering of chemistry to the topics dis-
cussed in them. Having spent his youth among
farmers who could think clearly and independently
on moral, political, and religious questions, he was
not inclined to ascribe to any real lack of mental ca-
pacity the fact that they were unintelligent and un-
businesslike in their methods of agriculture. This
shortcoming he rightly attributed to their lack of ele-
mentary training in science, and in his youthful ardour,
with his large sense of the importance of agriculture,
his perception of what chemistry might do for it, and
his genuine faith in the power of education, he was
already beginning to think it possible that, in spite of
the failure of his regular studies, he might succeed in
making himself useful in this direction.

Newspapers then were apt to contain articles such
as are now more likely to appear in magazines — long,
closely reasoned, and comparatively well written. In
the Youmans family such articles, supplemented by
new pamphlets and books lent from hand to hand, fur-
nished themes for earnest discussion. One of the
most intelligent friends of the family was Mr. Ransom
Cook, of Saratoga, well known as a manufacturer and
inventor, and pleasantly remembered by many beside
myself for his gracious cordiality of manner and the
suggestiveness of his racy conversation. His library,
which he placed quite at Edward's disposal, contained
the standard treatises on science and the mechanical
arts. As a freethinker, Mr. Cook had collected many

3

42 Edward Livingston Youmam.

books of a sort that Edward, when he had borrowed
them, did not think it quite prudent to leave " lying
about the house." From him was obtained the " Ves-
tiges of Creation," which was read to Edward in the
early days of his blindness, and was much talked of in
the family. His sister, being always at hand, spent
much of her time reading* for him. She thus soon
became his constant companion and helper, and the
relation then established lasted until the end of his life.
It was, no doubt, his eager interest in all current ques-
tions that served to occupy his mind and save him
from utter despondency.

With settled summer weather his health was mend-
ed, and his remaining eye grew so much better that he
could walk about without being led. In July he was
able to attend the famous Albany convention in which
the Liberty party was formed, and after it was over,
instead of returning directly home with his father and
brother, he undertook to make a visit to New York.
He went down the river on one of the day steamers,
and the shimmer of sunlight on the water put out
what little sight he had, so that on arriving at the city
he could not go ashore. He returned to Albany on
the same boat, and contrived somehow to make his
way home.

This was only one of the first of many relapses that
were to tantalize the eager young man and sicken his
heart with hope deferred. As the autumn of 1840
arrived without bringing the desired improvement,
and one of the neighbours happened to be going to
New York, Edward was placed in his care and es-
corted to the eye infirmary, where Dr. Delafield took
charge of his case. After several weeks, although
the doctor always spoke cheerfully and gave hopes of

Years of Blindness. 43

recovery, he found his eyes growing worse ; and one
day, in his impatience, he asked the doctor's assistant
very pointedly if there was really any chance of his
getting well or not. With injunction of strict secrecy
about such a breach of confidence, the young physi-
cian replied that Dr. Delafield's encouraging tone was
simply "a way of his," and that he really considered
the case incurable. This opinion the kind but plain-
speaking young oculist shared, and proceeded to for-
tify with reasons of his own, but Youmans was not yet
ready thus to abandon hope. If he had any strength of
character or fertility of resource in a dire emergency,
the time had now come for its exercise. Alone in a
large city, amid surroundings of which he had not the
slightest experience, friendless, stone-blind, baffled in
his hopes of the infirmary, how should he make a fur-
ther attempt to get efficient medical aid ? Among his
fellow-patients were half a dozen other young men in
similar plight, all hopeless of benefit from a further
stay in that place, all poor, one or two actually penni-
less and dependent on charity. One of them, how-
ever, could see well enough to serve as pilot for the
others, and so the whole party sallied forth into the
streets and went about from one oculist's office to
another in quest of advice. Youmans, the youngest of
the company, was relied upon as spokesman for all.
Whether it was he that organized the movement or
not, one sees in it the boldness of purpose and vigour of
execution that always characterized his way of doing
things. We can imagine the anxiety with which he
listened, in one office after another, to the various
opinions offered as to whether he was likely ever again
to see the light of day. Some of the physicians pro-
nounced cure impossible; one promised recovery on

44 Edward Livingston Youmans.

the sole condition of faith ; others contented them-
selves with severely criticising the treatment he had
received. Among them all, Dr. Samuel M. Elliott
gave him most encouragement, and something in his
manner inspired a confidence that turned out to be
well grounded ; for through the coming twelve years
of difficult treatment the doctor's skill was never at
fault, nor his sympathy wanting.

When their circuit among the oculists thus came
to an end, Youmans and his fellow-patients turned their
steps toward a boarding-house. They were directed
to one kept by a Mrs. Cook, at the corner of Pearl and
Hague Streets. She was a humane and kindly woman,
but the struggle to keep up her boarding-house and
support her family kept business considerations, of
course, in the foreground. These blind men could not
be brought to her table ; so she found for them in her
basement some quarters, which they hailed with de-
light as a change from the infirmary. Since the inter-
view with Dr. Elliott the party were in high spirits,
and Youmans created much merriment with his droll
quips and sallies. In a few weeks all the rest had left
Mrs. Cook's ; Youmans remained, but not in the base-
ment. Charmed with his modest dignity, his spark-
ling conversation, and his witchery of manner, the
landlady at once became his friend. He was accom-
modated with a large and comfortable room, and
when her daughters could find leisure for it they
would read to him. Among the boarders were some
bright young printers, and soon they too became inter-
ested in the newcomer. They brought him books
and papers, they came to his room and read for him,
and always felt more than rewarded by his shrewd
comments and telling illustrations. It was here that

Years of Blindness. 45

Youmans first met Horace Greeley — the beginning
of a warm friendship.

Dr. Elliott had expressed a belief that the cure
could be effected in six months. In saying this he
probably stretched a point, for it was evident that a
less hopeful view might prevent Edward from under-
taking the treatment. Edward felt that the doctor's
fee of one hundred and sixty dollars, besides the cost
of board in the city for six months, would be a heavy
burden for his father. A longer stay would at that
moment have seemed impracticable.

At first the progress toward recovery seemed
rapid, but painful and vexatious relapses kept occur-
ring. Sometimes the patient would be able to read
the signs over shop doors, then for a long time he
would be totally blind. It thus gradually became
evident that years rather than months might be
needed for the cure. After the first installment of
sixty dollars had been paid the doctor would not
accept any further payment until the cure should be
complete ; and so many years passed before this result
was reached, and so many occasions had there been
for mutual good offices, that further payment was
never thought of.

Edward's home was with Mrs. Cook throughout
the year 1841, except now and then in .the summer,
when he was able to superintend the workmen upon
Dr. Elliott's estate on Staten Island, which he was al-
ways glad to do, for when there, besides the welcome
opportunity of earning his support, he had healthful
outdoor life, sea bathing, and even some horseback
riding, and was much improved thereby. Neverthe-
less the relapses would come. If he happened to catch
cold, however slightly, the congestion always seized

46 Edward Livingston Youmans.

upon that eye. From a state of comparative comfort
and self-helpfulness on going to bed he would often in
the morning arise quite blind again ; and when this
happened at the island, he had to go back to the city
and take the treatment at the doctor's office.

Early in 1842 he left Mrs. Cook's and boarded for
a time at Mrs. Chipman's, on Chambers Street. It was
here that he made the acquaintance of Walt Whit-
man, when he was plain Mr. Whitman, wearing a coat
and necktie like other people, and editing a newspaper
called the Aurora, for which Edward wrote occasional
" Saratoga correspondence." In later years Youmans
always maintained that Walt was an arrant humbug,
and that his " barbaric yawp " and obtrusive filthiness
were assumed purely for pelf, after he had found that
polite writing would not pay his bills. Among the
friends made at this time, and who for many long,
weary years proved most sympathetic and helpful,
was Mr. Benjamin Flanders, whom he met at Dr.
Elliott's office undergoing treatment for a minor mal-
ady of the eyes.* Mr. Flanders was a sailmaker do-

* The sight of any one in trouble always moved Mr. Flanders to help
him in some way if he could. Hence he sought Edward's acquaintance,
and at once took a personal liking to him. He was much pleased by
Edward's manner, in which at that time, along with the embarrassment
due to blindness, there was unusual modesty and deference to others, asso-
ciated with peculiar energy of speech and confidence of statement. No
doubt the liberal opinions of the youth and his ability to state and defend
them also pleased Mr. Flanders, so that when his eyes were cured and
the two friends ceased to meet at the doctor's office he sought Edward out
in his boarding-house and in the most delicate way did much to alleviate
his circumstances. His persistent kindness throughout the long years of
helpless dependence that were to follow had much to do in bringing about
the final recovery. In the early years of his stay in New York Edward
was much alone, and suffered a great deal from low spirits. Often when
Mr. Flanders found him downhearted he would take him to his home in

Years of Blindness. 47

ing a large business, for that was before the time
when American shipping was destroyed by idiotic
navigation laws and robber tariffs. He was interested
in Fourierism, and as a member of the North Ameri-
can Phalanx was associated with Horace Greeley,
William H. Channing, Freeman Hunt, Edgar Hicks,
Richard H. Manning, and other prominent reformers
of the time. Mr. Flanders took Edward with him to
social gatherings in Brooklyn where these gentlemen
were present and where the subject of the reorganiza-
tion of society was a leading topic of conversation. At
these gatherings questions of reform were presented
in a broader light and involved more fundamental
changes than the antislavery and temperance discus-
sions to which Edward was accustomed, and we may
be sure that he made the most of these opportunities.
He was too heavily weighted by the consciousness of
his infirmity to make acquaintances readily in such
mixed gatherings, but he came to know some of Mr.
Flanders's more intimate associates, and we shall see
how lasting were the friendships commenced in those
enthusiastic days when the immediate and indefinite
educability of everybody, mentally and morally, was
believed in without reserve — when generous zeal be-
lieved that a new heaven and a new earth were at
hand.

Necessity had wrought in Edward that develop-
ment of touch and hearing which comes to all who
lose sight, and his memory, naturally very retentive,
became still stronger. He was able to find his way

Brooklyn for a time and cheer him in many ways, not the least of which
was the confident tone he always kept up about Edward's ultimate recovery
of vision. Mr. Flanders lived to see him a successful author, and in wide
repute as a popular scientific teacher.

48 Edward Livingston Youmans.

through the less crowded streets, and sometimes took
great risks in venturing about alone.* He was often
driven to exposures which a little money might have
enabled him to avoid, and thus poverty hindered and
jeopardized his recovery. One of his worst exposures,
however, was connected with an incident of which I
never heard until after his death, when I came to put
together this memoir. In 1842, as he was picking his
way along one of the riverside streets near the edge
of a wharf, he heard a sudden splash in the water and
cries for help close by. Instantly seizing a large chain
that happened to be within reach, fastened at one end
to a post on the wharf, he let himself down into the
water, got hold of the drowning man, and kept him
up until help came, thus saving his life. It was mid-
winter, and this stay of several minutes in the freezing
water brought on a violent fever, which detained Ed-
ward for nearly three months in a hospital, while his
anxious family had no news of him. It was eighteen
months before his sight could be brought back even
to the dim twilight condition it was in at the time of
the accident. This brave act was just like Youmans,
and it was also like him never to speak of it.

A pleasant incident of his first year in New York
led shortly to results of much consequence. Some
time during his stay at Mrs. Cook's his watch needed
mending, and he was told to take it to Mr. James

* Once a man who was carrying a plank on his shoulder on the side-
walk hit him with it so violently that his fall injured him seriously. His
narrowest escape was one evening when, in going from Mr. Flanders's to
his home in New York, he found himself at the very brink of the water
wall below Fulton Ferry, where one step more would have precipitated
him into the East River. It was not built up then for a considerable dis-
tance below the present upper entrance to the ferry.

Years of Blindness. 49

Ketcham, a watchmaker living hard by. Mr. Ketch-
am was a Quaker, and a genial old bachelor withal.
That he felt drawn toward the blind young man
was no more than natural — everybody felt drawn
toward him ; there never was such a magnetic crea-
ture as Edward Youmans. This circumstance was
the beginning of a pleasant acquaintance which soon
ripened into friendship, so that when Edward left the
neighborhood to go to Mrs. Chipman's boarding-
house he frequently spent a pleasant hour at the
watchmaker's shop. He was invited and urged to
visit Mr. Ketcham's household, over which a maiden
sister presided. This he for a long time declined to
do, because of the embarrassment of his blindness ; but
his hesitation was at length overcome and the invita-
tion was accepted. The interest he had awakened in
the brother was at once shared by the other members
of the family. This was soon after his escape from
the hospital. He was in delicate health, and so help-
less that the Ketchams insisted upon his making his
home with them, where he might have care and atten-
tion impossible in a boarding-house. He was very
glad to accept the proposal, and for many years there-
after his New York home was in the Ketcham family.
Thus, within three years after coming to New York,
blind and helpless as he was most of the time, he had
won friends on every side, friends whose sympathy
and kindness he gratefully remembered to the close of
his life. Seventeen years afterward, in 1859, ne visited
Detroit on a lecturing tour ; Mrs. Cook was then living
in that city, and he called upon her. During their
conversation many reminiscences of his years of blind-
ness and privation were recalled, and he thus alludes
to it in a letter written at the time : " I yearn for those

50 Edivard Livingston Youmans.

old friends who assisted and cheered me in days of
affliction, and I was most glad to see her. Yet our
talk revived so much that was painful that I was sad
all day afterward."

Late in the summer of 1843, with his scanty vision
somewhat improved, he went home to Milton and
spent some pleasant weeks while his sister read to
him. In these days, along- with the reading of current
literature, the subjects which engaged his attention
were chemistry, pure and applied, the geology of
soils, mineralogy, botany, physiology, and astronomy.
" Our reading," says Miss Youmans, " constantly
outran our knowledge and kept us on the strain for
explanations."

At this time Mr. Youmans had begun to support
himself by miscellaneous literary work — precarious,
difficult to get, and difficult to do. He early began
writing for the press, which gave him practice in com-
position and brought him into journalistic relations
which grew in extent and in after years were of the
utmost importance. In writing reviews, popularized
citations from technical works, etc., his blindness
proved an almost insuperable obstacle. Aid from
friendly eyes and hands could of course be only occa-
sional. He had to resign himself to spending weary
weeks over tasks that with sound eyesight could have
been dispatched in as many days. He invented some
kind of writing machine, which held his paper firmly
and enabled his pen to follow straight lines at proper
distances apart. Long practice of this sort gave his
handwriting a peculiar character, which it retained in
later years. When I first saw it, in 1863, it seemed
almost undecipherable ; but that was far from being
the case, and after I had grown used to it I found it

Years of Blindness. 5 1

but little less legible than the most beautiful chirogra-
phy. The strokes, gnarled and jagged as they were,
had a method in their madness, and every pithy sen-
tence went straight as an arrow to its mark.

I have already mentioned Youmans's strong sympa-
thy with the little party of abolitionists, then held in
such scornful disfavour by all other parties. He was
also interested in the party of temperance, which, as
he and others were afterward to learn, compounded
for its essential uprightness of purpose by indulging
in very gross intemperance of speech and action.
The disinterestedness which always characterized him
was illustrated by his writing many articles for a tem-
perance paper which could not afford to pay its con-
tributors, although he was struggling with such disad-
vantages in earning his own livelihood and carrying
on his scientific studies. It was not often, however,
that he was called upon to work for nothing.

Among the friends whom he made at the home of
the Ketchams was William Baner, a stereotyper, and
in a small way a publisher. Through him Mr. You-
mans had occasional employment on liberal terms.
One day, for example, Baner sent to him an old sea
captain who had an original system of the universe
wrapped up in a bandanna handkerchief ; this compre-
hensive effort received grammatical and other revision
for a very satisfactory honorarium. Mr. Baner pub-
lished on his own account a history of the life and
times of Madame de Pompadour, revised and edited
by his literary coadjutor.

The rare conversational powers which from the
first had interested so many people in Mr. Youmans
were constantly ripening and expanding. Especial
development was observed in his power of explaining

52 Edward Livingston Youmans.

problems abstruse in themselves or unfamiliar to his
h*earers. Naturally great, this power of exposition
was developed until it came to be marvelous. His
deprivation of sight contributed to this. When sitting
silent and alone in his room for hours together, his
mind was always busy ; its activity was spurred by his
necessities and definitely directed by such opportuni-
ties of work as came to him. When he had heard a
scientific article or a chapter in a scientific book read,
whether he intended to use it or not, he would go
over the entire statement or train of reasoning, search-
ing out defects and fallacies, pushing the arguments
to new conclusions. Such links as he laboriously
thought out between the familiar and the unfamiliar
he would repeat in talking over his favourite themes
to his friends, and Mr. Ketcham was a great help to
him in this respect. He was intelligent, interested in
everything, and fond of argument. He had no greater
pleasure than in talking over with Edward whatever
subject was uppermost at the time. This laborious mas-
tery of what he learned gave Youmans the key to mas-
terly exposition when that became his task. Blindness
and solitude had some compensations, though sadly in-
adequate. With his impulsive and somewhat impetu-
ous temperament they enforced a depth and steadiness
of reflection he might not otherwise have known, al-
though at the expense of pain unspeakably bitter.

In the winter of 1844 there was some excitement
in New York, in educational circles, over the system
of artificial memory brought out in a course of lec-
tures by a Frenchman, one F. F. Goureaud. For a
time this system of phreno-mnemotechny, as it was
called, was very popular, and its author reaped large
pecuniary rewards. Youmans incidentally made Gou-

Years of Blindness. 53

reaud's acquaintance, and found a class of young men
preparing themselves under his guidance to become
teachers of his system. Having sight enough at the
time to get about alone, he enlisted with these pupils,
simply with the hope of gain. Goureaud had applied
his system to all the important dates of secular and
ecclesiastical history, and these had to be learned by
the young teachers as illustrations to their audiences
of the power of the mnemonic system. Youmans
presently went home to Milton, where he could have
the help of others' eyes, and began memorizing long
lists of biblical and political dates. This labour was
soon accomplished, and he taught his first class in
Saratoga. He could not read the text-book, but for-
tunately his sight was sufficient to enable him to read
a few notes printed in large characters upon slips of
paper .concealed within it. He had no pleasure in the
work for its own sake, but he was happy to be able
to earn something, and for several months he taught
these classes at intervals in neighbouring towns. The
topics to which Goureaud applied the system had for
him little importance. From the first he began a list
of his own, made up of the dates of inventions and
discoveries. This was congenial work, and he spent
all his leisure in collecting and memorizing facts of this
sort. As his list grew, and was marked off into cen-
turies and classified according to subjects, he became
more and more interested in the growth of knowledge,
and especially in the progress of the sciences and their
successive dependence one upon another. He was
fairly successful in teaching, but in this itinerant life
he often took severe colds, with consequent relapses
into blindness, and so he had to abandon the work.
But he kept up the study of scientific progress with

54 Edward Livingston Youmans.

increasing interest, using this mnemonic system to fix
dates in memory, and throughout life he found it of
service in remembering facts expressed in figures.

Amid all the earning of daily bread and butter and
all the visits to Dr. Elliott's office, Youmans kept con-
stantly in mind the theme of agricultural chemistry.
Railroad development had not then made it easy to
forsake old land for new ; at Milton, as elsewhere
throughout the older settlements of the country, the
main question was how to get the most out of long-
tilled soil. His visits at home always brought this
problem sharply before him. His reading was discur-
sive, but his interest always came back to the science
which could ease his father's toil and increase the
small gains of his industry. In the spring of 1844
Liebig's Agricultural Chemistry was read to him. It
opened up a new world to his mind. During the
previous year his sister had been trying to fit herself
to give him aid by attending a course of chemical
lectures delivered by Prof. Mather in Fairfield, N. Y.
The knowledge thus acquired was to be brought to a
severe test. She was plied with questions regarding
obscure or ambiguous statements met in the text-
books. Edward would never pass a definition or
term he did not understand, and so there were perpet-
ual interruptions for consultation of dictionaries and
works of reference. He was full of comment and sug-
gestion as the reading went on, and when it was ended
he would sit quietly for hours absorbed in thought.

Sometimes there were days — and rarely, perhaps,
a week or so — when he could see well enough to go
about and superintend work. He was eager to put
his scientific knowledge into effect, and such success
as attended experiments in drainage, fertilizing, or

Years of Blindness. 5 5

new crops, undertaken at his instance, made him
jubilant. During one visit at home he had muck
spread with excellent effect on the farm's thin, sandy
soil. At another time he introduced a hydraulic ram,
the first ever known in that neighborhood. Among
other household improvements of his were a bath-
house and an ice-house, well planned and well built.

CHAPTER IV.

YEARS OF BLINDNESS (Continued}', THE CLASS-BOOK OF
CHEMISTRY.

1845-1851. Age, 24-30.

IN the summer of 1846 Mr. Youmans had a long
period of total blindness, and two members of the
Ketcham household, who rendered him much service
in reading and in leading him through the streets,
were obliged in the autumn to leave New York. He
now wrote to his sister, asking her if she could come
to New York to set free his friends from their care of
him, and to aid him in some projected literary work.
She went to him at once, and was pleased to find, not-
withstanding the despondent tone of his letters, that
his personal charm had drawn about him so many
helpful friends.

He had several literary projects to lay before his
sister, the chief of which was a history of progress in
discovery and invention, and upon this book work
was forthwith begun. Despite all obstacles, he had
year by year contrived to pick up a good deal of in-
formation regarding scientific progress all along the
line ; and the themes which he now discussed with
most animation were those suggested by modern
geology and the nebular theory. Are Nature's laws
uniform ? Is the universe vastly older than has been
supposed? These were grave questions to a man

(56)

EDWARD L. YOUMANS

AT THE AGE OF THIRTY
From a photograph taken in 1851

The Class-Book of Chemistry. 57

brought up to regard the Bible not only as the au-
thoritative basis of religion, but also as absolutely
correct in its science. His thought upon these sub-
jects was greatly stimulated by the first lectures de-
livered in New York by Professor Agassiz. To these
lectures, introductory to the study of natural history,
Miss Youmans escorted her brother soon after her
arrival in the city. They were delivered to crowded
audiences in the hall of the College of Physicians and
Surgeons, in Crosby Street. Every fitting occasion
in the course of the lectures was used by Agassiz to
illustrate his favourite conception of the truths of
science as the thoughts of God. People were so
eager to hear him express an opinion on the develop-
ment theory, that in his sixth lecture he felt con-
strained to turn aside from his systematic exposition,
and say:

But with the progress of species, as we find them in
different geological strata, the question is, Can we find in
Nature external causes which will produce these changes ?
And, again, Can we refer these successive appearances of
different types to the influences of external causes ? I say
No ; because, since man has studied Nature, he has never
seen any species modified under external influences.

And again:

These views — to which I shall recur when I come to
speak of the position of man in Nature, and of his relations
to the animal kingdom — disagree entirely with the views,
and have not the slightest alliance with the views, of a
work which is very much spoken of [The Vestiges of Crea-
tion], but which I consider entirely unworthy of notice by
any serious scientific man, because it is made up of old-
fashioned views which have been brought before the notice

58 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of the public for half a century by the French school, and
are supported only by antiquated assertions, and by no
means by facts scientifically ascertained. It must be owing
to some particular circumstance that this work has been so
much noticed, because really it is not worthy of critical
examination by a serious scientific man.

This criticism of The Vestiges is in the main cor-
rect and well deserved ; yet I suspect that Youmans
already felt that somewhere in all that heap of chaff
there was a sound and sturdy kernel of truth. Sir
Charles Lyell had in 1830 shown how enormous geo-
logic effects are wrought by the cumulative action
of slight and unobtrusive causes ; and this, which had
so much to do with turning men's minds toward some
conception of evolution, was not without its effect
upon Youmans. Full illustrated reports of Agassiz's
lectures were published in the Tribune, and were read
and re-read to him and carefully pondered ; and from
this time the tendency of his thinking was more and
more toward the development theory.*

The project for a history of progress in discovery
and invention had been suggested by the dates in
Goureaud's mnemotechnical system. Eschewing the
deeds of popes, kings, and emperors, the dates of
sieges, battles, and massacres, Youmans was intent on
weaving into a connected story the triumphs of ob-
servers, explorers, experimenters, and philosophers.
At once brother and sister began the work of gather-

* In this connection I can not refrain from adding that in my own case
the immediate cause which drove me to the development theory was the
mental reaction experienced in reading Agassiz's arguments against that
theory in his Essay on Classification, in 1859, shortly before Darwin's book
was published.

The C lass-Book of Chemistry. 59

ing and arranging materials. Every day they paid
long visits to the public libraries to consult authorities
and make extracts. In those days New York was no
larger than Buffalo is now, and its public libraries
were near together. The Mercantile Library was on
Nassau Street, the Library of the American Institute
on Chambers Street, the Society Library on the cor-
ner of Broadway and Franklin Street. Sometimes the
needed book was not to be found in any of these
places, and recourse would be had to the book-stores.
Sometimes those who had books to sell were unwill-
ing to lend them, even in a good cause ; but this was
not always the case. One morning, on their round of
calls, Miss Youmans led her brother into D. Appleton
& Co.'s store, then on Broadway below the City Hall,
in quest of a volume. Mr. \\^illiam H. Appleton at
once offered him the loan of it, and of any other book
he might want. He frequently availed himself of the
privilege so kindly extended, with welcome saving to
his slender purse. That chance visit, as we shall see,
was a capital incident in Youmans's life, and the Ap-
pletons now look back upon it as one of the most
auspicious events in the annals of their firm.

After several months of hard work, when the his-
tory was well on its way to completion, Youmans
learned to his deep chagrin that Mr. George Putnam,
the publisher, had just brought out a similar book —
The World's Progress. After recovering from this
bitter disappointment, he resumed his usual round of
literary work and scientific study. Somewhat more
than two years ran uneventfully on. Then, at the
close of 1849, a combination of untoward circum-
stances plunged him into the deepest despondency of
his life. His relapses into total blindness became

60 Edward Livingston Youmans.

longer, without apparent cause either in exposure or
in lack of medical care. Events at home were such
as to make a man of his strong family affections most
anxious. His father had suffered serious loss by fire,
and three of his brothers had gone to the far West,
seeking opportunities denied them in rural New York.
To his young imagination the remote and untried
West had perhaps more of evil than good in it for
such adventurous spirits as might brave its perils.
Troubled and perplexed, what wonder that the blind
man's courage should for a moment desert him ?

" I must give up this struggle ; it's no use going on
in this way ; my case is hopeless," he would say, bid-
ding his sister return home and leave him to his fate.
For days and weeks his despair continued, and he
would make no effort to* go on with work of any kind.*

* When it is remembered that before he had been with Dr. Elliott a year
he had advanced as far toward recovery as ever he had done in the ten
years following, it does not seem strange that he should at last lose heart.
Long before this time many of his friends had become quite hopeless of
his recovery, and even his mother, one of the last to give up the case, at
length undertook to reconcile him to a life of blindness. " Nothing can
be worse," she would say to him, " than these endless alternations of hope
and despair. If, in all the fifteen years you have been struggling with dis-
ease, the only gain has been brief intervals of partial seeing — intervals that
continually become rarer and shorter, while the subsequent lapse into
blindness grows harder and harder to bear — how much happier you would
be to give it up and adapt yourself to the circumstances." She instanced
blind men who were leading happy, useful lives, and assured her son that
he could always depend upon the affection and devotion of his family and
friends.

In after years, when the subject was referred to, he always said that he
never quite ceased to expect recovery. But there were periods when it
seemed to his friends that he had lost all hope. At these times he
shunned society, even that of his nearest companions. He would some-
times lock the door of his chamber and remain for hours, and even days,
in solitude. It seemed as if he shrank even from sympathy. Worry always

The Class-Book of Chemistry. 61

At last, a reaction came, and he slowly lifted himself
out of the slough of despond. To this one or two
favouring circumstances contributed. His sister se-
cured what for those times was a well-paid engage-
ment as teacher, with quite enough incidental leisure
to act as his amanuensis and reader. His brother
Earle sent good news of his prosperity in California,
and as an earnest thereof inclosed a generous remit-
tance. Dr. Elliott, who had never wavered in his
sincere assurances that his patient would ultimately
recover, offered him a lodging at his office, where he
could practice sundry economies. The office con-
tained chemical apparatus available for Miss You-
mans's experiments. In the district school at Milton,
three years before, she had gained a slight experience
in chemical work, using the water pail as a trough, and
collecting gases in bottles, but she had little knowl-
edge and less skill in handling apparatus. Her brother
had long wished that her chemical education should
proceed further, but where was the opportunity ? It
came at last through Dr. Antisell, an Irish refugee of
'48, who had come to New York and established a
laboratory as a teacher of chemistry at the corner of
Elm and Grand Streets. He had enough of the spirit
of revolution and reform to open the first laboratory
in the city that admitted women. Every Saturday
Miss Youmans spent several hours at work under the
doctor's eye. In the evening she described and ex-
made his eyes worse. When at last he did in a measure recover sight, the
medical treatment was just the same that it had been from the first. The
exhilaration attendant upon the success of his literary work was the begin-
ning of the amendment. He believed, and the doctor was sure, that the
same might have happened years before if an evil fate had not waited
upon his first efforts at self-support.

62 Edward Livingston Youmans.

plained to her brother what she had been doing-.
These studies were intended to be preliminary to the
analysis of soils, but by the time she was able to make
such analysis Mr. Youmans had become convinced
that they were of no value in practical agriculture.
In the course of his pondering over chemical facts
which he was obliged to take at second hand, it oc-
curred to him that most of the pupils in common
schools who studied chemistry were practically no
better off. It was easy enough for schools to buy
text-books, but difficult for them to provide labora-
tories and apparatus ; and it was much easier withal
to find teachers who could ask questions out of a book
than those who could use apparatus if provided. It
was customary, therefore, to learn chemistry by rote ;
or, in other words, pupils' heads were crammed with
unintelligible statements about things with queer
names — such as manganese or tellurium — which they
had never seen, and would not know if they were to
see them. It occurred to Youmans that, if visible
processes could not be brought before pupils, at any
rate the fundamental conceptions of chemistry might
be made clear by means of diagrams. He began de-
vising diagrams in different colours, to illustrate the
diversity in the atomic weights of the principal ele-
ments, and the composition of the more familiar com-
pounds. At length, by uniting his diagrams, he ob-
tained a comprehensive coloured chart exhibiting the
outlines of the whole scheme of chemical combination
according to the binary or dualist theory then in
vogue.

These diagrams elicited much interest among his
friends. One of them (Mr. J. R. Burdsall) was a drug-
gist and dealer in patent medicines, whose advertise-

The Class- Book of Chemistry. 63

ments Youmans had often written for a liberal hon-
orarium. When the diagrams had been united in a
chart Mr. Burdsall became enthusiastic. He declared
that it made clear to his mind chemical facts and laws
which he had never before understood. It was cer-
tain, he said, that a chart so instructive to him would
be equally so to others, and that it would have a large
sale if published. He urged Youmans to seek a pub-
lisher at once, and offered him five hundred dollars for
an interest of one fifth in the enterprise. The advice
and offer were promptly accepted, and the cash was
applied in getting the chart engraved. Before the
engraving was finished the chart was put on exhibi-
tion at the American Institute Fair, then held in Castle
Garden. Its author prepared a brief primer of ex-
planation and tied it to the chart roller, placing his
exhibit on a halfway landing of one of the main stair-
cases. This chart, when published, was a great suc-
cess. It not only facilitated the acquirement of clear
conceptions, but it was suggestive of new ideas. It
proved very popular, and kept the field until the
binary theory was overthrown by the modern doctrine
of substitution, which does not lend itself so readily to
graphic treatment.

The success of the chemical chart led to the writ-
ing of a text-book of chemistry. Friends urged that
such a book was needed to accompany the chart, and
letters began to come in from different parts of the
country with a similar request. The idea took root
in Youmans's mind, but, as usual, he had more than
one task in hand. He devoted part of every day to
writing a text-book of arithmetic, wherein the exam-
ples were to introduce the constants of science instead
of the usual commercial terms. When his work was

64 Edward Livingston Youmans.

nearly ready for the press he learned, from a review
in one of the morning papers, that Horace Mann had
just published an arithmetic on precisely the same
plan. His disappointment at being thus a second time
forestalled was very keen. But there was much con-
solation in the remarkable popularity of the chemical
chart, and he made up his mind to write the desired
chemical text-book. He attended Dr. J. W. Draper's
lectures on chemistry and physiology, and always
cordially acknowledged his indebtedness, for method
as well as for facts, to that eminent teacher. Of refer-
ence books he gathered all that he could find that
were of real authority. These, after they had been
read to him, he would ponder over and digest for
hours together. At length, filled with his subject, he
began to dictate his book.

Miss Ketcham, at this time, chiefly at his instance,
had taken a large five-story boarding-house at 49 Cliff
Street. Here, on the fourth floor, he occupied a back
bedroom, about eight feet by twelve. Opposite the
door was a large west window, and under this was a
hinged shelf, which could be let down when not in
use. Little space was left for moving about, although
bedstead, washstand, bureau, and chairs were of the
severely simple type of furniture. During working
hours books of reference and manuscript covered
every inch of shelf and bed. At night all had to be
neatly gathered up and put away. Practice had made
our author, naturally a tidy man, very expert in stow-
age and in finding things exactly where he had placed
them.

His idea of the kind of book he wished to write
was distinct ; he felt an enthusiasm for natural knowl-
edge, and meant to arouse that enthusiasm in others.

The Class-Book of Chemistry. 65

With a vivid recollection of his Milton school, he de-
sired to make a book acceptable to just such boys and
girls as had in years gone by sat on benches at his
side. They and thousands like them— farmers' sons
and daughters — were surrounded every day of their
lives by chemical phenomena which would interest
them deeply if understood. Current text-books were,
he knew, unfit for their purpose ; they were dry, tech-
nical, destitute of sympathy with young minds, and
oblivious of their ways of looking at things. As a
rule their authors made a perfunctory circuit of all
the sciences, and turned out a series of class books in
the true style of a mechanic of the pen — work little
better than cataloguing or almanac-making. You-
mans felt that chemistry ought to be made as popu-
lar as physics, or natural philosophy, as it was then
called ; for this he found his chart prepared the way
by its easily understood pictures. His plan of work
was, first of all to make himself familiar with what
each authority had written upon the topic in hand.
He would then slowly elaborate such a statement as
he thought best suited to his purpose. The chemical
elements were described briefly and plainly, omitting
the tedious accounts of apparatus and complex reac-
tions which filled the current books. Instead of these
bare details, every fact was presented in its relation
to law, every step in the progress of his chapters was
systematically linked to the next. Chemistry had not
then acquired its present wealth and diversity of spe-
cialization. In a volume of three hundred and forty
pages he was able not only to give the substance of
the current inorganic chemistry, but to include chap-
ters wThich summarized the chemistry of plant and
animal life. In carrying out his method of approach-

66 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ing the unfamiliar through the familiar, he drew his
illustrations from everyday toil and common pro-
cesses— from farming, cooking, washing, the manufac-
ture of sugar, starch, vinegar, and soap. He sought
to open the eyes of young people to the scientific
significance of surroundings usually too near to be
noticed ; he wished to awaken their interest in nature,
that they might not only learn how to economize
drudgery, but also get more wholesome enjoyment
out of life.

In composition Youmans's methods were labo-
rious. He never had so fault-finding a critic as him-
self. Revision followed revision, and emendations
and corrections covered every page of his copy.
When at length several chapters were finished they
were sent to the Appletons for the judgment of their
" reader," Mr. E. P. Tenney, and the decision was
awaited with much anxiety. It was very favourable.

These pages give promise of an excellent work on
chemistry. The author evidently understands the science,
and possesses a clear, logical mind. His manner of pre-
senting the various subjects is quite full, and his thoughts
are practical and such as can not fail to make a striking
impression on the youthful mind. The "atomic theory"
and the subject of chemical combination are not more
clearly handled in the works of either Silliman, father or
son. More attention should be paid to punctuation.

Thus encouraged, the young author went on and
finished his book in high spirits. His introduction, as
in all his books, was written with especial care, for he
understood the importance of making a favourable
impression at the start. If we consider the date when
this first edition of the Chemistry was written, and the

The Class-Book of Chemistry. 67

author's experience up to that time, the following
passage from the introduction is very interesting :

Among the various occupations which require a knowl-
edge of chemistry to be successfully carried on, that most
noble, useful, and universal of all human pursuits, agricul-
ture, stands prominent. The farm is a great laboratory,
and all those changes in matter which it is the farmer's
chief business to produce are of a chemical nature. He
breaks up and pulverizes his soil with plough, harrow, and
hoe for the same reason that the practical chemist powders
his minerals with pestle and mortar — namely, to expose the
materials more perfectly to the action of chemical agents.
The field can only be looked upon as a chemical manufac-
tory ; the air, soil, and manures are the farmer's raw mate-
rials, and the various forms of vegetation are the products
of his manufacture. The farmer who raises a bushel of
wheat or a hundredweight of flax does not fabricate them
out of nothing ; he performs no miraculous work of crea-
tion, but it is by taking up a certain definite portion of his
raw material and converting it into new substances through
the action of natural agents; just as those substances are
again manufactured in the one case into bread and in the
other into cloth. When a crop is removed from the field
certain substances are taken away from the ground which
differ with different kinds of plants; and if the farmer
would know exactly what and how much his field loses by
each harvest, and how in the cheapest manner that loss
may be restored, chemistry alone is capable of giving him
the desired information. To determine the nature and
properties of his soil, and its adaptation to various plants,
and the best methods of improving it ; to economize his
natural resources of fertility ; to test the purity and value
of commercial manures and of beds of marl and muck ; to
mingle composts and adapt them to special crops; to im-
prove the quality of grains and fruits; to rear and feed

68 Edward Livingston Youmans.

stock and conduct the dairy in the best manner — farmers
require a knowledge of this science. Nor can they as a
class afford to be much longer without it; for it has always
been found that the application of scientific principles to
any branch of industry puts power into the hands of the
intelligent to drive ignorance from the field of competi-
tion ; so that, as discoveries multiply and information is
diffused, those farmers who decline to inquire into the
principles which govern their vocation, or who prefer the
study of politics to that of agriculture, will have occasion
to groan more deeply than ever over the unprofitableness
of their business.

The superiority of natural sciences over all other ob-
jects of study, to engage the attention and awaken the
interest of pupils, is conceded as a fact of experience by
the ablest teachers. This can not be otherwise; for the
infinite wisdom of the Creator is nowhere so perfectly dis-
played as in the wonderful adaptation which exists between
the young mind and the natural world with which it is
encompassed. On one hand, there is the realm of Nature,
endless in the variety of its objects, indescribable in its
beauty, immutable in its order, boundless in its beneficence,
and ever admirable in the simplicity and harmony of its
laws; on the other, there is the young intellect, whose
earliest trait is curiosity, which asks numberless questions,
pries into the reasons of things, and seeks to find out their
causes as if by the spontaneous promptings of instinct.
The study of Nature is, therefore, the most congenial em-
ployment of the opening mind, and one of its purest
sources of pleasure. Every fact that is learned becomes a
krey to others ; every progressive step discloses wonders
previously unimagined.

When the introduction was finished, in the autumn
of 1851, the manuscript was at once placed in the
hands of D. Appleton & Co. for publication. The

The Class-Book of Chemistry. 69

author's brave and patient toil was at length to be re-
warded. The book had an immediate and signal suc-
cess ; and to this day, having been twice rewritten in
conformity to the advancement of the science, it re-
mains one of our best text-books of chemistry. The
sale has reached one hundred and fifty thousand
copies. In every State of the Union teachers and
pupils welcomed the book. The subject was pre-
sented with beautiful clearness, in a most attractive
style. There was a firm grasp of the philosophical
principles underlying chemical phenomena, and the
meaning and functions of the science were set forth in
such a way as to charm the student and make him
wish for more. At that time a spark of enthusiasm
was no more expected in a text-book of chemistry
than in a treatise on contingent remainders. But in
Youmans's pages the chemical elements were alive.
To him oxygen was not merely an element of certain
specified weight ancl affinities ; it was alternately the
sustainer and destroyer of life, the master builder of
organic form and the chief agent of its decay, the
purifier of air and sea.

The Class-book of Chemistry was Youmans's ger-
minal book ; all his subsequent work was foreshad-
owed in it — his Correlation, Household Science, Cul-
ture, and his articles innumerable. Its reception
showed him his strength and his true field. Thence-
forth his career was that of breaking the bread of sci-
ence to the multitude.

The present chapter and its predecessor have their
lesson, full of consolation and encouragement as of
pathos. When the Chemistry was finished, in the
autumn of 1851, its author had been for eleven years
under the care of an oculist. Under such circum-

7O Edward Livingston Youmans.

stances, if a man of eager energy and boundless intel-
lectual craving were to be overwhelmed with de-
spondency, we could not call it strange. If he were
to become dependent upon friends for the means of
support, it would be ungracious, if not unjust, to blame
him. But Edward Youmans was not made of the
stuff that acquiesces in defeat. He rose superior to
calamity ; he won the means of livelihood, and in dark-
ness entered upon the path to an enviable fame ; or,
as he would doubtless prefer to have it said, he made
for himself an opportunity to be helpful to his fellow-
men.

CHAPTER V.

THE SCIENTIFIC LECTURER.

1851-1868. Age, 30-4.7.

THE success of the Chemistry was supplemented
by increased demand for the chart which illustrated it.
Brightened fortunes told favourably and at once on
the health and spirits of our author. He had justified
his friends' faith that there was " something in him."
He had proved that he had more than an empty am-
bition to bring a knowledge of science to the people.
Mind and body soon told the story of cares banished
and a fight well won. The long, distressing period of
darkness now came to an end. Sight was so far re-
covered in one eye that it became possible to go about
freely, to read, to recognize friends, to travel, and
make much of life. I am told that his face had ac-
quired an expression characteristic of the blind, but
that expression was afterward completely lost. When
I knew him it would never have occurred to me that
his sight was imperfect, except as regards length of
range. There could be no doubt on that point. He
never could recognize any but his most familiar friends
at a distance of more than a couple of yards, and this
fact was apt to give him a slight air of timidity and
reserve, which instantly vanished, however, as soon as
he knew to whom he was speaking. When sight was
first recovered, it must be confessed that he ran seri-

(71)

72 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ous risks by overtasking the eye, and in after years he
was known to repeat this imprudence, but he never
again had to put himself under an oculist's care.
When his malady threatened to recur he knew how
to arrest its progress, and with firmer general health
he became much less liable to attack.

Mr. Youmans's career as a scientific lecturer now
began. His first lecture was the beginning of a series
on the relations of organic life to the atmosphere. It
was illustrated with chemical apparatus, and was given'
in Dr. Elliott's commodious office to an audience which
filled the room, including a number of young ladies
from fashionable uptown schools. Probably no lecturer
ever faced his first audience without some trepida-
tion, and Youmans had not the mainstay and refuge
afforded by a manuscript, for his sight was never good
enough to make such an aid available for his lectures.
At first the right words were slow in finding their
way to those ready lips, and his friends were begin-
ning to grow anxious, when all at once a happy acci-
dent broke the spell. He was remarking upon the
characteristic instability of nitrogen, and pointing to a
jar of that gas on the table before him, when some
fidgety movement of his knocked the jar off the table.
He improved the occasion with one of his quaint bons
mots ; and, as there is nothing that greases the wheels
of life like a laugh, the lecture went on to a success-
ful close. At the end of the series a general wish
was expressed that the lectures should be repeated
in a larger audience-room. Among his first topics
were the chemistry of organized bodies, of vegetable
growth, of food and digestion. He subsequently dis-
cussed the sources and nature of alcohol, and its
effect on the human system. Then came a series on

The Scientific Lecturer. 73

the sunbeam, explaining the varied influences of the
solar ray, with an analysis of its forces ; the relation
of the sun to life on our planet ; the chemistry of the
sun and the stars ; the links uniting the realms of mat-
ter and mind. In two lectures on Ancient Philosophy
and Modern Science he set forth the debt due by
chemist and astronomer to alchemist and astrologer;
and here he took occasion to point out how the guesses
of Democritus and Lucretius had been barren, not-
withstanding their shrewdness, from their not having
married experiment to speculation. In his Masquer-
ade of the Elements he presented in glowing outline
the phenomena of protean chemical transformation.
His New Philosophy of Forces was the first popular
exposition of the correlation of forces given in Amer-
ica. In every discourse it was his custom to give
ample graphic and experimental illustration ; the seen
proof riveted the spoken thought. His lectures, more-
over, had in them the salt of persuasion ; the interest
he enjoyed he was anxious others should share. He
was a sower desirous that a harvest should spring up
so abundant as to make his handfuls of seed corn
seem paltry enough. Sympathy, not less than enthu-
siasm for science, made him one of the most impres-
sive lecturers of his time. One other characteristic
never failed to broaden every discourse he delivered —
a philosophic spirit which passed from detail to gen-
eralization, from a fact to the law of universal sweep
whose manifestation and proof it was. To his mind a
part always suggested the whole ; he never looked
through a window of science so small that it did not
show the sky. When he came to the outlook from a
new and lofty standpoint his delight would burst forth
in poetic fervour.

74 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The lectures in Dr. Elliott's office were the begin-
ning of a busy career of seventeen years of lecturing,
ending in 1868 ; and I believe it is safe to say that few
things were done in all those years of more vital and
lasting benefit to the American people than this broad-
cast sowing of the seeds of scientific thought in the
lectures of Edward Youmans. They came just at the
time when the world was ripe for the doctrine of evo-
lution, when all the wondrous significance of the trend
of scientific discovery since Newton's time was begin-
ning to burst upon men's minds. The work of Lyell
in geology, followed at length in 1859 by the Darwin-
ian theory ; the doctrine of the correlation of forces
and the consequent unity of nature ; the extension and
reformation of chemical theory ; the simultaneous ad-
vance made in sociological inquiry, and in the concep-
tion of the true aims and proper methods of education
— all this made the period a most fruitful one for the
peculiar work of such a teacher as Youmans.

In his early manhood there was in the community
a very inadequate appreciation of natural law. An
indolent reverence contented itself with a theological
cosmogony little modified by the results of observation
and experiment. Physical science had been like an
archipelago, with each island distinct and separate from
its neighbours. Even while he looked they rose, and
the retiring waters showed a continent soon to be
parcelled out among sturdy bands of explorers. That
the wave circling out from the paddle, the musical
note pulsating the air, the throb of electricity, the pull
of magnetism, the vibrations of heat and light shot
forth from fuel, sun, and star, were in all their diver-
sity fundamentally one, was a conception to fascinate
such a mind as his and give charm to his discourses.

The Scientific Lecturer. 75

The newness and freshness of a great truth add much
to the effect of its intrinsic importance. Fortunate are
the men who live in times when ideas of the first mag-
nitude mount above the horizon ; who are young
enough to be adequately impressed by them, suffi-
ciently mature to see their significance and think out
their implications.

Such an idea of the first magnitude was the doc-
trine of evolution, the grandest thought of science.
By showing Nature to be a family it gave to classifica-
tion genetic relationship as its true basis. To educa-
tion it indicated a new way and the best. It made it
possible to write Nature's history backward to the
primitive chaos — as wonderful in all its dormant possi-
bilities as the cosmos it contained. It made the uni-
verse one in a new sense, for it bound together, in a
single web of causation worlds, continents, life, mind.
To have lived when this prodigious truth was ad-
vanced, debated, established, was a privilege rare in
the centuries. The inspiration of seeing the old
isolating mists dissolve and reveal the convergence of
all branches of knowledge is something that can hard-
ly be known to the men of a later generation, inherit-
ors of what this age has won.

During the course of Youmans's career as a lec-
turer the atmosphere became charged with concep-
tions of evolution. Youmans had arrived at such con-
ceptions in the course of his study of the separate
lines of scientific speculation which were now about
to be summed up and organized by Herbert Spencer.
In the field of- scientific generalization upon this great
scale Youmans was not an originator, but his broadly
sympathetic and luminous mind moved on a plane so
near to that of the originators that he seized at once

76 Edward Livingston Youmans.

upon the grand scheme of thought as it was devel-
oped, made it his own, and brought to its interpreta-
tion and diffusion such a happy combination of quali-
ties as one seldom meets with. The ordinary popu-
larizer of great and novel truths is a man who com-
prehends them but partially and illustrates them in a
lame and fragmentary way. But it was the peculiar-
ity of Youmans that, while on the one hand he could
grasp the newest scientific thought so surely and firm-
ly that he seemed to have entered into the innermost
mind of its author, on the other hand he could speak
to the general public in a convincing and stimulating
way that had no parallel. This was the secret of his
power, and there can be no question that his influence
in educating the American people to receive the doc-
trine of evolution was great and widespread.

The years when Youmans was travelling and lec-
turing were the years when the old lyceum system of
popular lectures was still in its vigour. The kind of
life led by the energetic lecturer in those days was
not that of a sybarite, as may be seen from a passage
in one of his letters : " I lectured in Sandusky, and
had to get up at five o'clock to reach Elyria ; I had
had but very little sleep. To get from Elyria to
Pittsburg I must take the five o'clock morning train,
and the hotel darky said he would try to awaken me.
I knew what that meant, and so did not get a single
wink of sleep that night. Rode all day to Pittsburg,
and had to lecture in the great Academy of Music
over footlights. . . . The train that left for Zanesville
departed at two in the morning. I had been assured
a hundred times (for I asked everybody I met) that I
would get a sleeping car to Zanesviile, and when I
was all ready to start I was informed that this morn-

The Scientific Lecturer. 77

ing there was no sleeping car. By the time I reached
here I was pretty completely used up."

Such a fatiguing life, however, has its compensa-
tions. It brings the lecturer into friendly contact
with the brightest minds among his fellow-country-
men in many places, and enlarges his sphere of influ-
ence in a way that is not easy to estimate. Clearly,
an earnest lecturer, of commanding intelligence and
charming manner, with a great subject to teach, must
have an opportunity for sowing seeds that will pres-
ently ripen in a change of opinion or sentiment, in an
altered way of looking at things on the part of whole
communities. No lecturer has ever had a better op-
portunity of this sort than Edward Youmans, and none
ever made a better use of his opportunity. His gifts
as a talker were of the highest order. The commonest
and plainest story, as told by Edward Youmans, had
all the breathless interest of the most thrilling ro-
mance. Absolutely unconscious of himself, simple,
straightforward, and vehement, wrapped up in his
subject, the very embodiment of faith and enthusiasm,
of heartiness and good cheer, it was delightful to hear
him. And when we join with all this his unfailing
common sense, his broad and kindly view of men and
things, and the delicious humour that kept flashing out
in quaint, pithy phrases such as no other man would
have thought of, and such as are the despair of any
one trying to remember and quote them, we can seem
to imagine what a power he must have been with his
lectures.

When such a man goes about for seventeen years,
teaching scientific truths for which the world is ripe,
we may be sure that his work is great, albeit we have
no standard whereby we can exactly measure it. In

78 Edward Livingston Youmans.

hundreds of little towns with queer names did this
strong- personality appear and make its way and leave
its effects in the shape of new thoughts, new questions,
and enlarged hospitality of mind, among the inhabit-
ants. The results of all this are surely visible to-day.
In no part of the English world has Herbert Spencer's
philosophy met with such a general and cordial recep-
tion as in the United States. This may no doubt be
largely explained by a reference to general causes ;
but as it is almost always necessary, along with our
general causes, to take into the account some personal
influence, so it is in this case. It is safe to say that
among the agencies which during the past fifty years
have so remarkably broadened the mind of the Ameri-
can people, very few have been more potent than the
gentle and subtle but pervasive work done by Edward
Youmans with his lectures, and to this has been large-
ly due the hospitable reception of Herbert Spencer's
ideas.

Many a young man in many a town could trace
to Youmans and his lectures the first impulse that
led him to seek and obtain a university education.
In quarters innumerable his advice gave direction to
family reading in the best treatises on astronomy, phys-
ics, chemistry, geology, and physiology. Nothing in
all his experience pleased him more than the genuine
interest in science which he used to find in the small-
est and unlikeliest places. After a lecture it was
always his habit in free and easy talk to draw' out the
opinion of his hearers, and thus he often got useful
hints. It helped him in learning what modes of pres-
entation were most effective, and at what points of the
borderland between the known and the unknown his
audiences could most readily follow him. He also

The Scientific Lecturer. 79

learned how often the stupidity of the average mind
will misapprehend and pervert the clearest statements.

His lectures were never committed to memory,
but each time delivered with such variation of argu-
ment and illustration as to bring to the second or third
delivery in a city many of the auditors present at the
first. Of his absorption in his subject when he had
fairly warmed to his work some amusing stories are
told. At Faribault, Minnesota, one evening, such was
the amplitude of his excited gyrations that they ex-
ceeded the rather narrow bounds of the platform.
Twice he slipped off to the floor. Fortunately the
platform was a low one, and after each fall he resumed
the thread of his exposition without the slightest dis-
composure. On another occasion, in Brooklyn, his
emphasis came out in gesticulation so fierce as almost
to bring a heavy screen down on his head. To the
relief of his audience, and especially of his committee,
the screen stood proof against his thumping.

Miss Youmans tells me that Edward's loud voice
and emphatic manner were family traits. When any
topic of moment came up in the family circle a stranger
might have supposed the talkers were quarrelling, so
vehement were their tones. Edward's most conspicu-
ous quality was the amount and intensity of energy
displayed in speech and action on all occasions. It
should be added, at the same time, that a man of more
perfect refinement never lived. We are apt to asso-
ciate loud tones with a certain kind of roughness ;
sometimes, too, with brusqueness. About Youmans
there was not the faintest trace of anything of the
sort. The combination of explosive animal spirits and
intense eagerness with perfect grace and gentleness
was such as I have never witnessed in any other man.

8o Edward Livingston Youmans.

Words cannot describe it. In all that emphasis of
tone and gesture there was nothing harsh. The effect
was magnetic. I never heard him give a lecture, but
I have often been-told that his audiences sat as if spell-
bound, and could not turn their eyes from him while
he was speaking. He must have made a fine appear-
ance on the platform, for he did everywhere. He was
about five feet and ten inches in height, and in middle
life weighed not far from one hundred and ninety
pounds. He was well proportioned, and easy in his
movements ; a man of fine fibre, with clear complex-
ion and soft brown hair, somewhat curly ; always
plainly dressed, but with daintiest neatness. Quite
compatible with perfect manly dignity, and add-
ing to its charm, was a slight touch of modest
deference, the natural outgrowth of unselfish inter-
est in his fellow-men and constant readiness to learn
something from the person with whom he was
talking. In this particular there was something
about his manner that used to remind me of Mr.
Darwin.

Prosecuted, as these lecture tours were, chiefly in
winter, through circuits of thousands of miles, when
trains were as yet uncomfortable and slow and their
connections uncertain, it was often impossible for the
lecturer to avoid exposure that injured his health.
Sometimes his vigour was seriously impaired, and the
effects could be seen in the lessened animation of his
lectures. At last, warned by attacks of rheumatism
and increased liability to catch cold, he withdrew
from the field where he had been so useful, from the
work he had so thoroughly enjoyed.

The following characteristic extracts from his cor-
respondence may serve to illustrate some of the mis-

Tlie Scientific Lecturer. 81

haps of a lecturer, and his inevitable ups and downs of
fortune and of spirits :

GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY, CANADA,
Wednesday, November 30, 1859.

DEAR SISTER: "The Lord reigneth, let the earth re-
joice." I have great satisfaction in the sentiment, and
return thanks. It is so agreeable to think that the devil is
superfluous and impotent, and has nothing to do but " loaf
and invite his soul," and have a good time generally down
below. ... I discover that I lost my ring. It may be some-
where in the room " knockin' round," and may turn up, un-
less it came off while washing and went down the pipe, or
slipped into the crevice when I lay down upon the sofa or
on the bed ; but I do not understand, for I did not sleep a
wink all night. I don't see how it could have got off with-
out my knowing it. However, it's all right. The aurifer-
ous particles are not abolished ; matter is never annihilated
— it changes place, as the ring illustrates, but the totality is
ever undisturbed. What vicissitudes may befall the plain
little annulus are beyond the reach of rational speculation ;
but the Lord has it in his keeping. Let the earth rejoice,
and the solitudes of the isle, etc.

Editor Thomas, who professes to reign righteously in the
little world of Appletons' Guide, said, " Go by Erie Railroad."
I trusted also to Lord Thomas — with the usual result. It
is the worst route — miserable ; failed to make its connec-
tions yesterday. I am consequently behind time, and shall
not arrive at Detroit till ten o'clock to-night — an hour after
my audience have dispersed. The Lord reigneth, let the
people of Detroit rejoice. It was philosophical fate. If
I had taken another line along the planet it would have
altered the centre of gravity of the physical universe. If I
had stopped at the Hudson River Railroad depot, which I
scornfully passed by, I should have arrived in ample time,
lectured, and thus altered the centre of gravity of the intel-

82 Edward Livingston Youmans.

lectual universe. I am so glad to contribute something to
the harmony of the universe ! . . . We stopped an hour
since with the alarm that the baggage car was on fire.
Horrifying intelligence for the haves ; indifferent, though a
little exciting, for the have nots. Let us see : one bag is
with me here. The diagrams, too, stick closer than a broth-
er— either of my brothers, at any rate. They are safe,
thank the Lord ! The large bag with the books, clothing,

etc., is in the travelling refrigerator of Shadrach, M ,

and A . Let us proceed to ascertain if our bag has had

the same experiences as those incombustible old Jews who
could have snapped their fingers in the face of all insurance
companies in the world. Piles of wet and damaged goods
upon the platform, scattered around. Let us see. Books.
The late lamented Nicoll, now doubly lamented — an illus-
trated edition of igneous and aqueous agencies. The illus-
trated Correlation of Forces — succumbed at last to its own
convertibility. Bain in a decidedly baneful way. Carpet
bag (except the faithful handles) reverted to the inorganic
state — just saves the equilibrium of the organic world. I
pray that the Lord will continue to shower down his richest
golden blessings with increasing profusion while I am "in."
More anon. With much affection, E. L. Y.

The following letters and extracts will have a fur-
ther interest :

JACKSON, MICH., December 7, 1859.

DEAR SISTER : It is painful to be separated from you
all, but fifty dollars per night, with the cash in the morning,
is so compensating and so mitigating and so assuaging and
mollifying and healing! They have just this moment paid
me for last night's work. My lecture at Ann Arbor was
most satisfactory, and gave general pleasure, although the
recollection of the Sunbeam is too recent and the treat-
ment of that topic was too peculiar to permit the advan-

The Scientific Lecturer. 83

tageous exhibition of the new subject. But in Jackson it is
different. I had never been here before — all strangers. I
had the best light yet, and the affair went off satisfactorily.
I spoke in the Presbyterian church. The clergyman said
it was by far the ablest and most masterly lecture to which
he had ever listened, and expressed great wonder at the
possibility of cramming so much clear thought into a single
performance. The practical, testing effect was that the
committee desired to engage me in February for the four
on the Chemistry of the Sunbeam, at two hundred dollars.
I declined to engage positively. ... I am stopping with the
pleasantest private family in the world. Good folks are
everywhere.

Make rough, large skeleton drawings of your own of
the brain, its parts and dynamic connections, so as to help
me when I return. Can't you draw a rough colossal spi-
nal column, with the thirty-one pairs starting out — two col-
ours, and the entrances sufficiently far apart so that you
could print appended to each nerve the part to which it
goes, so that the whole could be learned in the quickest
way and without reference to text, which loses time ? Our
studies should be, first, the fullest normal anatomy and
physiology of the nervous system ; then we shall be pre-
pared to consider fully its pathology and all its morbid
phenomena. And then we shall first be prepared to estimate,
weigh, and pronounce authoritatively upon the whole do-
main of mysticism, upon which the public are actually mad,
viz., biology, magnetism, spiritism, etc. A large and rich
field; and as an offshoot of the first branch of inquiry the
Chemistry of the Sunbeam is a mere twig. I write in great
haste. Don't forget to drop me a line frequently if you
have but a word, and I will do the same.

With love to all, affectionately,

E. L. Y.

84 Edward Livingston Youmans.

KALAMAZOO, MICH., December //, 1859.

DEAR SISTER : I arrived here last night, and found your
letter of Monday, the 5th. I am in sad plight, and shall
write a savage letter. Another fool is in charge of lectur-
ing affairs in Chicago, and I am completely upset by it.
Milwaukee fizzles — can't get a hall, and of all the places I
have written to I have heard only from Milwaukee and
eternal Aurora, who demands the Chemistry of the Sun-
beam in one lecture at forty dollars, with the written speci-
fication that I shall pay all my own expenses. And so I
have now two engagements to play — here to-morrow even-
ing, and at Chicago on Thursday evening — and then I am
out for the month, except such chance events as may hap-
pen to fall out. I am wanted to lecture in all directions,
but there is no chance to arrange, and so I will let it slide.
The only difficulty is this — and here I stopped and took up
Bain — the charred remains of poor Bain, full of interest. I
have been trying to get out of this Western world into Plato's
world of pure thought. It has helped. . . . My Ancient
Philosophy here last night was perfectly splendid. A fine
room, a fine house of intelligent, sympathizing people ; the
thing went off admirably. I am beyond doubt a better, a
rather better speaker than last year. I have profited some-
what ; gestures are certainly better, although, Heaven be
my witness, they are bad enough yet. . . . Our old land-
lord is the very lord of that kind of lords. I'd sell out my
stock in the universe for one twentieth of his suavity.
What wonders I might do then ! Oily Gammon was a
polar bear beside him. As I descended from the omnibus,
tied to that immortal trail of baggage, half a dozen nigs
seized upon the plunder, and old Chesterfield took one of
my hands, and, passing his other arm so gracefully, so
gently, so lovingly around my waist, led, conducted, es-
corted— took me into his castle, the Burdick House. You
remember Burdick ! I think I'll lie down.

Tlie Scientific Lecturer. 85

Well, I have had a nap and a dream — a smash-up on the
railroad; fourteen killed, several wounded. I tried to get
admission to the place where the surgeons were operating.
Dr. Blake would not admit me. I persisted, and was at
length graciously permitted to enter the hospital room after
the operating was all done. The first object or "case" I
saw was the upper end of a negro, like a blackened bust of
Webster standing on a barrel. He was not dead, for he
had a pipe in his mouth, which he kept steady with one hand.
He was puffing away most leisurely, and seemed entirely
happified. How do you think his other hand was occupied ?
Why, his heart had been taken out by the accident, and the
surgeons had replaced it by a pair of small wooden boxes
containing valves and pistons, which the acardiac wretch
was working alternately and most satisfactorily. Whatever
may be said of innate ideas or the creative power of mind,
the probability is that I could never have dreamed this
dream until after Harvey and the railroad system.

I approach the end of my sheet, but to what purpose
have I scribbled ? I have had nothing to say, and have
stuck to the formula. The Sunday is superb. I stay
within, and am blessedly let alone. Do you know, I have a
strange sort of feeling concerning this thing of where-
abouts. I have never before been so satisfied with drift-
ing, and I have a kind of vague dread of coming back to
New York. I have never before been in this sort of mood
of mind. I tolerate, I almost enjoy, I almost solicit ab-
sence. I have been solidly busy ; that may perhaps par-
tially account for it. What mood the coming fortnight will
induce remains for determination. You say you don't know
if you are managiig just right. It makes no difference.
Only sleep it out ; all the time you spend in sleep is clear
gain. If there is any surplus life, draw it off in the direc-
tion of letters — sent to Chicago the rest of the time, I guess.
Your brother, loving and discouraged, ELY

86 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Eleven at night — I have had a blessed, refreshing season
this evening with the first part of Bain, where he opens
the nervous system. There is no subject like it in all the
world under the sun. Let us rip it up from the bottom.
You can't learn too much about it, nor think too much
about it. Every step of simplification gained in this region
is a mighty stride in a grand direction. So, press on gently
with the brain and nervous system, . . .

My position is secured. If health lasts, it only remains
now to reap. It is well worth while to battle this thing
out. Every little point gained has a great value. I am
out of the horrible pit and miry clay of my to-day's letter.
Give yourself no trouble; I am not to be unhorsed now,

you understand. Truly,

E. L. Y.

LAFAYETTE, IND., December 21, 1859.
DEAR SISTER:

I have had a lesson.

" Only one ? " you say.
Yes, I have had many,
But the last to-day,
From that costly teacher

Whom we all employ,
In that thorough manner
Which we don't enjoy.

But I can't get on in this way — it's too slow — and so I must
dismount from Pegasus and take Foot-Walker line. I have
further to report of the Lord's dealings (read the inclosed
long extract). Lafayette turns out an audience of a thou-
sand. Think of the Masquerade after the publication of
that passage ! Wasn't that a fix ? But I have been provi-
dentially saved from mortification. Yesterday morning,
while in the cars, He who watches the ground birds and
counts hairs sent a cinder out of the popgun of fate and
struck the bird's eye in the white — the left one, It was a

The Scientific Lecturer. 87

dead shot. Then my eye swelled and inflamed furiously,
and when I arrived here I was done for — helpless. The
committee crowded round, condoling, consoling, disap-
pointed, etc. Some one was aware of the state of my eyes
heretofore, and enlightened them on the subject. I thought
I should have to leave at once for home. After getting all
ready to go — packing baggage done, bill paid, waiting for
the stage — the lamentations of the committee were so ve-
hement, their protestations of regret at not hearing me so
vociferous, that I said : " Gentlemen, if you want to hear
me lecture, you can do it. I'll go in blindfold rather than
you should suffer. If you say another word, I'll take the
risk myself and lecture to-night." " Oh, it's too late now,"
said they, referring to the evening paper containing extract
No. 2, which I inclose. " Very well," said I, "to-morrow
night, then." " Agreed," said they. I started out for lauda-
num, concentrated ammonia, and pills; put myself through,
and am round straight again to-day. But this (bless the
Lord !) affords excuse for not reading the Masquerade.* I
am going to give them the Sunbeam to-night and to-mor-
row night. I am now trying to fix up the other places by
telegraph where I am unhinged. It will probably bring me
home not till the 3ist — Saturday night. If 1 can get to
Schenectady Friday morning I will run up for the day.
And now, from the receipt of this till I come home you
won't have much to do. They want to see you at Saratoga.
Suppose you slip up till the 3ist — next week Saturday. I
will call, if possible; if not, you can come down alone.

I lectured at X last Thursday. My treatment there

* He wrote out a lecture on the Masquerade of the Elements, which
his sister printed in large letters with pen and ink, that he might try the
experiment of reading, as most lecturers did and do. He succeeded very
well with it in places where he had never been before ; but people who
had heard his extempore Sunbeam lectures did not conceal their disap-
pointment.

88 Edward Livingston Youmans.

was the shabbiest I have yet received. The committee met
me — three of them — and a carriage was ordered. We all rode
to the hotel, five minutes' walk, and I had the pleasure of
paying for the party — one dollar. Accommodations at the
hotel were fair, charge perfectly exorbitant. After the
lecture the secretary came up to me and handed me a roll
of bills, muttering indistinctly the word " seventy-five."
His manner was that of a sneak who was doing something
he was ashamed of. I said nothing, of course. There is
not a shadow of doubt that they had stipulated to pay a
hundred dollars, but chose to make twenty-five dollars by
this process. Well, if they can stand it I certainly can.
They will want me again, but will fail to get me.

I lectured in Ashtabula the other night in a howling
snowstorm ; had a crowd, and, although it was a small
place, they paid me seventy-five dollars, and earnestly
begged me to promise to come again next year. A teacher
drove over in his gig ten miles in the cold gale to attend
the lecture. He came to the tavern afterward and intro-
duced himself. He was a very fine, bright young fellow.
I commiserated his folly in coming out such an inclement
night. " I would not take five hundred dollars," he replied,
" for what I have learned this night, and I must hear that
lecture again." Next day I got a dispatch to come to
Geneva the first vacant night. He said the lecture gave
him the first " view " he had ever had in science, and would
be the turning point of his studies.

I go from place to place, getting into good quarters and
into all sorts of diabolical holes. At Mansfield I was to be
called for by the omnibus at five and a half A. M., to get the
train at three-quarters and off at six. At a quarter to six it
had not come. At ten minutes of six I started, with a negro
boy to carry my valise, ran all the way, and jumped on to

The Scientific Lecturer. 89

the train after it had started. Omnibus did not come at all.
At Youngstown I stayed in the most dismal and dolorous
den of a tavern I ever encountered. I was put to bed in a
compartment six feet by five, the bed a heap of rags, a par-
tition a little higher than my head, and a man dying of
consumption on the other side of it, coughing and expecto-
rating all night. Couldn't sleep. Got up at two, went
downstairs, and sat in the dingy, filthy, tobaccoed-and-
sanded bar-room till I left at six for Warren. Got a good
hotel there and a capital room, and enjoyed it. Went to
bed at eleven p. M. ; awakened at twelve by a glare of light
in my room. Sprang out of bed, and saw that the next
house was on fire. Six or eight buildings were burned, but
the brick hotel was saved. No sleep that night, of course.
Took the train at five o'clock for Cleveland. Got into the
cars ; overshoes pinched my feet — took them off ; fell
asleep, and slept an hour and a half, into Cleveland ;
awoke; overshoes gone — hooked. Such is life, or rather a
portion of it, for it has another side and a pleasanter.

At Grand Rapids I finished the Sunbeam with fine suc-
cess, but certain envious persons started the story that I
was a materialist, and there was much excitement. A depu-
tation of my warmest friends, who had been thrown into
spasms, waited upon me to get a formal authoritative con-
tradiction of the rumour. I denied their right to get ex-
cited, and demanded to know if I had given any occasion
for the rumour, and asked them if they were prepared to
assume that the naked tendency of science is, or involves,
materialism. Could they expect me to preach in addition
to lecturing? Had they no confidence that their cler-
gyman could take care of all applications, etc. ? They
agreed, and so on Sunday afternoon out came Dominie
Smith with a sermon on the lectures — conceding every-
thing, praising and puffing them extravagantly. I had ex-

go Edward Livingston Youmans.

pected the attendance would fall off at the next lecture,
but it did not.

The following is taken from a Buffalo newspaper
of 1873:

The seventh lecture in the Young Men's Association
course will be delivered at St. James's Hall this evening by
Prof. E. L. Youmans, of New York, editor of The Popular
Science Monthly. The subject upon which the professor
was originally announced to lecture was What is Social
Science ? A change became necessary, however, and the
subject of the lecture to-night is The Modern Doctrine of
Forces. A lecture upon any subject by Prof. Youmans is
sure to be both interesting and instructive. The hall
should be filled.

But, notwithstanding the eminence which Prof. Youmans
has attained as a scientist, those who know him most inti-
mately candidly admit that as a penman he is anything but
a success. Some time since Mr. F. D. Locke, chairman of
the Lecture Committee of the Young Men's Association,
wrote to the professor, reminding him of his engagement
here this evening. In due time the chairman received a
letter postmarked New York, and having for a signature
a combination of hieroglyphics which was supposed to be
meant for the name of Prof. Youmans. This letter was
evidently intended as a reply to that of Mr. Locke, though
it was utterly impossible to master the contents. It was
studied and pondered over, and submitted to experts, but
"no fellow could find out" what the deuce it was about.
Finally it was returned to the writer, with the regrets of the
committee that their early educational advantages had been
so limited that they were unable to decipher 'the epistle,
and requesting a copy done in a style more easily legible.
In reply to this the following was received :

The Scientific Lecturer. 91

NEW YORK, December 23, f£?j.
MR. FRANKLIN D. LOCKE:

MY DEAR SIR: I deeply sympathize with you in your
lack of early educational opportunities, but thank Heaven
that I was not thus neglected. My opening intellect was
most sedulously and skilfully cultivated, as is shown by the
fact that, when Alonzo Green came around winters in Sara-
toga County to teach writing school, I took a tallow candle
and some paper and quills and waded through the snow for
two miles that I might develop my precocious genius for
chirography. Such was my proficiency that I resolved to
pursue the destiny of a writing master, and if my eyes had
not failed me I should probably have ornamented that
itinerant vocation to this day.

Yours with commiseration, E. L. YOUMANS.

V

Here followed an " interpretation " of the letter
which had been " too many " for the chairman and
members of the lecture committee.

^^fy/^f^^.
LJu^^C^ C^%/

•r y ^

\jL-" /SL<1 ^^_ I9*fr- /^-C^

SPECIMEN OF YOUMANS'S HANDWRITING.

CHAPTER VI.
HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE.

1853-1860. Age, 32-39.

WHILE writing his Class-Book of Chemistry Mr.
Youmans had made a study of the physiological ac-
tion of alcohol. Following the best authorities of that
time — Liebig, Percy, Prout, Carpenter, and others —
he regarded alcohol as a disturber of functions and
disorganizer of structure, and therefore a poison ; and
because of its special action on cerebral tissue, a brain
poison. In 1853 the question of prohibitory legis-
lation was strongly agitating the public mind, and
Youmans prepared a carefully reasoned argument in
favour of State action, on the ground that alcohol in-
cited its victims to so much heinous crime as to justify
society in legislating against the traffic in it. Mr.
Greeley cordially adopted these views, and the article
was given an entire page of the Tribune. It so pleased
the teetotal party that they urged its writer to make
a book of it, which he did, under the title of Alcohol
and the Constitution of Man. Further reflection on
the subject, and change of conviction as to the legiti-
macy and efficiency of legislation in the circumstances
of the case, led him to abandon the ground he had
taken, so he let his book pass out of print.

In the course of 1853 his brother Earle returned
from California, and Edward was very anxious to have

(92)

Household Science. 93

him engage in scientific farming. He proposed that
Earle should establish an experimental farm at Sara-
toga, where all that was new in agricultural chemistry
should be practically applied. However, before mat-
ters had taken definite shape it became clear that the
task would not be congenial, and the enterprise was
abandoned. Feeling this disappointment to be due to
Earle's lack of scientific training, Edward determined
that a younger brother — William — should be better
equipped. William was therefore given a thorough
scientific education, and afterward graduated in medi-
cine. All this was designed with distinct reference to
the probability of future co-operation ; for not only
had blindness debarred Youmans from the system-
atic scientific training he had sought in early life, but
impaired vision and incapacity for enduring protracted
desk work made a coadjutor necessary to him. With-
out the co-operation of his brother William he could
not some years later have established the Popular Sci-
ence Monthly. On this brother its editorial duties
gradually devolved, until, at the last, they were wholly
transferred to his charge.

The success of the Chemical Chart suggested its
amplification in book form. A volume was accord-
ingly prepared, and published in 1854, entitled The
Chemical Atlas. The scale of illustration was much
smaller than that of the Chart; its diagrams portrayed
elementary chemistry, the chemistry of rocks and
strata, series of homologous compounds, nitrogenized
and non-nitrogenized principles of food, and illustrated
isomerism and compound radicals. Combustion, res-
piration, fermentation, and the chemistry of light were
also made the subjects of pictures. All the qualities
which had recommended the Chemistry equally

94 Edward Livingston Youmans.

marked this Atlas. Both publications were based on
the theory of binary combination ; when this was super-
seded by the current chemical philosophy the Chem-
istry was rewritten. As the new theories did not lend
themselves to graphic illustration, the Chart and Atlas
were not revised, and gradually fell out of use.

Ever since the preparation of the Class-Book of
Chemistry Mr. Youmans had cherished the purpose
of preparing a handbook for the household. His
studies no less than his sympathies and tastes had led
him to regard the home as a field which perhaps even
more imperatively than the farm demanded science
for the relief and economy of its toil ; while the cir-
cumstance that so much of his time throughout the
years of blindness was spent indoors made him still
more keenly alive to the bearings of scientific studies
upon the processes of the household. No work of his
life better expresses his character than the Handbook
of Household Science, which after several years of
preparation was published in 1857. He had carefully
studied the practical applications of science to the
heating, lighting, ventilation, and purification of dwell-
ings, and had given especial attention to the subject
of foods in relation to health and economy. At this
time he was much aided and encouraged by his excel-
lent friend Mr. R. H. Manning, a gentleman of wide
knowledge and sound judgment, who was building
for himself a house in Brooklyn, and was naturally
interested in whatever might tend to make it whole-
some and easy to manage. Many were the brisk
discussions over points in the Handbook- between
these two keen men/each with his marked gifts of
expression. But on one point they were heartily
agreed— that the highest use of knowledge is in minis-

Household Science. 95

tering- to the everyday welfare of mankind. Some
extracts from the Introduction to the Handbook ably
summarize some of the author's favourite views on
this point :

It deserves to be better understood that the highest
value of science is derived from its power of advancing the
public good. It is more and more to be consecrated to
human improvement as a sublime regenerative agency.
Working jointly and harmoniously with the great moral
forces of Christian civilization, we believe it is destined to
effect extensive social ameliorations. That it is not yet
fully accepted in this relation is hardly surprising. The
work of presenting scientific truth in those forms which
may best engage the popular mind is not to be fairly ex-
pected of those who give their lives to its original develop-
ment. . . . Conscious that the effects of his labours are
finally and always beneficial in society, the enthusiast of
research may be excused his indifference to their immediate
reception and uses. But the formal denial that the alle-
giance of mind is supremely due to the good of society is
quite another affair. The sentiment, too widely entertained
in learned and educational circles, that knowledge is to be
firstly and chiefly prized for its own sake and the mental
gratification it produces, we cannot accept. The view
seems narrow and illiberal, and is not inspired of human
sympathy. It took origin in the times when the improve-
ment of man's condition, his general education and eleva-
tion, were not dreamed of. It came from the ancient
philosophy, which was not a dispensation of popular benefi-
cence, an all-diffusive, ennobling agency in society, but
confessed its highest aim to be a personal advantage, shut
up in the individual soul. It was not radiant and outflow-
ing like the sun, but drew all things inward, engulfing them
in a maelstrom of selfishness.

The baneful ethics of this philosophy have given place

96 Edward Livingston Youmans.

to the higher and more generous inculcations of Christian-
ity, which lays upon human nature its broad and eternal
requirement, "to do good." From this authoritative moral
demand science cannot be exempted. The power it confers
is to be held and used as power is exercised by God himself,
for purposes of universal blessing. . . .

We place a high estimate upon the advantages which
society may reap from a better acquaintance with material
phenomena, for life is a stern realm of cause and effect, fact
and law. As such we would deal with it in education, giv-
ing prominence to those forms of knowledge which will
work the largest practical alleviations and most substantial
improvement throughout the community. It is wisely de-
signed that those studies which may become in the highest
degree useful are also first in intellectual interest. ... So
far from being unfriendly to the imagination, as is some-
times intimated, science is its noblest precursor and ally.
Can that be unfavourable to this faculty which infinitely
multiplies its materials and boundlessly multiplies its scope ?
In unsealing the mysteries of being — in turning the com-
monest spot into a museum of wonders — who can doubt
that science has opened a new and splendid career for the
play of the diviner faculties, and that its pursuit affords the
most exhilarating as well as the healthiest and purest of
intellectual enjoyments?

Of the method of science he says :

It educates the attention by establishing habits of ac-
curate observation, strengthens the judgment, teaches the
supremacy of facts, cultivates order in their classification,
and develops the reason through the establishment of gen-
eral principles. It is claimed, as an advantage of mathe-
matics, that it deals with certainties, and, raising the mind
above the confusions and insecurities of imperfect knowl-
edge, habituates it to the demand of absolute truth. That

Household Science. gj

benefits may arise from this exalted state of intellectual
requirement we are far from doubting, and are conscious of
the danger of resting satisfied with anything short of per-
fect certitude, where that can be attained. But here again
there is possibility of error. Mathematical standards and
processes are totally inapplicable in the thousandfold con-
tingencies of common experience, and the mind which is
deeply imbued with their spirit is little attracted to those
departments of thought where, after the utmost labour,
there still remain doubt, dimness, uncertainty, and entangle-
ment. And yet such is precisely the practical field in which
our minds must daily work. The mental discipline we need,
therefore, is not merely a narrow deductive training of the
faculties of calculation, with their inflexible demand for
exactitude, but such a systematic and symmetric exercise
of its several powers as shall render it pliant and adaptive,
and train it in that class of intellectual operations which
shall best prepare it for varied and serviceable intellectual
duty in the practical affairs of life.

He continues the argument by considering educa-
tion in its broad relations to liberty and progress :

Education, from the earliest time, has been under the
patronage of civil and ecclesiastical despotisms, whose
necessary policy has been the repression of free thought.
The state of mind forever insisted on has been that of sub-
missive acceptance of authority. Instead of laying open
the limitations, uncertainties, and conflicts of knowledge
which arise from its progressive nature, the spirit of the
general teaching has been that all things are settled, and
that wisdom has reached its last fulfilment. Instead of
encouraging bold inquiry and inciting to noble conquest,
the effect has rather been to reduce the student to a mere
tame, unquestioning recipient of established formulas and
time-honoured dogmas. It is obvious on all sides that this

98 Edward Livingston Youmans.

state of things has been deeply disturbed. The introduc-
tion of republicanism, with political freedom of speech and
action ; the advent of Protestantism, with religious liberty
of thought; and the splendid march of science, which has
enlarged the circle of knowledge, multiplied the elements
of power, and scattered social and industrial revolution
right and left for the last hundred years — these new dis-
pensations have invaded the old repose and fired the minds
of multitudes with a new consciousness of power. Yet we
cannot forget that our education still retains much of its
ancient spirit, is yet largely scholastic and arbitrarily au-
thoritative. We believe that this evil may be to a consid-
erable degree corrected by a frank admission of the incom-
pleteness of much of our knowledge; by showing that it is
necessarily imperfect, and that the only just and honest
course often involves reservation of opinion and suspension
of judgment. This may be consonant neither with the
teacher's pride nor the pupil's ambition, nevertheless it is
imperatively demanded. We need to acquire more humility
of mind and a sincerer reverence for truth ; to understand
that much which passes for knowledge is unsettled, and
that we should be constant learners through life. The
active influences of society, as well as the schoolroom,
teach far other lessons. We are committed in early child-
hood to blind partisanships — political and religious — and
drive on through life in the unquestioning and unscrupu-
lous advocacy of doctrines which are quite as likely to
be false as true, and are perhaps utterly incapable of
honest definitive adjustment. Science inculcates a differ-
ent spirit, which is most forcibly illustrated in those
branches where absolute certainty of conclusion is difficult
of attainment.

Coming to the details of his volume, after pointing
out that while the principal statements in the chapters
on heat, light, and air were comparatively well estab-

Household Science. 99

lished, on the other hand our knowledge of the physio-
logical effects of foods was in a much less advanced
condition, he closed as follows :

An important result of the more earnest and general
pursuit of science by the young will be to find out and de-
velop a larger number of minds having natural aptitudes
for research and investigation. As there are born poets
and born musicians, so also there are born inventors and
born experimenters — minds originally fitted to combine and
mould the plastic materials of Nature into numberless forms
of usefulness and value. It is a vulgar error that the work
of discovery and improvement is already mainly accom-
plished. The thoughtful well understand that man has
hardly yet entered upon that magnificent career of con-
quest in the peaceful domain of Nature to which he is des-
tined, and which will be hastened by nothing so much as a
more general kindling of the minds of the young with en-
thusiasm for science. The harvest awaits the reapers. How
strange that man should have neglected it so long ! Fuel,
air, water, and the metals, as we see them acting together
now in the living, labouring steam engine, have been wait-
ing from the foundation of the world for a chance to relieve
man of the worst drudgeries of toil. Long and fruitlessly
did the sunbeam court the opportunity of leaving upon the
earth permanent impressions of the things he revealed ;
while the lightning, though seemingly a rollicking spirit of
the skies, was yet impatient to be pressed into the quiet and
useful service of man. Can there be a doubt that other
powers and forces, equally potent and marvellous, await the
discipline of human genius ? Not in vain was man called
upon, at the very morning of creation, to " subdue the
earth." Already has he justified the bestowment of the
viceroyal honour. Who shall speak of the possibilities that
are awaiting him in the future ?

ioo Edward Livingston Youmans.

The Handbook of Household Science was not
the ordinary collection of scrappy comment, recipe,
and apothegm, but a thoroughly scientific treatise on
air, water, fuel, food, and cleansing materials, writ-,
ten in a simple and lucid style, and it is still a sound
and authoritative book. Mr. Youmans had much in
mind the need of such a book in girls' schools, and was
disappointed at the comparatively small demand for it
in that quarter. Teachers complained that it was too
full, that its study consumed too large a portion of the
time allotted to " the course," and to meet this objec-
tion he sometimes spoke of condensing the volume.
But the general demand for the book was so satisfac-
tory that he was led to amplify rather than to reduce
it. In this mood he planned a comprehensive House-
hold Cyclopaedia, and after working at it from time
to time, as opportunity offered, for the rest of his life,
he bequeathed to his brother William the task of com-
pleting it.

In connection with the popularization of science,
the following letter to Mr. W. T. Henderson, of Cin-
cinnati, who had charge of the common-school libra-
ries of Ohio, is an illustration of the zeal with which
Youmans was sure to extend a helping hand to any
fellow-worker :

NEW YORK, October <?, 1860.

MY DEAR SIR: I send you this day a copy of a book,
What may be Learned from a Tree, which possibly may
not have fallen under your notice. I do it though I am
assured that the matter of books for the Ohio libraries is
closed hermetically; yet, in the hope that there may be
somewhere some possible slip or gap or surplus, I never-
theless write. My object in soliciting your attention to the
book is, first, I am persuaded you have not a better book

Household Science. 101

on your list, and few equal to it in interest, instructiveness,
and adaptation to popular want. It is a capital book,
clearly written, reliable, thoroughly posted in its science,
suggestive, and abounds in lessons of wisdom for the con-
duct of life which have a high value, as they are linked on
so directly to the order of creation — to the life of so famil-
iar and beautiful an object as the living tree. Secondly, I
am moved to write and strike for any forlorn chance there
may be by the fact that the author is a poor, struggling
man of Philadelphia, without practical tact, who can't find
the handles of this world, and deserves that others should
help him. His book has been out a year, and six hundred
copies have been sold, almost entirely by himself. Dr.
Draper, of this city, called my attention to the book and
the man. I went on to Philadelphia and dug him up — a
splendid botanist, a fine thinker, yet in all that appertains
to this world a poor creature. The house of Appleton have
kindly promised me to do what they can to push the book
into better notice. I have done what I could for the author
and his work gratuitously. I neither expect nor want any-
thing for my trouble, time, or expense. The publishers
say they would be glad to help without expecting to make
much in the matter, and, all this being* the case, I venture
to write you as I have done. If the book pleases you and
it lies in your power, pray give us a little assistance.

Very truly yours, E. L. YOUMANS.

CHAPTER VII.

FIRST ACQUAINTANCE WITH HERBERT SPENCER.
i860. Age, J p.

IN one of the most beautiful of all the shining pages
of his History of the Spanish Conquest in America Sir
Arthur Helps describes the way in which, through
" some fitness of the season, whether in great scientific
discoveries or in the breaking into light of some great
moral cause, the same processes are going on in many
minds, and it seems as if they communicated with each
other invisibly. We may imagine that all good pow-
ers aid the ' new light/ and brave and wise thoughts
about it float aloft in the atmosphere of thought as
downy seeds are borne over the fruitful face of the
earth" (vol. iii, page 113). The thinker who elabo-
rates a new system of philosophy deeper and more com-
prehensive than any yet known to mankind, though
he may work in solitude, nevertheless does not work
alone. The very fact which makes his great scheme
of thought a success and not a failure is the fact that
it puts into definite and coherent shape the ideas which
many people are more or less vaguely and loosely en-
tertaining, and that it carries to a grand and trium-
phant conclusion processes of reasoning in which many
persons have already begun taking the earlier steps.
This community in mental trend between the immor-
tal discoverer and many of the brightest contempo-

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. 103

rary minds, far from diminishing the originality of his
work, constitutes the feature of it which makes it a
permanent acquisition for mankind, and distinguishes
it from the eccentric philosophies which now and then
come up to startle the world for a while, but are pres-
ently discarded and forgotten. The history of mod-
ern physics—as in the case of the correlation of forces
and the undulatory theory of light — furnishes us with
many instances of wise thoughts floating like downy
seeds in the atmosphere until the moment has come for
them to take root. And so it has been with the great-
est achievement of modern thinking — the doctrine of
evolution. Students and investigators in all depart-
ments, alike in the physical and in the historical sci-
ences, were fairly driven by the nature of the phenom-
ena before them into some hypothesis, more or less
vague, of gradual and orderly change or development.
The world was ready and waiting for Herbert Spen-
cer's mighty work when it came, and it was for that
reason that it was so quickly triumphant over the old
order of thought. The victory has been so thorough,
swift, and decisive that it will take another generation
to narrate the story of it so as to do it full justice.
Meanwhile, people's minds are apt to be somewhat
dazed with the rapidity and wholesale character of the
change; and nothing is more common than to see them
adopting Mr. Spencer's ideas without recognizing them
as his or knowing whence they got them. As fast as
Mr. Spencer could set forth his generalizations they
were taken hold of here and there by special workers,
each in his own department, and utilized therein. His
general system was at once seized, assimilated, and set
forth with new illustrations by serious thinkers who
were already groping in the regions of abstruse thought

IO4 Edward Livingston Youmans.

which the master's vision pierced so clearly. And
thus the doctrine of evolution has come to be insep-
arably interfused with the whole mass of thinking in
our day and generation. I do not mean to imply that
people commonly entertain very clear ideas about it,
for clear ideas on any subject are not altogether com-
mon. I suspect that a good many people would hesi-
tate if asked to state exactly what Newton's law of
gravitation is ; a good many, doubtless, would stop be-
fore arriving at that statement about inverse squares
which comprises the pith of the whole matter.

Among the very few men in America forty years
ago who were feeling their way toward some such uni-
fied conception of Nature as Spencer was about to set
forth in all its glory — among the very few who were
thus prepared to grasp the doctrine of evolution at
once and expound it with fresh illustrations Edward
Youmans was the first in the field. It was in the
course of the year 1856, while he was at work upon
the Household Science, that he fell in with an article
upon Spencer's Principles of Psychology in the Lon-
don Medico-Chirurgical Review, written by Dr. J. D.
Morell, author of some books on philosophy more read
then than now. Youmans was so deeply impressed by
the article that he at once sent to London for a copy
of the book, which had been published in the preced-
ing year. It will be observed that this was four years
before the Darwinian theory was announced in the first
edition of the Origin of Species. Toward the end of
that book Mr. Darwin looked forward to a " distant
future " when the conception of gradual development
might be applied to the phenomena of conscious intel-
ligence. He had not then learned of the existence of
such a book as the Principles of Psychology. In later

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. 105

editions he was obliged to modify his statement, and
confess that, instead of looking so far forward, he had
better have looked about him. I have more than once
heard Mr. Darwin laugh merrily over this, at his own
expense.

When the book arrived from London it found You-
mans deeply engrossed in his own work. As he cut
the leaves and glanced over the pages, they seemed
immensely difficult. His sister had more leisure ; so
he gave the formidable volume to her, to see what she
could make of it. Finding in the preface a suggestion
that readers unfamiliar with such abstruse studies
might perhaps find it for their advantage to read the
third and fourth divisions of the work before attempt-
ing the first and second, she profited by the hint and
soon became deeply interested.

After struggling for a while with the weighty
problems of this book — the most profound treatise
upon mental phenomena that any human mind has
yet produced — Youmans saw that the theory ex-
pounded in it was a long stride in the direction of
a general theory of evolution. His interest in this
subject received a new and fresh stimulus. He read
Social Statics, and began to recognize Spencer's hand
in the anonymous articles in the quarterlies, in whicff
he was then announcing and illustrating various por-
tions or segments of his newly discovered law of evo-
lution. One evening in February, 1860, as Youmans
was calling at Mr. Manning's house, in Brooklyn, the
Rev. Samuel Johnson, of Salem, showed him the
famous prospectus of the great series of philosophical
works which Spencer proposed to issue by subscrip-
tion. Mr. Johnson had obtained this from Edward
Silsbee, of Salem, who was one of the very first Ameri-

io6 Edward Livingston Youmans.

cans to become interested in Spencer. The very next
day Youmans wrote the following letter to Spencer,
offering his aid in procuring American subscriptions,
and otherwise :

NEW YORK, February 23, 1860.

DEAR SIR : My friend, Samuel Johnson, Unitarian cler-
gyman, of Salem, Mass., yesterday called my attention to a
letter and circular from yourself, proposing a reissue of
your writings. I was not only greatly pleased with the
idea, but the circumstance was especially fortunate for me,
as it gave me a clue to your whereabouts, which I had for
some time sought. I was on the point of writing to Dr.
Chapman* for your address. My purpose was this: I
meditate the compilation of a volume designed to present
the increasing claims of science upon teachers and the
directors of education, to contain the addresses of Faraday,
Whewell, Tyndall, Paget, and Daubeny before the Royal
Institution, on the popular claims of their respective
branches of science, together with the address of Agassiz
on kindred points, and your own article in the North
British (I think), which was omitted from the edition of
your essays. There is still another article, the opening
one in the Westminster for last July — What Knowledge is
of most Worth — which I wish also to include, and my so-
ijcitation was to fii}d its authorship. I concluded before I
read a page of it that you wrote it; the full perusal
strengthened my conviction ; yet, of course, as I may be
mistaken, I wish to find out about it. I might have
applied to the editor of the Westminster, but Scott, the
republisher, tells me the conductors are often shy and
delicate about giving this kind of information. I should
therefore be* glad of an assurance from yourself ; and if I

* John Chapman, M. D., at that time editor of the Westminster
Review.

First Acquaintance ivit/i Herbert Spencer. 107

happen to have been mistaken, would you not probably be
able without trouble to inform me who the author is ?

Respecting the plan of your publication I had no
opportunity to learn anything, as I had not time to read
the circular. But whatever you propose in the matter I
fully acce'pt, and will most gladly do anything in my power
to forward the enterprise. I have published several ele-
mentary books by which I have been somewhat mixed up
with book men and the book business, and this circumstance
may afford me some opportunity to aid the object. I am
more or less connected with the lyceum system through-
out the country, and, dealing with scientific topics, I fall in
with the class of men who would take most interest in your
current thought. Lecturing, however, is now about closed
for the season.

I got the impression that the push was first to be made
here, and that the project might be somewhat contingent
upon the result. How many subscribers will you need here
to justify the undertaking ? I wish you would forward me
a circular, or, if possible, several, with any accompanying
statement that may be desirable. If you should send sev-
eral, you might leave them at 16 Little Britain, which is
the London depot of the house I publish with (D. Appleton
& Co.). They will forward with goods. If I succeed in
shortly bringing out the volume I spoke of, it will furnish
additional means of advancing the object.

I have to thank you most earnestly for the pleasure and
advantage I have derived from the yet too hasty and frag-
mentary perusal of your books ; and I am justified in doing
the same thing in behalf of quite a number of friends for
whom I have had the great gratification of importing sev-
eral of your volumes. And now I pray you excuse this
informal Yankee short cut to business. If it be your pleas-
ure to write me, please direct to the care of D. Appleton &
Co., New York city.

Very respectfully, E. I, YOUMANS.

io8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

P. S. — Again: a friend of mine, an admirer of your
writings, has expressed a frequent and earnest desire to
get your portrait. I share the sentiment. Have you a
spare engraving or photograph to send over the sea? You
see, we take the utmost advantage of our Yankee reputa-
tion. E. L. Y.

Mr. Spencer's cordial reply was as follows :

24 OAKLEY SQUARE, LONDON, 26 March, 1860,

DEAR SIR : I am greatly obliged by your letter of 23
February, and must apologize for having so long delayed
answering it, partly on the ground that I have been over-
done with correspondence in the furtherance of my project
here, and partly on the ground that my plans were scarcely
mature.

Referring to the points of your letter in the order in
which they stand, let me first undeceive you as to the nature
of the series of works to be published. I fear that I must
have used some misleading expression, for I by no means
intend a "reissue of my writings." Four fifths will be
wholly new, the parts written will be in most cases greatly
developed, and the whole will assume an organization not
even indicated in anything I have as yet published. The
new organization will absorb, digest, and reorganize the
fragments already written, along with a far larger mass
that is unwritten.

I very gladly accept the assistance you so kindly offer
in furthering my scheme by obtaining subscribers to my
series in the United States. I have just written to my
friend Mr. E. A. Silsbee, of Salem, Mass, (to whom I sent
the circular you saw), inclosing him a revised circular con-
taining, with alterations, a list of the first subscribers in
England, including a number of the chief names in science
and literature. This revised circular, with its appended
names, I have suggested to Mr. Silsbee to reprint (at my

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. 109

expense) for distribution in the United States. I have sug-
gested that, in addition to the leading English names, there
be added to the American edition of the circular as many
American names of note as can be readily obtained. My
friend Prof. Huxley has suggested Prof. Dana, Prof. Asa
Gray, Prof. Leidy, and Dr. Draper as likely men, and I
have hinted to Mr. Silsbee that possibly you would allow
your name to be included. If you could, from your knowl-
edge of men of note throughout the States, suggest to Mr.
Silsbee any other names of weight which might be got, it
would be a service.

By the time that the American edition of the circular is
fully printed I propose writing again to Mr. Silsbee with
respect to its distribution. Possibly through your con-
nection with the lyceum system, which you are so good as
to name in relation to the matter, you would be able to
facilitate this. If you could furnish Mr. Silsbee with the
names of any who would act as local distributors, it would
be an important aid. You see, I am taking you at your
word, and am, I fear, imposing on you considerable trouble.
The fact, however, that I am unable to do anything myself
on the other side of the Atlantic, and have therefore to
trust to those who feel an interest in the matter, must be
my excuse.

Your question, " How many American subscribers will
suffice?" I am not able to answer. My hope is, that the
circulation in England and America together will suffice;
and until the result is known here (the final issue of the
circular not having yet taken place) I cannot say what
number from the United States will be needed to make up
an adequate list.

Referring to your question concerning the article, What
Knowledge is of most Worth ? you are right in ascribing
it to me. I should, however, regret to see it and the one
from the North British included in the volume you con-

1 10 Edward Livingston Youmans.

template, because I am myself hoping, in the course of a
year, to republish these articles, along with an equal bulk of
matter on the same topic, in the shape of a volume on
education, and I was thinking of exporting part of the
edition to the United States, or else agreeing with an
American house to reprint it.

With many thanks for your expressions of sympathy and
offers of aid, believe me, dear sir, faithfully yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

With this correspondence began the friendship
which was one of the warmest in Youmans's life, and
which gave added zest to all his subsequent labours.
As the friendship began long before there was any
adequate recognition of Spencer's genius by the pub-
lic, Youmans was able to render him great service.
His aid was from the outset important in a material
sense, and of still higher value was his intelligent and
enthusiastic sympathy.

Mr. Spencer's first idea was to have his projected
series of books published in Boston ; and there was
some talk of Messrs. Ticknor & Fields — then at the
Old Corner Bookstore — undertaking to conduct the
series in case subscriptions enough should be received.
But when, in the course of 1860, Mr. Spencer's book
on Education, above referred to, was offered to Tick-
nor & Fields, they declined to publish it, which was,
of course, a grave mistake from the business point
of view. Youmans, however, was not sorry for this,
for it gave him the opportunity to place Spencer's
books where he could do most to forward their
success.

Allusion has already been made to his chance visit
to the house of D. Appleton & Co. in the days of his
blindness. It was an auspicious event for all con-

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. in

cerned. In the first place, the Appletons became the
publishers of Youmans's books. His sagacity and his
magnetic personality prevailed with them as with al-
most everybody. By degrees he became an adviser
as regarded matters of publication, and it was largely
through his far-sighted advice that the Appletons
entered upon the publication of such books as those
of Buckle, Darwin, Huxley, Tyndall, Haeckel, and
others of like character, always paying a royalty to
the authors, the same as to American authors, in spite
of the absence of an international copyright law. As
publishers of books of this sort the Appletons have
come to be pre-eminent. It is obvious enough nowa-
days that such books are profitable from a business
point of view ; but thirty years and more ago this
was by no means obvious, and I doubt if there was
any other house in the United States that would not
have been at least very likely to view the matter in
the same light as Messrs. Ticknor & Fields. The
Americans were at that time excessively provincial.
There was much intellectual eagerness, along with
very meagre knowledge, and few persons had access
to authoritative sources of information. Reprints of
English books, translations from French and German,
were sadly behind the times. In the Connecticut
town where I lived people would begin to wake up to
the existence of some great European book or system
of thought after it had been before the world any-
where from a dozen to fifty years. In those days,
therefore, it required some boldness to undertake the
reprinting of new scientific books, and none have rec-
ognized more freely than the Appletons the impor-
tance of the part played by Youmans in this matter.
His work as adviser to a great publishing house and

112 Edward Livingston Youmans.

his work as lecturer re-enforced each other, and thus
his capacity for usefulness was much increased.

When Mr. Spencer's book on Education failed to
find favour in Boston, the Appletons took it, and thus
presently secured the management of the philosoph-
ical series. This brought Youmans into permanent re-
lations with Spencer and his work, as begins to appear
in the following letter :

NEW YORK, October 5, 1860.

MY DEAR SIR : I received your kind letter of Septem-
ber nth, and was grieved to hear of your unusually dis-
turbed health. I trust it is not to continue. My apology
for intruding upon you now is, that after the arrangement
had been effected Mr. Silsbee had not time to send a letter
by the steamer to-day, and I therefore write in his place.
Mr. Silsbee probably informed you that Ticknor & Fields
declined to publish the book on Education. He further-
more said there was no chance in Boston, and delegated
me to arrange, if possible, in New York. He did not re-
strict me to specific terms, but as the work had be-en gen-
erously offered to Ticknor & Fields upon their own condi-
tions, he committed it to me in the same liberal spirit.
From mixed considerations I was anxious that the Apple-
tons should publish the book. There is more import in their
imprint than in that of any other house on this side of the
Atlantic. They have been established nearly half a cen-
tury, and have won a pre-eminent reputation for sterling
and valuable books. I therefore thought it would be well-
indeed, best — for the book itself, and also as an introduc-
tion of its author to our people; and, besides, the firm have
treated me with great personal kindness, and I was anxious
they should have the good fortune to publish the book.
Furthermore, I have myself put forth some trifles in the
way of science for the multitude, and I was ambitious that
they might go in company with your masterly exposition

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. 113

of the educational claims of science. I thought also that
if our house had the management of the work I might pos-
sibly in various small ways contribute to urge it forward;
for we have found on this side that the straight and narrow
way that leads right up to the heaven of success is travers-
able by but one motor — namely, push. And although in a
house of great business, with numerous departments in
rigorous discipline, the general movement is steady and
automatic, and all things thrown into the hopper are
ground out at the usual rate, still the machinery is not
without reducing and multiplying gear and some chance
for crowding. So I asked the gentlemen to drive on with
the book and do the best they could for the author. They
promised, and when Mr. W. H. Appleton arrived from Eu-
rope, the day before yesterday morning, one hundred pages
of the work had been stereotyped. I was anxious to get
the volume on Education out at the earliest moment and
before the first part of the Series arrives. We do not exactly
know about that " Unknowable " ; we have great faith in it
undoubtedly, but we are sure of the weapon in hand and
would prefer to open the campaign with it. I therefore by
no means regret the delay of the first part, nor need you
trouble yourself to hasten it.

After explaining- that the chance for the series at
Ticknor & Fields's was very discouraging, and that it
was better that Mr. Spencer should transact business
with but one house, he says :

Mr. W. H. Appleton told me yesterday that the firm
would take the series and do the best it can with them. I
hope this change will be satisfactory to you, and that you
may not have placed the names of Ticknor & Fields upon
the first part, nor have sent the volumes yet. If you should
have printed their names on the title-page and cover, and
not have forwarded them, I would earnestly ask if it will
6

114 Edward Livingston Yomnans.

not be desirable to change the covers and print " D. Ap-
pleton & Co., New York," thereon instead ? The copies
of your other work will be brought from Ticknor & Fields
to New York, as they have declared they cannot sell them.
Allow me to suggest that the terms Mr. Appleton proposes
for the Education — ten per cent of the sales to the author
after preliminary expenses are paid — is all that I receive,
and the usual rate here, except where a popular author can
dictate terms.

And now, dear sir, I pray you do not think of me as
having officiously thrust myself into your business. Mat-
ters seemed to have " opened," as the Friends say, and I
" felt required " to take hold. If in the slightest manner I
can contribute to advance your interests it will be an un-
speakable pleasure, more especially when I remember that
in so doing I am serving the public in the most efficient
manner in my power. I hope the course things have taken
will not be unsatisfactory to you nor prove a hindrance to
your valuable projects.

With best wishes for the restoration of your health, I
am, yours most truly, E. L. YOUMANS.

As a result of these negotiations the Appletons
presently undertook to issue the philosophical series
in parts, concurrently with the publication in London.
They also published a reprint of Social Statics, with
a portrait of Mr. Spencer furnished by Mr. Manning.
A selection from the Essays, Scientific, Political, and
Speculative, was afterward published, under the title,
Illustrations of Universal Progress. This was a happy
thought ; for the general reader has a mind of very
limited capacity, and usually likes to take his philoso-
phy in morsels, so that doubtless many persons were
able to obtain some notion of evolution in this way
who would have been simply wearied by the mag-

First Acquaintance with Herbert Spencer. 115

nificent long-sustained argument of First Principles.
A second selection, under the title, Essays, Political,
Moral, and ^Esthetic, soon followed, and the diversity
of themes served to widen the circle of Mr. Spencer's
readers. The publication of these books was an ex-
periment entirely due to Youmans's urgency. As
soon as they were ready for the market he wrote re-
views of them, and by no means in the usual perfunc-
tory way. His reviews and notices were turned out
by the score, and scattered about in the magazines
and newspapers where they would do the most good.
Not content with this, he made numerous pithy and
representative extracts for the reading columns of va-
rious daily and weekly papers. Whenever he found
another writer who could be pressed into the service,
he would give him Spencer's books, kindle him with a
spark from his own blazing enthusiasm, and set him to
writing for the press. The effects of this work were
multifarious and fair-reaching, and — year in and year
out — it was never for a moment allowed to flag. The
most indefatigable vender of wares was never more
ruthlessly persistent in advertising for lucre's sake
than Edward Youmans in preaching in a spirit of the
purest disinterestedness the gospel of evolution. As
long as he lived Mr. Spencer had upon this side of the
Atlantic an alter ego ever on the alert, with vision like
that of a hawk for the slightest chance to promote his
interests and those of his system of thought.

CHAPTER VIII.

MARRIAGE AND FIRST VISIT TO ENGLAND.
1861-1862. Age, 40-41.

MR. YOUMANS was married in 1861 to Mrs. William
L. Lee, the widow of a distinguished jurist, and a lady
of culture, refinement, and much critical literary ability.
That a wife of such nice perceptions and intellectual
gifts should earnestly sympathize with the literary and
scientific work of her husband was to be expected. As
his amanuensis, and as an assistant and companion in the
occupations, correspondence, and .travel, by means of
which he was brought into intimate relations with the
leading thinkers of England and America, she rendered
him valuable aid which he highly appreciated.

Accompanied by his wife, in the year following
their marriage he made his first visit to England and
to the Continent of Europe, sailing from New York
in the Great Eastern, July 26, 1862. There were a
good many secessionists on board, and the voyage was
enlivened by a characteristic incident :

One evening there was a ball, and the saloon was deco-
rated with English and American flags. Secesh wouldn't
dance under the Stars and Stripes, and went raging out of
the room. Captain made a very good speech ; said that
this was a neutral vessel, and so long as he was in com-
mand the American flag should remain. But Secesh was

Marriage and First Visit to England. 1 1 7

not pacified ; ordered liquor, and drank to George Wash-
ington, the first rebel, then to Jeff Davis, etc.

Youmans went directly to Derby, where he was
expecting to find Herbert Spencer, but was disap-
pointed. Mr. Spencer was taking his customary vaca-
tion in Scotland, but his father and mother were at
home, and the following extract from a letter dated
London, August 10, 1862, gives an account of You-
mans's call at their house :

I sat a few moments in the dark, when a tall, dignified-
looking gentleman of very quiet deportment entered, and,
approaching in a very measured and pleasant way, said,
" Mr. Youmans ? " I said, " Mr. Spencer, father of Herbert
Spencer?" and he said, " Yes ; take a seat." Thus was I
fairly ensconced in the unpretentious home of the Spencers.
They have but one child — Herbert ; they have had others,
but they are dead. Mr. Spencer does not teach a school
[though he did until his health broke down, many years
before],* but he receives pupils in mathematics and other
things, who come and get lessons at his house [or receive
them at their own]. He is an unusually fine-looking person
— indeed, I think, handsome. He has a fine, profuse head
of grey hair, which he wears in a spirited standing way ;
must be sixty-five or sixty-eight years of age [he was then
seventy-two], but looks younger in the face, although his
shrivelled hands proclaim him older. Herbert has not his
face, but his brain. f His lips are quite thick, but his mouth
is handsome and expressive, with fine curves. A narrow
band of close-cut grey whiskers surrounds his face. His
expression of mouth reminded me of Joe Wood's mouth ;
indeed, there is considerable resemblance in their thought-

* The remarks within brackets are Mr. Herbert Spencer's comments,
f Youmans, of course, when writing this letter, knew Herbert Spencer's
face only by a photograph.

n8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ful and reserved manner. Fancy Joe Wood handsome, a
little taller, a little slenderer, like Newbury Loomis, and
with the old-school style of Uncle Good, and all these
characteristics will, of course, mislead you. The English
are reserved. Mr. Spencer was reserved. He remarked
that Herbert talks but little of his friends. With his con-
stitutional quietude and lack of enthusiasm, I could not ex-
pect he would take me in his arms, or scream or faint at
my momentous arrival. Don't mistake. I am not apolo-
gizing for a cool reception, but for not having a hot one.
It was as warm as the correlation of forces would permit,
and was eminently agreeable and satisfactory. We became
quickly well acquainted. He brought wine, which I tasted,
and then Mrs. Spencer came in. She is about Ma's size ;
Herbert's mouth exactly, but I guess handsomer ; wears
spectacles ; was blind of cataracts, and was operated on
successfully ; is pleasant, communicative ; has read the Ed-
ucation and Essays, but can't understand the other books.
They appreciate their wonderful son, and of course love
him and worry about him. His father says he is apt to
overdo himself in exercise. He is now on an expedition in
the north of Scotland, fishing, rambling, botanizing, to be
absent till mid-October. I saw a very fine morocco-bound
copy of First Principles, to be presented to the person
whom Herbert frequently visits in Scotland. Conversation
was free and rambling, but I brought it back to Herbert as
often as possible, and there was no difficulty about it. He
did not like his business of civil engineering [this is a mis-
take; he did like it], but was very successful in it. His
father showed us his herbarium, twenty years old, and a
beautiful coloured drawing of a locomotive, which he had
been begging his son to allow him to frame, but could not
get his consent. They brought me a little shred of a pho-
tograph, faint and yellow ; the father told me it was taken
just before the Psychology was finished, when he was in

First Visit to England. 119

wretched health and very sleepless. He is not a great
reader. His father and mother see very little of him. He
spends but little time in Derby, and, when there, but little
at home. Takes long rambles in the country.

Herbert learned to sing by note after he was a grown
man, liked it, and complained of his father for not letting
him learn earlier. I stayed an hour and a half, and then
invited old Mr. Spencer to call next forenoon on Kitty.*
He courteously replied that if it would be agreeable he
would accompany me then. So he walked with me a
twenty-five minutes' distance to the Queen's Hotel. It
was later than I had supposed, and Kitty was in bed, and
we separated with the arrangement that he was to meet us
at the station next morning, ten minutes to nine, to accom-
pany us to Elvaston Castle, the estate of Lord Harrington.

The following extracts from letters of August i^th
and i Qth, give some first impressions of London :

We have been in this great city a week, and seen a great
many sights and heard a great many sounds, the general
effect of which has been to put each other out and to pro-
duce a meagre impression of confusion. I don't know
where to begin or in what direction to write. I am in the
same state of mind that I am when I go out of doors to
start for some place. We are now established in the city,
miles further from the Exhibition than you are from Sara-
toga, so we have given but little attention to that yet, in-
tending to be located nearer it when we return. We move
in omnibuses and cabs. The omnibuses are like our own,
save that there is a man on the steps to collect fares when
you come out. The currency is very simple. I learned it
the first day. Everything is silver and gold. One half the
cabs are on four wheels, the other on two. " Hansom's

* The reference is to Mrs. Youmans.

I2O Edward Livingston Youmans.

Patent Safety Cab " is the most unhandsome thing I ever
looked upon. It is a top on two wheels, and, as it rains
nearly all the time, it has two doors in front, which lie down
like a pair of outside cellar doors, only a little steeper. A
seat for the driver is carried behind, supported by long iron
rods ; and when " cabby " gets mounted, with two or three
trunks on top before him, and his basket of oats swinging
under his seat, the whole thing' is altogether the most out-
landish exhibition to be seen anywhere but in London. On
the whole they drive much faster than in New York, but
the loaded horses take much larger loads, go tandem, and
very slow. The place resembles a half dozen New Yorks,
with any number of Broadways, crooked and straight,
running in every direction. I am beginning to have a dim
idea of the place, but it will take a very long time to get a
clear one of it, unless one's entire time could be given to
its study. There is no use in my describing particulars ;
that is done elsewhere much better than I can do it. Eat-
ing is much like eating everywhere, but they never have
butter at dinner; their water is always brought in bottles,
and never iced. They have no pies — or, rather, they call
them tarts, and make them in small dishes like sauce dishes,
two inches deep, with no under crust, and an upper crust
of triple thickness, served with a spoon. But we live well
enough. . . .

I yesterday got track of Silsbee, and went to his regis-
tered place. He was not there ; it was the family he was
with before and spoke of to us. The people were quite
interesting. An elderly lady sat in her large armchair,
highly dressed, with white kid gloves on, reading the
Prayer Book (it was Sunday afternoon). A youngish wom-
an (married) was with her, and at once opened conversa-
tion concerning Mr. Silsbee and Mr. Spencer, " her friends."
She had some personal acquaintance with Mr. Spencer, but
seemed to understand little of his works; and although

First Visit to England. 121

an intelligent woman, she had a vague, horrified sense of
the awfulness of anybody thinking for himself.

I had also a letter from Mr. Spencer ; he had received
one from his father announcing our arrival in Derby, and
turned his course at once southward. He wrote he would
be in Glasgow to-night to await a letter from me, or my com-
ing there, and so we have concluded to drop the Continent
for the present and go to Scotland. We have not much time,
as we have decided to return home in October, and there-
fore shall stay in Scotland but a day or two perhaps. . . .
There is so much to see of surpassing interest on this side
that a flying trip is almost ridiculous, and the Exhibition a
very small affair comparatively. Were I at home with all
the knowledge I have now, I would not make my stay less
than six months, and I would come over in February. I
would stay in London till May, while its people are at
home and it isn't crowded, and expenses are reasonable.
After that I would take the English country and the Con-
tinent.

The meeting with Mr. Spencer in Glasgow is thus
described in a letter of August 24th, to Miss You-
mans:

We returned this morning from Scotland after riding all
night from Edinburgh — four hundred miles, and with but
little sleep the night before. I think I never was so nearly
used up, and have slept painfully and heavily nearly all day
till four o'clock. I should have commenced writing as soon
as I returned, but had not power to get the materials to-
gether. However, I now feel refreshed and bright, and, that
nothing may intervene to weaken the impression of the last
three days, I sit down to write at once. Spencer has come
forth from his realm of abstraction, and is a living, breath-
ing, and in many respects very human specimen of human
nature. He wrote me he would be in Glasgow Tuesday

122 Edward Livingston Youmans.

night. We received the letter on Tuesday, and thought to
go on that night, and hence did not write him. But we
could not get away till Wednesday morning, arriving at
Glasgow at one that night. Spencer had telegraphed
Tuesday evening to 16 Little Britain, but it was shut up,
and if it had not been so they did not know where we were.
The purport of the telegram was, that Spencer would come
to London to see me if we were not coming to Scotland.
His father had written him that we would meet him at any
point in Scotland which he would indicate. I had emphat-
ically stated that I did not want him to turn a step out of
his way to meet us. I found him at eight in the morning at
his hotel. Ascending two flights of stairs, I was ushered into
the dining room. I inquired for Mr. Spencer; the waiter
said he was there at the other end of the room. I went
forward and made myself known to him. He received me
very quietly and cordially, and asked me first if I had re-
ceived his telegram ; said he had been waiting in suspense,
and should have left for London at four that afternoon;
would be round to see us after breakfast and arrange how
to dispose of our time. He was ready for an expedition of
any length we might desire. We had but little time. He
urged us to take more. We decided to stay in Scotland
from Thursday morning till Saturday night. He arranged
the route so that we should go from Glasgow to Edin-
burgh at once, see the city on Thursday, start for the
mountains and lakes on Friday morning, and get back to
Edinburgh to take the Saturday afternoon train at four
o'clock, he accompanying us about four hours, and then
diverging to go and visit J. D. Morell, who lives near
Manchester.

I cannot give you a progressive account of the journey,
for it is all a confused thing in my memory, and much, I
fear, has already escaped, we hurried through so rapidly
and changed so often. I went on account of Spencer. The

First Visit to England. 123

scenery was fine, but I cared nothing for it and paid no
attention to it. We went from Edinburgh to Stirling ; be-
yond that a few miles, took the old-fashioned stage-coach,
riding on top for eight miles to Loch Katrine, five miles
long, which we crossed in a packet steamer; staged four
miles again, then crossed Loch Lomond, walked a mile and
a half, and stayed all night. Saturday morning, at six,
took the boat again on Loch Lomond and went to Glas-
gow, and then to Edinburgh by rail. Spencer, of course,
wished to help us all he could, on various occasions ex-
pressing his warmest obligations, indebtedness, etc. ; but,
aside from all this, he is the most prompt, ready, adaptive,
and useful man on such an expedition I have ever known.
He is wonderfully practical, and handles circumstances as
they arise with all the energy and readiness of an experi-
enced business man. A hundred vagabonds were demand-
ing stipends. I was confused, and would have given them
all I had. He knew just what to do, and did it decisively,
allowing no nonsense, and dealing sharply with importunate
or outrageous claimants.

His health is bad. The difficulty is with his brain-
sleeplessness. He has not had a night's rest since he wrote
the Psychology. He can't sleep, and if he does he wakes
ten or twenty times during the night. He is very excit-
able, and when excited cannot sleep at all, gets alarmed at
the state of his brain, and flies from the scene of danger.
He undertook to attend to some Derby ladies at the expo-
sition, and had to fly from the city before his time.

As respects his business the poor man has had a troubled
time indeed. His books have never paid him anything, but,
on the contrary, have weighed him down like a millstone.*

* In reading this passage the reader must not forget that it was written
thirty years ago. Many years have now elapsed since Mr. Spencer's books
began to return a considerable and steadily increasing income to the au-
thor and his publishers.

124 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Five hundred copies of the Psychology were published ;
three hundred remain on his hands. The Social Statics has
done better. Seven hundred and fifty were published eleven
years ago, and the edition is nearly exhausted. None of
them are stereotyped, and so the several editions will very
shortly be out of print, and he says he shall not try it again.
Five hundred Education were printed, and two hundred are
sold. He was desirous of doing something to circulate
them, so he bound up some cheaper, to be sent by mail to
teachers if they desired. Twelve copies were thus disposed
of, with the result of giving mortal offence to the book
trade, who are down upon the work in consequence of this
informality. To crown his experience, his publisher, George
Manwaring, has failed within three months, whereby he
loses everything from the Education, and enough more on
his other publications to make his loss five hundred dol-
lars. As respects the First Principles, notwithstanding all
the efforts, the whole thing would have been exploded
and abandoned this summer but for some means which he
obtained from the death of an uncle. By using that little
capital he has been enabled to maintain the project and
live. He did not say much to me about his experience,
but alluded to it two or three times in a very simple and
touching way in connection with the assistance he had re-
ceived from America. That is all the profit he has ever
yet had from his work, and he said it was as grateful
and opportune as it was unexpected, for he had but little
hope from that quarter ; and he said his father thought
that when he sent a circular to Mr. Silsbee and expressed
some hope from that, he was very foolish; "but," said
he to me, " you have quite extinguished the old gentle-
man."

And when I looked upon the man, with his health broken
and nerves shattered, and remembered that his is the fore-
most intellect of our civilization, and that he is a man be-

First Visit to England. 125

yond all other men of his age to control the thought of the
future ; when I thought of him hampered and harassed for
want of means to publish his great thoughts — as having to
think for the world and then having to pay the expense of
instruction, setting up other men in intellectual business
with a paragraph, I confess I thank God that I had had a
little opportunity to do him service. Dear sister, let us re-
spect ourselves more that we saw through the obscurity of
distance the genuine and exalted claims of this unheralded
man, and were led to help him in a way that he most needed
help.

Mr. Spencer is a man who lives his philosophy. He ap-
plies his principles in the proper phraseology to the criti-
cism and consideration of all questions which arise. He
has not the slightest doubt or hesitation, nor is he at a loss.
He did not talk much upon these topics, to be sure, while
I was with him, nor did I desire to lead him into it, but the
evidence of the complete mastery of his themes, that they
are part of his mind's nature, crops out constantly. Again,
he is equally ready in the application of his convictions of
right and justice. " You see," said he, after two or three
days' acquaintance with me, " that I have a very disagree-
able habit of speaking my mind." For instance, he pounced
upon every man in the cars who smoked, and several at-
tempted it, as they have no smoking cars. Individuals
would try to smoke out of the window. He always at-
tacked them. " Is it disagreeable to you ? " they would
say. " Not at all," he would reply ; " but it is against the
law, and the law is a wholesome and proper one. You have
no right to break it, and you shall not do it ; and if you do
not desist I will call the guard." Again, when we were in
Edinburgh Castle, in the bedroom of Mary, Queen of Scots,
where her son was born, and let down outside through the
window, an old Scotchman was trying to rally his recollec-
tions about some details, and appealed to Spencer. " I am

126 Edward Livingston Youmans.

happy to say I don't know," he replied. The old man was
thunderstruck, and said he wished he knew all about his-
tory. " I should hate to have my head filled up with it, for
it would exclude better things." With porter, cabby, or
steamboat captain he was ever ready to do battle for the
cause of justice; but he deprecates the tendency to fault-
finding. " I used to visit Caflyle, but he has got so cross
and misanthropic, and raves so constantly about the
hor-r-rible state of things (imitating the Scotch accent)
that I couldn't stand it. I do not want to argue with him
and I will not listen to his nonsense, and so I stay away.
He is a prodigious talker. His tongue rattles inces-
santly; even his wife can't get a chance to say a word
till he goes out to smoke a pipe, when she starts up and
proves that nothing but her husband is able to extinguish
her." Carlyle's conversation, he said, was " one long
damn."

When we stopped at the inn on Friday night, as the boat
left at six, and we could breakfast on board, we left word
to be awakened at half past five. Spencer hoped to sleep
a little, as he had not done so the night before in Edin-
burgh in consequence of the noise ; but we were all called
a quarter before five. I lay abed. Kitty dressed and went
down. There was a register on a side table in the dining-
room, where travellers offer any sentiment about the scen-
ery after their names, and often record praises of the hotel ;
and so the book is an object of display. When Kitty went
down she found written, as nearly as I can recollect, as fol-
lows : " Prof, and Mrs. Youmans, of America, and Herbert
Spencer, of London, taking lodgings for the night, left or-
ders to be called at half past five o'clock, but were called
three quarters of an hour earlier. This is part of a system
pursued in this region to induce travellers to take breakfast
before starting. I was imposed upon in the same way a few
nights ago at Oban." Kitty says Mr. Spencer was very an-

First Visit to England. 127

gry at the imposition.* The book was quickly whipped out
of sight.

He thinks Mrs. Lewes the greatest woman living, if not
the greatest female intellect that has ever appeared in the
world. Lewes and wife live much by themselves, receive a
few friends on Sunday, and he is the only person who has
admission to them at all times. He called there one day
as she was finishing The Mill on the Floss, and Mr. Lewes,
who was just leaving the house for an errand, met him on
the steps. "Oh, Spencer," he exclaimed, " do go in and
comfort Polly ; she is crying her eyes out over the death of
her children " (i. e. Tom and Maggie Tulliver). To obtain
emotional relaxation after writing Adam Bede she read
through his Psychology the second time. She is masculine
in features, but soft and feminine in manners. He says he
first proposed her writing fiction and pressed her into it.
She was full of self-distrust, but at last she told him she
had commenced Scenes in Clerical Life. He and Huxley
think Silas Marner one of her very best things — a perfect
prose poem.f

He says Huxley has a new work on the relation of the

* Youmans's recollection was not quite accurate, for later in the letter
he adds that Mrs. Youmans copied the writing in the album above referred
to, and the latter part runs thus : " A similar course has been pursued at
Oban to induce travellers to breakfast at the hotel, which reason may have
operated also in this case." It was friends who had been treated that way,
not himself.

f Another anecdote of Lewes and George Eliot may find a place here.
Lewes had arranged to take a ramble in the country with Spencer and
Youmans, but was prevented at the last minute, as the following note ex-
plained : " My dear philosopher : Polly is ill, and as husbands are indi-
visible (and for that reason probably no matter), I am sorry to say that I
shall not have a leg or a cerebellum at your service. Faithfully yours,
G. H. Lewes." The quip on the divisibility of matter is a fair specimen of
the atrocious puns and jokes with which Lewes was always bubbling over.
There was something tonic and refreshing in that irrepressible flow of ani-
mal spirits.

128 Edward Livingston Youmans.

human brain to those of inferior tribes; Lyell, a new work
on The Antiquity of Man; and Tyndall, a new work on the
mechanical theory of heat. He reads nothing but what
bears on the immediate thing he is writing, and but little
of that. He expects to be reviewed by Mansel, whom he
has thrust into an embarrassing position. Goldwin Smith
and Mansel, at the same university, are at loggerheads
over the doctrine of Mansel's Limits to Religious Thought.
Smith charges him with atheism, and quotes Spencer's use
of the doctrine as proof of it. Yet, when one of Spencer's
parts is delayed, Goldwin Smith writes him a very kind let-
ter of solicitude for his health, and is thus liberal and gen-
tlemanly though thoroughly antagonistic. He says there
is obviously a growing liberality of thought and speech
toward the United States.

I broke off abruptly this morning, as I was forced away.
I tried to put down everything material about Spencer. If
I remember anything further I will record it. He knows
nothing about the state of practical education, never heard
of the Home Colonial Training School, and thinks there is
nothing here to be imitated. Viewed through English
lenses, things look gloomy enough at the North. Every-
body regards the independence of the South as a fixed and
foregone and irreversible fact, and they look upon the
movements of the North as the blind, infatuated, impotent
struggling of political pride. Every success of the South
is hailed with pleasure, and only the gloomy side of North-
ern affairs is presented. Even Mr. Spencer regards disso-
lution as determined, and deludes himself with the weakest
sophistry to explain the present confused attitude of Eng-
land. Your " conscription " and the frantic efforts to evade
it are made everything of. ... We leave to-morrow morn-
ing for Dover, Ostend, Brussels, Cologne, Basel, and where
else Heaven only knows, to be gone a fortnight or three
weeks. We shall not hear from you in all that time, but

First Visit to England. 129

shall expect letters on our return. I shall see nobody that
you are interested in, or I either, and as for a description
of the places, you will find it far better in Cornell's geogra-
phy. We write to-night to secure berths on the Great
Eastern for October ist. Give my tenderest love to Ma,
and say to her that as she is a Christian and has faith that
all things are ordered well, she should not vex herself
about the course of worldly affairs. Remember me kindly
to all, and write often.

Upon Youmans's return to London Mr. Spencer
introduced him to Huxley and several other friends
eminent in science and philosophy. From more than
one of these men I have heard the warmest expres-
sions of personal affection for Youmans, and of keen
appreciation of the aid that they have obtained in innu-
merable ways from his intelligent and enthusiastic
sympathy.

These beginnings of valued friendships were ex-
tremely pleasant, but there was much to mar the en-
joyment of this first journey abroad. It was war time,
and depressing news came by every mail. There was
much to perturb a man of patriotic spirit in the gen-
eral sympathy with the Southern cause expressed
by Englishmen. From much pleasure in sight-seeing
Youmans was debarred by his imperfect vision, while
his irritable nerves suffered amid the worries and
fatigues of constant travel. He visited the great Ex-
hibition at the Crystal Palace, but cared little for it.
However, when he attended the British Association's
meeting at Cambridge, he felt amply repaid for hav-
ing crossed the Atlantic. The addresses and papers
pleased him greatly ; and there was endless delight in
observing men of his own race and language, who
seemed to him foreign in so many ways. Their

130 Edward Livingston Youmans.

starchiness on the platform, their kittenish flow of
animal spirits before and after business, the odd way
in which men of advanced views were surrounded and
" supported " by their friends, were all to him new
and most amusing.

The following extracts contain some interesting
details of the last days of this first visit, to England :

LONDON, September 25, 1862.

MY DEAR SISTER : . . . I intended not to have called on
Spencer, desiring not to trouble him until just before leav-
ing London. But on Tuesday (I think it was) I met him
on the street. He had heard, through Silsbee, that we had
returned, and seemed quite surprised that we had not called
on him or notified him of our return. I think he had been
at some pains to find a place for us. He had on the ever-
lasting stovepipe, which everybody — yes, everybody — wears.
I was walking with him and let drop the word "residua,"
when he suddenly said: " By-the-by, Morell is in town,
and dines with me to-night. Come and have dinner with
us, and get acquainted with him. The only difficulty is, we
are somewhat crowded at table." I protested I did not
wish to intrude, but he said, " Walk home with me, and I
will find out if there will be room." He insisted, and so
we started. It was a mighty long way to Gloster Square
across Hyde Park almost to the Exhibition. Gloster
Square is about the size of Westcott's dooryard, and the
house is about two blocks away from it, so that the
green patch is just remotely in sight. Yet the neighbour-
hood is tiptop, and that is a very great deal here in Eng-
land.

The mistress of the house, a doctor's widow, is a tall,
conceited, pompous, spoony-looking creature. Mr. Spencer,
somewhat embarrassed, unfolded the business : " Oh, yes,
certainly — most happy. If there is not room we will make

First Visit to England. 131

room." Then, turning to me with a smile, " Mr. Herbert
is a great favourite in the house." "Mr. Herbert" curtly
remarked that he " wasn't aware of it." As soon as we were
out of doors he burst out : " The shallow hypocrite ! I
have done nothing to make myself popular in the house,
least of all with her." I may dismiss the woman with an
incident Silsbee mentioned. Sitting on the sofa, sewing,
one day, she suddenly exclaimed : " Mr. Spencer, you are
fond of books; here is Scott's Marmion ! " pulling the vol-
ume out of her basket and tendering it to him. The dinner
hour was half past six. I went home, and was back ten
minutes before the time. Was taken upstairs to the sitting-
room, where Spencer received me and introduced me to
Dr. Morell. Oh, my ! my ! my ! A youngish, jolly, jaunty,
sandy-haired, thin-bearded, gold-spectacled, small-headed,
little-nosed, undersized individual, the total reverse of all
I had supposed.* We got acquainted the first moment.
He had never heard of me before; did not understand
and could not remember my name ; but I knew him, and
that was enough for both. He is a laughing, joking, smart
conversationalist, who makes indifferent puns. We went to
the dinner table. Morell talks German, and Spencer un-
fortunately seated him beside the most diabolical bore of
a German that ever happened in the wrong place. He
monopolized the conversation, to my great torment. I
tried to turn it in some other direction, but the Dutchman
would argue.

I learned that Morell wrote his History of Philosophy
at the age of twenty-six ; that he is ashamed of it every
time he looks at it ; and that it continues to sell. Moreil
got Boase's work on The Duality of Forces, read five pages,
could get no further, and shelved it. Can't read Bain — " he
is all very well, but I have no patience to read him ; he is so

* Youmans was still apparently in that period of inexperience when
one takes it for granted that distinguished authors must look distinguished.

132 Edward Livingston Youmans.

tedious." I tried to remember all the things that were said,
but could not. It did not amount to much. The two men
are different and opposite. Morell is a " national school "
inspector, and has been in the receipt of a large salary for
fifteen years, visiting schools. Has a place of his own, with
cellar stored with choice wines ; has made money on every
one of his books; is the author of a grammar that sells
twenty thousand a year ; is in capital English health, etc.,
and consequently boils over with satisfaction. Spencer, on
the other hand, is burdened and embarrassed — no sale for
his books, in bad health, sleepless, and with the weight of
his mighty subjects pressing upon his soul. It is natural
that the bearing of the two men should be very different.
I don't know how much they have previously seen of each
other, but suspect but little. They made frequent refer-
ence to meeting at Dr. Carpenter's. For a little mischief
I got them by the ears on the subject of state education.
Spencer was intensely earnest ; Morell cavalier, grandly
indifferent — " had been through all that long since " ; " all
very well for reasoning, but it was a different thing to
have the responsibility of acting in reference to the mat-
ter." I had to divert the discussion, for Mr. Spencer was
getting excited, which is the worst thing in the world for
him.

I don't know how it came out, but it did come out, that
Morell had been into and through the socialistic craze. He
had even had the Fourier fever, and fraternized with Do-
herty, etc., who represented the thing in England, as Bris-
bane did in America. He was a little semi-shy in speaking
of it ; half commended it, half acknowledged the sell ; re-
ferred to his interviews with W. H. Channing, who sympa-
thized, and is on the whole somewhat in the condition of
Ripley on the subject. This is the rendering I put on what
was hastily said. Another thing I was surprised to learn
in regard to Mill. While intellectually there is accorded to

First Visit to England. 133

him the same supremacy here as with us, yet personally he
is regarded as a fanatic. He was so carried away with Mal-
thusianism that he personally distributed tracts through
London, like Bill Green— went round throwing them into
the cellars. On the subject of women all his friends regard
him as a monomaniac. If the intellectual equality of men
and women is questioned in his presence he flies into a
passion and raves and rages at an awful rate. Furthermore,
his view of his late wife is recognized as part of the mono-
mania. He married very late — lived with his wife but three
or four years. She was a widow, and followed him over the
Continent a good while before they were married. How
she could have been 4< the inspirer and in part the author of
all that is best " in his writings seems singular. She is
buried at Avignon. He has built a splendid monument to
her, and takes charge of the English portion of the ceme-
tery, going there every year and spending a good deal of
his time. These are quite curious personal details.

Morell knew Sir William Hamilton well. It was men-
tioned in illustration of Sir William's irascibility that, being
once at a meeting of the Philosophical Society where Gla-
cier Forbes, who was something of a dandy, attacked him,
he exclaimed that he " was not going to be put down by a
d d puppy ! " Great commotion. "Why, why, Sir Wil-
liam," cried the president, " such language as that before
this learned body!" "I don't call this a learned body!"
sputtered the angry Hamilton.

Morell thinks he shall rewrite his history, bringing it
down to the present day ; thinks he is better fitted for a
historian than an analytic psychologist. The article he
published in the Medico-Chirurgical in 1855, which first in-
troduced us to Spencer, was written at the request of the
National Review, Martineau's Unitarian organ. As they
had called for it, they sent him the money for it, but refused
to publish it — it was too materialistic. Morell says they

134 Edward Livingston Youmans.

were just then introducing the phase of transcendental
mysticism. (By-the-by, Garth Wilkinson was one of Morell's
intimates in the Fourieristic time.) Spencer, in Part I,
gives Martineau a rub, and now there is to be a review of
Spencer in that magazine, entitled Science, Nescience, and
Faith. Mill has an article in the forthcoming Westminster
Review on the Slave Power.

When we broke up, Morell reproached Spencer for the
brevity of his recent visit to him. He then unceremonious-
ly took my arm and we walked homeward, his place being
in Pall Mall (pronounced Pell Mell), near to mine. He
gave me a cordial invitation to come up and spend a day
or two with him. His business in London now is to inspect
a training school — the Normal Training College, which
stands upon the ground where Joseph Lancaster first estab-
lished the monitorial system in the beginning of the present
century. Morell says that it is the best training school in
England, has the least theology about it, and nothing of
the " routine " of the Home Colonial. So I made immediate
arrangements to go over to the school and see some of the
examinations. In all that, I was as much disappointed as
in Morell himself at first. I had no reason, perhaps, for
being so, but could not help it. Officials take things easy
— as Spencer says, it is the nature of officialism. I saw the
plan of working the machine, and was interested, of course,
but there was not much inspection. The principal, Prof.
Fitch, also examiner in English literature in the University
of London, is an accomplished lecturer and a close thinker.
I was delighted with him. I went to the school again yes-
terday. Morell got into the same stage, and we rode over
the Thames (Waterloo Bridge) together, to the Borough
Road, where the school is situated. ... I lunched with Mo-
rell and Prof. Wilkes, who lives in the building. Lunch, as
usual everywhere — hashed veal, boiled potatoes, cold meat,
bread, and ale, with an apple or plum tart for dessert, all

First Visit to England. 135

fresh and insipid. The American war was up. Morell
favoured the view of Mill, and recognized slavery as at the
bottom of the whole business. Wilkes stoutly denied it:
slavery had nothing to do with it ! He is a student of the
Times, and quoted all the proslavery action of the North,
with the recent demonstration of Lincoln to the black com-
mittee.* Morell gave me a copy of his Grammar, and Fitch
of his Arithmetic. It is now Friday morning. Morell,
Spencer, and Silsbee are to dine with us Sunday night at
seven. The Scientific Association meets at Cambridge,
October ist. Morell does not go. We shall go, though
whether we remain till the close is uncertain. . . .

I went with Spencer at his request to see Tyndall re-
specting the republishing of his forthcoming book. He was
at the Royal Institution, where their researches are carried
on in a dingy hole down cellar, which Tyndall denominated
the "den." He is a single man of forty, with a scanty
strip of forehead, and big, straight, prominent nose — the
most restless, nervous creature I ever set eyes on. We
stayed but a few minutes, and nothing was said of anything
but the book and the publication of books.

Saturday, September 2?th. — Was in the Exhibition yester-
day,! and never had such a realizing sense of the humbug
of art criticism. " Breadth, depth, simplicity, truthfulness " ;
"Truthfulness, simplicity, life, beauty — a splendid little
piece of Nature," etc., ad infinitum.

We have nothing from home since September 2d, though
we watch daily and with extreme avidity. The war plot
thickens with you. Heaven only knows how the knot is to
be cut ; but by the present outlook it must be soon. The
sympathy with the courage and spirit of the South is uni-
versal here. Our last newspapers are the nth September,

* The news of the emancipation proclamation had not yet reached
England to confute Prof. Wilkes.

f He was in the picture gallery in company with a couple of art critics.

136 Edward Livingston Youmans.

dispatches by telegraph to the i2th. We wait most anxious-
ly for later news.

LONDON, September 30, 1862.

At the close of my last I mentioned that we had invited
Spencer, Morell, and Silsbee to dine with us on Sunday
evening at seven. Spencer invited us (Silsbee and our-
selves) to go to Kew Gardens in the afternoon, or rather
to go first to Richmond, which is three or four miles be-
yond Kew, and see the scenery, which is said to be very
fine, and then return by a small boat to the Garden. We did
so, taking rail at ten o'clock. It was muddy, foggy, and
semi-rainy, the nastiest sort of a morning. As we left the
city it cleared up, but upon our arrival at Richmond — eleven
or twelve miles — it had again clouded up densely ; a fog cov-
ered everything, and we could see nothing. Stopping at
an inn, we took a little lunch and proceeded to the Gardens.
Dr. Joseph Hooker, the most philosophical botanist of Eng-
land, is in charge of the Gardens. Spencer knows him, and
intimated that he should call upon him, and he would per-
haps accompany us. He called. We went on, but he over-
took us alone ; the doctor did not accompany him. Spencer
said he did not offer to come out, " as showing the Gardens
is no doubt a great bore to him." We wandered round till
five o'clock, when there suddenly came a heavy rain. We
waited under a large horse-chestnut tree till it began to rain
through, and then started amid shower and mud for the de-
pot. We were getting drenched, so Spencer got a cab, and
we got into the place with an immense crowd, all driven in by
the shower, which made it doubtful whether we could all be
accommodated by the train. I had wished to take the half
past four train, but Spencer overruled it quite abruptly —
said there would not be time at the Gardens — that we could
get to the city station at five minutes past six, and be at
home at half past six, in abundant time for dinner at seven.
The great crowd caused delay of the train, and when we

First Visit to England. 137

reached the station, three and a half miles from our place,
not a vehicle was to be had, so we had to foot it through
the mud a long distance. Got a cab at length, and got
home one minute before seven, bedraggled with wet and
mud. Morell was waiting, and we dined. . . .

I have been over to the Training School this afternoon
to see a specimen of the way they do things. It was very
interesting, and shows great progress. Principal Fitch is a
very able man — I think the best adapted for his position
that they have in this country. Spencer called to-day
while I was out, and left us an introductory note to Hux-
ley, who is president of the zoological section. It was
very kind and quite unexpected. I called on Prof. Miller,
at King's College. He received me pleasantly, and showed
me the laboratory, which is down cellar, but more roomy
than the Royal Institution. He was disposed to discuss
the war, but couldn't understand what we were fighting
about. We go to Cambridge to-morrow.

CAMBRIDGE, October 2, 1862.

We arrived yesterday on the bank of the Cam. All
were notified to proceed to the Town Hall at once to
secure places. We inquired of a fellow-passenger the
distance from the station to the hall, and were told "five
minutes' walk"; so we started and found it nearer an
hour's walk. There was a great crowd of applicants for
places. The hotels were all filled ; lodgings only were
to be had, and there was a book with registered places,
prices varying with proximity to the place of meeting.
We took quarters at 34 Jesus Lane, five minutes' walk
from the centre of attraction, and opposite Jesus College.
I went back with the porter, who showed us how to pro-
cure our baggage ; then went to the hall again to get some
information, and shortly started for our new quarters in
Christ's Lane. The town is a confused network of little
crooked lanes. I inquired for Christ's Lane, and was di-
7

I3^ Edward Livingston Yonmans.

rected, and wandered and wandered till I found it. I then
went the whole length of it and couldn't find the house.
I then counted the numbers, and there was not a 34 in it.
I think I was mad at the town. There was Christ's Col-
lege and there was Christ's Lane, but no place to enter.
So I attacked every person I met on the general subject of
the theo-topography of Cambridge. At length somebody
asked if it might not be "Jesus" Lane that I wanted. I
told him " Certainly." Then said he, " You will find it near
Jesus College, at the other end of the town." So I found it,
and a quite comfortable place it is. Opposite is a low stone
building used as a store, and over the door the name of
the keeper — G. Death.

The first meeting was last night, at eight. We got in
at 7.30, and went up near the platform. It is a fine lecture
room in appearance and decoration, but without the slight-
est ventilation. Only those were admitted who had tickets,
but it was full— nine hundred or a thousand. The hall was
early crowded, and such a hum and bustle of joyous recog-
nition I never before witnessed. The English on such an
occasion are far more hearty and social than the Americans.
Everybody was busy shaking hands and chatting with every-
body, and at the same time watching and inquiring who
were present. The president-elect was Rev. Robert Willis,
Professor of Natural Philosophy at Cambridge, and he gave
as an opening address of an hour and a half the History of
the Association. It appeared in full in next morning's Times.
Prof. Owen moved a vote of thanks with a little speech,
the first part of which was glib, but the last part fizzled
amazingly. The Dean of Ely, a high ecclesiastical func-
tionary, seconded the motion, with a little speech which,
although good, tapered to a vanishing point like the other.
A large, florid, very fine-looking man, with the port and
semblance of old Ike Rowland, and something of the
aspect of a Methodist parson, appeared before us. He

First Visit to England. 139

had a lady with him, evidently his wife, and they took the
second seat in front of us. At the first glance I whispered
to Kitty, " I think that is Dr. Whewell ! " Presently I asked
a man near us who it was, and he replied, " The Master of
Trinity ! "

On Thursday, business opened at eleven by addresses by
the chairmen of the several sections. There is no general
session. We selected Huxley's, in the department of zo-
ology and botany, and we were fortunate, for it was a most
admirable address — explanatory of the scope and purposes
of biology. I meant to have got his classification, and shall
yet ; it is very lucid. Spencer says that, of all the scientific
men he knows, Huxley is the only one who understands the
importance of biology and sympathizes with his work in
this direction. ... In the geological section there was yes-
terday some fun. Owen came down on Huxley about man
and monkeys in his papers, one after another. The two men
hate and despise each other. Huxley is much more of a
man, and is more like Spencer, outspoken and independent.
Owen is an old grandmother, whose business is to nurse her
reputation — jealous of newcomers and exasperated at op-
position. He was not present at the reading of Huxley's
address. . . . Last night there was an address by Tyndall
before the association in the lecture room ; subject, Water
in its Several Conditions. It was altogether the most bril-
liant affair of the kind I have ever seen. . . . The new phi-
losophy of forces permeates everything. All science seems
worked with reference to it. Tyndall not only assumed it,
but it was the foundation of his philosophy. While I was
with him the other day Spencer started the point of using
the term " persistence of force " rather than " conserva-
tion." They had quite a spurt over it, Tyndall declining to
meddle with the words he found. But to-day Huxley used
the term " persistence of force." The experiments last night
were, first, testing oxygen and hydrogen separately ; second,

140 Edward Livingston Youmans.

exploding them together; third, bursting iron bottles by
freezing ; fourth, exhibiting the formations of crystals by
the electric light in a vacuum ; fifth, formation of an im-
mense spectrum on a screen — absorption of its different parts
by coloured glasses ; and, sixth, regelation of iron. He had
splendid diagrams of the glaciers, but hardly referred to
them ; was chiefly occupied with the watery vapour of the air
and its relations to obscure radiant heat. Tyndall has suffi-
cient Irish blood and temperament — not brogue — to remind
me constantly of Plunkett. He was not still a moment, but
bending and twisting in all possible shapes, as if he had the
St. Vitus's dance — twisting his legs together, bending down
to the desk, and working and jerking himself in all possi-
ble directions. Everybody was kept wide awake, enter-
tained, and instructed. It was a work of enthusiasm.

At Cambridge and elsewhere Youmans learned
much, and picked up many hints for future work, but
on the whole he was not sorry to return home after an
absence of four months.

CHAPTER IX.

THE APOSTLE OF EVOLUTION.
1863—1864. Age 42-43.

THE next year (1863) was the mid-year of the war,
the year of the great victories at Gettysburg, Vicks-
burg, and Chattanooga, but none the less a time of
sore anxiety, for no one could as yet see how near the
end was. The publishing business, in which Mr. You-
mans had already so many broad and generous inter-
ests bound up, suffered severely. Telegrams from
the battlefield withdrew people's attention from sci-
ence and philosophy ; and the violent fluctuations of
an ill-advised currency of inconvertible paper added
to the losses of a curtailed publishing trade. " As
things are," said Mr. W. H. Appleton one day, " it is
no object to publish any book ; we would rather stop
business if it were possible." The plates of Social
Statics were offered, by way of experiment, to " three
of our best publishers. They liked the book, and
were aware of the favourable position of the author
in this country, but they did not want to publish any-
thing. They were compelled to issue a book now
and then to keep their names before the public, but
would far rather sell the works of other houses than
manufacture themselves."

I cannot expect to give you a satisfactory account of
the sta.te of things here [wrote Youmans to Spencer a little

(141)

142 Edward Livingston Youmans.

later], but I will attempt it; the fact is, you ought to come
here and spend six months and then you could judge for
yourself. The difficulties are, first, that the labour and ma-
terials are enormously advanced in price; composition and
stereotyping are doubled, and paper is trebled. Govern-
ment has levied a tax of five per cent directly upon all
sales, while all business transactions and advertising are
also heavily taxed. In your letter you comment on this
state of things, and observe, " If the cost of labour and ma-
terials has risen, I do not see why the cost of manufac-
tured articles does not rise in something like the same
proportion." Well, such is the case generally, and the price
of books in some instances is doubled. Your Essays, which
five years ago would have been a dollar, now sell for two
dollars.

But there is this trouble — books are luxuries, to be
bought only after other wants are supplied, or not bought
at all if there is not plenty of money. People finding them-
selves pressed on all sides by exorbitant prices retrench
when they can.

Butter has gone up from ten to fifty cents per pound,
and a considerable portion of the community are now
abstaining from its use.

Moreover, it is the chief book-buying class — people
formerly in easy circumstances, with fixed incomes — that
now suffer. The rate of interest is the same, and their
former income of gold is now an income of greenbacks
only nominally equal. The consequence is, that as the
price of books rises the sales diminish in a greater ratio
than in any other business. But though sales diminish, the
publisher must still keep up his stock.

Mr. Appleton remarked : " Should materials fall to their
former prices, I should lose a hundred thousand dollars on
paper alone — printed stock." Again, if a house is wealthy,
like Appletons' or Harper's, it matters little how things go;

The Apostle of Evolution. 143

they can stand it. They can put up prices stiffly, and let
things take their course. But not so with the trade gen-
erally. The mass of booksellers are far from rich ; they
must sell, if at the smallest profit ; accordingly they yield
to the pressure and sell low. The book business at the
present time must therefore be looked upon as an anomaly
in respect to the relation between the price of materials and
manufactured products.

Throughout that dreadful summer of 1863 Mr.
Youmans found in hard work the best specific for
nervous depression. He was busily engaged in re-
writing his Chemistry, so as to take account of the re-
markable discoveries which had i verthrown the old
binary theory and given a new aspect to the whole
science. Amid the beating of drums and the bugle
notes of regiments starting for the seat of war, his
work was most thoroughly and conscientiously done.
While this was going on, a moment of acute terror
visited the city of New York. The following letters
give some account of the " draft riots " :

Wednesday, July 75", 1863.

DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER : We are in the midst of
very exciting times, and as you are probably informed of
it by the newspapers and may be anxious about us, I drop
you a line. The city has been proclaimed by the Governor
to be in a state of insurrection, and he is certainly right.
The mob rules the city. By actual violence and by fear
and terror they control everything. They commanded the
city railroad and omnibus establishments to stop running
or they would set fire to their stables. They are therefore
all stopped. They have cut the telegraphs, and torn up
the tracks of the railroads which go out of the city, to
prevent the transmission of intelligence and the entrance

144 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of troops. Having broken up the places of drafting and
burned them without resistance, they then went to burning
negro dwellings, and from that to general burning, pillage,
plunder, theft, robbery, and murder. A man last evening
was seized and choked, in front of our house, until he gave
up his purse. Men are knocked down and robbed every-
where with perfect impunity, for the police are gathered
in companies to fight the rioters en masse, and thus the
streets are left unprotected. Nor dare men resist, for
worse may befall them. The effect of intimidation is
tremendous, and the mob work it skilfully. I ventured
out this forenoon to the printer's — half a mile or so
away. While I was there, up in the fifth story, where
they are doing my work, two bullies entered the office
below and ordered the establishment instantly closed, and
ail the hands (three hundred) turned out, or else they
would burn the building. The risk was real ; the order
was at once complied with and business stopped. The
two bullies went right on doing the same thing to other
establishments with equal success, and the consequence is
that the streets are deluged with working people out of
business. A portion of this crowd is of course sucked into
the vortex of strife, and the rest so clog the thoroughfares
as to make it dreadful for the military to fire. The inno-
cent are far more liable to suffer than the guilty. And as
there is no other way under heaven but to fire, great num-
bers of women, children, and innocent men are injured.
The mob is nearly all composed of Irish, and they are
raging for the blood of the negroes. We hear nothing but
" damned nigger " and " damned abolitionists " in all direc-
tions. But when the blood is up, nothing comes amiss.
They cleaned out a whole row of stores on Grand Street
yesterday. A hatter thought he was going to escape by
damning niggers too, but they took every hat out of his
shop. The draft is no doubt unpopular, but those news-

The Apostle of Evolution. 145

papers that have made its unpopularity their capital, and
raved about the despotism of Lincoln, have got more than
they bargained for. We are very comfortable, and hope
the storm will soon pass by, so that in ten days or so we
may be able to leave the town. But there is no knowing
how long it will last.

With dear love to all, very affectionately,

E. L. YOUMANS.
NEW YORK, Friday evening, July 77, i86j.

DEAR SISTER : I received your two letters to-day, and
was every way relieved, and pleased that you were at home.
I take but a moment to write ; it is seven o'clock, and
dangerous to be out later — if, indeed, it is safe to venture
out one block to the lamp-post. The fury of the riot, I
think, is passed, but we were kept awake till midnight last
night by the firing on Second Avenue. We are well, and
oppressively busy; the printers are pushing on, and we
shall be done soon, and can come home, which I greatly
desire. You will have time to write, so don't forget us.

Friday morning, July 24, 1863.

DEAR SISTER : Coming in at D. Appleton & Co.'s I find
your letter. ... I first heard yesterday, of the alarm at
Saratoga, and heard it had been very serious. I am drudg-
ing with desperation to get things along as fast as possible.
I did have hopes of getting the text done this week. Proof
reached 380 last night. It will probably make 450, and they
will get to 410 or 420 to-morrow night. I am now strain-
ing everything to finish next week, and shall come up the
minute the last line is corrected. When the text is made
there will then be the contents and preface. Kitty can do
the former and I the latter. I calculate to have the text
done by Sunday night.

In the course of the next twelvemonth the sale of
the New Chemistry attained large dimensions, and

146 Edward Livingston Youmans.

not the least gratifying recognition of its value came
in an order from Harvard University for two hundred
copies. Youmans was much gratified at receiving the
following letter from Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes :
21 CHARLES STREET, BOSTON, March 10, 1864.

MY DEAR SIR : You may remember — what I certainly
have not forgotten — that you called on me some months
since and left me a copy of your Class-Book of Chemistry.
I placed it upon my shelves, thinking that at some future
time I might do something more than glance over it, which
was all I pretended to do at that time.

Some days ago I had occasion to look at it for some
accidental reason, and while it was in my hands I was
drawn to a more particular examination of it. I read the
dedication, and liked it particularly. I read the preface,
and was pleased with that. I read the introduction, and
was struck with its philosophical breadth and the simple
clearness of its style. I looked over all the illustrations,
which seemed to me particularly well contrived or selected.
I had become interested in the book, and read various
chapters relating to matters of which I knew something
but wished to know more. In every instance I was very
much gratified with the neatness of statement, the fresh-
ness of the views brought forward, showing that you kept
up with the vanguard of science instead of lingering in the
rear. I was also pleased with the unpretentious way in
which the true essentials of each special branch of the
science were laid down, without any unnecessary amplifi-
cations for the sake of making a book, as is too commonly
done. I was furthermore glad to see that the proportions
of the various parts were preserved, so that no subject
was overdone and none neglected.

In mentioning your book to Prof. Bacon, of the Har-
vard Medical School, I was glad to find that he agreed
with me in the very favourable opinion I had formed of it,

The Apostle of Evolution. 147

and that it was on the list of books recommended by him
to the students. For myself, I consider it a real accession
to my library, and renew my thanks for it with thrice their
first cordiality. And so, my dear sir, I have the pleasure
of signing myself, Your truly obliged friend,

O. W. HOLMES.

Soon after rewriting the Chemistry, Youmans pub-
lished, under the title of The Correlation and Con-
servation of Forces, a collection of monographs by
Faraday, Grove, Liebig, Carpenter, and Mayer, with
an introduction by himself. This introduction is an
able condensed statement of the modern doctrine of
forces, with its pregnant implications for the guidance
of life. The book was just what people needed, and
it had a very large sale.

As a consequence of his visit to England, You-
mans had been instrumental in having the Appletons
reprint the principal works of Bain, Huxley, Tyndall,
and other men of mark. It became part of his daily
task to do what he could to bring these volumes
suitably before the public. In this he was much
helped by his wide acquaintance throughout the
country among teachers and others interested in the
spread of science. Wherever he knew a competent
reviewer he sought his aid in connection with the
local press. In New York his journalistic relations
were such as to insure the widest circulation for the
reviews he himself wrote. These were usually anal-
yses clearly bringing out the positions of an author,
adducing the arguments in support of his conclusions.
This was exactly the kind of work he liked and ex-
celled in. The results attending the faithful work of
himself and his allies, performed as it was in the midst

148 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of the turmoil of war, were satisfactory. His faith
that new science had but to be known to be appre-
ciated was justified.

While enthusiastic in propagating modern views
in physics, chemistry, geology, and the organic sci-
ences, contained in the works of Tyndall, Huxley,
Darwin, and their allies, Youmans felt their work to
be tributary to that of disseminating the philosophy
of evolution. As presenting the supreme organizing
idea of modern thought, his chief effort at all times lay
in directing inquirers to Mr. Spencer's works, in ex-
plaining their doctrines, defending them from mis-
quotation and misunderstanding — in being, in short,
the American apostle of evolution, fervid, instant in
season and out of season, making opportunities where
he did not find them. A series of extracts from the
correspondence of 1863 and 1864 will illustrate the
zeal and efficiency with which this work was carried on.

NEW YORK, March 28, 1863.

MY DEAR MR. SPENCER : I ought to have written you
before, but have been delayed partly from being very busy
and partly to get some information concerning the state of
your account. But so great is the pressure in the depart-
ment which has your subscription in charge that I have as
yet quite failed. The new Cyclopaedia is just finished, and
is having an enormous sale ! The presses are driven day and
night upon it, and they are far behind their orders. The
clerks are overworked, and I have not pressed them for the
information I wanted. . . . The subject of an American
edition of the Essays is still in my mind. I suspect it will
come to that at last, and perhaps soon. The book trade is
recruiting. I feel a sort of embarrassment at soliciting
anything further from you under present commercial cir-
cumstances, and I must take the liberty of very strongly

The Apostle of Evolution. 149

urging you not to draw money from this side at the present
ruinous condition of exchange.

I know you view the state of affairs here with great
apprehension, and it is not surprising that you should ; but
we are NOT going to the devil. " My word for it," if you
want a guarantee ! I believe that any amount you may
leave in the hands of D. Appleton & Co. will be just as
safe as if in the hands of the best London publishing house
you could name. It would be far better to let it lie idle in
their hands a considerable time than to draw it before ex-
change finds its equilibrium; or, better yet, you can have it
deposited in a savings bank, where it will draw six per cent
interest. I believe those institutions are entirely trust-
worthy. I trust them myself without hesitation. I hope
you will trust us for the present, and when the amount of
indebtedness becomes considerable, if exchange is still high,
it would be better to invest it in some form of produce
consigned to a London or Liverpool commission house.
Excuse me for interfering with this element of your busi-
ness. I have done it in pure friendliness, and I shall be
grieved and disheartened were you again to lose as you
sacrificed last fall.

I received the advance sheets of Prof. Tyndall's book
on Heat, and I beg of you to express to him my sincere
thanks for the kindness. The Appletons will issue it at the
earliest moment, the cuts being already nearly all re-en-
graved. It is a very fascinating and altogether remarkable
book, and it will be a pure pleasure for me to work for its
circulation. It cannot fail, I think, to have a good sale.

Prof. Huxley's Lectures to Workingmen we have is-
sued,* and the Evidence of Man's Place in Nature is in the

* In a letter to his sister, dated February 13, 1863, Youmans thus
speaks of Huxley's little book : " There came at the same time from
England a book of Huxley's of which I had not heard — six lectures to
workingmen on — what do you think? — Darwinism. The most perfect

150 Edward Livingston Youmans.

printers' hands. There was competition for the latter
volume. The Appletons advertised it as soon as I re-
turned, and have continued to do so ; the Philadelphia
publisher of Lyell's new work wanted it badly, and ven-
tured upon the ruse of announcing it from advance sheets;
but when he began to realize that if he persisted the Apple-
tons might possibly reprint Lyell upon him, he prudently
withdrew from the contest. The work is now in the best
hands that could have it.

So you see we are getting used to the war, and there
begins to be liberty again to think of something else. And
speaking of " liberty " reminds me of Mill's Liberty, and
the growth of liberality here, of which it is an illustration.
When it first appeared I tried to get the Appletons to pub-
lish it, but they were afraid of its radical doctrines, and
other houses also refused it. I revived it again recently,
and they consented to issue it. But on advertising, it
turned out that five houses had simultaneously announced
it, while Ticknor & Fields, of Boston, having the start of
all the others, will publish it. I am glad we are to have it
for general circulation. I have read Part I of the Biology
with great interest. I think more can be done with this than
with its predecessors in the way of business. I have firm
faith that as your philosophy is unfolded it will be better
and better appreciated, and may ultimately prove compen-
sating and indeed very profitable to you. My wife, who
happens just now to be busy directing some circulars to
those of your subscribers who have not renewed their sub-
little gem of a book I have met with ! George Appleton sat up till mid-
night the first day of its reception to read it, and is crazy to have it repub-
lished. My first impulse was to send you my copy, but I decided not to,
for two reasons: It would distract your attention, and you have not
strength for so much now ; and, besides, there is a lecture in it on Method
that is so inimitable — Spencer's idea of the growth of science, etc. — that I
am ashamed of my introduction and shall reconstruct it. Huxley beats
Hugh Miller out of sight in lucidity."

The Apostle of Evolution. 1 5 1

scriptions, asks to be very kindly remembered to you. I
thought it best not to send away Parts V and VI any
faster than they were paid for. Remember me with kind
regards to Mr. Silsbee, if he is still with you ; and believe me,
Faithfully yours, E. L. YOUMANS.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, LONDON, W. C., May 12, 1863.

My DEAR YOUMANS: Let me once more thank you for
your continued attention to my affairs, which is the more
to be valued by me as being given under your present great
pressure of work. Your unflagging enthusiasm for the prop-
agation of advanced ideas is something quite remarkable,
and the spectacle of it serves one as a kind of moral tonic.

I read to Huxley and Tyndall the passages in your let-
ter concerning them. They were pleased at finding their
respective reprints so rapidly pushed forward. ... I am
much obliged to you for your advice respecting the dis-
posal of the amount due to me from Appletons. I asked
the opinions of several mercantile men here (one an Ameri-
can), and they advise me to draw at whatever sacrifice. I
feel somewhat inclined to follow this advice, notwithstand-
ing your protest. I cannot but think that the comparative
prosperity you describe is an illusive indication of your
social state, and results from the spending of capital rather
than revenue. There was a like condition of things during
the French Revolution, and in England during the war with
France. But in both cases there came a fearful prostration
and a discontent of the lower classes, which would probably
have produced social convulsion had not the repressive
power of political organization been so great. With you
there is nothing like so great a repressive political organi-
zation, and under the same intensity of popular distress a
crash would be much more likely to result.* I doubt not

* Mr. Spencer was probably wrong here. I doubt if any other gov-
ernment in existence would be so hard to overturn by a social convulsion
as that of the United States.

IS2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

that you would afterward recover your equilibrium, but
I suspect that terrible commercial catastrophes and an im-
mense sacrifice of property would have to be gone through.
On the whole, I prefer to lose by the state of the exchange
than to run the risk of much greater loss. Please, therefore,
when the account has been made out let the balance be
transmitted. I was greatly obliged to Mrs. Youmans for
her interesting letter of April nth. I was glad of her in-
formation and opinion respecting the war and its prospects.
The view she takes of the past and future of this terrible
struggle is one in which I perfectly coincide.

Ever yours, very truly, HERBERT SPENCER.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, W. C., October 28, 1863.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: . . . Thank you for the copy of
the New Englander which you have been so good as to
forward. The review it contains is a fair representation
of the first part of First Principles, especially considering
that it is written by a minister.* The objections made are
such as must, of course, be looked for from such a quar-
ter. One point in it, however, annoys me — viz., the asser-
tion that I belong to the school of Comte. This is a mis-
understanding which I am anxious to rectify ; for, though
I am quite ready to encounter the prejudices raised by
opinions which I hold, I do not like to bear the odium of
opinions which I do not hold. Dissenting from Comte as
I do on all those points that are distinctive of his phi-
losophy, I object to being classed as in any degree his dis-
ciple. I am therefore thinking of writing a letter to the
New Englander, setting myself right with its readers on
this point. Should this letter appear, I should be glad if
you could get it republished in the Tribune ; for I fear

* This review was written by Rev. Jonathan Ebenezer Barnes, of
Middletown, Conn., a scholarly and thoughtful clergyman, whom I knew
well and highly respected. He died at an early age in 1866.

The Apostle of Evolution. 153

that this erroneous notion is widely spread, and may do
me much harm if not rectified.

In the last number of the North American Review I see
an interesting article on the Evolution of Language, partly
based on First Principles.* If there have appeared, or
should appear hereafter, any noteworthy criticism, I should
be glad if you would let me know, so that I can get copies
of them through Williams & Norgate, who have now be-
come American agents. . . .

Faithfully yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

The foregoing extract is inserted in advance of
some of earlier date, which are now to follow, and
which present a continuous story. It must be borne
in mind that up to this time none of Mr. Spencer's
books had been reprinted in America except the Edu-
cation, though First Principles and part of the Biology
had been issued to subscribers in numbers, as pub-
lished in London.

NEW YORK, Wednesday, September 16, 1863.
MY DEAR SISTER : I want very much to go up [to Sara-
toga] to-night, and have hitherto hoped to do so, but I shall
not be able. Things to do — important things — thicken,
and must be attended to. I find myself in such a position
of influence with the New York men that I must avail my-
self of my opportunity. . . . Ripley is doing the splendid
thing by me in the Tribune, and the more I know him the
better I like him. He is broader than I supposed, and

* I was the author of this article, published in the North American
Review, October, 1863 ; and it was followed by another, entitled The
Genesis of Language, in the same Review, October, 1869. Neither of
these have been republished among my collected writings, because the
rapid progress of linguistic science has rendered them somewhat anti-
quated.

154 Edward Livingston Youmans.

much of his apparent narrowness and intolerance I have
found out to be mere bluster. He dined with us the other

day.

SARATOGA, November 4, 1863.

MY DEAR SPENCER : When last I wrote you I promised
and expected to write again very soon, but the plans I had
formed, depending as they did upon seeing many persons,
were not so readily executed as I had hoped, and I thought
best to delay troubling you with a letter until I could com-
municate something definite and satisfactory. My purpose
has been, from the beginning, twofold — to circulate your
writings as extensively as possible, and to do it in such a
manner that you might share the pecuniary results.

It had been comparatively easy to accomplish the first
object unembarrassed by the second. That (which would
have been also much easier under usual circumstances) has
been made difficult by the state of the times, and so re-
fractory have been the elements with which I have had to
work that I could not urge the business as I would like to
have done. I find satisfaction, however, in the thought
that the course which has been taken is perhaps on the
whole the best.

There has been in many minds a helpful progress and
ripening of opinion respecting your philosophical views,
which makes the present a fitter time for action than would
have been any period earlier. As respects writing to you,
what I have lost in time I shall now make up in quantity,
and must trespass upon your patience, to lay before you
with some fullness the present aspect of affairs.

Some weeks since I urged Mr. William Appleton to re-
publish the present volume of the Essays upon the same
terms as the Education. He read it and spoke highly of it,
but said that by printing it you would gain nothing and he
would lose. I replied that the writings of Mr. Spencer had
many admirers throughout the country, and that I thought
their relations to the author had in them so much of sym-

The Apostle of Evolution. 155

pathy and personal interest that they might be counted
upon to assist the circulation of the work. He replied :
"We have a great deal of that kind of talk in the course of
business, but it will not do as a basis of action. Yet, if Mr.
Spencer has friends who are so much interested in his
thought that they are willing to divide with me the risk of
publication, I will meet them with an equal liberality.
Whatever their action produces shall result in an increased
dividend to Mr. Spencer." This was certainly fair, and all
I could desire ; I have therefore taken action accordingly.
But let me here state that Mr. Appleton's refusal to
publish the book is by no means to be taken as an index
to the universal publishing mind. This house is proverbi-
ally slow and cautious; other establishments are more ven-
turesome and ready, and would be unhindered by any con-
sideration of copyright. I have reason to know that there
has been, and is now, much danger of your books being
seized upon by other houses. The long and, I think, ex-
ceedingly favourable review (considering its orthodoxy) of
First Principles in the October New Englander (a copy of
which I have ordered sent you at Derby), the recent article
in the North American Review, which the author * will send
you, and other indications, show a growing appreciation of
your works, and I am sure that the danger is imminent of
their seizure by other houses. The effect of this would be
that you would get nothing from the new publisher, while
the competition immediately arising would make it im-
possible that any other house should pay you anything.
Should Blanchard f publish First Principles — and it is far

* I had just met Youmans for the first time three days before this
letter was written, as will appear below.

f Calvin Blanchard, a disreputable publisher who kept a shop on Nas-
sau Street, where you could buy any kind of book that your minister
would frown upon — whether for free thought or for obscenity made little
difference to this unsavoury Calvin. It is odd to find him wanting to pub-

156 Edward Livingston Youmans.

from impossible (I prevented him from publishing Social
Statics) — it would not only ruin the entire subscription
project, but, by mingling your name with the gang of ob-
scene, prurient, and scoffing authors whom he patronizes and
advertises, would make it very embarrassing for others.

Perceiving, then, as I thought, all the bearings of the
case — the hope of advantage and the danger of loss — I
determined to proceed from Mr. Appleton's proposition as
a base, and see what might be done. I have accordingly
spent the last three weeks in a tour of observation and
inquiry through New England, to make the acquaintance
of some of those who have taken interest in your writings,
and I have had a most gratifying experience. I found with
most of them a hearty and earnest appreciation for your
labours and a deep solicitude for their continuance.

There was a uniform and strong desire that your books
should be issued here in a form suited to the American
market, and, I need not add, a cordial and unanimous wish
that you should reap every practicable pecuniary advan-
tage. The plan I proposed met with general concurrence,
and it was resolved to issue one of your volumes at once
upon the terms offered by Mr. Appleton.

I have not seen that gentleman lately, but expect to
talk with him soon, and arrange the precise terms of the
undertaking. There was some diversity of sentiment as to
which of your works should be selected for publication,
but it was generally thought your Essays would be most
successful. Others considered it more desirable to issue
First Principles, and in behalf of this opinion it was said
that this being your latest work, and coming forward into
notice as the opening of a new system of philosophy, it will
be more in demand. In this stage of the matter I should
be glad to learn what you think upon this point, and also

lish Social Statics. Probably somebody had told him that the author was
an " infidel " or a " positivist." That would have been enough.

The Apostle of Evolution. 157

to get a statement concerning the forthcoming volume of
Essays. Will you not send me its table of contents, and
tell me how much it will make, what will be its price,
whether you have begun to print, whether it is now too
late to negotiate for a large edition, and, if not too late,
on what terms it could be procured ? Should we publish
the present Essays, could we not procure editions of First
Principles and of the new series, by taking a considerable
number, so near to cost price that we could afford to throw
them into the American market as high-priced American
books, and thus secure a supply and forestall competition ?
I fear that the rate of exchange will make this utterly im-
practicable, and at any rate it is only a suggestion of my
own, and amounts to nothing until I see Mr. Appleton. My
chief anxiety now is to learn concerning the new volume
of Essays. We may choose to print a volume selected from
the two, particularly if it is impossible to arrange for an
American edition of the second series. How does that
notion strike you? It would be every way desirable to
make the book we issue now as complete a business success
as possible. Such a result would be highly salutary in all
directions. If desirable, another. volume could follow with
the remaining essays. I wish, however, to begin in such a
way that step by step we shall get all your works; for a
very common experience with us is, that when a person
has procured one he subsequently wants the rest, and it is
most desirable also that they should all be procurable in
one place. Again, I want a popular introductory statement
of your scheme of philosophy to prefix to the volume we
publish — something continuous; readable, and attractive.
Your synopsis is of course invaluable, and should be pub-
lished at the close of the volume, but it is not the thing to
win strangers. I am not competent to do that any sort of
justice; I will do the best I can with such assistance as I
can get, but I should be glad of any hints from you ; or, if

158 Edward Livingston Youmans.

there has been any sketch of the kind in newspaper or
review, will you not send it to me, if convenient ?

It has been suggested that the term Essays is the worst
title by which a book can be known, and that this class of
works is generally least successful of all. There may be
something in the suggestion, but I should not like to inter-
fere with an author's preferences. Would you object to a
change, or, if we should compose a volume out of the two,
could you not suggest something fresh, sharply defined, and
"taking"? You have a remarkable facility in this ; it struck
me long since, and I have heard many remark it. I will
not protract this letter, as I have communicated all that is of
special importance. I will write you again soon, and speak
of some persons I met and their relations to your writings.

I look forward to the time, and I believe it is not very
distant, when all your books will be republished here, and
you will have an extensive and appreciative American
audience. In view of this, if there were any articles or
parts of articles in the Essays which have reappeared or
are to reappear in the early parts of your serial you might
perhaps choose to omit them. We have decided to publish
one book now, and it will probably be the Essays.

The action I have taken is to me a great source of
pleasure. I have enjoyed it every way, and have a deep
gratification in its promise of future results. You very
kindly allowed me to take the thing into my own hands,
and I have adopted the course which all approve and think
wisest. I trust your health continues as good as you last
reported it. I am afraid you will have trouble to read
what I have written, but my wife (who begs to be kindly
remembered to you) thinks it may be readable. Please
remember us both with very kind regards to your father
and mother, who are, we hope, still in good health.
Yours very truly and sincerely,

E. L. YOUMANS.

The Apostle of Evolution. 1 59

The unconsciousness of the opening paragraph ot
Mr. Spencer's next letter is charming:

6 HINDE STREET, MANCHESTER SQUARE, November 18, 1863.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I have been hoping for sotne
time past to hear from you. I suppose, however, that the
getting out of your Chemistry has absorbed all your atten-
tion ; and also, perhaps, that you have nothing special to
report.

I fear that the present disastrous state of things with
you will have an injurious effect on your literary enter-
prise, as well as on the enterprises of others. It is reported
here that the New York publishers have agreed to bring
out no more new books for the present. Is this true ? and,
if so, how will it affect you ? . . .

November 21. — Had it not been that I had lost my copy
of the Reader which contained the accompanying extract,
and that I have been delayed in getting another copy, I
should have posted the enclosed sheet to you three days
ago — that is, before the arrival of your welcome letter,
which reached me last night.

The energy and self-sacrifice you continue to show in
the advancement of my scheme quite astonishes me ; and
while in one respect it is very gratifying to me, yet in an-
other it gives me a certain uncomfortable sense of obliga-
tion more weighty than I like to be under. If it were not
that this sense of obligation is in some degree qualified by
the consciousness that you are in great part prompted to
what you do by your love of truth and your philanthropic
desire to aid the spread of it, my feeling on the matter
would be really oppressive. Similarly, though in a smaller
degree, the results of the tour you describe give me a
pleasure which, though great, is not unmixed. While I
am rejoiced to find so much interest felt by many of your
countrymen in the diffusion of my writings, yet the con-
sciousness that they run any risk in aiding this diffusion is

160 Edward Livingston Youmans.

a somewhat painful one to me. However, I hope that what
steps are taken will be taken with such caution that those
who stand in the position of guarantors will surfer no
loss. . . .

»The first part of this letter answers several of the
questions contained in yours. The new volume of Essays
is now issued here, and the two hundred and fifty copies for
America are on their way to you. In printing these two hun-
dred and fifty only for your market I acted on the opinion
which you sent me, and, not anticipating any such step as
that which you are proposing to take, did not stereotype.
Unfortunately, therefore, we cannot supply you with a
cheap edition of this book from the English type. Of First
Principles you can, as I think you know, have an unlimited
supply at a cheap rate. ... I am by no means sure, how-
ever, that First Principles would be the best book to start
with. I agree in the impression that the Essays are more
likely to be popular. I agree also in the belief that the
title Essays is a bad one ; and I agree also in the notion
that a selection from the two series of Essays would be the
most likely to succeed. The contents of the new volume
are as follows: The Nebular Hypothesis, Illogical Geol-
ogy, The Physiology of Laughter, Bain on the Emotions
and the Will, The Social Organism, Representative Gov-
ernment— What is it good for ? Parliamentary Reform ; the
Dangers and the Safeguards, Prison Ethics, State Tamper-
ings with Money and Banks, The Morals of Trade. Now,
bearing in mind all that you tell me, the proposal I make
is this: i. That you sell off the two hundred and fifty
copies of the new series of Essays as soon as you get them
at the ordinary American prices ; and similarly with what
you have remaining of the first series, so that the high-
priced stock may be at once got rid of. 2. That out of the
two series you then select all the essays bearing directly
on the doctrine of evolution, viz., Progress — Its Law and

The Apostle of Evolution. 161

Cause, The Nebular Hypothesis, Illogical Geology, Tran-
scendental Physiology, Bam on the Emotions and the Will,
The Social Organism, The Genesis of Science, Manners and
Fashion, The Origin and Function of Music; and that this
group of essays be republished under some such title as, .
How all Things Progress. 3. That if this succeeds, I then
supply you with a thousand First Principles, at such price
as to be sold at American rates. The further steps would,
of course, be decided by the results of these. Such a volume
of essays as that which I have described would, I think,
be popular ; and would be a good introduction to the Sys-
tem of Philosophy. Moreover, the popular sketch of the
System of Philosophy would form a good prefix to such a
volume of essays; since the essays would be so many
illustrations of it.

When you see Mr. Appleton, thank him for the very
liberal course he has taken on this matter, as on all pre-
ceding matters. He has done much more than was to be
expected from one in his position. I will see whether I can
find any appropriate materials for such a sketch as you
propose, and, if so, will send them to you.

Mrs. Youmans was quite right in not copying your letter
for you. I made it out, save one or two words, with but
little difficulty. I am glad to hear of your settled inten-
tions for the spring, when I hope to see much more of
you both than I did before. Meanwhile I am again,

Very truly yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, November 23, 1863.

MY DEAR MR. SPENCER : In my last letter sent to
Derby I mentioned the measures I had recently been
taking to bring about an American reprint of your books.
We want them for general circulation.

Sooner or later they will be republished. This will end
the sale of English copies, and if not attended to will cut
you off from any pecuniary advantage. Conscious of the

1 62 Edward Livingston Youmans.

injustice of our copyright law, your friends have resolved
that you shall not be the loser. They accept Mr. Apple-
ton's proposal and will furnish him the stereotype plates,
while he pledges himself to pay you double the usual copy-
right, or twenty per cent upon the sales. This arrange-
ment, as I wrote you, refers to the Essays, and we are now
ready and anxious to go forward with the book, and only
wait to hear from you respecting revision. . . .

I promised in my former letter to give you some further
particulars of my recent visit East. It was undertaken, as
I mentioned before, with a view to concerting measures
with those who are interested in your works, for bringing
them before the public, and the result was in a high degree
encouraging to your prospects. I found everywhere a
deep interest in your writings (though in some cases but a
partial mastery of them), and a desire to learn of your
personal welfare as if they had been old friends. I was
heartily thanked for offering them an opportunity of doing
something to promote the circulation of your writings, and
I think an important effect of the course taken will be to
secure additional attention and more prominent notice of
future publications.

At Bangor, Me., I made the acquaintance of the Rev.
Charles Carroll Everett, a Unitarian clergyman of large
liberality and with a fine reputation for ability and scholarly
attainments, who was the author of the review of First Prin-
ciples in the Christian Examiner. He is a thorough student
of your various writings, and much in sympathy with their
spirit and aims. A brother parson was rallying him a while
since on his endorsing a philosophy which began without
God and ended without freedom. He replied "that these
first generalizations of Spencer's are only the emerging
peaks of the rising continent."

At Portland, Me., I met the Rev. Horatio Stebbins, who
had been with great reluctance induced by Mr. Alger, of

The Apostle of Evolution. 163

Boston, to subscribe for the serial. His interest in the work
had led him to procure your other writings, and he was ex-
tremely desirous that they should be republished in this
country. The Rev. Mr. Alger is not only an appreciative
student of your works, but a confessed and ultra-enthusi-
astic disciple. He is a gentleman of much culture and re-
finement, but his training has been rather scholastic than
scientific. Charles Sumner was an admiring reader of your
Social Statics, and boasts that he had the first copy in this
country. He acknowledges large indebtedness to it, but
his former bad health and the pressure of public duties, he
regretted to say, had prevented him from following up your
subsequent publications. Wendell Phillips, the " golden-
tongued," was happy to be ranked as a reader and admirer
of Mr. Spencer's writings. He had read Social Statics
early, often quoted its author in his discussions, and asked
me when I wrote you to convey to you his cordial respects,
with an acknowledgment of his deep indebtedness to your
labours. He was delighted with the project of reissuing
your books, and begged to be used in any way that would
forward the undertaking. Mr. G. B. Emerson, an eminent
and influential educator of Boston, expressed great pleasure
in the hope of having all your works in American form, and
asked me to say to you that if your readers in this country
are not numerous, they are at least appreciative and multi-
plying.

Upon approaching the University of Cambridge, the
brain of Boston, the interest deepened. Prof. Asa Gray
expressed astonishment that the serial had not succeeded
eminently, both in this country and in Europe, and could
hardly credit the statement that it had not paid its own
expenses. He did not seem to be much interested in the
republication of the old books, but thought something ought
to be done immediately to advance the circulation of the
work now being issued. The first six numbers he had not

164 Edward Livingston Youmans.

read, for Dr. Walker (formerly president of the college) had
borrowed them. He was, however, much interested in the
Biology; thought it promised to be more taking than its
predecessors, and might be made popular.

Dr. Thomas Hill, present president of the college, told
me that he was not a subscriber to the serial and had not
read First Principles ; but he had prepared a sermon directed
against its doctrines (no names being mentioned), which he
considered but a reproduction of the French atheism of the
last century.

There is a literary club in Cambridge, embracing the
president and some of the professors, at the monthly meet-
ings of which an essay from one of the members is read
and discussed. I gathered from various remarks that the
philosophy of Herbert Spencer was brought up at the last
meeting by an essay of Dr. Walker, the borrower of Gray's
numbers. The college is in the midst of a ferocious fight
between the scientists and the classicists, the latter having
become alarmed at the inroads of the former. The new
president is regarded as a triumph of science, and I suspect
that his newly prepared sermon may be intended to con-
ciliate the adverse party.

I tracked out the author of the article on the Evolution
of Language, in the last North American, who proved to be
a very able young fellow, only twenty-one, named Fiske — a
resident graduate of Cambridge and a student of the law
school. You may remember I mentioned to you an article
in the National Quarterly on Buckle, which had a refer-
ence to you. That article was also by Fiske.* He has an
intimate companion named Roberts, and they have read,
pondered, and discussed together every line of yours they
could obtain, in volume or review. First Principles thoy
have read through twice together, and they have not only

* Mr. Buckle's Fallacies, National Quarterly Review, December, 1861 ;
republished in my Darwinism, and Other Essays.

The Apostle of Evolution. 165

adopted your philosophy but assimilated it, employing your
terminology habitually in conversation. While Fiske is
busy with the principle of evolution in its application to
language, Roberts is applying it to the history of juris-
prudence. Their three favourite authors are Spencer, Mill,
and G. C. Lewis, although they^did not consider the last
two comparable with the first. * They are brimful of fire
and enthusiasm, and may be relied on for important assist-
ance.

The editor of the North American Review* erased the
passages from Fiske's article which were most compli-
mentary to you, but the periodical has now passed into
other hands, f which we trust are more liberal. Mr. Fiske
has been solicited to become a regular contributor, and
says he will never again submit to the mutilation of his
articles. The young men had been debating for a year
whether it would do to write to you, and as I took the
liberty of encouraging them to do so I presume you have
heard from them before this time. Prof. Wm. B. Rogers,
who has constant fights with Agassiz about the develop-
ment hypothesis, was another of those appreciative friends
who acknowledged the value of your labours and expressed
a desire to be of assistance to our project.

While in Boston I met Mr. Silsbee, who was in remark-
ably fine health, his northern expedition having evidently
been of immense benefit to him. He heartily approved of
my plans, and was of considerable assistance to me. To
resume business, I may add that several of our leading and
most important organs of public opinion (newspapers and
periodicals — Silliman's Journal, Atlantic Monthly, Boston
Journal and Transcript, the New York Tribune, Times,
and Evening Post) are pledged to full notices of anything
from your pen. As I should like to bring these influences

* Rev. Andrew Preston Peabody.

f James Russell Lowell and Charles Eliot Norton.

1 66 Edward Livingston Youmans.

to bear upon your philosophy, I am especially anxious to
get the First Principles in hand as soon as possible. With
earnest wishes for your health and general well-being, I
remain,

Very cordially yours, E. L. YOUMANS.

In reading this letter for the first time, almost thirty
years since it was written, and five years since all that
was mortal of my noble friend was laid in the grave,
many bright and tender reminiscences are awakened.
Subtle links of causation had begun to join our lives
together before we ever met. It was owing to You-
mans that the first volume of Buckle's History of
Civilization was reprinted by the Appletons in 1858.
A copy was not long in finding its way to Middletown,
Conn., where I soon got hold of it and devoured
it. Many years would probably have passed before a
copy of the London edition would have reached that
little town. I thus owed to Youmans the most power-
ful intellectual stimulus of those early years and the
occasion of my first published essay. The study of
Buckle led directly to Mill's System of Logic and to
Comte's Philosophic Positive, which interested me as
suggesting that the special doctrines of the several
sciences might be organized into a general body of
doctrine of universal significance. Comte's work was
crude and often wildly absurd, but there was much in
it that was very suggestive. I have already mentioned
how, early in 1860, Youmans first saw the prospectus
of Spencer's proposed series of works setting forth
the doctrine of evolution, and how he wrote his first
letter to Spencer the very next day. It was at about
the same time that I first became aware of Spencer's
existence, through a single paragraph quoted from

The Apostle of Evolution. 167

him by Lewes,* and in that paragraph there was im-
mense fascination. On my first visit to Massachu-
setts, in May, 1860, I fell upon a copy of that same
prospectus of Spencer's series, in the Old Corner
Bookstore, in Boston, and read it with exulting de-
light, for clearly there was to be such an organiza-
tion of scientific doctrine as the world was waiting
for. When I published the essay on the Evolution of.
Language, in 1863, there were so few people who had
any conception of what Spencer's work meant that
they could have been counted on one's fingers. At
tha£ time I knew of only four — the Rev. John Lang-
don Dudley, of Middletown, a preacher of extraor-
dinary wisdom and power ; my old comrade and fel-
low-student Mr. George Litch Roberts, of Boston,
now one of the most eminent patent lawyers in the
United States ; Mr. John Spencer Clark, now of the
Prang Educational Company ; and the late Professor
Gurney, of Harvard. Of course there were others,
besides Youmans himself, whose names occur in the
foregoing letter and elsewhere in this book. Some
of us entertained pretty decided opinions about Mr.
Spencer's workr When we sometimes ventured to
observe that it was as great as Newton's, and that his
theory of evolution was going to remodel human think-
ing upon all subjects whatever, people used to stare at
us and take us for idiots. Any one member of such a
small community was easy to find ; and I have always
dated a new era in my life from the Sunday after-
noon when Youmans, escorted by Roberts, came to
my room in Cambridge. It was the beginning of a

* Lewes, Comte's Philosophy of the Sciences, London, 1853, pp.
168-171.

1 68 Edward Livingston Youmans.

friendship such as hardly comes but once to a man.
At that first meeting I knew nothing of him except
that he was the author of a text-book of chemistry
which I had found interesting in spite of its having
been crammed down my throat by an old-fashioned
memorizing teacher who, I am convinced, never really
knew so much as the difference between oxygen and
-antimony. At first it was a matter of breathless in-
terest to talk with a man who had seen Herbert Spen-
cer; but one of the immediate results of this inter-
view was the beginning of my own correspondence
and life-long friendship with Mr. Spencer. And from
that time forth it always seemed as if, whenever any
of the good or lovely things of life came to my lot,
somehow or other Edward Youmans was either the
cause of it, or, at any rate, intimately concerned with
it. The sphere of his unselfish goodness was so wide
and its quality so potent that one could not come
into near relations with him without becoming in all
manner of unsuspected ways strengthened and en-
riched.

His next letter, in which his scheme has taken on
still more definite shape as to the volume of essays, is
highly characteristic :

NEW YORK, December 14, 1863.

MY DEAR MR. SPENCER : Your favour of November i8th
reached me about a week since. I was very glad to get it,
as it put an end to my suspense and settled at once what
was to be done. ... I like the prospect of the volume of
selected essays, and am glad that you agree to the notion
of a new title. Either of the titles you suggest might an-
swer, but I have thought that with more time you might
perhaps improve them. I think it important that the term
"progress" should be incorporated in the title, but should

The Apostle of Evolution. . 169

it be Illustrations of Progress, or Phases of Progress, or
the like ? I think there should be a further explanatory
clause. But I am no adept at these things, and you are.
There is also no hurry about it. You do not name the
article on The Philosophy of Style, yet I think it should be
by all means included, as it has great value and is much
admired. Bancroft was to-day eulogizing it to me in very
high terms.

Respecting your protest to the New Englander, I think
it all-important. Theologians, of all men, love to throw
mud — to use Tyndall's phrase — and the Comtean puddle is
now the favourite. In looking over the American press
notices of your works I find the dominant idea is that you
belong to the positive school ; and although not one in a
hundred knows what Positivism is, all are agreed that it is
positively dreadful. It is desirable to stop this authorita-
tively, and I should be glad to have a pointed disclaimer to
append to the popular sketch of your philosophy for our
new volume. Excuse the suggestion ; you know, of course,
far better what needs to be done than I do. Respecting
First Principles, I had a conversation to-day with Mr.
Appleton ; he thinks it best to import five hundred copies
in sheets and bind them here. I still entertain the hope
that we shall be able to get the use of your plates when
we can adopt a thoroughly liberal policy toward the
press.

As respects what I have done, I pray you give yourself
no uneasiness. It is but little at any rate, and it seems to
be my kind of work. I greatly like it, and never enjoy
myself so well as when occupied in promoting by some
measure the diffusion of valuable thought. I am an ultra
and thoroughgoing American. I believe there is great
work to be done here for civilization. What we want are
ideas — large, organizing ideas — and I believe there is no
other man whose thoughts are so valuable for our needs as

17° Edward Livingston Youmans.

yours are. It is pleasant to find myself less and less alone
in my estimate of the case and in my efforts.
Yours very truly and sincerely,

E. L. YOUMANS.

" It seems to be my kind of work." Bless his dear,
unselfish, modest heart, how much of Edward You-
mans is summed up in that unconscious remark!
Never was anybody's kind of work more nobly
done.

The next letter from Mr. Spencer answers the let-
ter of November 23d :

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, W. C., December 77, 1863.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I suppose you have before this
received a letter which I wrote in answer to your last, and
which I directed to the care of the Appletons.

The description you give me of the reception which
your philanthropic proposals met with during your tour
are highly encouraging to me. Evidently the American
mind is more plastic than the average English mind, which
is so much more restrained by institutions and traditions.
The progress that I make here, though tolerably sure, is
very slow. But the aspect of matters with you compen-
sates. The list of subscribers here, instead of increasing,
has greatly decreased since the completion of the first vol-
ume; but the sale of the first volume itself makes some
compensation for this. And, taking into account the pros-
pects your generous efforts have opened to me, I feel tol-
erably safe in pursuing the course I have marked out for
myself. . . .

I must really protest against the amount of sacrifice so
generously proposed to be made by my American friends.
The obligations under which you have placed me, and to
which you have lately been adding so greatly, it has been
beyond my power to avoid, had I wished to avoid them ;

The Apostle of Evolution. 171

but the obligations foreshadowed in your last letter are in
part such as I can and must avoid. If my American
friends, moved by your active efforts, agree to take upon
themselves the risk of republishing some of my writings —
a risk which I dare not run myself — I cannot help it; and
while I feel somewhat uneasy at seeing such responsibilities
undertaken, I cannot but feel a considerable pleasure in
finding so much interest manifested in the success of my
aims. But when it is proposed that my friends should sup-
ply Messrs. Appleton with the stereotype plates, and that I
should begin to reap the profits of the reprint from the
outset, as seems to be implied by your statement of the
arrangement, I must decline to agree. It is, I think, a
quite sufficient generosity on their part if they save rne
from a contingent risk and give me the contingent profit
after their expenses have been paid. The twenty per cent,
on the sales, which the Appletons agree to give me, must
be set aside for defraying the cost of composition and
stereotyping, until that cost has been repaid — supposing this
twenty per cent, profit should suffice for the repayment.
Only after such repayment has been made must the twenty
per cent, on the sales be payable to me — only then will I
accept it. ... Perhaps the best title for this proposed vol-
ume of selected essays would be Illustrations of Universal
Progress. . . .

Give my kind regards to Mrs. Youmans, along with my
thanks for the trouble she expended in copying your last
letter. Once more accept yourself my warm acknowledg-
ments for your untiring and disinterested labours in fur-
therance of my scheme, and believe me,

Very truly yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

NEW YORK, January 12, 1864.

MY DEAR MR. SPENCER: Yours of the iyth of Decem-
ber, 1863, is received, and I regret exceedingly that you so
interpret what we are doing as to be troubled with any

172 Edward Livingston Youmans.

sense of obligation. Certainly, if the matter is to be viewed
in the light of debit and credit, the indebtedness will be
mainly on the side of your friends. My chief purpose
in this affair was not to raise funds, for, although the
publishers would not risk the issue of the essays, I could
readily have done so, as there is really no risk to run.
There will be no difficulty in this volume at least paying
expenses.

But I wanted active co-operation, and therefore took
steps to personally commit a few gentleman of wealth and
influence — persons who appreciated and acted upon the
public bearings of the case — to an interest in the under-
taking. I of course did not hesitate to state that your
English publications did not prove remunerative, but I
explicitly disavowed this consideration as the motive of
my efforts. Nevertheless your requirement shall be faith-
fully complied with, and, with this assurance, pray dis-
miss all solicitude and leave us to work out our mission,
using your tools and paying as fairly as may be for their
use. I like the new title very much. The work is in
the printers' hands, and will be finished in less than a
month.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, LONDON, W. C., January j, 1864.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I did not include the essay on
The Philosophy of Style, because it does not in any mani-
fest way illustrate evolution. A further reason for not
including it is, that if there should be a second volume of
essays issued in case the first succeeds it is desirable that
some of the more interesting articles should be reserved
for it. ...

I have not yet heard from the two Cambridge students
whom you name. I shall be very glad to do so; your
account of them is very encouraging, and they are evi-
dently adherents well worth having. The article on the
Evolution of Language interested me much, showing, as it

The Apostle of Evolution. 173

does, not only extensive information, but power of inde-
pendent thought.*

I was pleased to find that you agree with me in think-
ing it important to disabuse the American public respecting
the imputation of Comtism. I had at first thought of em-
bodying in my letter to the New Englander a general dis-
claimer on behalf of the scientific thinkers of England,
but I concluded that, as the matter was essentially a per-
sonal one, the editor might object to my entering on the
more general question. Now, however, that you suggest
the addition of some such remarks to my letters, with a
view to general distribution, I willingly make them.

I embody them in a paragraph on the next page ; which
you may quote as an extract from one of my letters and
append to the republished letters to the New Englander.
I inclose a copy of the letter to the New Englander, lest
it should not have been published.

My father, who is with me, joins me in "kind remem-
brance to Mrs. Youmans and yourself.

Very sincerely yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

There appears to have got abroad in the United States
a very erroneous impression respecting the influence of
Comte's writings in England. I suppose that the cur-
rency obtained by the words " positivism " and " positivist "
is to blame for this. Comte having designated by the
term " positive philosophy " all that body of definitely es-
tablished knowledge which men of science have been
gradually organizing into a coherent body of doctrine,
and having habitually placed this in opposition to the in-

* This paragraph, quoted by Youmans in his next letter to me, gave
me the courage which had hitherto been lacking to write to Mr. Spencer.
I did so in February, 1864, and received a very prompt and cordial reply.
It was the beginning of my personal acquaintance and friendship with Mr.
Spencer.

174 Edward Livingston Youmans.

coherent body of doctrine defended by theologians, it has
become the habit of the theological party to think of the
antagonist scientific party under this title of positivists,
applied to them by Comte. And then, from the habit of
calling them positivists there has grown up the assumption
that they call themselves positivists, and that they are
disciples of Comte. The truth is, however, that Comte and
his doctrines receive here scarcely any attention. I know
something of the scientific world in England, and I cannot
name a single man of science who acknowledges himself a
follower of Comte or accepts the title of positivist. Lest,
however, there should be some such who were unknown to
me, I have recently made some inquiries into the matter.
To Prof. Tyndall I put the question, whether Comte had
exercised any appreciable influence on his own course of
thought ; and he replied, " So far as I know, my course of
thought would have been exactly the same had Comte
never existed:" I then put the further question, " Do you
know any man of science whose views have been affected
by Comte's writings ? " and his answer was, " The influence
of Comte on scientific thought in England is absolutely
#//." I put the same two questions to Prof. Huxley, and
received, in other words, just the same answers. And
Prof. Huxley pointed out to me passages in his own writ-
ings in which he spoke of Comte in language almost con-
temptuous. Prof. Huxley and Tyndall, being leaders in
their respective departments, and being also men of gen-
eral culture and philosophic insight, I think that, joining
their impressions with my own, I am justified in saying
that the scientific world of England is wholly uninfluenced
by Comte. Such small influence as Comte has had here
has been on some literary men and historians — men who
were attracted by the grand achievements of science, who
were charmed by the plausible system of scientific gen-
eralizations put forth by Comte, with the usual French

The Apostle of Evolution. 175

regard for symmetry and disregard for fact, and who were,
from their want of scientific training, unable to detect the
essential fallaciousness of his system. Of these, the most
notable example was the late Mr. Buckle. Besides him, I
can name but seven men who have been, in any appreciable
degree, influenced by Comte ; and of them, four, if not
five, are scarcely known to the public.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, W. C., March 26, 1864.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: Thanks for the two letters which
I have received since I wrote last. Probably you have
been somewhat surprised at not receiving an answer before
now ; but I have been for the last six weeks wholly ab-
sorbed in writing a pamphlet on The Classification of the
Sciences, with an appendix repudiating the philosophy of
Comte. An article on First Principles, in the Revue des
Deux Mondes for February 15, which speaks of me as be-
longing to the " positive " school, has led me to take this
step, and I have postponed everything else until this
needful work was done. The pamphlet will be published
here in a few days. I am having papier-mache" impressions
taken from the type, which I will send to you by the next
steamer, so that you will be able to cast stereotype plates
and print at once. I think an extensive distribution of this
pamphlet in the United States will be desirable.

NEW YORK, April 12, 1864.

MY DEAR MR. SPENCER : After more delay than I an-
ticipated our new book is published and presents a very
satisfactory appearance. I have taken the liberty, as you
will see, of making some changes, which seemed demanded
by circumstances. Besides putting headings over alternate
pages, I have broken up some of your larger paragraphs,
so as to lighten the pages and render them more attractive
to miscellaneous readers. It was not easy to find points of
cleavage, so closely runs the thought, but I tried to violate

176 Edward Livingston Youmans.

the continuities as little as possible. I give the volume the
subtitle of A Series of Discussions, in order to avoid the
word " essays " on the title-page and thus preserve the in-
dividualities of the separate works. I have prefixed to the
volume a notice of your philosophical system more credit-
able, I trust, than the hastily written pages I sent you.

First Principles is nearly ready, and is to be published
as soon as the present volume is fairly out of the way.

Your remaining essays are now in press, and will be pub-
lished as soon as First Principles is off the track. As the
original title is now unsuitable, I have made it Essays:
Moral, Political, and ^Esthetic, the latter term being justi-
fied by the three papers on Style, Personal Beauty, and
Gracefulness. We have concluded, furthermore, to follow
the publication of the Essays by that of Social Statics, and
thus complete the American series of your works, a large
copyright being allowed on the whole.

I think you once remarked to me that certain of your
views had been considerably modified since the publication
of Social Statics ; but as you intimated that the change
consisted in a divergence from the democratic views there
expressed, the volume may be more acceptable to us in its
present form than it would be after your revision. You
will hence see the propriety of a republication here, when
you might not choose to have it reissued in England. I
think it is especially the book we need at the present time,
and may do important service.

I have sent you a notice of the Progress I prepared for
the Tribune. It is not what it ought to be. I am thorough-
ly sensible of my incompetency to do you justice, but it is
better than I could get done by anybody else. The best
thing about it is that it enables you to speak for yourself.
I, however, take some little credit to myself for managing
its publication. The Tribune is the most influential journal
in this country. I long ago saw its importance in regard to

The Apostle of Evolution. 177

our enterprise, and acted accordingly. The literary editor,
Mr. Ripley, is a fine scholar, but a Unitarian clergyman to
begin with, and classical to the core, and infected with Ger-
man metaphysics — an unpromising subject certainly, and,
most of all, pointedly and publicly committed against the
new views of Herbert Spencer. The notice of the Educa-
tion, I must confess, was fairly battled into the Tribune
through friend Greeley's influence, Mr. Ripley vehemently
protesting against this new evangel of education. He had
not read it, and would not look at it. But an old copy of
your Essays (found in Beecher's library, when he went to
Europe, with the margins of the pages written full of notes)
fell into his hands, arrested his attention, and changed the
current of his opinion. Since that time his views have been
gradually modifying,* and the upshot of the matter is, that
I have been able to get the long notice in all the editions of
the Tribune (a copy of each of which I send you), the
daily having a circulation of 400,000, the semiweekly of
30,000, and the weekly of 160,000. Advertising in the latter
is one dollar per line, the market value of the space allowed
me being $960. Considering that the Tribune circulates
mainly among that class which it is important to reach, and
is moreover of great influence with other newspapers, this
gain is a telling one. I published the notice in the daily
the very day the work was advertised.

I send you the New York Observer, the most bigoted of
our religious journals. The criticism is surprisingly mild,
the editor having evidently read only the introductory no-
tice, which I aimed to make a sort of religious breakwater
to protect First Principles from the rush of the pious flood.
The Independent is the most largely circulated and influen-
tial religious journal in the country, having six or eight
thousand clergymen on its subscription lists. I have

* In course of time Mr. Ripley became an unqualified adherent of Mr.
Spencer's philosophy.

178 Edward Livingston Youmans.

written a notice for it, which will appear next week. Prof.
Gibbs has promised me a notice in Silliman's Journal and
Mr. Quincy in the Atlantic Monthly. I am making interest
also in several other quarters, so you see things are slowly
moving along.

As for myself, I am not at all well. I had a week or two
ago an attack of neuralgia of the chest, accompanied with
high fever and other distressing symptoms, and since that
time have been troubled with dizziness and loss of ordinary
strength. As my work in town is nearly done, I shall
leave for Saratoga in a few days, hoping to recover my
wonted tone by exercise in the bracing country air. The
prospect of getting to England soon is not very encourag-
ing, as the rate of exchange is frightfully high.

The last number of Biology delights me, as did all its
predecessors. We must issue it as soon as our volume is
completed, and you had better keep duplicate plates of the
remainder. . . .

As regards the obstacles in the way of our going to
England, I am rather glad of it, for though I should like
greatly to avail myself of the intellectual advantages of the
London season, yet I am well content to forego them if I
can accomplish the important work with which I am occu-
pied. I am certain that I can in no way so effectively pro-
mote the true interests of the American people as by bring-
ing these works before them and urging public opinion to
them at the present time. The effects of the war are far
more profound than is generally realized. Whatever be the
political results, there is a mental emancipation to which
this generation has been a stranger. The great slave sys-
tem, intrenched in conservatism, and the natural ally of
everything old, superstitious, arbitrary, and barbarous — the
sworn foe of all liberty of thought and expression, all re-
form and progress, and ruling us first through the Govern-
ment, and then, by a thousand pressures, commercially, for

T/te Apostle of Evolution. 179

the South was our great customer — this system had well-
nigh paralyzed the mind of the nation. But the war has
broken the spell. I have never before known such boldness
of inquiry and demand for first principles. If the slave sys-
tem is broken up in this convulsion, the mind of the country
will be far freer than ever before ; if not, I see no escape
from utter mental re-enslavement. If the slave power has
the vitality to maintain itself through the shocks of this
war and achieve its aim, it will be regnant in the future; it
will be dominant over the continent, and make fight with
the course of civilization, Heaven only knows how long!
But be that as it may, now is the time for action, and I
have striven my utmost to make it available. I shall
strongly hope that events will so shape themselves that I
may be in London next winter.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, W. C., May 18, 1864.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: Accept my thanks both for the
Progress and for the copy of your own Chemistry, which
you have been so kind as to send me. I have as yet had
little time to dip into it, but I am struck with the immense
amount of matter you have contrived to put into a small
space, and als^> with the very great clearness of statement.
It seems to me admirably adapted to serve its purpose as a
class-book. I expect to find it useful for ready reference;
and have, indeed, already done so on one point I had for-
gotten.

As to the Progress, it looks very well, and is evidently
more fitted to be popular than it was in its original form.
You must have bestowed an immensity of trouble upon it,
in putting the headings to the pages and dividing the para-
graphs, as well as in correcting the press. Indeed, in this,
as all along, you amaze me by the amount of labour you
expend in furthering my undertaking. I cannot but feel
somewhat oppressed by the consciousness of it, since the
disturbance of health which you describe can hardly fail to

180 Edward Livingston Youmans.

have been either produced by overapplication or made
worse "by it. Pray be a little more economical of yourself.
Even with a view to the most efficient propagation of the
ideas in which you are interested, it is needful that you
should be more moderate in your exertions. A breakdown
in health entails more loss of time than all those minor
losses that may result from taking work somewhat more
easily. My own case may serve you as a demonstration.

You say, " So you see things are slowly moving along."
It seems to me rather that they are moving along with
great rapidity. If I could describe them as moving with an
equal "slowness" on this side the water I should be quite
satisfied. The rapidity with which you are proposing to
bring out the successive reprints is indeed rather startling
to me, since I had understood that the results of the pub-
lication of this first volume were to determine the steps to
be taken with respect to the others. I hope I may ration-
ally infer that the promptitude with which the others are to
be brought out is an indication that the prospects are good.
It may indeed be not a bad policy to bring out the volumes
in rapid succession. The result will no doubt be to keep
up and deepen the interest more decidedly than a slow suc-
cession would do.

I was amused and pleased with your skilful generalship
with respect to the criticism in the Tribune, especially as
the diminished antagonism of the literary editor has been
one of its accompaniments.

Respecting Social Statics, I gave you a somewhat wrong
impression if you gathered from me that I had receded from
any of its main principles. The parts which I had in view
when I spoke of having modified my opinions on some
points were chiefly the chapters on the rights of women and
children. I should probably also somewhat qualify the
theological form of expression used in some of the earlier
chapters. But the essentials of the book would remain as

The Apostle of Evolution. 181

they are. When you come to the reprinting of Social
Statics, should that -project be persevered in, I should like
to put a brief prefatory note stating my present attitude
toward it.

In the essay on Classification of the Sciences which I
sent you there is a new generalization respecting the ulti-
mate conditions to evolution and dissolution. The arrival
at this has led me to see that the second part of First Prin-
ciples is by no means complete in its organization, and the
result is that I have some thought of reorganizing it. If
my intention does not change I may probably set about
doing this as soon as I have completed the first volume of
the Biology. Part XI will be out in the course of next
week, and Part .XII, completing the volumes, I shall
probably get finished early in the autumn. If this should
be so, and if I should then commence remodelling the
second part of First Principles, it may be that by the end
of the year I shall want the stereotype plates back. This,
however, is problematical ; for if I take this step, I shall
not take it until the existing stock of First Principles is
sold off, which it may not be at that time.

I greatly regret that you have had to abandon your
project of coming to England for the present. The ruinous
rate of exchange is a very sufficient reason. Let us hope
that this obstacle may very soon disappear. With wishes
that you are by this time quite well again, and with kind
regards and thanks to Mrs. Youmans,

Believe me, very sincerely yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

29 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, LONDON, June 8, 1864.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: When I wrote to you last I be-
lieve I had not read the new introductory notice you have
written for the volume of the Essays on Progress. Had I
done so, I should have expressed to you my indebtedness
for the very admirable and judicious way in which you

1 82 Edward Livingston Youmans.

have presented the leading points of the system. The
theological aspect especially you have'presented in such a
way as is very well calculated to serve the purpose you
had in view — to act as a breakwater against the sectarian
storm. No doubt the favourable reception given to the
book by some of the theological journals has been in
great part due to this. . . .

I have quite decided on making the reorganization of
the second part of First Principles. The further develop-
ment which will be given to the doctrine is too important
to let it stand over. . . .

I find good reason to be glad that I have published a
distinct repudiation of Comtism, for the impression that I
am a Comtist was far more widely spread than I had sup-
posed. One of the reviewers of the pamphlet says: "By
this publication Mr. Spencer has completely removed the
impression that he was a mere slavish adherent of Comte ! "
My estimate of the average intelligence has never been
very high, but really the degree of stupidity implied by
such a remark exceeds even my anticipation.* The preva-
lence of such perverse interpretations makes me feel, even
more than before, how desirable it is that the pamphlet
should be extensively circulated in the United States.

I am inclined hereafter to follow your advice respecting
the amounts due from the Appletons, and, instead of having
them remitted here, invest them in America — perhaps in
railway stock, of which I already hold a little. I name this
now not with a view of making any immediate decision,
but lest I should forget to name it before the next account
becomes due.

* For it was really very much as if one had said : " Mr. Theodore
Parker has completely removed the impression that he was a mere slavish
adherent of Jonathan Edwards ! " It would be difficult to find in all the
history of philosophy a more intense and radical antagonism than that be-
tween Spencer and Comte.

The Apostle of Evolution. 183

88 KENSINGTON GARDENS SQUARE, LONDON, W., October 14, 1864.

. . . The batch of opinions of the press which Mrs.
Youmans was so kind as to collect for me, and the accom-
panying letter, in which she was at so much trouble in
giving me accounts of their writers, &c., reached me while
in Scotland. The receipt of them formed a very pleasant
little episode in my Highland life — calling me back to
things which were for the time wholly out of my thoughts;
for when with my friends at Ardtonish, occupied with vari-
ous sports and amusements, I get wholly absorbed in sur-
rounding things — forgetting all about philosophy and the
writing of books. I have to thank Mrs. Youmans for re-
minding me of them in so agreeable a way.

I have but little to report respecting the progress of
things here. Your American style of doing things makes
me somewhat dissatisfied with the very small results
achieved in England. The most hopeful fact is that !•
gain the suffrages of all the most highly cultivated men ;
and I suppose that the suffrages of a wider public will
follow in due time. I am very glad that I published when
I did the essay on the Classification of the Sciences,
for I was surprised to find how widely there was spread
the erroneous impression that I was an adherent of
Comte. I hope the pamphlet has been well circulated with
you.

Thanks for the photograph of Mr. Fiske which you sent
me. Do you know who is the author of the article on A
Physical Theory of the Universe (or some such title) in the
July number of the North American Review ? I suppose it
is one of your astronomers.

The article in question was by Chauncey Wright,
containing a discussion of the nebular and meteoric
theories of stellar evolution. It betrayed a misunder-
standing of the general principles of evolution, which

1 84 Edward Livingston Youmans.

called forth a very able criticism by George Roberts,
to which Spencer thus refers :

Thanks for the further press notices which you sent me
along with the Boston Evening Transcript. I presume
from the initials that the letter is by Mr. Roberts. I read
it with much pleasure, and thought it extremely well done.
The replies are very much the same as I should have made
myself, the only further way in which I might have en-
forced the reply being by referring to the chapter on The
Rhythm of Motion as being an elaborate statement of that
" principle of countermovements " on which the reviewer
insists. When you write to Mr. Roberts pray convey to
him my thanks for his very efficient defence.

The following sentence, coming soon after, in an
acknowledgment of the publishers' accounts, illus-
.trates one of Youmans's inveterate habits. I believe
one of his chief delights in buying books was to have
them to give away :

I see in the account the item, " seven copies of the
Essays sold to Professor Youmans." Surely you have not
been throwing away your money on my books to give away !
If there are any presentation copies which you think it well
to give, pray always order the Appletons to send them, and
debit me with them.

I cannot close this chapter more appropriately
than with an incident clipped from a letter of Christ-
mas, 1864: "Henry Carey called in to blow up the
Appletons for publishing Spencer's British free-trade
doctrines. Spencer was an upstart ; his system would
soon die, like Comte's and Mill's. Said W. H. Ap-
pleton, ' I can tell you one thing— Spencer won't die
as long as Youmans lives ! ' '

CHAPTER X.

SECOND AND THIRD VISITS TO ENGLAND.
1865-1866. Age, 44-45-

MR. YOUMANS sailed from Portland, with his wife
and sister, on April 15, 1865, the day when strong men
were crying on the streets and utter strangers wrung
one another's hands in grief over the dreadful news of
the murder of President Lincoln. The voyage was
dismal enough. There were no other Americans on
board, and nobody had a good word or a good wish
for the United States. The captain, in the hope of
being the first to reach England with the news, made
all haste. From Liverpool the party proceeded with-
out delay to London, where Youmans at once en-
tered upon the work entrusted to him by the Apple-
tons, of arranging with divers authors for the republi-
cation of their works in America. Incidentally he
took note of British progress in scientific education,
and projected a book which should have value as a
criticism of tendencies much stronger then than now
in American educational policy. He intended to show
that university education in England had been de-
veloped as the natural concomitant of an aristocratic
Government, swayed by adherence to old traditions
and by respect for social rank quite as much as for
merit. He held that this system of education, as
brought over to America and long established here,

9 (185)

1 86 Edward Livingston Youmans.

was unsuited to the needs of our people ; and that in
so far as our universities gave direction to general
education, the influence of " classicism " was extremely
injurious. His design, pretty fully sketched, was
never completed, but he afterward made much edi-
torial use of facts and arguments gathered with refer-
ence to it.

In the course of the summer the party made a
journey to Switzerland. I give a few extracts from
the correspondence of the spring and summer. Miss
Youmans was at that time in rather poor health.

LONDON, May 20, 1865.

DEAR FRIENDS : I yesterday morning breakfasted with
Mr. Forster, M. P., the great champion of America. I had
a note to him from Minister Adams. I am having the op-
portunity I have so long desired of informing myself upon
educational facts, points, and questions, and I think I
shall profit by it. I was yesterday present in a committee
room of the House of Commons, or rather Westminster
Hall, in which both Commons and Peers came to witness
the examination of Archdeacon Dickinson, who appeared in
behalf of the High Church to oppose the new " conscience
clause," as it is termed, which it is proposed to introduce
into the school management. The national schools are in
charge of the Church, superintended by the clergy, and no
child is permitted to enter them unless he has been first
baptized by a Church clergyman, and attends the Church
and Church Sunday-school. The "conscience clause" pro-
poses to abolish this, and let dissenters' children in with-
out requiring this of them. The archdeacon opposed this
to the bitter end: it was dangerous and wicked; there was
only one Church, the Episcopal, and therefore but one re-
ligion, and the business of all education is to teach religion.
It was curious and highly interesting.

Second and Third Visits to England, 187

LONDON, June 7,

DEAR BROTHER : We continue in our place still, but
with no immediate prospect of change. The weather is
exceedingly cool and refreshing. We went to the Borough
Road Training School this morning directly after break-
fast, which occurs at 9 A. M. It is almost three miles. The
omnibus took us from door to door. Staying there two or
three hours, we came back to the Jermyn Street School of
Mines and heard Tyndall's lecture on Spectrum Analysis,
which closed at half-past three. Having had tickets pre-
sented us to the gardens of the Royal Botanical Society,
in Regent's Park, we took a cab from the lecture directly
to that place. . . .

We made an excursion to Kew three or four days ago.
Kew is about eight miles by rail from Charing Cross. It is
an old royal park converted into extensive gardens, and is
the great botanical establishment of Europe. We left
home at ten and a half, accompanied by Mr. Spencer, took
a cab for the Hungerford Bridge over the Thames, and a
boat from there to Chelsea for "tuppence." (Tuppence and
tuppence ha'penny are great institutions here.) At Chelsea
we changed boats and navigated the crooked river up to
Kew. The boats are abominable little black things with
no covers, close crowded, and most disagreeable. We
lunched at Kew, under a shed, on cold ham, cold beef,
bread and butter, with salad. Eliza had to travel slowly
over the extensive grounds, but there were frequent seats.
The immense park is filled with venerable and magnificent
trees, and is traversed by broad gravelly walks, straight,
crossed, and curving around. Numberless plants and shrubs
and countless groups, beds, banks, and borders of flowers
are everywhere. And then through the grounds are dis-
tributed plant houses, heated for the reception of tropical
plants, aquatics, and various collections too numerous to
mention and far too numerous to see. We returned by

1 88 Edward Livingston Youmans.

rail at exactly dinner time, half past six. Kew Gardens
were founded and have grown up under the care and con-
trol of Sir William Hooker. His son, Dr. Joseph Hooker,
is now the active man and lives on the spot. He married
the daughter of Rev. John Henslow, Professor of Botany
in Cambridge. Prof. Henslow was a very able man, and
his hobby was popularizing botany and introducing it into
the very lowest schools. He devised a method for this, and
tried it in the parish schools with great success. He pre-
pared a plan, a regular philosophic system, but did not
publish it before his premature death. His son, Rev.
George Henslow, made over the manuscripts to Prof.
Oliver, of the London University, who has lately published
them in the shape of a small volume, which Eliza got yes-
terday. George Henslow has inherited his father's reputa-
tion as a botanist, with his system and all appurtenances.
He teaches a grammar school in South Crescent, about ten
minutes' walk from here, and also takes private pupils in
botany. Eliza is going to take some lessons of him. He
has explained to her his method, which pleases her. She
will begin day after to-morrow. If her strength holds out
she will probably Americanize Henslow's method and re-
produce his text-book. It has certain very important ele-
ments for educational purposes.

LUCERNE, SWITZERLAND, August 16, 1863.
DEAR FATHER* AND MOTHER: Presuming that before
this reaches you Jay will have left the United States, I
address this to you, and will try to make it so legible that
you can easily read it. We left London a week ago
yesterday, and have travelled through France, Belgium,
Prussia, and Bavaria, and are now in Switzerland — a pretty
good week's work for invalids. We crossed the Channel
without difficulty. Eliza expected to be horribly seasick
and dreaded the trip, but went to sleep and was there be-
fore she knew it. We stopped the first night in Brussels,

Second and Third Visits to England. 189

the next at Aix-la-Chapelle, the next at Cologne, Friday
night at Heidelberg, Saturday night at Strasburg, Sunday
night at Basel, and Monday and Tuesday nights at Zurich,
from which place we came this morning. We have visited
the chief objects of interest and curiosity in each of these
places, and Eliza has stood it remarkably well — much better
than I should have thought she could. Of course she gets
tired, and when tired, like her mother, myself, and the
human family generally, frets a little, but that is nothing.
I think she is enjoying her Continental experience, and that
it will prove extremely profitable to her. We found her
old teacher and my old friend Prof. Wislicenus, and had
a very delightful visit with him and his family. We are
now fairly among the Alps, and are experiencing the un-
certain and changeable weather which belongs to this
region. An hour ago we were admiring the magnificent
ranges of mountains, which raised their numberless peaks
all around in front of us, the beautiful lake intervening
between ; now all is hidden from view by enveloping clouds,
and there is a drenching rain. We expect to leave here to-
morrow morning, having, with a party of three English
people, engaged a private carriage to take us to Meiringen.
There we shall take mules and cross a mountain which
abounds in fine views, and, after passing through the most
interesting portion of the country, return to England per-
haps early in September. Kitty is very well — looking ex-
tremely well, and in excellent spirits. Eliza is picking the
coloured spots or little figures out of one of her silk dresses,
and is actually getting up a little bit of a sing. I am to
have our letters sent to Geneva, where I expect to meet
them next Monday or Tuesday. The boat is just return-
ing, bringing the excursionists from their trip over Lake
Lucerne, with a band of music in full blast — a jolly lot
altogether.* I cannot go into any particulars of our jour-
neyings and experiences, but will reserve that till our re-

190 Edward Livingston Youmans.

turn, in October. I hope this will find you well. Don't
overwork ; old people generally kill themselves by expo-
sure. Not that you are very old, but ought to be old
enough to take care of yourselves.

LONDON, Augttstjo,
DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER : We returned yesterday
from the Continent. In the whirl and haste of our tour I
have quite forgotten from what point I wrote you last. I
have, however, sent but one letter from the other side of
the Channel. I think we were just entering Switzerland.
Well, we went through that remarkably hilly country and
saw a great deal of it. The peculiarity of Switzerland is
this: you thread your way through long narrow valleys at
a rapid rate on the finest roads that are found in the world,
with the mountains rising on each side of you all along,
from 5,000 to 14,000 feet high. Many of them are snow-
clad — the highest — but the more common ranges are not.
The Swiss live in these valleys in their little cottages, some
of them part way up the sides of the mountains, and in
consequence of the stagnation of air they are often very
unhealthy. Sometimes it is desirable to go from one valley
into another without going round. We then either ride in
vehicles (in a few cases they have made roads zigzagging
up the steep slopes), but most commonly we have to go
over on mules or horses, as the paths are so steep and
crooked and narrow that no vehicle can be got up. The
places where we cross are called " passes " and are of vari-
ous heights. They are interesting as commanding distant
views of the lofty, snow-clad summits. We all went over
one very fine pass in a private carriage and enjoyed it
exceedingly.

In October Youmans returned to America with his
wife, leaving his sister and brother in London. He
had scarcely reached home, at Saratoga, when the

Second and Third Visits to England. 191

shocking news arrived that his brother Warren had
been murdered on his own farm in Minnesota.

SARATOGA, October 23, 1865.

DEAR BROTHER AND SISTER : The letter I wrote you
last week is probably in mid-ocean, yet when it w^as written
our dear brother Warren was already quietly resting in his
grave. His life has been full of manly activity and earnest
struggle, but he is now released, and the vicissitudes of
earth will trouble him no more. The manner of his death
was shocking, but his suffering could hardly have been
protracted. It may perhaps matter little to the subject of
it what are the accompaniments of his exit, but the reflec-
tion must always be most painful to the survivors that it
involved a crime and was a consequence of human brutality.
Yes, as Earle says, the family circle, so long happily pre-
served, is broken at last. The tragic elements of life come
into sharper relief, and we have a stern and startling ad-
monition that whatever we do must be done promptly, for
the time will swiftly come when we must take our place
beside our fallen brother. I have a very deep satisfaction
in my remembrance of the visit we had with Warren last
winter. I enjoyed it inexpressibly at the time, and I think
it was a very pleasant experience to him. He was so un-
affected and natural, satisfied to be simply himself — as had
always been one of his marked traits of character. . . .

I brought Earle's letter home last Friday, and did not
open it till I found Pa in the barn husking, #s it was
directed to him. Of course, it was a terrible blow to us
both, but Pa bore it very calmly. We went in and took
Ma upstairs into your room. I told her we had dreadful
news, and she was hardly able to make her way. " Is Ann
Eliza dead ? " said she. I told her " No," it was War-
ren, and explained how he died. She was deeply affected,
but bore it far better than I feared she would. Of course,
the first thought was about his dying "unprepared." I

192 Edward Livingston Youmans.

replied at once and decisively to that, and I think it greatly
composed her. Indeed, I am well persuaded that this first
practical trial of her theology shows it to have utterly lost
its power. She quickly recovered her entire self-posses-
sion, and, although deeply saddened by the affliction, she is
quite herself again. Zella,* of course, felt very badly, but,
poor child, she could not realize the event. The destroy-
ing angel has passed over our house, and one of our family
has disappeared from the scene ; the rest remain as before,
preserving the courses that each must follow for himself.
I am again at work preparing my lectures, which I think
of illustrating somewhat, and hope to get Millicent to make
my diagrams. The work is much advanced outside — corn
husked, potatoes safe — only the turnips to secure. The
weather is quite cold and blustering ; to-day is pleasanter,
but the time of bleak and rasping winds has come. I had
almost forgotten to say that we received your long, wel-
come, and satisfactory letter of October 26. last Thursday.
I have no time to comment on it now, nor is it needful, I
am very glad that events so shaped themselves that you
can continue in your place, as it has many advantages.
Your opportunity is a golden one, and I know you will
improve it. Let nothing disturb you. Ma's chief trouble
in our late affliction is fearing its effect upon you, for you
are more constantly in her thoughts than any other. It
was a sore disappointment that you did not return ; but
as soon as she understood the circumstances she cheer-
fully acquiesced in the course adopted. I am most happy
that we are at home now.

Very affectionately, EDWARD.

The brother (William Jay Youmans) and the sister
were busily occupied in London, he studying physi-

* Warren's daughter by his first wife. She had lived with her grand-
parents since her babyhood.

Second and Third Visits to England. 193

ology with Huxley and she botany with Henslow, and
each preparing- to make a text-book available for
American purposes.* Delightful place as London is
for persons engaged in such sort of work, there is
nothing strange or unusual in one's having a fit of the
blues when the broad ocean is between one's self and
one's home. The following fragments of a most kind-
ly and cosy letter tell their own story :

SARATOGA, November 12, 1865.

DEAR BROTHER AND SISTER: Your letter of super-
abounding misery came yesterday. It seems to me it must
explode soon ; I do not think the boilers can stand another
inch of pressure. I think we have discomfort enough on
this raw, bleak, windy hill, with our extraordinary environ-
ment. I have Millicent here, drawing part of the time ;
Kitty has a seamstress part of the time; Kitty, Carrie,
and Zella are housekeepers. Last Thursday Mrs. Rowland
sent word that she and Mrs. Carr were coming a-visiting
Friday. At the same time Carrie received a letter that her
folks were to have a surprise party Friday night, and she
must come home. And so Pa had to quit the securing of
his cabbage and go up on to the mountain to carry his help,
and Zella has been after her to-day. I can't get a thing
done to the ice-house ; the turnips and the cabbages have
occupied the last three weeks. Our father's cabbage crop
comes out as. usual— he can't get anything for it. Three
fourths of the teams we meet coming from Saratoga are
laden with cabbages which they can't give away. Cab-
bages, rye, and rye-straw are the minima of the market.
Why do I talk about such things ? Because the universe
from this standpoint is composed entirely of cabbages and
carrots and kindred objects and interests. They have hired

* Miss Youmans's Botany was published in 1869, and has been a very
successful text-book.

194 Edward Livingston Youmans.

a school teacher of very remarkable claims at a great price.
Mrs. Rowland says "she writes an excellent hand, and
closes the school with singing " — or will close it after she
begins. It is inspiring to see H. R. pressing up the educa-
tional mountain with superhuman afflatus, disappearing
among the clouds and shouting " Excelsior ! " There is no
news — that is, nobody's dead that I have heard of. I am
beginning my lecture to-day ; have two weeks to prepare
it in. As I approach it I begin to have hope of it again.
Millicent has finished one diagram and has another ad-
vanced. The third and largest will occupy her a good
while. I hope she will have it done by the time I am
ready. I am going to try it on up at the meeting-house
for the benefit of the society, at ten cents a head. The
prospect is I shall have a good deal of lecturing to do, but
how much is still undetermined. I have many applications,
but they are scattered. I shall get from fifty to one hun-
dred dollars — mostly, I think, seventy-five dollars. Buf-
falo, Cleveland, Akron, Detroit, will pay a hundred ; others
less. Many new places are applying in Ohio, Michigan,
Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa. I shall work chiefly in the West
and be there most of the winter. Your letter of October
22d, filled with rain, fog, smoke, and universal misery, has
caused a very considerable amount of misery here also.
Ma is certain that Eliza will either go crazy or die this
winter.

The Botany may be all very well, but it may cost too
much. I have no doubt the weather is crushing and killing
to the spirits. Whenever you feel that you can't stand it
any longer, or that there is no further object or use in your
staying, come back. Take a Cunarder — the China for Bos-
ton, or the Scotia for New York, it's immaterial which ;
and if on the China, get a berth, if possible (and I pre-
sume there will be no difficulty in winter), near the stair-
case. It will have air and be away from noise. Twelve

Second and Third Visits to England. 195

or thirteen days in winter will probably fetch you across ;
but I would not return till I had tried changing quarters,
and get good quarters if you change at all. Respecting
Spencer's affairs, I cannot write more till I have some-
thing to write, and I shall have nothing to write till I do
something myself. That I shall do as soon as I can.

I wish Eliza would go to the British Museum, find the
transactions of the Royal Society, look over the list of con-
tributors from its foundation to 1860, and see how many
noblemen are among them. This is important, and has not
been done. I shall go into this field — this English educa-
tion field — next winter. It will be very popular and very
important. I wish she would also call on Miss Margaret
Jones, whose whereabouts can be learned at the " Home
Colonial," St. Chadd's Row. I think it is not far from your
place, and I would go there and hunt the woman out and
see her school. I would take a little whiskey and stir around.
It is Sunday night ; our folks are writing.

Affectionately, E. L. Y.

Sunday Evening, November 12, 1865.

DEAR CHILDREN : To-morrow morning, Edward says, a
letter must start for Europe, and I thought I would drop a
few lines to you, so that you might not have it to say that
Pa never wrote to us while in Europe. And what shall I
say ? The first thing I have to say is that we are alive and
well, and I think Eliza will say that is a great blessing. It
is indeed, especially if we rightly improve it; and who does
rightly improve it ? Those only who glorify God, that they
may enjoy him forever. Think of it ! We have recently
had fresh proof of the uncertainty of life. We received a
letter last night from you, dated the latter part of October,
and were very glad to hear from you, and especially of
your resolution to write every week. It may stimulate us
to write oftener. We were sorry to hear that Eliza was so
miserable. No doubt you are homesick. If that be the

196 Edward Livingston Youmans.

case you can cure yourself of it by just saying, Well, I
cannot go home until next April, and I will take things
easy. Do not expose yourself by overdoing or underdoing.
Take no more exercise than is necessary ; it has been the
bane of our family — overdoing. You might all stop over-
doing but myself; I cannot. However, my time is so near
out, it makes but little difference with me. Another idea is,
time is on the wing; days and weeks and months fly apace.
April will soon be here ; then we shall all be glad to see
you and bid you a hearty welcome.

V. YOUMANS.

MY VERY DEAR ELIZA AND JAY : When we heard the
sad tidings of your brother's death my first reflection was
my unfaithfulness to my dear ones when they were young.
This was a cutting reflection, and I thought if I could once
more meet you all I would entreat and endeavour to per-
suade you to make that preparation which is all-important.
Everything earthly seems to vanish, and eternity with all
its vast realities looms up before my mind. One immortal
spirit committed to my charge has gone to the judgment.
Feeling and knowing that the Judge of all the earth will
do right, we leave him there. But the living — where are
they ? Will not they now listen to the voice that speaks
from the tomb, saying, Be ye also ready, for in such an hour
as ye think not death may come and cut short all your
prospects ? Feeling that no words of mine will reach your
case, I go to the Mercy seat and lay your case before the
Saviour, pleading that he will grant the Holy Spirit so to
impress truth upon your hearts that you may be led to in-
quire, What shall I do to be saved ? Only look up to the
Light, ask to be guided aright, and you will soon be safe
within the inclosure. If you come with penitence, the
Saviour will meet you with open arms and bid you a ...

Second and Third Visits to England. 197

Monday^ November ijth.

Ma broke down at half past ten last night at the point
where I now commence in Mr. Cook's shop.*

I have little to add, except to say I will send you all
the money you can use. Go to the theatre every night — to
Christy's — everywhere where there is any fun going on.
Spend at least fifty cents to a dollar every day in cab rid-
ing; anything to stir up and get out of the dumps. If
Eliza sews any, she had better do it on dresses, silk or what
not. Jay can buy shirts already made, but dresses you can't
get so. Nor can you pass through the customhouse goods
merely cut into breadths. They must be finished and worn.
There is no prospect of goods being lower in a long time.
It is the infernal tariff, and not the exchange, which makes
them so high. ... In December Kitty will probably be in
New York. You had better direct to New York, care of
Appletons. If we are here, they will send up. If we are
in New York, we can send up home. Don't write anything
for our folks that is discouraging. Write anything to me.
Affectionately, EDWARD.

CENTURY CLUB, NEW YORK, December 4, 1865.
MY DEAR SISTER : I left home Thursday — it is now
Monday night — lectured yesterday before the Normal
School, on Friday at Cooperstown ; spent Sunday here ;
go to-night to Albany ; speak on Wednesday at Utica, on
Thursday at Jersey City, and then rest a little. Your let-
ter about the Botany came the very hour of my leaving; I
had to leave it for our folks. It mortifies me that I have
made myself so little understood that you suppose I am
especially anxious for you to work at either the Botany or
any other task. If you can enjoy it better to do otherwise,
by all means do that which will be most agreeable ; that is

* Edward's mother had trouble with her eyes, and in this instance they
failed her so that she could not finish the sentence.

198 Edward Livingston Youmans.

the very first condition of health, and I did not dream of
your touching the Botany except when you felt like it, and
would rather, from intrinsic pleasure, work at it than not.
It would, no doubt, be very well, but I care little for it —
nothing, absolutely nothing, for it in comparison with your
comfort. I think there is a great deal in Spencer's sug-
gestion, that if you make a business of amusement you can
get interested in it ; and to get thus interested in something
would be your salvation. So pray take it up systematically,
cost what it will ; that is nothing, literally less than nothing,
in the scale of benefits. I shall get seventy-five dollars a
night this winter, and sometimes one hundred dollars. Am
beginning to realize the fruition of long labour and long
weary waiting, in all of which you have shared, and in all of
which you must continue to share. Take Jay and go to
the theatre every night, to the minstrels, the wax figures,
the workhouse, and I think that last will be an excellent
place to go to for change. Be assiduous in taking it easy.
I have thought latterly that the Botany was perhaps a mis-
take ; you had got deeper in and further on with the Psy-
chology— that would have worked itself. Say to Jay to go
in for nervous system and brains. If Huxley does as he has
a mind to in treating subjects, so may his partner. Brains
are the things, and are coming up. I have got some brains
in Dynamics of Life, and they tell. Say further to Jay to
have as good a time as he can get and while he can get
it. ... Our folks have come out Untversalists. They say
they don't believe in any literal hell of real genuine fire,
and never did ! — which is the tallest kind of an orthodox fib.

Shortly after his return from England Youmans
received a letter from his friend, the Rev. Dr. Bellows,
of New York, urging him to accept a non-resident pro-
fessorship at the college founded by Horace Mann, at
Antioch, Ohio. His duties were limited to giving a

Second and Third Visits to England. 199

course of twelve lectures annually, for a salary of five
hundred dollars. Some time before he had been of-
fered the presidency of this college, and had declined
it. He now accepted Dr. Bellows's proposal, and
gave his course of lectures there in 1866. Then the
pressure of other duties obliged him to resign.

In that autumn of 1865 we were all dismayed by
the announcement that Mr. Spencer would no longer
be able to go on issuing his series of philosophical
works setting forth the doctrine of evolution. In Lon-
don they were published at his own expense and risk,
and despite the earnest efforts made in America the
state of the accounts was very discouraging. His
property was too small to admit of his going on and
losing at such a rate. As soon as this was known, John
Stuart Mill begged to be allowed to assume the entire
pecuniary responsibility of continuing the publication ;
but this Mr. Spencer, while deeply affected by such
noble sympathy, would not hear of. He consented,
however, with great reluctance, to the attempt of
Huxley and Lubbock and other friends to increase
artificially the list of subscribers by inducing people
to take the work just in order to help support it. But
after several months the sudden death of Mr. Spen-
cer's father added something to his means of support,
and he thereupon withdrew his consent to this ar-
rangement, and determined to go on publishing as
before, and bearing the loss.

But, as soon as the first evil tidings reached Amer-
ica, Youmans determined to avert the disaster, if pos-
sible. As the needful aid was not to be had through
any available accession to his list of subscribers to the
serial, he made up his mind that a sum of money must

2OO Edward Livingston Youmans.

forthwith be raised by subscription for the express
purpose of repairing the loss already incurred, and
thus enabling Mr. Spencer to go on with his work.
Once let this difficulty of a day be surmounted, and
the path of the new philosophy would soon become
straight and easy. It is delightful to remember the
vigour with which our dear friend took up this task.
It was more of " his kind of work," and, as usual, it was
successful. The sum of seven thousand dollars was
raised and invested in American securities in Mr.
Spencer's name. If he did not see fit to accept these
securities, they would go without an owner. The best
Waltham watch that could be procured was presented
to Mr. Spencer by his American friends ; a letter,
worded with rare delicacy and tact, was written by
the late Robert Minturn ; and Youmans, who was
going to England to publish there his Culture de-
manded by Modern Life, took the watch to Spencer.
It was a charming scene on a summer day in an Eng-
lish garden when the great philosopher was apprised
of what had been done. It was so skilfully managed
that he could not refuse the tribute without seeming
churlish. He therefore accepted it, and applied it to
extending his researches in descriptive sociology.

In this connection the following extracts are inter-
esting :

NEW YORK, January 2, 1866.

DEAR SISTER : Sixty-five is in its grave, and we start
fresh with a new year. In my last two letters I have indi-
cated in a vague way what I am about. I made up my
mind to make a drive in the direction of a cash testimonial
to Mr. Spencer that should cover his loss of $5,500 since
he commenced publication. Having myself decided upon
ijt, I drew up a circular, a copy of which I send to you (care

Second and Third Visits to England. 201

of Layton, for fear some accident might cause it to tran-
spire at 88).* Read it, and then hide it. Neither let
Spencer nor anybody else but Jay have a glimpse of it ; it
might be fatal to all future action. I send it for your satis-
faction alone, and to show that I have not been idle. I
came down to the city last week expressly on this business.
Of course 1 cannot tell now what will be the result. I had
but one day here to try it after I got the circular, but
things look fair. ... I called on Beecher — I had spoken
to him when he lectured in Saratoga that I wanted to see
him about some such matter. I called with the proof of
the circular. He says, " Well, what's this nonsense ? " "I
want your distinct opinion of this circular — its suitableness
for its work, its redundancy, its diffuseness." He glanced
it over : " ' Mongrel scheme of aristocratical and ecclesias-
tical government ' ! That won't do ; strike out mongrel.
Spencer never calls names or uses an epithet, not even
when he is going to cut a thing up root and branch. Well,
it's very good. Have you seen X, Y, and Z ? " f " No,"
said I ; " I sort of disliked to call on them. I did so before
and thought they were a little afraid." "Yes, that's it;
nobody so cowardly as your half liberal, who has got to
take care of his position. See here ! leave those old infidel
fellows to me. I'll say, * Here, you needn't be afraid of this
if I ain't.' It's revolutionary, but who cares. Turn which
way it will, I'm bound to come out on top, for I go in for
the truth. \ Send me some of those circulars as soon as

* He means 88 Kensington Gardens Square, Mr. Spencer's lodging at
that time.

\ Naming three distinguished liberal preachers. I do not think it
necessary to give the names.

\ Nobly said, old Beecher ! His head was always sound and clear on
such points. In a letter of November, 1864. Youmans says : " I saw
Beecher yesterday. He says : ' Stir them up — subsoil the people with
Spencer, Huxley, and Tyndall. I have got them all, and go in for them
all. If the trellis of old philosophies is rotten and falling down, take it

2O2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

possible. I have a little time now, but I shall soon be off."
... Of course it won't do to let Spencer know what is
going on at all. He would spoil it, sure as fate. It is un-
certain at best, but to succeed it must be already done and
come upon him in a shape he cannot help. . . . Good-by.
I leave to-night for the West to be absent at least six
weeks. I am sorry to go just now.

FREEPORT, ILL., February i^ 1866.

DEAR SISTER : Welcome back again with all gladness, if
you are back and not dead. It was plucky to undertake it,
just after Jay's account of sea-sickness, but I suppose you
rushed into it with a fatal fascination, as people go and
hang themselves when the air is filled with rumours of
suicide. I trust you came through with nothing more than
indescribable physical discomfort. I know all were de-
lighted to see you at home, as I certainly shall be if I ever
get home, and I hope you will take it easy and pick up
strength. I am storm-bound here; snow deep; thermometer
minus twenty, and railroad obstructed. Went to lecturing
hall — only twenty persons present, the weather so horrible.
Night before last missed an engagement by failing to con-
nect. Shall try it again to-night, but this week will amount
to nothing. I hope to be back to New York by first of
March.

I smoke — praise be to God for tobacco !

NEW YORK, March j, 1866.

MY DEAR FISKE : I have just returned from a long lec-
turing tour West, in which I had the calamity to get no
news from home for nearly two months — everything missed
me. Your letter of January 2oth therefore has been left
till now unconsidered. I was delighted to see it, to hear
from you, and to get a glimpse of such a vision of glory

away and let us have a better. We can train the vines of faith on the new
one just as well.' "

Second and Third Visits to England. 203

as you there picture. I think you are altogether right;
I never thought the practice of law would satisfy you.
You are on the right track — a little routine literary work,
which will not exhaust the mind, but will keep the pot in a
state of brisk ebullition, leaving the surplus of time and
force for independent thinking. Business first, of course —
the dear wife and darling baby, food and raiment, before
all other things — and beyond doubt the first condition of
all other, success. But a non-professional and literary busi-
ness, if possible, as a profession tends to suck up all the
mental juices and leaves only a husk for other things.
Your bill of fare is indeed tempting, and makes one's
mouth water to glance it over.* I cannot doubt its suc-
cess, and by this I mean that you will have no difficulty in
procuring a first-rate publisher, and your book would be
bound to work its way into the libraries of the best
thinkers.

But it will be wise not to entertain too sanguine expecta-
tions in reference to the profits of a work of this grave
character, and a first effort at that. Still, I doubt not it
will do well, and, being intrinsically valuable, can be made
to do well at any rate.

I opened the ball for Spencer before leaving for the
West. I hoped it would be a good thing to get it simmer-
ing; and when I return and find nothing, nothing, nothing
done by anybody, I am a little alarmed, for there was
considerable stir and promise before I left.

There is one thing that is bad — infernally bad just now.
Some Eastern Abbot — Time and Space Abbot, I supposef

* The reference is to a projected volume of essays illustrating the
doctrine of evolution. I had sent Youmans a list of the subjects which
I proposed to treat. Such work as was done in pursuance of this design
was afterward absorbed in the larger enterprise of the Outlines of Cosmic
Philosophy, begun in 1869. The chapter of that work entitled Sociology
and Free Will was written in this year (1866).

f Mr. Francis Ellingwood Abbot, of Cambridge (class of 1859), who

2O4 Edward Livingston Youmans.

— has just published the ablest thing yet against Spencer
in the March Christian Examiner. There is concession of
second-rate ability, but a mean ingenuity in concentrating
upon Spencer all the blistering rays of theological odium,
and that, too, with a vast pretence for caring only for the
truth. It is a panic appeal, a scream, to the entire theo-
logical world that their day of judgment is at hand, and
that Herbert Spencer, materialist and atheist, is the head
devil who is engineering the headlong movement. It is all
right enough, and at any other time would be of no ac-
count, but just now it embargoes " liberal Christianity,"
and leaves us to raise money out of the "world, the flesh,
and the devil." Well, if these will give the money, I will
vote them the true saints and bet on their chances of para-
dise. I am going to work at this thing at once, and don't
mean to be bluffed.

I got a letter from my brother in London yesterday, who
stated that Spencer had received one from Mill the day be-
fore expressing regret and proposing a remedy, but did it in
such a way as, of course, to elicit a prompt and decided re-
fusal. Tact is all-essential in such a matter. I have Mill's
letter, and it is noble, though not adroit. Spencer exacted
a promise that it should not go out of my hands. If I
come to Boston, as I may before long, I will bring it. I
am now going to work, and will advise you of the result
of the experiment. I will send this to Roberts's care,
thinking perhaps it will get more prompt delivery. Write
me what you think of Abbot's article, and oblige me by
pointing out every flaw you see.

NEW YORK, March j-, 1866.

DEAR SISTER : . . . There is nothing in reference to
the Spencer enterprise. Nothing whatever has been done,

had published an able essay on the Philosophy of Time and Space in the
North American Review.

Second and Third Visits to England. 205

as far as 1 can learn, by anybody, and that is not the worst.
An article has just appeared in the Christian Examiner, by
" Time and Space " Abbot, of a most malignant character
concerning Spencer. It is able and ugly. I am afraid of
the effect, as it circulates among just the class to whom
the appeal is to be made. I received your letter contain-
ing Mill's letter to Spencer. I was glad to get it this
morning, as its tendency was somewhat to counteract the
unpleasant effect of the Examiner paper. That article ac-
cords merit to Spencer as an organizer of the sciences, but
is savage on his religious doctrines, and his cowardice as
evinced in his preface to his Psychology, where he says
there was a fifth part withheld from prudence.* At any
other time I should not mind it, but now it is bad. I shall,
however, go forward with the undertaking to see what will
come of it. I have seen nobody yet, and have just drawn
up the paper for signature.

NEW YORK, March 2fth.

I am working away with all my might upon the review
for the Tribune. I find I have a considerably shorter time
to do it in than I had expected. Ripley leaves Boston
April 25th, and New York a week earlier, and he wants
this thing attended to before he goes, as also do I. I am
getting on very well with it — that is, I have got well at
work. I have a little room at the club, warmed and cosy,
where I go most of the day and till late at night ; it is
perfectly still and quiet, and favourable to my work. I

* This absurd charge of " cowardice," brought against Mr. Spencer by
Mr. Abbot, would seem to have been made in a spirit of mere captiousness.
The fifth part of the Psychology, entitled Physical Synthesis, was withheld
from the first edition in 1855 simply because Mr. Spencer rightly believed
that without more explanatory context than he could provide for it in that
book it would not be correctly understood. After the publication of First
Principles and Biology the case was altered, and the second edition of the
Psychology contained the portion omitted in the first, with many other
additions.

206 Edward Livingston Youmans.

shall stick right to it till I finish it.. I am going to review
Spencer's Philosophy generally, First Principles and Bio-
logy, making as taking and impressive an article as I can.
I want to complete it at the earliest possible moment, to
get it through all the Tribune editions. Sam May sends
me the names of all the Boston clergy to help. Poor soul !

April i8th.

DEAR SISTER : I have an envelope directed to you. I
may as well fill it. As for Philamadelphiana, I have been
in that interesting and religious town and have come away
no richer but much wiser than I went. They have been
Chauncey Wrighted. He is a relation, I think, of the set
into which I fell; and they coolly assured me that I would
find it worse in Boston, for Spencer was hated there. I go

to Boston to-night to try.

NEW YORK, April, 1866.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I send you the daily Tribune con-
taining my article, which will also appear in the larger
weekly and semiweekly editions of that journal. There
is no other paper in the country whose opinion of books
has equal weight with that of the Tribune, and none also
which is so widely taken by the editors. We know how
utterly indiscriminating and stupid newspaper notices of
works like yours usually are, and I felt it to be important
that something should be done, however slight, to help
these gentlemen of the quill. The notice I have written is,
I know, very imperfect and totally inadequate^to the sub-
ject. I am conscious of my own utter incompetence to do
justice to the subject, but if I had been less disturbed, and
had had any opportunity for quiet thought, it might have
been better. Still, there is evidence that the article is some-
what suited to its purpose. I may add that the closing re-
marks are not mere empty talk, as I trust time will show.
You are doing great work in this country, and have friends
who very thoroughly appreciate it.

Second and Third Visits to England. 207

And now I have something of a favour to ask. For the
success which has attended your reprints in this country we
are very largely indebted to the liberal and kindly feeling
of Mr. George Ripley, literary editor of the Tribune. At
first he was not easy to manage, but, being eminently candid
and liberal, he soon came into favourable relation with our
movement, and has allowed me the unrestricted use of the
Tribune, to act upon public sentiment. While in no sense
has he mastered your Philosophy, he is in thorough sympa-
thy with your philosophical aims.

Mr. Ripley was educated for a Unitarian clergyman, and
when a young man had charge of the wealthiest congrega-
tion in Boston. But he could not endure the clerical rela-
tion, and threw up his position to join the socialistic com-
munity of Brook Farm. Quickly perceiving that this would
not answer, he took to literature systematically. He was
the senior and chief editor of the New American Cyclo-
paedia, of which I am told 375,000 volumes have been sold.
Well, all this means that Mr. Ripley sails on the 25th of
this month for England, and will spend two or three weeks
in London. He is desirous of meeting you, and I have given
him an introductory note. You will find him intelligent and
interesting, and if you can give him some attention while
he stays in London I shall appreciate it as a personal favour.

I have told him that you are somewhat at liberty after-
noons and evenings, and I presumed would be glad to con-
tribute something to make his visit agreeable. His chief
interest is in people, but he is a gentleman, and no gossip.
He has letters to Mill, and I have given him notes to Morell
and Bain. I feel so much my indebtedness to Ripley, that
if I could be remotely instrumental in making his London
visit a pleasant one it would be a real gratification ; and if
you could bring about the opportunity of his seeing Lewes,
Tyndall, and Huxley — though only barely to meet them —
I should be much obliged.

2o8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

88 KENSINGTON GARDENS SQUARE, LONDON, W., April 10, 1866.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Yesterday I received your letter
containing the certificate of the shares in which you have
invested the amount due to me. This letter and the two
preceding ones have greatly encouraged me. Thanks to
your skilful superintendence and untiring energy, without
which it is clear that nothing would be practicable, it
seems to me that I may take a hopeful view of matters.
The amount that has come to me is far greater than I
had anticipated ; and if I may take it as evidence on the
strength of which any estimate for the future may be
formed, the difficulty becomes greatly lessened. I quite
recognize the fact that, after omitting the amounts arising
from the Psychology and from Mr. Silsbee's payment, which
'do not enter into the estimate, the remainder largely con-
sists of the sums arising from the sales of books recently
published, which can hereafter be expected to bring in
comparatively little. Still, taking the case of the Educa-
tion as some sort of index (though one evidently much
too favourable to apply generally), there seems reasonable
ground for anticipating an annual total not to be despised.
And if, as you think, the financial condition will improve
with tolerable rapidity, the ability to draw the proceeds
without much loss would make things much easier.

As to the progress of matters here, though I have been
aware from hints dropped for some time that something
was doing among those interested in preventing the im-
pending stoppage, I did not learn until two days ago what
was the nature of the course taken ; and when I did learn
it, a misapprehension very nearly led me to put a peremp-
tory stop to it. Indeed, I was on my way to the printers
with the draught of an adverse circular, when I learned the
true state of the case. It is now probable that, after insist-
ing on certain qualifying conditions, I may agree to the
arrangement that has been secretly made, and which I find

Second and Third Visits to England. 209

I can hardly resist without quarrelling with my friends who
have made it. It seems that the arrangement has resulted
under the pressure of a number of persons interested, chiefly
wealthy, who were anxious that something should be done
to meet the difficulty, and who, under the guidance of Hux-
ley, Tyndall, Busk, Lubbock, and Mill, have arranged to
take a large number of copies (250) for distribution ; and
they say that I cannot prevent them. However, I shall
refrain from opposing the arrangement only on condition
of a large reduction in the number (down to 150) and the
erasure of the names of some of those concerned.

I have received the two periodicals which you have been
good enough to send me. As usual, where there is theo-
logical antagonism there is plenty of misstatement and
garbling of evidence by leaving out passages that give a
totally different meaning to the passages quoted. If it
were worth while rebutting these statements, a strong case
of deliberate untruthfulness might be made out.* But I
have no energy to spare in controversies, and must make
up my mind to be continually misrepresented. I am glad
to hear that the first volume of the Biology is at length
printed. I suppose it will be issued before this reaches

* Usually, however, I believe that such misrepresentations admit of a
more charitable construction. They are probably oftener due to dulness
than to dishonesty. It is hard to make sufficient allowance for the abys-
mal depth of human stupidity. Such a luminous intelligence as Mr. Spen-
cer's cannot realize the way in which ordinary minds, even of many men
who are able enough in some things, grope in darkness and stick fast in the
mud. I cannot help feeling some regret that Mr. Spencer has not adhered
more closely to the resolution above expressed, not to waste time and
strength in controversies. His rejoinders are always delightful to read,
but they must often have consumed hours which had been better devoted
to the great work. Such arguments as rebutting charges of materialism,
etc., are, moreover, apt to be wasted. As long as people feel like making
such charges they will do so, but it is less the fashion now than half a cen-
tury ago, and by and by it will cease entirely. A sufficient number of funer-
als is sure to bring a change of fashion.

10

2io Edward Livingston Yonmans.

you. These investigations which I have had to make on
the Circulation in Plants have greatly hindered me. I have
only quite recently got to work against my next number.
I shall not get it out before the end of May or the begin-
ning of June.

Your brother left us ten days ago. I hope he will have
had as favourable a voyage as your sister. When next
you write you will, I hope, be able to give me some infor-
mation as to your intended movements. I shall probably
remain in London till the middle of July.

With kind regards to your wife and sister, very truly
yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

88 KENSINGTON GARDENS SQUARE, LONDON, W., May 7, 1866.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: Before you receive this you will
probably have received the Derby paper, which I posted to
you on Friday, containing a paragraph which you will read
with melancholy interest — a brief tribute of respect to my
late father. I was called down to him by telegraph this
day fortnight, and found him seriously ill, but not, as I
supposed or as any one supposed, in immediate danger.
He got gradually worse, however, and died on the Thurs-
day night. As you may imagine, the shock has been great
and has unnerved me greatly. Indeed, I found my system
running down so rapidly and such serious symptoms show-
ing themselves, that I have been obliged to come up to
town for a few days' change of scene, lest I should fall into
some nervous condition, out of which it would take me a
long time to recover.

I return to Derby probably at the close of this week,
and shall most likely be away some time. If Mr. Ripley
(your note respecting whom has reached me) should call
in the course of the next few days, I shall be happy to
show him what little attention is possible under present
circumstances ; but after Friday it will, I fear, be out of
the question for me to do this.

Second and Third Visits to England. 211

I duly received the New York Tribune containing your
review, which I read with much interest. The general
sketch of the aspects of modern thought was very graphic,
the antithesis between the aim of ancient philosophy and
the philosophy of the moderns being, I thought, particular-
ly happy.

I rejoice to hear that you continue your intention of
returning here for the summer. I hope circumstances will
permit us to see as much of one another as before. With
kind regards to your wife, brother, and sister, very truly
yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

ANTIOCH COLLEGE, May 12, 1866,

DEAR SISTER : It was very kind of you to say that I
need not give myself uneasiness about you in my absence
or trouble myself to write. I did not at all intend to avail
myself of your generosity when I left, but, as Jay has
probably informed you, the lectures come thicker than I
expected — five a week instead of three. I have therefore
been busy every moment of the time. I shall have two
days of liberty now (Saturday and Sunday), and the first
thing I do this morning is to drop you a line. The place
is pleasanter here than I expected to find it. Indeed, it has
some admirable features in its surroundings, of which much
might be made if there were the right spirit and plenty of
means. The college structures are immense and imposing,
but ill adapted to any use. Mr. Mann sent out the plans,
but the carpenter threw them under the table, and bought
a cheap plan of an architect and built according to his own
ignorant notions. I have been glancing over the history
of the institution, as shadowed forth in the lately published
life of Horace Mann, and it is exceedingly instructive. It
has been cursed from the beginning by two things: first,
Western jealousy of the East, and second, " religion." Out
of debt, with $125,000 endowment, and with a gift of $4,000
or $5,000 from the Unitarian organization this year, and with

212 Edward Livingston Youmans.

a full corps of professors, they have less than a hundred
students. If the money continues to pour in, of course, all
the motions can be kept up. But my opinion is that all
the hope of the institution lies in its reorganization upon a
scientific basis, and I can conceive few things more futile
than such a hope. The listeners to the lectures are from
100 to 200 insiders and outsiders. The history of Mr.
Mann's career is exceedingly impressive. There never was
a clearer case of suicide from ignorance of natural laws. His
lectures, his letters, his talk, were full of the preaching of
natural law. George Combe was his intimate correspond-
ent and his model. The clatter of "natural laws" runs
through his entire life, and yet he died twenty years before
his time from ignorance of the dynamic law that exercise
must be followed by rest. He was offered up to the same
Moloch as Hugh Miller, and I have a suspicion that George
Combe went in the same way.

NEW YORK, June 2jd.

DEAR SISTER: The accompanying note to Marble* will
explain itself. A box of two hundred twenty-five-cent
Havana cigars and $950, making our sum now $7,000 clear.
So the Spencer affair is finished, all but the most trouble-
some part. I will keep you informed, but have no time
to write further now. We sail at twelve to-day.

Minturn's letter was sent by mail, as appears fur-
ther on.

S. S. CITY OF PARIS, Monday, July 2, 1866.
DEAR SISTER AND ALL THE REST OF YOU : We have
had an excellent passage on a very fine ship. We reached
Queenstown this morning at five o'clock, eight and three
quarters days' journey from New York — a six-hour longer
passage than the one previously. Our weather has been
on the whole excellent — only two rough days ; the rest of

* Manton Marble, at that time editor of The World.

Second and Third Visits to England. 213

the time the sea has been quiet. I have not been seasick a
moment nor missed a single meal. Kitty has had the best
voyage she has yet had on the Atlantic, having been up
every day, though she has been but little at table. I have
read some — indeed, considerably — and somewhat warmed
myself up for my work, but at the expense of a reputation
of great unsociability, which has made it unpleasant for me.
The only men of note on board are two sons of Cambridge,
Harvard College — Prof. Torrey, of the chair of History,
and Prof. Bowen, of Metaphysics, Ethics, and Political
Economy. I have somewhat made their acquaintance, and
find it agreeable. They run over for their vacation. We
learned by the pilot this morning that the war is precipi-
tated in Germany and reform scuttled in England. You,
of course, will have the particulars, and perhaps as soon as
we do. We expect to reach Liverpool to-night, perhaps
by twelve or one o'clock, and leave for London to-morrow
morning — Friday — by the 9.30 train.

LONDON, Juty 7, 1866.

DEAR SISTER : . . . I inclose a note received last night
from Spencer. I shall telegraph him to-day, to learn the
place and hour of his arrival, and meet him and invite him
here,* as there is plenty of room. I called on Williams
[of the firm of Williams & Norgate, publishers of Mr.
Spencer's books] this morning.

LONDON, Friday, July ij, 1866.

MY DEAR SISTER : . . . I think I sent you the note in
which Spencer announced his coming to town. I tele-
graphed him to meet him, but he replied that he did not
know at what hour he should arrive. Next day he sent

* To the boarding house kept by a Mrs. Langford, from which Youmans
was writing. Mr. Spencer had left 88 Kensington Gardens Square, and
had not yet gone to 37 Queens Gardens, Bayswater, where he lived so
many years.

214 Edward Livingston Yonmans.

me a dispatch that he would be at King's Cross Station at
six o'clock P. M. I went there (and I may state that my
object in telegraphing him was to invite him here) ; the
train was behind time. I stayed twenty minutes, and left
rather than lose my dinner. He arrived, went to his
hotel, where I had left a note for him, and came directly
here ; decided to stay, and then went after his baggage,
and did not come in till Tuesday night. Wednesday morn-
ing, after breakfast, it being very hot, I proposed to go out
into Mrs. Langford's garden, where there are seats (before
that, however, I had presented him with the box of cigars,
which he received very cordially). When in the garden we
proposed a smoke, and as the cigars are enormously large
he cut one into three pieces and began on one third. I
then referred to what I had written him in reference to
what I had said at the close of the Tribune article, and
that I was able to report that we had not been idle. I
then handed him Minturn's letter, which had come in good
time, and of which I enclose a copy. He read it, and with
some excitement and surprise exclaimed : " Why ! What
is this ? Good gracious ! WThy ! I thought perhaps you
were going to get me a list of subscribers. Well, really,
this is wonderful ! So much beyond all that I had expected !
It's magnificent ! W'ell, I ought to have a list of the
donors." He made reference in language I cannot recol-
lect to the idea of its being all done past recall ; and so
the thing was neatly accomplished — a perfect success. Of
course it was very natural there should be some embarrass-
ment, as well on my part as his, and I certainly had
nothing particular to say ; so I interrupted the somewhat
awkward situation by handing him the blue-velvet box
containing the watch and called his attention to the in-
scription. This, of course, was a descending climax, in-
flection, or whatever you call it, and served as a relief.
He was much pleased with it, and thoroughly delighted

Second and Third Visits to England. 215

with the whole thing. I walked with him afterward in
the afternoon. He was in excellent spirits, and made fre-
quent reference to the " splendid present," and I could see
was revolving plans at once on the basis of it. He once
broke out: " I wish my poor father was alive to know of
this! Do you know that your Tribune notice only arrived
the day after his death?" ... I called on Huxley this
afternoon. He asked very cordially after you and Jay,
and complimented Jay as a faithful, industrious student,
and asked if he was ready for him. I shall begin to have
proofs in a few days, and revise during the vacation and
publish during the autumn. I can send them over as fast
as they go through the press, so that our brother can be at
work on-them. So he is clearly calculating on the bargain,
and Jay can edit the volume and gain all the advantages I
originally proposed. . . . Huxley will expect to have our
agreement carried out, so it will only remain for Jay to
take right hold of his sheets as fast as they come and add
as editor what they need. It need not be a finality, but it
will be a capital step forward, giving Jay standing at once,
and it will also pay him well for all he does at it.

NEW YORK, June 25, 1866,
HERBERT SPENCER, Esq., London.

DEAR SIR: The republication in this country of your
various writings has awakened profound interest and ex-
erted a powerful influence for good. Many among us be-
lieve that few men in the whole history of our race have
had the privilege of rendering such important services to
society. There is a still larger class here who, while differ-
ing radically from some of your conclusions, recognize
with the utmost sympathy and admiration the noble and
humane spirit which penetrates your works, and own with
gratitude their intellectual obligations to you.

The announcement, therefore, that the completion of
your philosophical system had been arrested from want of

216 Edward Livingston You mans.

proper support has apprised your American friends of a
possible loss to themselves and the world too serious to be
borne without an effort to avert it, and it has seemed to
some of them an opportunity for repaying in such form as
they may a portion of the indebtedness to you, which can
never be entirely cancelled. They have not permitted
themselves to doubt your friendly acceptance of such co-
operation as they can offer to insure the continuance of
your valuable labours, and they have charged me with the
pleasant duty of informing you that the sum of seven thou-
sand dollars has been invested in your name in American
securities (a list of which is inclosed, and which you may
either retain or convert at your pleasure), and that they
have done this not merely as an expression of sincere re-
spect and gratitude toward you personally, but also in the
highest interest of liberal thought and civilization.
With great regard, very truly yours,

ROBERT B. MINTURN.

DERBY, Augiist 2, 1866.

MY DEAR SIR : Though my friend Mr. Youmans, by ex-
pressions in his letters, led me to suppose that something
was to be done in the United States with a view to prevent-
ing the suspension of my work, yet I was wholly unpre-
pared for anything so generous as that which I learn from
your letter of June 25th. In ignorance of the steps which
were being taken, I had thought that a revival and pos-
sibly an extension of the list of subscribers to my works
would be attempted, and, my thought having taken this
direction, the unexpected munificence of my American
•friends quite astonished me, as it astonished all to whom I
have named it. Not simply the act itself, but also the
manner in which the act has been done, is extremely grati-
fying to me. Possibly you are aware that, while on the
one hand I had decided that I ought not to continue sacri-
ficing what little property I possess, I had on the other

Second and Third Visits to England. 217

hand resolved not to place myself in any questionable po-
sition, and in pursuance of this resolve I had negatived
sundry proposals made here in furtherance of my under-
taking. But the course adopted by my American friends
is one which appears to give me no alternative, save that
of yielding. Already in the case of the profits accruing
from republished works, which I declined to receive unless
the cost of the stereotype plates had been repaid to those
who furnished the funds, they defeated me by saying that
if I did not draw the proceeds they would remain in Messrs.
Appletons' hands; and I foresee that were I now to be rest-
ive under their kindness they would probably take an
analogous step. I therefore submit, and feel less hesita-
tion in doing this because the strong sympathy with my
aims which from the beginning has been manifested in the
United States makes me feel that impersonal rather than
personal considerations move those who have acted in the
matter, and should also guide me. Will you therefore be
so good as to say to all who have joined in raising this mag-
nificent gift, which more than replaces what I have lost dur-
ing the last sixteen years, that I accept it as a trust to be
used for public ends, and that at the same time feelings of
another kind compel me to express my gratitude as well as
my admiration. Let me add that while the material result
of their act will be that of greatly facilitating my labours,
the approval conveyed by it in so unparalleled a way from
readers of another nation cannot fail to be a moral stimu-
lus and support of great value to me. Believe me, my dear
sir, very sincerely yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

ROBERT B. MINTURN, Esq., New York.

The effect of the subscription gathered by You-
mans was rather to extend Spencer's work than to
prevent the suspension which a few months before
had seemed unavoidable. It enabled him to employ
as an amanuensis and assistant a gentleman of univer-

218 Edward Livingston Youmans.

sity education ; and, enjoying the increased demand
for his works which Youmans had confidently pre-
dicted, Mr. Spencer next year began to collect and
organize the data since published in his Descriptive
Sociology, engaging three assistants for that purpose.

ABERDOVEY, WALES, Attgust 8, 1866.

MY DEAR SISTER : When I asked Mr. Spencer where to
go in the country, he replied, " To get sea bathing, some
fishing, some social excitement, and moderate prices, Scar-
borough." I replied, " I think we will go there," and so
intended, but lingered in London until I received a letter
from him in Derby, saying that he had not yet heard from
his friends in Scotland, and might have some days to spare,
so he proposed to come to Scarborough and spend the
interval. I replied that I had not gone, and next day sent
him another note, proposing to meet him anywhere he
chose for a few days. He named Chester as the meeting
place, and last Tuesday, a week since, as the time, and
some place in north Wales as the destination. WTe met
and started. I undertook to travel with him, and broke
down the first day. Thursday I was down sick, Friday
miserable and unable to write ; hence, I sent nothing last
Saturday. Seeing that I could not stand much, he pro-
posed that we pitch for some place and stop. We agreed
upon Aberdovey, a Welsh watering place of stone houses
in the water under a high bank without a tree, a thousand
degrees below Perth Amboy. The cholera report in Lon-
don had risen from three hundred to one thousand the
previous week, and I thought Kitty had better come into
the country. So I wrote to her to join us at this place,
which she did last Saturday, and it is now Tuesday.
There's not a decent hotel in town, and so I found a lodg-
ing house, a stone affair, sort of like a blacksmith shop,
where we have three small rooms, and are as comfortable

Second and Third Visits to England. 219

as we can make ourselves, with but little to get to eat in
the town. My breaking down was due to excessive fatigue
— going into Greenland-cold sea water to bathe, finding
myself with a little fever, and travelling back a long dis-
tance to — Heaven knows the name of the place where we
were stopping.

The wind was blowing a perfect tornado when we came
here last Saturday, and it has kept it up ever since, so that
I have not been able to go out at all, except that Mr.
Spencer and myself emerged Saturday night in the howling
wind to get eatables for Sunday. Went to what they call
the market house and called for a piece of beef; the only
butcher said that all the beef he had was a little lamb,
of which we bought a fore quarter, and one half pound
of bacon, also a peck of peas and two pounds of pota-
toes, also a pound of butter, three pints of gooseberries, a
pound of brown sugar, one half pound of coffee, and six
candles. We have eaten all except the candles, and Kitty
has just gone out into the gale to buy something more.
The old Welsh mother of the house we can't understand ;
the daughter is quite an interesting girl, and waits on us.
Spencer had in his pocket the Pall Mall Gazette of July
3d, with the following paragraph : " It is stated in Amer-
ican papers that Prof. Youmans recently left that country
in order to present to Mr. Herbert Spencer $5,000 and a
valuable gold watch as a testimonial from his American
admirers." He told me that his friends had been dogging
him to publish the whole thing as an act of simple jus-
tice to the Americans. He thought that the false figures
ought to be corrected, but is very fearful that there will
be too much of a story made about it. I shall write a cor-
rective note to the Pall Mall fellows. As you may im-
agine, things have not been favourable for my work. Still, it
has been profitable. I have got glimpses of light on many
things, which will be helpful in the future. The present

22O Edward Livingston Youmans.

occasion, moreover, has turned out proximately suitable
for doing that little job for brother Abbot. Spencer has
his article with him, and we are taking it up point by point.
Spencer talks, and I am amanuensis. I have written eight
pages of foolscap at his dictation this morning, and have not
only had the pleasure of seeing Spencer give it to Abbot
much as Artemus Ward says the mob caved in the head of
his wax figure of Judas, but I have myself learned some
matters and things worth knowing. Spencer doesn't recede
or budge a hair, but he interprets.

We shall only remain here this week. There seems to
be about as much cholera around here as in London, and I
want a little time there before going to the Association at
Nottingham. Spencer will be there, if he doesn't get an
invitation to Scotland.

CHAPTER XI.

POPULAR EDUCATION, AND OTHER MATTERS.
1866-1868. Age, 45-47.

AFTER disposing of the Spencer affair, Youmans
devoted all his energies to the work of completing
and publishing the collection of essays entitled The
Culture demanded by Modern Life. His chief ob-
ject in this third visit to England was to bring out
this long-projected book * under peculiarly favour-
able conditions in London. From time to time he
had read able essa}rs and addresses bearing on this
topic, but they had been published in ephemeral jour-
nals or shelved in volumes of Transactions. He
now proceeded to carry out his plan of publishing a
selection of such essays by the most eminent writers
of the day, with an introduction by himself, setting
forth the subject in its widest relations. While en-
gaged in this work he came into personal contact with
a good many members of the College of Preceptors,
and was invited to give them a lecture upon some
topic in which they were all directly interested. He
chose for his subject The Scientific Study of Human
Nature, and after delivering the lecture he inserted it
among the essays in his book.f A pleasant account of

* It is mentioned in his first letter to Mr. Spencer, Feb. 23, 1860 ;
see above, p. 106. f See below, pp. 451-485.

(221)

222 Edward Livingston Youmans.

this, together with some other matters of interest, is
given in the following letters to his sister:

LONDON, July 21, 1866.

There are but few boarders here at Mrs. Langford's,
which makes it pleasant, and I have a separate room with
all my books and papers, which is very convenient for study.
The situation is high, and up near Regent's Park and very
eligible, so I shall be contented here a while. I have been
thus far reading and making references, and am just now
beginning to write. The subject opens finely before me,
and I hope I shall have grace to do it justice. Spencer
has promised to look over my argument when I get it
ready. ... I had almost forgotten to say that Wislicenus
and Fick (the latter a physiologist of Zurich) have given
the last annihilating blow to Liebig. Their joint paper
has been- translated, and published in the Philosophical
Journal, a copy of which, with Spencer's last number, I
have left at Layton's to be sent to New York and forwarded
to you by post. It will leave here the last of next week.
I am going to write to Wislicenus, asking him the privilege
of making a sketch of his American experience preliminary
to his statement of his researches, for publication at home.
He has proved that animal power is due to the combustion
of the hydrocarbons in the muscles, the heat produced
being converted into mechanical force !

LONDON, September i, 1866.

We got here yesterday afternoon, and your letter of
August i4th came in the evening. I was greatly rejoiced
to learn that you had all gone a-fishing; I hope you will
follow it up. The only way to strengthen any tendency,
faculty, or habit, is through its own exercise. You can't
infer its propriety and then enter upon it. It is a great
"victory over the inane " to learn to fish. Pray go often.
I shall when I return. I am hard at work, pushed and

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 223

racked with thinking, and have a world to do by mid-
October, but I believe in my book. I see Hedge is out in
the September Atlantic (which I shall get), on University
Reform. This is the subject of the age. England is full
of it, and if it were not for the infernal clangour of poli-
tics America would be, and it certainly will. Our politics
are now intense because we have nothing else to think of.
England has politics and religion, and that diminishes the
intensity. ,

September 8th. — I have arranged with Macmillan to pub-
'lish my book, and he will begin stereotyping next week.
There is a sharp attack in this morning's Times on the
Classical Dogma. The time is ripe for the work I am
preparing. Huxley has sent me rough proofs of the Physi-
ology up to the 2o6th page, which I will forward in small
quantities. Ask Jay to advise me of what he receives, that
I may know if any are lost. I am proposing to leave about
the middle of October, or the moment I get through writing.

September 28th. — We dined at Huxley's last night.
Spencer and a Mr. and Mrs. Young were there, and Frances
Power Cobbe; and Frances is a power, or, at all events, a
bulk in the land ! Huxley is in a bad way ; he is un-
doubtedly failing from overwork. He is now, at the close
of his holiday, just as at its beginning, and Spencer is
worried about him. . . . After the party I finished my lec-
ture at three this morning, and was so excited that I did
not get a wink of sleep till five o'clock. Spencer leaves
town to-day at two for a fortnight's absence, and I ar-
ranged to call to-day at eleven to read my production to
him. With my tail feathers spread and in a state of in-
finite complacency I went, and returned trailing my glories
in the infernal London mud.

Poor man ! What could he do ? There was but one
thing to do, and he did it, you had better believe. Faith-
ful indee4 are the cruelties of a friend. My lecture was

224 Edward Livingston Youmans.

fairly slaughtered. I had such nice authorities for every-
thing. What are " authorities " to Herbert Spencer ? The
pigs went to the wrong market this time.

" A little too much effort at fine writing " — forty-five
pages. " You have lost your point at the fifth page and
not recovered it. Why, I thought you wished to make a
sharp presentation of science in its bearings upon the study
of human nature, and you seem to have entered upon a
systematic treatise on physiology interlarded with bad
psychology." The unfeeling wretch ! " Strike out half,
put the rest in type and work it up," was the final injunc-
tion. Well, striking out will be better than building up.
Easier, at all events. The fact is, I had overworked the
details — that was the only real difficulty. I had not read
it over, but had passed it over to Kitty to copy, batch by
batch. I read it first to-day, and hardly needed telling
that it was too long and needed compressing. I shall re-
shape it and read it the loth, before you get this. But
there is one thing: I shall not work as I have done — an-
other month would lay me out. I will not work nights
when I can't sleep daytimes. I am very well, but jaded. I
fear justice to my enterprise will require me to appro-
priate the rest of October to it. The book will hardly fail
to prove valuable. I see nobody, but drudge on day by
day, thinking ever of home, and longing for the moment of
return. The fogs have begun to come, and I have lighted
candles to read by in the daytime.

The next letter is dated from Mr. Spencer's new
apartments, at 37 and 38 Queen's Gardens, Bayswater,
October i3th :

The lecture on the Scientific Study of Human Nature
came off as per appointment at the room in Queen's Square,
where you heard Hodgson. I had got hurried proofs of it,
and it would take an hour and a half to read it, but as only

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 22$

an hour or less was all that could be allowed, I was com-
pelled hastily to scratch it, and I overcut it. Kitty went
with me. Just before I began, in came Tyndall. I thought
I saw through that dodge in a moment. Spencer is out of
town, has been away for a fortnight, expected to return, I
am told, to-night, and as he was evidently solicitous about
the result he got Tyndall to go. Whichever way it be, it
was fortunate, and I am certainly much obliged to him for
his consideration, for the meat was too strong for the
babes. They were restless, and as I said thing after thing,
a dozen pens sprang convulsively to paper, to note them
down and blow them up. There was the closest attention,
and at all events I had them in hand. At the close there
was cordial applause — as usual, I suppose. A gentleman
then arose, and said he was attracted to the meeting by the
announcement of my name, having read a very remark-
able argument in the shape of an introduction to a work
on chemistry lent him by his friend Dr. Farr (to whom
I had given a copy), and he said, " I was, therefore, less
taken by surprise at the paper we have just heard than
most of you have evidently been." After a very pleasant
and excellent address, in which he said Locke had laid
down the true view of the basis of education two centuries
since, which, if followed out, would have produced the most
beneficent results, he sat down and Tyndall arose. He
made an exceedingly neat and happy address, into the very
notch of the case. He put the plaster on large and thick
and close, as he best of all men knows how to do, and the
consequence was that all subsequent remarks were but
adding lesser patches. One good old gentleman of the
old school did not really seem to see that there were yet
the materials of a new science of human nature, but hoped
there would be. The president wound up with a little
speech, demurring somewhat to the strictures on the pres-
ent spirit of teachers, but saying frankly that the address

226 Edward Livingston Youmans.

was beyond doubt the ablest, and solidest, and most im-
portant that had ever been delivered before the College
of Preceptors. Tyndall escaped before I could speak to
him, but I dropped a note to him next morning, thanking
him for his kind consideration in coming, for his too par-
tial remarks, and for his shielding me from the little hail-
storm which I should have undoubtedly experienced other-
wise. He replied, saying: "I quite expected the little hail-
storm, and was astonished to find what you said (for the
view was very strong for such a place) so heartily appre-
ciated. Believe me, when I say from my very heart, the
paper surprised me as much as it delighted me."

October 2oth. — It turned out to be a mistake about Spen-
cer sending Tyndall to the lecture. Spencer was under a
wrong impression about the time, and says he intended to
be there himself. Tyndall and Huxley were invited the
day before. Huxley said, had it not been for a previous
engagement he should have been there.

October 2jth. — I have only to-day at twelve sent the last
revise of my lecture to the printer; in making it there has
been a large loss of power, owing to my solicitude. I was
editing the work and thrusting a discourse of my own
among the highest names, and assuming the largest and
most difficult topic of all to treat. Besides, I was to submit
it to the coldest and keenest critic in the world, who cared
not tuppence for anything but the facts. I was to write on
his own topic — his special topic, and where he rejects all
the physiology of psychology to be gathered in books, and
doesn't know what an " authority " is. It has been hard
work, but I have at last got the epithet "capital" out of
him, and that without asking, as you may well understand.
I hoped to send you the sheets to-day, and sat up all night
nearly, last night, hoping to get them ready; but Spencer
could only finish the reading this morning too late, and I
have had to give it up. The Introduction I care less about

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 227

in this country, and am not going to have it stereotyped
at any rate, as the American argument must be very differ-
ent. I shall do what I can with it and let it go.

The " highest names " to which allusion is here
made were those of Liebig, Tyndall, Henfrey, Hux-
ley, Herschel, and Paget, whose essays were gathered
together in Youmans's volume, published under the
general title, The Culture demanded by Modern Life.
After his return to America, late in the autumn of
1866, he added a contribution from Dr. Draper, and
summed up his own views in the Introduction on
Mental Discipline in Education, which was perhaps
the most finished piece of work that ever came from
his pen. It is reprinted entire in the present volume.*
The book, published in the spring of 1867, was re-
ceived with favour; and there can be no doubt that
its contents, in this connected form, were vastly more
influential for good than in the separate and narrow
fields of their original issue.

The following extracts from letters have interest in
connection with this book, as also with other matters,
personal and general :

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., January 14, 1867.

MY DEAR 4TouMANS : I have been looking for a letter
for some little time past, telling me how you are going on ;
but I suppose lecturing has carried you away into the West,
and is absorbing all your time.

Macmillan delayed for a long time the issue of your
volume of Essays. Why, I don't know, unless business
policy dictated the delay. We did not get our respective
copies until the beginning of January. The volume looks

* See below, pp. 399-450.

228 Edward Livingston Youmans.

very well, and is likely, I think, to do a great deal of good.
Dr. Hodgson, whom I lately met, expressed great satisfac-
tion with it. He said your essay would have delighted
George Combe. I suppose you have already printed off
the first American edition.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, January 20, 1867.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have been very little in New York
since my return, and know nothing of the state of the book
trade. General business is active, but prices are enormously
inflated. Shrewd men say it will be impossible to get back
to stability except through widespread financial ruin. One
of the most discouraging symptoms of the times is the in-
sane and universal clamour for exorbitant protection. Pro-
tection, even to prohibition, is now the cry with many.
There are various causes for this. Some think it is the
only defence from the impending financial ruin.

The sentiment of nationality or patriotism, which has
become a cant since the war, favours protective measures ;
and the deep feeling of hostility toward England, which per-
vades almost the whole mass of the people, which talks
continually of British free trade, and refuses to think that
anything but selfishness can come from that quarter, has
also a powerful influence. The Free-trade League has up-
hill work of it.

Gold has fallen to 130, although now rising again. I
presume it will return to that point again. As you have
dipped considerably into American securities, would it not
be well — at all events safer — to convert what may become
due to you into an available shape ? Please indicate what
you would like in the matter. I leave to-morrow for the
West on a six-weeks' lecturing absence, and dread it in-
tensely, as the country is submerged in deep snow and the
weather extremely cold. My wife is in New York, and will
remain there until my return.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 229

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., February 23, 1867.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I think you are right in your sug-
gestion as to the impolicy of further investment in Ameri-
can securities for the present. Any balance that may be
due to me from the forthcoming account may as well, there-
fore, be transmitted to me here.

March nth. — You were saying when over here that you
thought the time was coming when we might recommence
the issue of the serial in the United States. I doubt, how-
ever, whether it would be worth while. Our subscription
list here has just been gone through for the purpose of
giving a peremptory reminder to those in arrear. I find
there is not far short of two hundred pounds sterling due.
Possibly the intimation that has been given, that no further
numbers will be sent to those whose last two subscriptions
are unpaid, will have its effect. But I foresee that, if things
go on as they have been doing, it will be needful to give
up the issue in parts by the time the Psychology is com-
pleted. The trouble and loss will no longer be compen-
sated by the gain. You will be startled in America, as
people are being startled here, by the marvellously sudden
change of opinion that is taking place in our political world.
The phenomenon reminds one of that which takes place
with ice when much below the freezing point. You go on
raising its temperature for a long time without any appre-
ciable effect, and then all at once it begins to thaw rapidly.
Doubtless in the same way a change has been going on
here without producing any sign ; and now it is making
itself visible all at once.

I shall be glad to hear of your doings, and also of your
plans for the summer. I hope we shall be able so to man-
age as to have a sojourn in Paris together.

Ever yours truly, HERBERT SPENCER.

230 Edward Livingston Youmans.

NEW YORK, March 77, 1867.

DEAR SISTER : I am here at the club,* where I have a
warm, pleasant room to work in. It is now four, and I
have done an excellent day's work. We have had a diabol-
ical storm, and the snow is two feet deep. I have dashed
off a rough scheme of study, a rude curriculum, which I
will transcribe. If you can help me on it please do so.

1. Home and Primary Education, in which are to be ac-
quired correct habits of expression, familiarity with the
properties of common things by the intelligent employment
of the object method, reading, drawing, writing, elemen-
tary numbers, elementary form, etc.

2. The Discipline of the Physical and Mathematical Sci-
ences— arithmetic, geometry, natural philosophy, chemistry
— establishing systematic habits of continuous attention, of
observation, induction, deduction, and verification of truths.
Familiarity with the conception of cause, law, necessary
truth, and with the history of the growth of physical and
mathematical sciences. Thus preparing for

3. The Discipline of the Biological Sciences — botany, zool-
ogy, physiology, geology. Extension of the idea of law
and sensation into the departments of life and familiariz-
ing with the conditions of inquiry and methods of reason-
ing in this department of thought, with the history of the
growth of these departments of knowledge. This is a
preparation for

4. The Discipline of the Psychological or Representative
Sciences — mental philosophy, logic philosophy. Forming
the threefold basis for the systematic study of litera-
ture, history, ethnology, social science, government, and
morality.

This division is on the basis of discipline, as I shall be

* The Century Club, in its pleasant and ever-to-be-regretted old home
on Fifteenth Street.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 231

able to show that the order of ideas in these four stages
gives a progressive training, and completes the circle of
mental requirements in this respect. But I am tired, and

so good-bye.

NEW YORK, March 23, 1867.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I send you the Atlantic to-day.
Holmes has reached the philosophy of hysterics in No. 4
of the Guardian Angel, and will treat the psychological
sequelae of its paroxysms in the next number. Fiske deals
with University Reform in a very quiet but able article —
as liberal as could be expected from a devotee of philol-
ogy. His argument does not touch the case as it stands
in my mind, but its suggestions require careful pondering.
Fiske is strong, but a little pedantic on the lingual side.*
I see that Mill makes an unqualified indorsement of Greek
and Latin. I shall pay him my respects and include Fiske.
By-the-by, Mill is the champion of the classics here now.
He is thrown in everybody's face who questions tradition.
There are many excellent things in his address, but what
he says about the classics won't hold water.

As for what lies before me this summer, Omniscience
alone knows it ! I should be glad to come over, but fear
it will be impossible.

* He means that I am too fond of Greek and Latin, and attach too
high a value to the study of those languages and to philological training
generally. On this point I have never been able to agree entirely with
Spencer and Youmans, owing perhaps to peculiarities of early training
and the bias resulting therefrom. From childhood I was steeped in Greek
and Latin, and read ancient authors with a zest which time has done noth-
ing to lessen. Naturally, therefore, as to the educational value of the
classics, I was inclined to agree with Mill in his Inaugural Address at the
University of St. Andrews, to which Youmans here refers ; and with such
views as those of the late Prof. W. F. Allen, of the University of Wis-
consin, in his Essays and Monographs, Boston, 1890, pp. 155-164. The
article of mine referred to was Considerations on University Reform, in
Atlantic Monthly, April, 1867, reprinted in Darwinism and Other Essays,
revised edition, Boston, 1885.

232 Edward Livingston You mans.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., April <?, 1867.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I issued the closing number of
the Biology, or rather double number (it contains ten
sheets), on the 3oth of March, just managing, by a good
deal of pressure, to save the date. The bound volume is
advertised, and I expect to get some copies to-day.

To-morrow I shall commence the revision of First
Principles. I had intended to make one or two replies to
criticisms in the first part, but have been dissuaded by the
Leweses from doing so. Huxley is just through his Hun-
terian course, and is much better than was to be expected,
for he has been in a very shaky state during the last three
months under a great pressure of work. Tyndall, too, has
been doing too much, and has to pull up. He is urgent to
get out his volume on Sound, and, as usual, has been be-
trayed into overwork by his eagerness.

April ifth. — The inclosure contained in your letter*
was a considerable surprise to me. I had anticipated some-
thing very much less. What a wonderful steward you are !
I never dreamt a few years ago of any such results arising,
and had it not been for you it is clear that no such results
would ever have arisen.

Your remark as to the use that is being made of Mill's
name completely fulfils the prophecy I made to him. I
told him that I regretted to see the weight of his authority
given to a side that is already, to say the least, far too
strong, and that the result would be that the classicists
would appropriate all he said in their favour, and ignore all
he said against them.

I regret that you are not thinking of coming, having
counted on our having a "good time" at Paris together.
As you hold out no hopes of this, I think of making my
trip to Paris pretty soon — probably on the 2pth of this

* The reference is to the check for royalty on sales.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 233

month. I shall take some work with me, and most likely
stay about a fortnight.

June 7th. — It may be that you are wise in not coming
to the Paris Exhibition. I went for a fortnight, and came
back before the week was out. Perpetual sight-seeing soon
became a weariness, and I was heartily glad to get back.
Matters were made worse by the extremely hot weather,
which set in just as I went there.

I have decided within these few days to use a specific
title for the whole series of volumes that I am issuing.
Originally, when drawing up the programme, I contem-
plated doing so, and was very nearly using the title Deduc-
tive Philosophy ; but I was dissuaded, and finally fell back
upon the indefinite title of a System of Philosophy. There
are decided evils, however, in the absence of a distinctive
name, and I have had these evils just now thrust before
me afresh. At the close of his new edition of his History
of Philosophy Lewes persists in claiming me as one of his
school, saying that " Mr. Spencer is unequivocally a posi-
tive philosopher, however he may repudiate being con-
sidered a disciple of Comte," and he goes on to close his
book in the next paragraph by saying, " Am I claiming too
much for the Positive Philosophy in claiming for it what-
ever the future may produce ? " Now as — whether Lewes
intends it or not — the Positive Philosophy will continue to be
understood as the philosophy of Comte, and as I so distinct-
ly repudiate the philosophy of Comte, it is needful to take
some step to prevent the confusion. So long as there is no
other title in use to express a philosophy formed of organ-
ized scientific knowledge, one cannot expect people to
discriminate. Another title, therefore, is evidently extreme-
ly desirable, and will, I think, in many respects yield posi-
tive as well as negative advantages. I have decided upon
the title Synthetic Philosophy, which, on the whole, seems
the most descriptive. I am intending to make the issue of
ii

234 Edward Livingston Yonmans.

this second edition of First Principles the occasion for
introducing it, and propose that each successive volume
shall bear this general title on its back in addition to its
special title.

June 26th. — We are about to give a public breakfast
here to Garrison. Bright is to be in the chair, and the ad-
dress is to be moved by the Duke of Argyle and seconded
by Earl Russell (probably), and also by John Mill. I am
one of the Committee of Arrangement.

The second edition of First Principles is working out
very satisfactorily — even more satisfactorily than I had
anticipated. In its reorganized form it will be extremely
coherent all through ; the thread of the argument will be
unbroken, and it will, I think, have the obvious character

of completeness.

DERBY, July 9, 1867.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Williams and Norgate the other
day ordered a supply of Biology, Volume I, of which their
bound stock was out. On sending an order to the printers,
the answer returned was that they had none. My account
with them showed that there remained in their hands thirty-
three unbound copies, and they admit that the evidence
shows it. They cannot be found, however.

Please without delay send the stereotype plates. Do not
delay to print any more copies before sending them, for as fast
as the printing of the new supply goes on I will have a
duplicate set of plates made and sent to you.

Ever yours truly, HERBERT SPENCER.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, July jo, 1867.

MY DEAR SPENCER: Upon the reception of your letter
I took the next train for New York to do myself what could
not be trusted to others. There was reluctance, almost re-
sistance, to sending the plates. The cause was this: after
having made two mistakes, first in issuing my own book,
and then Maudsley's, in midsummer, I had stopped the

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 235

Biology, which was a little behind them, designing to be
all ready with it September ist. Hence, when I gave the
order to return the plates, I was met by the statement
that there were but one hundred copies of Volume I re-
maining, and it would not do to publish Volume II with-
out a full supply of the first ; and as it would take a long
time to get the plates back, and would be attended with
considerable expense of transit, they insisted that the bet-
ter plan would be to take the duplicates here, which could
be done in twenty days for three hundred dollars. I re-
fused to entertain the idea, and by driving up the printer
and bullying the box-maker I got the plates ready for the
shipper the next day at noon. I intended to have seen
them on board the steamer, but was taken ill, and had to
leave for home. I know, however, that they started for
the ship, and I believe they are now on their way, but I
should be easier if I knew.

I need not urge the utmost dispatch, as you see the
situation. The change of title is desirable, and the one you
have hit upon fortunate. But the reasons you offer for tak-
ing the step compel me to suggest that if it can be avoided
it will be undesirable to reopen the Comte discussion. I
have myself never doubted the wisdom of publishing the
Classification, but that is by no means the universal opinion.
Your original letter disclaiming Comtism had a wide cir-
culation in this country, and was generally felt to be oppor-
tune, appropriate, and satisfactory. But when the pam-
phlet appeared many of your friends said, " Mr. Spencer's
work will vindicate itself and find its true place. We are
sorry to see him so apparently sensitive about these early
misapprehensions of it." You have an antagonism upon
this question with your friends the Leweses, while Mr.
Lewes is engaged in the business of weighing and measur-
ing philosophers. May not this circumstance have had a
tendency to keep the subject alive, if not to exaggerate

236 Edward Livingston Youmans.

it in your own mind ? I think a third reference to your
differences with Comte, especially on the occasion of your
adoption of a new title for your system, would afford great
facility for misinterpretation ; and in the preface to the
new edition of First Principles, in explaining the reasons
for revision of title, I shall be glad to see a minimum recog-
nition of Comte. I incline to think that there is a good
deal in this, but you know best.

I send you two notices of my own book by Fiske, clever
but partial.* Mr. Mill has unwittingly done the most atro-
cious thing for the cause of real improvement in this coun-
try that any living man could have done. The whole theo-
logical world are in ecstasies over his performance at St.
Andrew's as an unanswerable argument for the way things
are. All he says for science goes for less than nothing — is
never referred to, and all his unqualified claims for the
classics are borne on the wings of the newspapers to the
remotest part of the land.

The presidents of all the colleges in the land are re-
hashing his classical arguments in their this year's ad-
dresses, and scattering them broadcast and throwing up
their hats at a new and unexpected accession to their
forces, to which they must know they are not justly entitled.
The standard of classical attainment upon which Mill in-
sists (and insists that it shall be general) crowds out every-
thing else, and makes futile all talk about the educational
claims of science. The Catholic organ warns its clergy
against commending the Culture demanded by Modern
Life, and the Protestant theologians recommend the dif-
fusion of Mill's classical argument as an antidote to it.

The worst difficulty about it is that the theological
party is skilfully working it as a gain of authority, and
Mill's name is so potent that the opposite party has us at

* I. e., too much in favour of Greek and Latin ? Or, more likely, in
his excessive modesty he meant that I praised his work too highly.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 237

an enormous disadvantage. Right here in Saratoga, for
example, they are organizing a free high school to be sup-
ported entirely by public taxes; the clergy lead in the
movement, and demand that the institution shall be co-
ordinated with our college system and arranged upon a
classical basis of Latin and Greek ; and if a person opens
his mouth in protest he is immediately knocked down with
Mill's classical argument, and that, too, by those people
who have never read another line of his writings and a year
ago would as soon have quoted Voltaire as Mill. Somehow
and by somebody that argument must be answered. If
anything appears in England that has any value as a criti-
cism of it, I will be greatly obliged if you will send it to
me. But I am wearying you. My wife and sister join me
in expressions of kind and sympathizing regard.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., July 20, 1867.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : People's blunders are perpetually
entailing on me all kinds of trouble and expense. A con-
siderable percentage of my time is taken up in rectifying
them. The last is a serious one. The statement on the
part of printer and binder that they had no stock of
Biology, Vol. I, has turned out to be a mistake on the part
of the binder, who has discovered that he had one hundred
and seventy-five copies. Thus my hurried order to send
off the stereotype plates at once will prove to be a need-
less and unfortunate one. If you have a sufficient stock to
last two or three months it will not matter, as the duplicate
stereotype plates can be at once executed and sent to you.
Of course, if the plates have not been dispatched before
this reaches you, you will retain them.

I leave town for the season in the course of a few days,
and shall be at various places, mainly in Scotland. I shall,
however, keep Miss Shickle informed as to my whereabouts,
so that you may address to me at 37 Queen's Gardens, which,
indeed, will now be my permanent address.

238 Edward Livingston Youmans.

I received the other day — sent, I suppose, by you,
though I did not see the address — a copy of No. i of the
Journal of Speculative Philosophy, containing a long criti-
cism on me from a Hegelian point of view. You named it,
I fancy, some time ago. It has some sharpness here and
there, but I am not conscious of being hurt by it.

ARDTONISH TOWER, MORVEN, September 7, 1867.

MY DEAR YOUMANS i I regret that you should have
been put to so much trouble about the sending off the
stereos, of the Biology — the more so as it has turned out,
as you have since learned, to be needless.

I gave orders for the restereotyping to be immediately
commenced, and it is now in progress. You will probably
have the duplicate set of plates by the time you want them.
When those of First Principles are sent — which they will be
as soon as ever the second edition is out of my hand — you
will be set up and we shall have no further bother.

Thanks for your remarks about the title to the series,
and about Comte. You have alarmed yourself needlessly,
however. Though I referred to Lewes and his description
of me as a positivist as a reason for taking the step, I did
not say that I should give this as a reason. It never oc-
curred to me to mention Comte or positivism in the preface
to the new edition.

I regret to hear what you tell me about Mill's address,
but it completely fulfils the prophecy I made to him about
its effect. I wish would write a letter direct to him about
it, saying that you did so at my suggestion. It might
prompt him to write something in one of your papers to
rectify the impression. I should very well like to answer it,
but it would add another to the many delays that meet me.

I am staying here with my friends in Scotland, doing a
little work, but passing most of the time in sports and
amusements. I am getting much better. The relaxation
did not come too soon, for I find myself anything but

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 239

strong. However, I expect soon to be right. Kind re-
gards to all, and believe me very truly yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, August 29, 1867.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I wrote you some time since that
I sent the plates of Biology, as you requested, " promptly,"
and, furthermore, that it placed us in something of a pre-
dicament— putting back the publication of Volume II, I fear,
till late. I hope you did not fail to get the letter, as I ex-
plained the necessity of the utmost promptness in returning
the duplicates. The blunder of your printers was very
unfortunate, and cannot fail to tell seriously upon your
dividends this year. But I console myself with the reflec-
tion that when this obstruction is tided over we shall have
clear sailing.

An American edition of Huxley's Elementary Les-
sons in Physiology, with added chapters on Hygiene,
was to be prepared by William Jay Youmans. The
causes of delay are explained in the following emi-
nently characteristic letters :

SARATOGA, July jo, 1867.

DEAR BROTHER JAY : I think I left Chapter XIV with
Werrey.* He will send proofs to me, and after final revision
I will send you a set, chapter by chapter. That I have
considerable to do on them, as you will perceive, is one of
the causes of delay. But I will now hurry it forward.
There is nothing new here ; everything jogs along at the old
rate; some kitchen perturbations give spicinessto domestic
life. I have Gorman's brother — green, and a natural fool
into the bargain ; also Mike. And between the Mclllroys
and the Germans there is feud dating back to Ireland,
which makes a precious mess of it.

* Head of Appletons' printing department.

240 Edward Livingston Youmans.

August j d. — I found the inclosed passage imbedded in
a paragraph, and there having been no reference to the sub-
ject before, the first question of an ignorant pupil would be :
What is he talking about ? What are cysteria ? What are
trichinae ? What is encephaloid ? One of the things I had
expected was to find a complete paragraph, or several para-
graphs, with a full account of these parasites. Turning to
the last section of the chapter on Foods, I find a recurrence
to them, but no explanation. Everything is taken for
granted. The passage is a somewhat exaggerated sample
of your prevailing fault of writing. You must study the
art of putting a case. You must, in the first place, throw
yourself into the state of mind of one who knows nothing
of the subject, and make the explanation simple and com-
plete without his having to go to the dictionary or glossary.
A world of practice will be required upon this one point.
As practice, you cannot do better than to make a statement,
and then make it over and over again, striving each time
to get it more simple and clear. I will omit the included
passage from its place, and put what is said upon this sub-
ject in the last section of the chapter, and I wish you would
immediately write out a full account of the matter: the
origin, size, circumstances, propagation of the animals, and
their physiological effects, harmless or harmful. It will be
expected in the book. It is just what the second part of
the book is for.

August 4th. — I am head and ears into your job, as I
wrote yesterday. The chapter on clothes is the best of all,
as the whole discussion is most pertinent. Yet I miss the
specific and most important statement to which you have
often referred, of the effect of insufficient clothing in in-
fancy. You despatch the whole question of infancy and
old age by a short extract from Parkes. If you can muster
some statements with specific evil effects, concrete facts,
and send them down, I will incorporate them. A note from

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 241

Werrey says some of the manuscript is missing. I hope it
will not be serious. I shall send him in a day or two all
the copy up to the last section of the chapter on foods. I
must keep that for a better statement about trichinae, as
I wrote you yesterday. And in that section also the refer-
ence to the diet of children is very meagre and unsatisfac-
tory. The effect of substituting arrowroot for milk in
their diet is not referred to. Can you not make some
points on this subject by reference to the handbook ? And
both in respect of diet and clothing, can't you get some
concrete hints from Part IV of Spencer's Education ? In
the chapter on food the last section is really the only part
that bites upon the subject of hygiene, the rest is but re-
motely applicable. I am retrenching what seem the more
indirect parts.

September nth. — I have been down to New York to see
about things, and returned this morning. I send by mail
to-day twenty-four pages more. Chapter XIX is in the
hands of the printer, and I have commenced Chapter XX,
the last ; must have it done in a week. Send down the
questions at once as far as they go. Werrey will set them
up and page and stereotype them as soon as the last chapter
is through.

I received yours of September 6th this morning. We
are all well, our folks quite smart, and slowly gathering
themselves together to leave, which they will probably do
in October. We shall commence boxing their things
shortly. I am not without serious fears respecting the
Physiology. Neither Part I nor Part II are just what they
ought to be. If the work proves to have any value or
promise, I suspect the only method will be a thorough re-
vision and restereotyping. There is too much irrelevant
or very remotely relevant matter in Part II. I shall do
what I can to make Chapter XX attractive.

September 24th. — A mess of questions, pages 13 to 25,

242 , Edward Livingston Youmans.

came yesterday. I have not received those going before.
If they have been sent and miscarried, you will have to
copy or make them over. Let me know about it. You will
have to be patient with this long delay. I am doing the
very best I can. You won't require much imagination to
understand that in the midst of this breaking up there is
little opportunity for quiet and contained thought. I am
hourly and semi-hourly disturbed. Have been bothered to
death to get a man to make our boxes; have at last found
a fool who can put them together, but I shall have to do
all the packing myself. The last chapter of the book is to
be the most important one. It will be quite a new feature,
and I wish to make it the card of the work. It is the most
difficult thing I ever attempted, and I have to do it many
times over. I guess I have broken up and restated the
first section already ten times. I shall hurry it along as
fast as possible consistent with doing it right, which is the
first thing to be considered, for the success of the book is
in question, and it is a matter of ten years' interest with no
further trouble when done. I have not touched my lec-
ture, nor shall I till this job is finished.

Early in 1868 the Physiology and Hygiene of Prof.
Huxley and Dr. William Jay Youmans was published.
The following letter alludes to this and to the text-
book of Botany which Miss Youmans was preparing :

SARATOGA, March j, 1868.

MY DEAR SISTER : You will be glad to know that the
Physiology has been warmly commended by Dr. Austin
Flint, who has written Mr. W. H. Appleton a note about it.
The only fault he finds is with the illustrations, which he
does not consider up to the times. Earle mentions that
you have had a little trial trip with the Botany, which
proved satisfactory. I was glad to hear it. There rests
no doubt in my mind that it is a very big thing education-

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 243

ally, and that the public is quite ripe for it. I had a talk
with Mr. Hewitt at the Century the other night, and was
glad to find that he had formed a very high opinion of
botany in a disciplinary point of view, saying that it was
probably as good as mathematics. I showed him in what
respects it was superior, and when I told him that it was
the only point in the whole course of education at which
aesthetics might be naturally developed, I think he was
much struck by the remark. He asked me if I thought it
could be systematically included or co-ordinated with the
other studies in the School of Design. I said, Undoubtedly.
He had looked over the Physiology, and liked it. He was
interested in your progress with the Botany when I told
him about it. The botanical field, as you mean to take it
up, is quite unoccupied ; how long it may remain so is un-
certain. You ought not to carry the book through alone ;
you must have somebody help you do the drudgery of it.

I have been overhauling the World to find Fiske's arti-
cles,* and have been well rewarded. He remembers Spen-
cer every time. I send them to you. Preserve them and
bring them down when you come.

In this winter season of 1868 Mr. Youmans made
the last of his long lecturing1 journeys, attended by
much weariness and discomfort. In reading the let-
ters of this time, that susceptibility to cold — which
afterward ended his life — impresses me as greater
than in those days I had fully realized.

WINONA, January 26, 1868.

MY DARLING KITTY : I was gladdened by two letters
when I arrived here yesterday, while a third has come to-

* The reference is to various reviews of historical and scientific books,
in the course of which the doctrine of evolution was apt to get mentioned,
with some of its bearings upon the particular case in hand.

244 Edward Livingston Youmans.

day. You are a very dutiful little wife. The train which
was due at La Crosse at midnight did not arrive till six in
the morning. There was no sleeping coach, and the in-
fernal cars were hotter than ovens. Not a wink of sleep
did I get, and my eyes became much irritated. I got here
at noon, and ah, how solid and dense was my sleep last
night ! It has left me rather exhausted. . . .

At Freeport there was a protracted meeting in full blast
in every church in town except the Episcopal, and a general
feeling of pious rage at my appearance on the scene. The
Presbyterian clergyman alone, a cold-blooded but highly
intelligent man, who had been reluctantly driven into the
revivalist movement by sheer competition, appointed his
meetings at half-past six, so that people could come to the
lecture at eight. My first audience accordingly consisted
of about a hundred stragglers from prayer meeting. In
my lecture I of course assumed the antiquity of the earth,
and that was enough ! It got abroad the next day, and
was reverberated through the town that " Prof. Youmans is
an avowed and unblushing infidel." There was a deuce of
a time. I was called upon and offensively catechised as to
what I believed. Questions were written out by a clergy-
man and sent to me to be promptly answered in public.
The next night it was scarcely better; but the gentlemen
who had my lectures in charge, seeing how things were
going and determined not to be baffled, crowded the house
the last two nights with pupils of the schools let in free —
a capital arrangement, for I would always rather talk to
them than to the old folks. At the close of the last lecture
I gave them a piece of my mind in a dignified way. 1
turned the tables on them, and showed that the real infidels
are those people who have so little faith in God and in his
universe as to be skeptical about the wholesomeness of
demonstrated truths. It was a successful hit. After I had
finished, a splendid-looking man, ever so much like Uncle

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 245

Good in appearance (he was a Mr. Mitchell, member of the
Presbyterian Church and president of the principal bank in
Freeport), came up to the platform and gathered the com-
mittee together. He then said, " I will myself stand the
expense of an immediate repetition of this course of lec-
tures//-^, if Prof. Youmans will stay and deliver them ! ! ! "
My engagements, as you know, made this impossible.
I remain, with much love, your vagrant husband,

E. L. Y.

WiNONA, February 4, 1868.

MY DEAR WIFE : I almost dread to sit down to write to
you. I seem fated to send you such a lugubrious set of
reports that you must be very much wearied with them.
Still, if only for the sake of the unities, I am constrained
to continue my grad-grindings. It is now Tuesday morn-
ing. I left a week ago yesterday morning for Rochester,
gave one lecture there and one in St. Paul, and consumed
the entire week, only getting back very late Saturday night.
The prairie winds drifted the hard dry snow over the rail-
roads, filling the deep cuts as with ice. To be four or six
hours in a single snow-bank was a common experience. I
counted myself most fortunate in getting back as I did, as
the roads are now almost completely blocked, and the
train that started out yesterday morning returned at night
after having only reached the first station. I lectured at
Coldwater on Saturday night, and while under ordinary
circumstances I could arrive there by leaving Friday morn-
ing, I cannot now venture to leave here later than to-mor-
row morning. My visit home,* therefore, although by no
means spoiled, has been greatly interrupted and disturbed.
The cold has been very intense — from ten to twenty-eight
degrees below zero — and for this I was not at all prepared.

* Youman's father and mother had left the Saratoga farm, and were
now staying at Winona.

246 Edward Livingston Youmans.

I therefore took a succession of colds, day by day and
night by night, and when I returned to Winona was quite
ill — hard cough, great hoarseness, extreme and painful
soreness of the chest, and headache. Jay at once took me
in hand, and what with going to bed, two days' rest, and
mustard plasters on my chest, I came out this morning
feeling very much better, headache and lung soreness gone,
and cough diminished but tightened. The weather has for-
tunately relaxed. . . . I. have mentioned to you repeatedly
how predominant is the religious excitement in the various
towns where I have lectured. A note from Mr. Cowles, of
Freeport, states that Rev. Mr. Gary (who sent me up that
series of questions to be publicly answered) announced
that he would preach from Genesis i, i, a sermon entitled
Thoughts suggested by the Recent Lectures of Prof.
Youmans. The Methodist clergyman of Rochester also
advertised that he would preach on the Dynamics of Life.
I doubt not that both houses will be jammed. My lecture
at St. Paul was very satisfactory on my part, but for ex-
actly the same cause the house was slender. All the
churches were aflame with the religious excitement. I
met the Methodist bishop coming down on the cars (to
dedicate some church), who regretted that I had come to
St. Paul just at this time when there was so much religious
interest. Several gentlemen attacked him because the
clergymen did not attend the lectures. He replied : " We
never suspend religious meetings for such reasons." The
quick rejoinder was, "You did suspend them for Gough
and Anna Dickinson," which of course made him angry.
He replied, " If they had not adjourned them they would
have been left alone." He said, " It is not science that
the world wants, but Christ ! "

I hope I may soon see you, and be at home somewhere.
I am very, very tired with this life of vagrancy.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 247

ZANESVILLE, OHIO, February 23, 1868.

DEAR SISTER: I have held on steadily, and closed my
series of engagements last night without losing a lecture,
but it has been harder and harder work. I have had a ter-
rible cough, which has been equally distressing to myself
and my audience. I could not give another lecture, and
yet I think my cold is in that state that if I can stop to
rest it will quietly leave me. The speaking tears it up
every night. Last night, when I had begun to speak, I
had a spasm of the throat that lasted four or five minutes,
embarrassing and alarming me very much, but it soon
passed entirely away.

SARATOGA, March j, 1868.

MY DEAR MOTHER : Earle will report to you that I got
home to New York safely, although pretty well used up.
He left me yesterday morning at Mechanicsville in the
midst of a furious snowstorm. The cars got to Saratoga,
but could go no further. Tommy* was there, but the
storm was so blinding and furious that we almost gave up
the idea of trying to get over to the larm. We had a tough
job, I can assure you, and were two hours getting over.
The road was buried out of sight, and the drifts were deep,
some of them immense. Tommy said the snow was three
feet on a level before, and we have had another foot or
fifteen inches. The house this morning is completely buried
in. I find the house tight as a drum, every door locked
(and the key hid) but the kitchen. The house is as neat
as waxwork. The kitchen is kept swept, the stove pol-
ished, and Tommy has a harness, which he has been oiling
in the back kitchen. One of the cows had a calf the night

* Thomas Welsh was a young Irishman who had been left in charge
of the farm. When Vincent Youmans and his wife went out to Winona
to live Edward took the farm off their hands. He sold it in the course
of the spring, and then secured for the faithful " Tommy " a position in
the Appletons' printing establishment.

248 Edward Livingston Yoiimans.

before I came, but Tommy found it dead. It lies there
stiff, and the poor cow feels awfully. Her dumb supplica-
tion to us to do something for the poor dead thing is very
touching. She goes to it, and then turns back and looks
at it and moans, as much as to say, " Can't something be
done?" She is doing well, and Tommy says will be all
right by the seventh milking. The horses are looking very
well. The colt got so fractious that he was compelled to
stop giving grain. He gives them alternate stalks and
hay. He says old Roan is very fond of the stalks. The
road goes across the hill, between the house and barn, and
Slade has just gone over it with a snowplough. It is town
meeting, but there will be a very light vote to-day. The
hens have not begun to lay yet. I had last night the first
solid, sound, unmitigated sleep for the last three months.
Tommy rolled the hot water thing all round in the bed
before I got into it. He has raised a hundred bushels
of ashes, and drawn five or six cords of wood from the
mountain, and several cords down in the new roadway.
I am going to try hard to sell the place this March. The
weather has been terribly cold here, and however it may
be in Minnesota, you may well congratulate yourselves
on having escaped from this chilling environment. I must
go back to New York to-morrow, if possible. Tommy is
"a-bilin"' dinner; the pork, cabbage, and potatoes are
walloping* away in the pot while he is shovelling out the
house. . . . Study to be quiet, and don't go out while it is
cold.

The crowded occupations of the autumn and win-

* An ancient and picturesque word : wallop, " to boil," Skeat ; " to
bubble up," Wright, Halliwell ; " to move quickly and with much agita-
tion," Jamieson's Scottish Diet. The Anglo-Saxon is up-weallan, to well
up, like a spring ; " aufwallen" Edward Miiller, Etym. Woerterb. d. Eng-
lischen Sprache ; " represents the sound of liquid in agitation," Wedgwood,
Etym. Diet.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 249

ter had prevented the writing of letters to Mr. Spen-
cer, until he had begun to feel some anxiety about his
friend.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., January 2, 1868.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I am beginning to be anxious to
hear from you, fearing from your silence that something
may have happened. The date of your last letter is August
29th — more than four months ago — so that I begin to fear
either that my letters have not reached you, or that you
have been doing too much and made yourself ill. Pray,
let me hear from you.

I am just now suffering under one of my occasional
attacks of greater nervousness than usual, resulting more
especially in very bad nights. For the last fortnight I have
done very little work, and for the last week none at all.
To-morrow I am going off into Gloucestershire, where, if the
frost which has now set in lasts, I hope to get some skat-
ing, and I count upon this for doing a good deal toward
setting me right again. I had hoped to get out the first
number of the Psychology by the end of February, but this
untoward state, entailing, as it may do, considerable delay
beyond what has already occurred renders that achieve-
ment impossible.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., January 22, 1868.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: Your welcome letter reached me
a few hours after I had posted my last to you. I was glad
to find that nothing amiss had happened.

I dare say you were surprised to find that I had not
adopted the new title for the serial,* as I proposed. I dis-
cussed the matter with both Huxley and Tyndall, and
though I do not think that the objections raised were such
as to outweigh the manifest advantages, still there doubt-

* The reference is to the title Synthetic Philosophy, which was
adopted somewhat later.

250 Edward Livingston Youmans.

less are objections, and in the midst of conflicting con-
siderations I eventually became so far undecided as to let
the matter stand as it was.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., February 29, 1868.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: After losing a great deal of time
during the last two months, hoping to get into working
order by using half measures, I have been at length com-
pelled to take a more decisive course. I start to-morrow
morning for Italy, where I propose to spend some two
months, expecting that by the end of April, by the com-
bined effect of desisting from all excitements, intellectual
and social, and getting the exhilaration due to so much
novelty, I shall regain my ordinary state.

I have postponed writing until to-day, hoping that I
might hear from you again before starting, and thinking
that I might have something to reply. Any letter that ar-
rives from you shortly I expect will reach me in Italy, as I
am leaving directions to have all foreign letters sent on.

NEW YORK, March 4, 1868.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have but recently returned from
a protracted absence in the West, where I at last broke
down from the exposure of travel in a remarkably inclem-
ent winter. I left a number of engagements unfulfilled,
and did not think to return again, but I am getting better,
and am strongly urged to return. If I go, it will take three
or four weeks. ... I shall not be able to give attention to
your books till I return from the West (if I go). I am now
closely occupied with Huxley's Physiology, which must be
attended to at once, as the competition against it is going
to be very sharp. I was somewhat disappointed at the
non-appearance of your new title, as 1 had fully made up
my mind that it would be a desirable thing. What about
your coming to this country ? Does the project begin to
take definite shape ? I shall be very glad to hear about it.

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 251

Mrs. Youmans wishes to be remembered, and expresses the
hope that you are attending first of all to your health.

NEW YORK, March 16, 1868,

DEAR SISTER : A short note from Spencer this morning
states that he is down,* and packing for Italy to start at
once and be absent two months or more. A man named
B. Waterhouse Hawkins, of London, naturalist or mythol-
ogist, acclimatizologist, and palaeontologist (reconstructor
of the monsters of a former world in the Crystal Palace
grounds), called on me day before yesterday with a card
from Huxley. He wants to lecture and to reconstruct the
American monsters in the Central Park. He has many let-
ters to many people from Lord Stanley and the inevitable
Sir Roderick, but Huxley sent him to me, and told him to
put himself in my hands, and so I have him on my hands.
I gazetted him in all the morning papers, and arranged for
him to speak before the Lyceum of Natural History to-
night. I had never heard of B. W. H., but he appears to
be well known to all the scientific men. Huxley is out
with a new and very strong thing, in the March Macmil-
lan, entitled A Liberal Education and Where to get it.f

NEW YORK, Wednesday, March 2$, 1868.

DEAR SISTER : I am up to my eyes in this Hawkins
business, the whole work of bringing him out devolving

* I. e., in poor health.

f The place to get a liberal education was certainly not the American
college, of which Prof. E. D. Cope once told Youmans, " a college where
the whole classical power was concentrated in the effort to throw derision
upon his [Cope's] subjects and to shame the boys out of caring for them.
He got them well started at first, when an old horse was given them to
prepare the skeleton. They commenced boiling him up to clean the
bones, when the classical power actually incited a mob to break up the
proceedings, and it proved a deathblow to biological studies ! " And yet
Fourth-of-July orators persist in calling this a free and enlightened coun-
try, and allude to the Dark Ages as to a period remote and elapsed.

252 Edward Livingston Youmans.

upon me. Something may come of it. He lectures at the
Cooper Institute to-morrow night. I will go up home on
Friday night, and will then write you about it.

NEW YORK, April iot 1868.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I think when I wrote you before I
'was purposing to go a third time West. I failed, however,
to get away, and before I was aware of it I found myself
over head and ears in a new job.

Mr. Waterhouse Hawkins, who brought a card from
Huxley, had to be set a-going. His success as a lecturer
through the country depended entirely on the reception
and success he met with in New York. I devoted myself
to the enterprise, and by managing the papers and linking
on his work to our educational needs in natural history
secured for him a splendid reception, of which I inclose an
account.

We immediately started for a course of lectures (four),
which would have undoubtedly paid him a thousand dollars
profit, when he stepped into a hole in one of our villainous
pavements and got such a savage sprain of the ankle that
he has been in bed ever since, and it will be, I fear, many
days before he can be about — which is as bad as it can be
both for me and for him.

We may yet do something, but we have lost our main
chance, and the thing now looks discouraging, especially
as the lecture season is now past. When I say that I
have been completely engrossed day and night with this
thing for a month, and wish I were assured of being out
of it in another month, you can understand something how
delays arise with me to prevent the accomplishment of
other things. But for this I should have perhaps reached
your works again, and certainly should have written you
before this. . . . We have felt much concern at the an-
nouncement of your serious ill health, and hope your
Italian tour will brace you up. If not, I think you had

Popular Education, and Other Matters. 253

better strike your work and come to this country for a
year. Forget philosophy, and dip into American life; I
believe it would be the very thing for you. Think of it.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., May j, 1868.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: Your first letter, or rather that of
Mrs. Youmans written on your behalf, reached me at Rome,
and the second and third I got since my return. I cannot
say that my hopes that a journey through Italy would put
me into working order were realized. I came back no
better than I went — in fact, in some respects not so well. I
have, however, been improving very considerably during
the last week, especially in sleeping, which is my great
difficulty. Indeed, I now feel pretty sanguine that with
tolerable care I shall shortly get into my usual state.

Thanks for your reminder about my visit to America.
I fear, however, there is no prospect of my soon respond-
ing to your wish. My recent experience has given me
very conclusive proof that, with my irritable nervous sys-
tem, I am quite unfit for travelling. I was greatly ex-
hausted by my journey to Marseilles, although I stopped a
night at Paris and a night at Lyons. My voyage to Naples
did me further damage. Sleep was out of the question.
What little I got during three nights I owed to morphine.
And during the last three weeks of my stay abroad, a lead-
ing subject of thought with me was, how I should get home
again with the least amount of injury, which was the
shortest route, and how it might best be broken into short
stays. After this experience you will see that it is out of
the question for me to commit myself to a ten or twelve
days' voyage, and to such railway journeys as travelling
through the United States would involve. If I should
ever again get into a normal state — which does not seem
very probable — I may decide differently ; but while I remain
as I am I must give up the idea of extensive journeys.

A further reason for thus deciding is that, quite apart

254 Edward Livingston Youmans.

from fatigue, I find the penalties of travelling greater than
the pleasures. In early days I had considerable appetite
for sight-seeing ; but nowadays my appetite is soon satiated,
especially as not looking at things through the spectacles
of authority, I often find but little to admire where the
world admires, or professes to admire, a great deal. The
chief pleasure I get in travelling I get from fine scenery ;
and of this there is plenty to be had without leaving Great
Britain.

Thank you for the copy of the American edition of
Culture, etc. I have read a good part of your preliminary
essay on Discipline, and like it very much. The argument
is sound and well-sustained, and I wish the English edi-
tion had the advantage of it. The only passage to which
I should take exception is one on page 17, where you have
committed yourself to the vertebral theory of the skull.
You should modify this in the next edition.

I can quite understand that you were disappointed that
I did not use the general title of Synthetic Philosophy,
as I had thought of doing. I discussed the matter at
considerable length with both Huxley and Tyndall, and
though the objections they raised were not, to my think-
ing, adequate, still they had weight, and though I
thought, and continue to think, that on the whole this
general title would be desirable, my conviction was not
sufficiently decided to lead me to make the change in spite
of adverse opinions. I see that you have been speaking
of this proposed title, and that Mr. Alger has been making
use of it. To this I see no objection ; and, indeed, it
strikes me that this habitual application of it by those who
write reviews in America will be the most desirable way of
establishing its use, if no reason to the contrary should
hereafter arise. Ever yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

CHAPTER XII.

APPLETONS' JOURNAL.

1868-18^0. Age 47-49.

FROM the beginning of his connection with the
Appletons my friend had looked forward to a time
when he might enlarge the scope of his labours by
publishing a magazine which should deal with scien-
tific subjects in such a way as to educate the people.
It was a steady purpose of his, and he never neglected
a chance of bringing the subject forward and urging
its importance. In 1868 the opportunity seemed to
have arrived, but the case was complicated by the fact
that the Appletons wished to establish a weekly paper
of a literary and artistic character, which might have
some such business value for its publishers as Har-
per's Weekly, or as Every Saturday, then published
by Ticknor & Fields. After long consultation it was
decided to combine the two schemes and issue an
illustrated weekly paper that should be devoted at
once to popular science and to art and letters. It was
intended to secure contributions from the most emi-
nent writers in Europe as well as America ; and with
this end in view Mr. Youmans, as editor, sailed for Eng-
land. On the eve of sailing he wrote to his mother :

NEW YORK, September 15, 1868.

MY DEAR MOTHER : I cannot leave without dropping
you a line, for although little is made of crossing the At-

(255)

256 Edward Livingston Youmans.

lantic by people hereabout, I know you cannot fail to look
upon it very differently and as full of danger. But there are
dangers also on land, and the perils of land travel rival the
perils of the ocean. I go on an errand of importance, I
believe, to the public, and which I trust I am partly quali-
fied to execute. There is great satisfaction in having
reached a position in which I command the confidence of
the publishing house which has known me for eighteen
years, and now tenders me an unqualified commission to
use their funds to carry out the most important and con-
siderable project they have yet undertaken. Even should
nothing come of it, so much, at all events, will remain, and
the consideration I have with them I have earned myself.
In my connection with them I have never pursued a selfish
end, and am as far from it now as is possible for one to be
who cannot utterly lose sight of a duty to himself. Should
the enterprise be carried out I shall be glad, and do not
dread the responsibility or the work it may entail. It will
be steady, and so will be healthier than the fitful and
anxious course I have hitherto pursued.

I think of you and father very often, often every day,
and never forget how much I owe you that I can never
repay. I have much happiness in reflecting that you are
still so well, though in feeble health, and that you are so
comfortably situated in your declining years. Doubtless
you have your trials — all have them — but how many have
less cause of thankfulness than falls to your lot. You have
done your duty ; be contented, and all will be well. Worry-
ing is exhaustive, anti-vital, anti-healthful, injurious, and
therefore immoral and irreligious. It cannot be alto-
gether avoided, as I know, but something may be done to
escape it. It is our highest obligation to make the best of
things. Your very affectionate son,

E. L. YOUMANS.

Applet ons Journal. 257

Mr. Spencer had advised him not to undertake the
work of editing a periodical :

For your own comfort, health, and happiness, I would
advise you not. You will be committed to a slavery full
of weariness and vexation. It is a great blessing to be
one's own master — a blessing not to be given up unless some
peremptory duty or need demands it. You can do quite
good enough in the way of public work without thus bind-
ing yourself.

But if he must undertake such work, said Mr.
Spencer, let it be upon a monthly magazine rather
than a weekly paper :

In deciding on a weekly periodical rather than a
monthly, you are, I think, entering upon the much more
serious undertaking of the two. To have perpetually
hanging over you responsibilities that must be fulfilled by
a given date, is bad enough when the date recurs at inter-
vals of a month ; and when it recurs weekly, the conse-
quent sense of slavery must be very oppressive, and the
wear and tear very serious. Unless the mercantile reasons
in favour of a weekly periodical are overwhelming, I think
a monthly will be very much preferable. I think this for
other reasons than that named. The smallness of a weekly
periodical necessitates short articles, whether they are
otherwise desirable or not ; but in a monthly periodical
you may have them short or long, as the subject demands.
Moreover, from the exercise of this ability to treat with
due fulness topics that can-not be well dealt with in a small
space, there arises the incidental advantage of having a
mixture of long and short articles, so obtaining an addi-
tional kind of variety. I should say, too, that editorship
can be more satisfactorily discharged with a periodical of
longer intervals. More time for arrangement and more

12

258 Edward Livingston Youmans.

time for calm judgment are allowed. Then, too, your in-
tervals of relaxation are sufficiently long to admit of
absence.

The following letter explains itself :

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., NovembenS, 1868.

MY DEAR SIR : Let me introduce to you my American
friend Dr. Youmans. He is over here to make certain
literary arrangements, which he will explain to you, and in
the success of which I feel much interest, as do also Hux-
ley, Tyndall, and many leading men whose names Dr. You-
mans can give you.

That his project is an important one, and that there is
every likelihood of its being successfully carried out, I am
fully convinced. It is from no short or superficial acquaint-
ance with Dr. Youmans that I say this. Ever since 1860 he
has been working for me in the United States, and it is to
his self-sacrificing efforts that I owe the success which my
undertaking has had there. Hjs untiring devotion being
joined with extensive scientific knowledge and very sound
judgment in matters of business, he seems to me thoroughly
fitted to carry out the plan he proposes.

If you can do anything to forward his views, either
directly or indirectly, you will greatly oblige me.

Sincerely yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

In December we find Youmans back in New York.
The first number of Appletons' Journal of Popular
Literature, Science, and Art was published April 3,
1869. Its editorial announcement was as follows :

The publishing house by which the present Journal is
issued has been extensively engaged for nearly half a
century in the work of promoting general education and
diffusing information among the people of the United

Apple tons Journal. 259

States through the medium of valuable books in all the
leading departments of knowledge. In further pursuance
of this important object, and recognizing the increasing
tendency of the public to cultivate the periodical form of
literature, the publishers have engaged in the enterprise of
a weekly Journal, which they design to make worthy the
liberal patronage of the reading community.

Omitting ordinary news and avoiding partisan advocacy,
both political and sectarian, the Journal will be devoted to
general literature, to science, art, and education, and to the
diffusion of valuable information upon subjects of public
importance. It is intended to make use of all resources,
original and selected, domestic and foreign, which can give
interest and variety to its pages ; and neither exertion nor
expense will be spared to secure the aid of the best talent
of the time. We abstain from the large professions and
the parade of conspicuous names so common on these oc-
casions, and, trusting to the intelligence of the people,
shall be content to let the Journal speak for itself.

The principal " attraction " in the new Journal was
the translation of Victor Hugo's L'Homme qui Rit,
published simultaneously with the appearance of the
original work. The first number contained an excel-
lent article by the editor, What we mean by Science.
It is 'reprinted in full in the present book as an illus-
tration of his clear thought and admirable manner of
exposition.* But there was not very much science in
the Journal, for comparatively little room was allowed
for it. In such a novel enterprise the publishers were
haunted by a nervous dread of boring the general
reader. As Youmans wrote with grim humour to
Spencer, April 27, 1869, after four numbers had been
issued :

* See below, pp. 486-490.

260 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The paper is having a curious experience. The bare
announcement that it would give attention to science and
valuable thought raised an almost universal condemnation
of it in advance as a certain failure. And although we
have had no science in it, and made it as vacant of ideas as
possible, it is voted heavy.

A bolder policy from the start might very likely
have proved more successful, and would have saved
the enterprise from the danger of falling between two
stools. From its editor's point of view Appletons'
Journal was neither one thing nor another, and after
a somewhat irksome year he resigned his charge.
His friend Mr. R. H. Manning, of Brooklyn, then
came forward with another editorial scheme. He
offered to make a considerable investment for the
purpose of founding a daily newspaper which should
aid the educational reforms in which Youmans felt so
deeply interested. Youmans was to edit and control
the paper ; but after due consideration he declined the
liberal offer, for he felt that his work could best be
done in other fields than those of daily journalism.

The following glimpse of the winter season of 1870
shows a renewed attempt to give lectures and renewed
failure from ill health :

NEW YORK, March 23, 1870.

MY DEAR SPENCER : Yours of February 3d came punc-
tually. It found me in Minnesota in rather a bad way. I
went West in early January to give some lectures, and at
the fourth broke down from a heavy cold. After threaten-
ing me with something serious in the lungs, it seemed to
shift to my right foot as a kind of rheumatic inflammation.
I fortunately got to my brother's, in Winona, where I was
confined, with much pain, for two months. I returned to
New York a fortnight ago with considerable difficulty, but

Applet ons Journal. 261

am now able to be about, though still lame. I did not
write from Winona because I constantly hoped soon to
return and be able to speak of business.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., April 26, i8jo.
MY DEAR YOUMANS : I was very sorry to hear of your
having been so ill. I have long feared that, like many
others who are anxious to diffuse a knowledge of the laws
of health, you would yourself have to suffer from continu-
ously disregarding them. As I sometimes say jokingly to
Huxley, apropos of his transgressions, we ought to erase
the proverb ** Experience makes fools wise," and write in
place of it " Experience does not even make wise men wise."
I hope, at any rate, that henceforth you will not so lavishly
expend your energies for the benefit of others, taking no
care of yourself. It is bad policy in all respects. A man
who gives his work gratis is sure to be undervalued.

The lively interest in Mr. Spencer's philosophy felt
by a few Americans and their zealous efforts in his
behalf had touched him deeply, and for some time he
had been thinking of dedicating his System of Philoso-
phy to his American friends. The following letter
inclosed the draft of such a dedication :

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., October 19, 1870.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : The inclosed will show you my
reason for writing again before you replied to my last.

I dare say you and other Americans may have wondered
why I did not take this step before. The fact is that I
did contemplate it at the time when the second edition of
First Principles was in the press ; but I was eventually de-
terred by the thought that it might seem unfair to those
English friends who had, shortly before that time, shown
their sympathy by the steps they took. On thinking the
matter over of late, however, I have come to the conclusion

262 Edward Livingston Youmans.

that the reasons against the step do. not counterbalance the
reasons in its favour. Certainly if there are any cases in
which such expressions of feeling are appropriate this is
one.

The step will probably be thought somewhat tardy ; and
I have myself, from time to time, regretfully put aside the
thought of it under the impression that it was too late.
Recently, however, it occurred to me that, as the dedication
includes the whole series of volumes, only part of which is
at present issued, it is by no means too late.

I have forthwith acted upon this conclusion, and I send
you proofs before stereotyping for the purpose of asking
whether you have any suggestion to make.

You had better say nothing about it until the thing is
done ; indeed, considering that it is somewhat out of the
usual course, it will probably be best to say nothing about
it when it is done, but let the knowledge of it become
gradually diffused by the insertion of the dedication in all
copies of First Principles hereafter issued.

Very sincerely yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

Youmans's admirable letter in reply must be given
entire :

NEW YORK, November, 1870.

MY DEAR SPFNCER : I have delayed replying to your
last from want of time, and take it up at the first available
moment. The dedication you sent is admirably drawn and
no doubt would please American vanity amazingly, but I
am of opinion that its publication would be decidedly un-
advisable. You have a few friends in the United States,
as you have in England and on the Continent, who appre-
ciate the importance of your undertaking, and for this rea-
son have done something to make it known. It happens
that in this country other elements than intelligent appre-
ciation have been made available to promote the diffusion
of your writings. Yet if these were subtracted from the

Appletons Journal. 263

movement here, nothing would be left to distinguish the
American reception of your labours from those of other
countries. In specializing the Americans for this honour
you therefore compliment the wrong thing. We have no
claim to it, and it would be unjust to your sincere friends
in other countries. Nothing in the whole history of the
case can compare with the nobleness of Mr. Mill's pro-
posal to you. You have a large generosity of feeling
toward the Americans; they are a great way off, and you
know little of the ins and outs of things here, while many
of them undoubtedly deserve your kindly regard. But
they well enough understand that they are the indebted
parties in this matter. Your sensitiveness, however, is
natural, and it found ample expression in your letter to
Minturn, which ought to have been published as an act of
justice to you. I did not like to ask him for it for the pur-
pose, as I had been meddling so much in the matter. I had
some time since resolved to do it, however, and hope soon
to give it to the public under suitable circumstances;* and
this will make the dedication unnecessary for the purpose
you have in view.

Your philosophy, Heaven be praised, has no narrowness
or taint of nationality about it. It belongs to the world's
civilization ; let it not be blemished by any external mark
of partiality.

In saying that you have a few friends in this country I
only refer to those who have been active in the service of
your works. You have a very large and growing con-
stituency of students, who are becoming more or less deeply
imbued with your views. You are becoming both widely
known and deeply felt in these communities. I yesterday
received a letter from a young man in Philadelphia the
point of which was : " I have Motley's histories in seven

* It has been given in full above, pp. 217, 218.

264 Edward Livingston Youmans.

volumes perfect ; can I exchange them for Spencer's works,
which I have long wanted but am unable to buy ? "

There are many such encouraging symptoms which come
to my observation. The sales are slow, but I still have
strong hope that they may be quickened. I am almost
ashamed to refer to this again. It has been my purpose ;
I have talked about it so much, and so little has come of it,
but I have not been favourably situated to do anything.
The baulk of the Journal was a very severe thing for me,
but there have been other things worse than that which
have helped to break me up — things which cannot be ex-
plained— and so I have done but little. I have, however,
made a loose semi-arrangement with the Appletons to give
attention to some of their books. I have devoted myself
for weeks to Huxley's and Lubbock's books, and the result
is very satisfactory to the publishers. They were doubtful
about the policy of getting Lubbock's book at all, yet the
second edition is very nearly gone.

They thought a thousand would answer for Huxley a
year. It was not published until late in October, and has
gone to the third thousand already. The arrangement is a
precarious one, as they want much done for small pay ; but
before it terminates I mean to get at your books and stir
up the public about them.

Recurring to the dedication, you say we may have won-
dered why the step you propose was not taken before. I
certainly think not. I believe there is no feeling that any-
thing of the kind is due, and I hope you will dismiss from
your thoughts all shadow of anxiety in the matter. If we
have done something, we have sufficiently bragged about
it and are immensely satisfied.

Could you have come to this country and judged of
things for yourself, I should have nothing to say ; but,
knowing them as I do, I take the liberty of giving you my
opinion that it would be an unwise thing.

Ever and truly yours, E. L. YOUMANS.

Appletons Journal. 265

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., December 28, 1870.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Your letter dealing with the ques-
tion of the dedication took me somewhat by surprise. How-
ever, it was in one respect satisfactory, since it relieved me
from the feeling which I have long had that an adequate
recognition of the sympathy of my American friends had
not been made and was due from me. I trust to your judg-
ment in the matter. I had very nearly given orders, before
receiving your letter, to stereotype the dedication, wishing
to prefix it to a supply that was being bound for the English
market. However, I did not do so, and since the receipt
of your letter I have caused the type to be distributed.

Your late letters have given but evasive replies to my in-
quiries respecting your own affairs, and have tended to con-
firm my suspicion that things were not going well with you.
This suspicion I was sorry to have verified lately by Dr.
Draper, who is over here, and who quite confirmed me in
the belief that your sacrifices in the propagation of ideas
had entailed an undue neglect of your own interests. This
is a very unsatisfactory consciousness for me, knowing as
I do that so much of your time has been occupied in the
diffusion of my works. I should be well pleased to hear
that you were devoting yourself for a time entirely to per-
sonal advancement. Would it not be well to look for a pro-
fessorship ? You have had offers of the kind. The duties
would be congenial, and would leave you a considerable
share of freedom. Ever sincerely yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SERIES.
1871. Age, SO.

FOR chronological and other reasons it is well
enough to begin our chapter with some extracts from
letters.

NEW YORK, April 21, 1871.

MY DEAR SPENCER : Things are going here furiously.
I have never known anything like it. Ten thousand De-
scent of Man have been printed, and I guess they are nearly
all gone. Five or six thousand of Lay Sermons have been
printed, while Mivart is reprinted and has fallen stillborn.
The progress of liberal thought is remarkable. Everybody
is asking for explanations. The clergy are in a flutter.
McCosh told them not to worry, as whatever might be
discovered he would find design in it and put God be-
hind it.

Twenty-five clergymen of Brooklyn sent for me to meet
them of a Saturday night and tell them what they should
do to be saved. I told them they would find the. way of
life in the Biology and in the Descent of Man. They said,
"Very good," and asked me to come again at the next
meeting of the clerical club, to which I went and was again
handsomely resoluted. My warrant for attempting to en-
lighten these gentlemen is that they know nothing what-
ever about the subject, while I was in wonderfully sympa-
thetic nearness to them. I send you Every Saturday, with
new illustrations of That Heathen Chinee, and inclose

(266)

The International Scientific Series. 267

illustrated cards of another bit of slang poetry, but true
to nature in Pike County, Illinois. I quite relished the
last illustration.*

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W.,Junej, 1871.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I inclose a brief article just out.
I wrote it partly as a quiet way of setting opinion right
on the matter. Since the publication of Darwin's De-
scent of Man there has been a great sensation about the
theory of the development of mind — essays in the mag-
azines on Darwinism and Religion, Darwinism and Morals,
Philosophy and Darwinism, all having reference to the
question of mental evolution, and all proceeding on the
supposition that it is Darwin's hypothesis. As no one says
a word in rectification, and as Darwin himself has not in-
dicated the fact that the Principles of Psychology was pub-
lished five years before the Origin of Species, f I am obliged
to gently indicate it myself.

I send you the letter, thinking that perhaps the repub-
lication of the last paragraph with some preliminary ex-
planation might not be amiss in America, where I -doubt
not the same erroneous idea is current.

Ever yours truly, HERBERT SPENCER.

On the date of this last letter (June 3) Mr. You-
mans was in mid-ocean, sailing on one of the most im-
portant of his many errands to England. Since his
resignation of the editorship of Appletons' Journal
his services to the Appletons had consisted chiefly in
the examination of foreign scientific books, from which

* The reference is to John Hay's Little Breeches, and to the last stanza,
where the angels' deed of kindness is felicitously pronounced
" A derned sight better business

Than loafin' 'round the throne."

f Mr. Darwin mentioned the fact next year in the sixth edition of the
Origin of Species, «pp. xix, 428.

268 Edward Livingston Youmans.

he chose such as could be recommended to the Apple-
tons for republication. His sagacity in this regard
was marked ; scarcely a volume he selected failed to
find a satisfactory demand. Among the authors of
note first introduced to the American public through
his agency were Bagehot, Bain, Buckle, Carpenter,
Darwin, Helmholtz, Huxley, Lecky, Lubbock, Mauds-
ley, Roscoe, Sully, and Tyndall. In this department
of their business, as already observed, the Appletons
were no less honourable than enterprising. They an-
ticipated the benefits of international copyright by
paying foreign authors the same rate that was paid to
American authors. It occurred to Youmans that this
business was capable of being systematized and devel-
oped. He suggested that a series of new works be un-
dertaken, covering the entire field of modern science,
to be simultaneously issued on both sides of the Atlan-
tic. This scheme was in pursuance of a favourite and
eminently sensible idea of his. He realized that pop-
ular scientific books adapted to the general reader are
apt to be written by third-rate men who do not well
understand their subject ; they are apt to be dry or
superficial, or both. No one can write so good a pop-
ular book as the master of a subject, if he only has a
fair gift of expressing himself and keeps in mind the
public for which he is writing. The master knows
what to tell and what to omit, and can thus tell much
in a short compass and still make it interesting ; more-
over, he avoids the inaccuracies which are sure to
occur in second-hand work. Masters of subjects are
apt, however, to be too much occupied with origi-
nal research to write popular books. It was You-
mans's plan to induce the leading men of science in
Europe and America to contribute small volumes on

The International Scientific Series. 269

their special subjects to a series to be published simul-
taneously in several countries and languages. Fur-
thermore, by special contract with publishing houses
of high reputation, the author was to receive the or-
dinary royalty on every copy of his book sold in every
one of the countries in question, thus anticipating inter-
national copyright upon a very wide scale, and giving
the author a much more adequate compensation for his
labour. To put this scheme into operation was a task
of great difficulty, so many conflicting interests had to
be considered. Youmans's brilliant success is attested
by that noble series of more than seventy volumes
on all sorts of scientific subjects, written by men of
real eminence, and published in England, France, Italy,
Germany, and Russia, as well as in the United States.
In mid-ocean, bound upon this important errand,
he wrote to his mother the following letter, thoroughly
characteristic, though more occupied with himself than
usual, because, in his own humorous phrase, it was an
occasion that would never occur again :

LATITUDE 41° N., LONGITUDE 57° W., June 3, 1871. •
MY DEAR MOTHER : It is my fiftieth birthday, and away
out here on the Atlantic all alone I celebrate it. The
weather is fine ; the ocean like a pond, smooth and still as
glass, and has been so all the way from New York. The
passengers are agreeable, and the living is tolerable. Meals
could be enjoyed but for the horrible, sickening ship smells.
Yet these things do not occupy me much to-day, for my
thoughts go back through the years I have spent, with too
little good result — back forty years to Greenfield, which I
left after the first ten years. Old Greenfield is still very
dear in my memory, for my recollections of early childhood
are very vivid and pleasant. There is still nothing that I
so much enjoy as seeing the persons and reviving the memo-

270 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ries of that early time. Then came ten years of boyhood
and youth in Milton, which still lives vividly in my recol-
lection. It was a chequered kind of life, with bright lights
and dark shadows ; but the light predominates in memory,
and much of my life is now spent in living over again the
years from nine to nineteen. From that time on things are
much confused in my memory. There came twenty years
of struggle, unrest, hard work and poor pay, privation, dis-
cipline, disappointment ; and yet the time was far from
thrown away. I fought it out pretty well, made some head-
way, and didn't live for nothing. I had won a place in the
public consideration and become of some service to the
community, and had done it with pluck and perseverance.
I suffered much in this time, but always enjoyed working.
I was much away, and one of my permanent and never-
failing pleasures, both of anticipation and realization, was
going home.

A square half century, terminated in 57° west longitude,
with the water under me two miles deep, in a steamship
with all the modern improvements ! Steamships, and rail-
roads, and telegraphs, and a thousand other things have
grown up with my growth. It has been a stirring age, and
I am glad my mind took the turn it did and that I became
interested in the progress of humanity. Much of the intel-
lectual pleasure of my life has been derived from this cir-
cumstance— that I have looked upon its more hopeful and
promising side. To help it on somewhat, to do what I
could in the way of mitigation and amelioration, to con-
tribute a little toward making the world somewhat better
than I found it, has been my ambition ; and although I have
accomplished but little — very little in this great direction —
yet the purpose was certainly commendable. Perhaps I
have not come up to your standard of what was required,
and I know that there have been plenty of shortcomings.
I am not satisfied with my life, nor am I greatly dissatisfied.

The International Scientific Series. 271

I have tried to do well — tried hard to do as well as I knew
how in my own way, and I commit myself and my future in
hope and trust to that Divine Power who is the Author of
all things, whose ways and works I have tried faithfully to
understand — the duty of every rational being.

You see I am now very much in my own mind. It is a
peculiar occasion, and will never occur again. Yet I do not
forget the rest, and there can be no fitter time than this to
acknowledge my deep indebtedness to you, to my dear
father, and to my brothers and sister, for the kindness and
self-sacrifice I have experienced from all of you. You have
been very good to me in my past times of trouble, and very
patient with me in my times of irritation. I can never
repay the obligations and never sufficiently express my
deep feelings of gratitude. A thousand heartfelt thanks to
you all. One of the profoundest satisfactions of my life
is that you and father are still spared to us, and in circum-
stances of pecuniary comfort. May your remaining days
be pleasant, and may you be happy in the prosperity of
your children and in the prospect of a future life !

Your affectionate son, E. L. YOUMANS.

On arriving in London he found the great city
terribly crowded,

LONDON, June if, 1871.

DEAR SISTER : I am here for sure, as witness a painful
consciousness. Arrived at Euston Station, I took a cab for
the Langham. No rooms. Frightened at the reports, I
stipulated with cabby by the hour and started. We visited
about a dozen places of all sorts, high and low, but to no
purpose. Not a room anywhere, nor a private room or
apartment either. I then left my trunk at the Langham
and went to 37 Queen's Gardens. There they offered me
a room not larger than my stateroom, which of course I
took. It is close and suffocating, and I have had a hard
time in it. I have not got over the sea yet, my brain be-

272 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ing stirred up in the swimming way. Between that and
the stifling atmosphere of the room I did not get asleep till
five this morning, and my eyes began to get hot and un-
comfortable. However, two or three hours rest has saved
me, and I feel better now, although much used up. Spen-
cer is looking very well ; plays billiards a great deal ; dis-
ciplines himself to amusement. I have not yet smoked on
English soil, which I presume has much to do with my
nervousness.

I have had a few minutes' interview with old Tyndall —
very, very cordial and satisfactory. Nothing of business
was touched, however. I am writing in the Royal Institu-
tion, as there is nowhere else in London where I can get a
yard of space. France being shut up is the reason of all
this crowding.

I dine privately at Huxley's Saturday night to talk busi-
ness. Will report progress as soon as there is any. If I
send a Punch, send it on west. Spencer's side projects on
the Sociology are amazingly interesting. He has been
afraid of their being stolen and has kept them shady, but
he will show them to me. The pith of the whole matter
is, however, that the speed of the enterprise depends upon
funds ; and in consequence of the prospective delay he is
already thinking of going over to the Ethics after Volume
I of the Sociology.

LONDON, June 77, 1871.

It is now Saturday afternoon. Have not found a room
yet; not a sign of "apartments" visible in London. I
have been a little lame with the " distances," but am get-
ting better of it now.

June 23, 1871. — It is as cold as the very grave itself. I
sit down to write with my heavy overcoat on and am shiver-
ing. I got lodging rooms day before yesterday near Port-
land Road Station, and have a parlour and large bedroom.
I ought to have kept a fire up, but going in and out con-

The International Scientific Series. 273

stantly I thought it hardly worth while. The weather is
dismal, cold, rainy, and sour. Huxley has grown tremen-
dously in public influence. He is the man of the School
Board, though there are other strong men — forty-seven —
and two women.

Tyndall is arranging to come over next year. Two
illustrated lectures on the glaciers, two or three on heat,
others on light and electricity. "I want you to take entire
charge of me so far as the public is concerned ; my assistant
will take charge of the experiments. I will not enslave
myself. I will take it just as easy as I have a mind to. I
don't want your money, nor will 1 bring away one dollar of
it. I will help your scientific institutions with it, but it
shall never be said I went to America to line my pockets.
I have no reflections to cast upon those Englishmen who
have chosen to do this. It may have been right for them,
but it won't do for me."

I have not got hold of the handle of my enterprise yet,
but I gather that it promises well. My intention is to make
it go at any rate. Bain is all right, and will be helpful. I
have this morning had a very interesting interview with
Galton. He thinks well of the scheme, and, strange to say,
is now writing upon the very subject I had assigned to him.
The British Association meets at Edinburgh August 2d. I
shall probably stay over till that time, and go from there
to Liverpool. Yet the thing I have in hand is large, and,
if it goes, will be the thing, and to make it succeed in the
fullest manner will rule my movements and my stay.

The following letters tell their own story :

LONDON, July 4, 1871.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I am anxious to do all that is pos-
sible to extend and establish the arrangement you are
making with English authors — arrangements which prac-
tically amount to international copyright.

274 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Having for the last ten years benefited so greatly by the
arrangements you have made with the Appletons on my
behalf, which have put me on a footing as good as the
American authors, I have the best possible reasons for
thinking that the interests of English authors will be sub-
served in a very important degree by the success of the
negotiations which you have come over here to carry out.
Various of my scientific friends who have reaped pecuniary
and other advantages from the contracts you have made
for them will, I am sure, coincide in this expression of
opinion.

From the conversation I had with Mr. Appleton when
he was here recently, it was manifest to me that he was
anxious to carry out in his relations with other English
authors the same equitable system from which I and some
others have gained ; and now that he has given you full
powers to make engagements in pursuance of this system
I think it very desirable that all should co-operate. Stand-
ing so high as the Appletons do, alike in respect to the
character of the works they publish and in the extent of
their business, it appears to me clear that this system which
they are adopting needs only to be known and understood
by English authors to be at once accepted by them.

Pray make use of this letter in any way that will further
your negotiations. Ever yours sincerely,

HERBERT SPENCER.

To which Prof. Huxley added :

I have read Mr. Spencer's note, and entirely agree with
what he has said. T. H. HUXLEY.

Then came this additional indorsement :

ROYAL INSTITUTION, July 5, 1871.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I am equally desirous with my
friend Mr. Spencer to do all that is possible to extend and

The International Scientific Series. 275

establish the arrangement you are making with English
authors, and which will practically amount to international
copyright.

Let me also add the expression of my personal recog-
nition of the excellent service which you have already ren-
dered to English authors in America.

Most faithfully yours, JOHN TYNDALL.

Sir John Lubbock added :

I entirely agree with Prof. Tyndall.

JOHN LUBBOCK.

Youmans did not find his task an easy one. A
good many of the authors he called upon had been
engaged as contributors to the Journal, and were dis-
appointed in it as an educational medium. Others
were so committed to their publishers that they could
not join in the series proposed. Some men, so emi-
nent as specialists as to be well-nigh indispensable,
were too busy to write or mistrusted their ability to
write acceptably. Not a few bluntly stated their
opinion that the series would not "go." But You-
mans was not the man to be either discouraged or
baffled. He knew his project to be sound, and he
advanced it with all the address at his command.
Some of the incidents of the summer may be cited

from his letters :

LONDON, July 15, 1871.

DEAR SISTER : Cunarder day has come around again,
and therefore again I write — not that a week makes much
difference in things. I have now been here a round month
— to what end, you ask ? Well, to no end — hardly to a be-
ginning, and still possibly to some purpose. I am pretty
sharply at issue with my former failure,* which is just as

* I. e., of Appletons' Journal.

276 Edward Livingston Youmans.

far from being forgotten as possible. I did my other work
too effectually, as I now find. They seem to have believed
in me awfully, and there is something proportional in the
reaction. They listen now with a kind of rapt incredulity
as I expand and expound and " expredge " myself on Occi-
dental possibilities. Yet my case is so strong that it gives
me the inside track, and they are precious careful about
bluffing me. It turns out when I get here, and get serious
hold of my subject, that I have in hand a pretty large thing.
Its importance grows upon me, and when I think of the
quality and difficulty and delicacy of the enterprise, and of
the important consequences that may flow from it, although
nothing is completed and all is in the crudest grizzle, I am
anything but dissatisfied with the aspect of things. It will
take but three weeks more to decide it. The British As-
sociation meets in Edinburgh August 2d. I shall fumble
till that occasion, and then act.

Darwin was in town this week and called on Mr. W. H.
Appleton, who presented me. I was invited to lunch
Wednesday at his brother's, Mr. Erasmus Darwin. There
were Mr. D., Mrs. D., Miss D., and Master D. It was
altogether juicy and jolly. This was fresh material — no
dregs of '68 — and it went with a rush. I took Mrs. D. in
to lunch. They were all curiosity about America. Mr. D.
had just resolved to send two of his boys across the
Atlantic, and they leave the last of August. I told him
about my lecturing the Brooklyn clergymen on evolution.
" What ! " said he, " clergymen of different denominations
all together ? How they would fight if you should get
them together here ! " They were greatly amused with a
spiritualistic paper they had received from Chicago, which
stated that if it were known that God were dead Beecher
would be unanimously elected by the American people to
fill his place.

Well, my point is this: that Mr. Darwin insisted on

The International Scientific Series. 277

having my project brought up at the British Association
and indorsed there. I am going to dine with his boys on
Monday night, at the new University Club, to post them
up a little before they start for America. Of course I can-
not at this stage ask Spencer, Tyndall, Huxley, or Lub-
bock to go in on the enterprise, but I must make them as
available as possible to get other men. Tyndall sees my
position and has gone farthest in the way of promise. He
asked me what I thought of Helmholtz. I said, " He is
worth the whole of you." Tyndall said, "I think you can
get him." He gave me a note at once, and I wrote the
same day to Helmholtz, at Berlin, and to Bancroft.* I got
a reply yesterday from the latter, offering all Germany if
I wanted it. He went immediately to see Helmholtz, who
is to be in Scotland in August. He sent also a capital letter
to him. And thus it goes, slowly, but as fast as it can ;
and, as I said, I shall know by the middle of August where
I stand. . . .

July 77, 1871. — Having worn out my boots kicking
against the pricks, I take no further part nor lot in that
sort of work. I go in for this world from this date. As
evidence of my sincerity I have bought a swallow-tail, and
I wear it. I prayed that this cup might pass from me, but
the world's scientific salvation required that I should drink
it to the dregs. I found it, if not indispensable, at least
important to my enterprise not to be singular, but to con-
form wherever it is possible. I took Addie's advice — told
her just exactly how I was situated, and told her I had the
most perfect faith in the infallibility of her judgment, and
I would abide by it implicitly. "I am afraid," said she, "if
I were in your place I should get a swallow-tail." And it
was so.

August 77, 7c?/7. — The present budget, if it reaches you,
will tell the story of my work. It is a success just as far

* The historian George Bancroft, then minister to Germany.

278 Edward Livingston Youmans.

as a prospective thing of considerable complication can be.
My experience in Edinburgh was disgusting, but it answered
its purpose. A bewildering crush excited everybody. It
was more than the city was worth to find anybody. When
found, no one had a minute, and if they gave you their
ears for a moment they did not give their attention. I was
miserable and unfit to be out, and yet the thing was most
decidedly advanced. I should, however, have had far more
trouble but for Spencer. When, therefore, I found his
note,* which I send, I cannot say that I was surprised, but
I was certainly greatly pleased, for I needed him. I could
not see. I could find nobody, and was swamped in the tur-
moil. He took hold earnestly, and it was splendid to see
him work. He got interested, and before I get through I
shall have a work from him for the series, and perhaps one
jointly with Collier, on the Principles of Evolution. He
said the first day that we should have a meeting, and we
fixed the time for Friday, 10.30 A. M. He wrote several
notes of invitation ; I wrote the rest. Our room was in the
university where the sections met. This proved fortunate.
We had Huxley, Carpenter, Balfour Stewart, Bain, Spencer,
and a Dr. Lindsay, of Perth, with whom I had had corre-
spondence regarding a book on the minds of the lower ani-
mals. I went over my plan in detail and answered all sorts
of questions. Huxley backed me up grandly, and told how
much he had received from the Appletons for reprints.
After some discussion about an English editor for the
series, it was decided that Huxley, Tyndall, and Spencer
be an advisory committee to consult with the London pub-
lisher. Michael Foster, who is to write on the Involuntary
Movements of Animals, may be added.

The last day Spencer was in Edinburgh I couldn't find

* MY DEAR YOUMANS : Here I am, come to help you. You will find
me at the Waterloo Hotel, Room No, 40. Ever yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

The International Scientific Series. 279

him, but he left a note for me saying that he had seen Clif-
ford and Dyer. I had to get part of my circular on the
series printed in London and had the names added in Edin-
burgh. They are weighty, as you see, and the little docu-
ment carries everything before it. Hooker suggested Dyer
to Spencer as one of the most promising young botanists
of the age, and he is realty a splendid fellow. Clifford is
also immensely strong. Huxley says he is the only man in
England who can do the work he is engaged for. Edward
Smith is the authority on diet. Tylor is great on primitive
man — greater than Lubbock — but he may not be able to
leave his present publisher. I have other subjects and
other men in anticipation, and shall stay till the thing is
quite crystallized. Spencer said: " Be deliberate, and don't
go till all is closed up." He enjoys my success. But I
must stop, for I am completely used up with this wretched
cold.

The circular inclosed with the foregoing letter
said :

The attention of English scientific writers is asked to a
project of international publication which has both public
and personal claims to their consideration. It is in con-
templation to prepare a series of monographs or elaborate
essays on selected scientific topics, and in a form suited for
wide circulation. The general aim of the series will be to
give authentic, popular expression to the latest advances of
thought on the leading subjects of progressive inquiry.
The recent and more important steps of physical investiga-
tion will come within its scope, and those interpretations of
Nature which have undergone marked revision within a re-
cent period. Yet it is desired to give especial prominence
to those branches of biological, psychological, and social
science which help to a better understanding of human
nature and the economy of human life.

280 Edward Livingston Youmans.

As these works are designed to address the unscientific
public, they will require to be thoroughly explanatory and
expository in character. It is hoped to secure in this series
the greatest freedom from technicalities and the utmost
simplicity of style compatible with clearness and precision
of scientific presentation. The form of publication pro-
posed is that of handbooks of ffom two hundred to three
hundred pages, about four hundred words to a page. They
will be issued in uniform style, with some suitable title
for the series. Illustrations will be employed wherever
needful.

The subjects treated being of equal interest to people
of different countries, it is proposed to organize the under-
taking upon an international basis. The proposition comes
from the United States, which will give efficient support to
such an enterprise. That country now contains a popula-
tion of nearly forty millions, eminently a reading and book-
buying people. Education is extending and improving
among them, and the interest in science, especially in its
progressive aspects, is also becoming more earnest and
general. There are good grounds for believing, therefore,
that such a scheme of publications as that now contem-
plated— essentially popular and carrying the weight of
authoritative names — would have an extensive American
patronage, and would become a powerful agency of public
education.

To secure the international advantages of such a series
of books to English authors, they will be produced by
London publishers who will pay the most liberal rates.
Duplicate stereotype plates will then be taken for reprint-
ing in the United States, and the books will be simul-
taneously issued in the two countries. The American pub-
lishers will engage to pay the foreign contributors to the
series the usual rates that are allowed to American authors.
The project, in fact, implies that the English authors are to

The International Scientific Series. 281

be voluntarily allowed the practical benefits of an inter-
national copyright law. The subscriber has devoted him-
self for several years past to bringing about an arrange-
ment of this kind, and may refer to Profs. Tyndall,
Huxley, and Bain, to Sir John Lubbock, Messrs. Darwin,
Spencer, Lecky, Galton, and Mill, who have had experience
of its benefits. In its business aspects, therefore, the pres-
ent enterprise is but an extension of a policy already exist-
ing, and it is now proposed to enlarge the circle of authors
who may reap its advantages. Further information regard-
ing the project can be had by addressing the subscriber,

E. L. YOUMANS.
16 LITTLE BRITAIN, LONDON, August, 1871.

The story goes on with the letters:

LONDON, August /<?, 1871.

MY DEAR SISTER : . . . I got a note from Dr. Hooker
asking me to come over to Kew and dine with him, as he
was quite alone. Spencer had spoken to him of my proj-
ect, and he had suggested Dyer. I had a very interesting
time with him. He mentioned receiving your book, and
asked after you. He said : " That was an admirable little
effort — // came very near being a great book ; it was much better
for beginners than any they have in England. . By-the-by,
why don't Miss Youmans put herself into relation with Dr.
Gray ? He is the greatest botanist in America, and author
of the best series of botanical schoolbooks in the world,
but his first book is not sufficiently simple for children." I
asked him why they did not take the thing up here, and give
us a model child's book on Prof. Henslow's method. He
replied : " Oh, don't ask. We can do nothing here. Eng-
land is convulsed with the effort of trying to teach children
to read. The stupid conservatism of England is incalculable.
Look at Prof. Henslow's work at Hitcham ! He worked there,
in that parish, twenty years, and revolutionized it so that
13

282 Edward Livingston Youmans.

people came from all over Europe to see what had been done.
But not a single thing that he did influenced in the slight-
est degree a single adjacent parish. And when he died the
work stopped, and nothing has been done since. I don't
know ; perhaps something may be done after a while.
Strong men are at work, and they have begun at the right
end ; perhaps something will be brought about after a
while.

LONDON, August 79, 7877.

And now next morning some more Hookerian reminis-
cence. He speaks unreservedly of Spencer; says "Spen-
cer is the mighty thinker among us. And what a splendid
talker ! He talks right at you like a book, and his language
is so fluent and adaptive! He is all right now. The recog-
nition of -his genius is now complete. What a lucky thing
it was that he failed in getting a consulate or some other
public appointment when he began his Philosophy ! Had he
succeeded, we never should have heard of the Philosophy.
The things are absolutely incompatible. No man can do
great original work and be hampered by the cares of a
position. The thing is impossible. The work must have
the whole man. That is why I have tried to get Gray free.
You Americans don't know how much of a man Gray is ;
but he is hampered with students' work, and is not able to
keep an assistant. When you were working for Spencer on
the other side I was working for Gray here. I thought I
had got it arranged all right. I obtained a promise from
Peabody to give money enough to relieve Gray and let
him go on with original research ; but when he got over
there they worked at him and defeated all the good of the
plan. He gave his money to Harvard College. Gray re-
ceived no help, and the only effect was to pile on him one
more official burden. You did better for Spencer. Your
work told just where it should. You have a very honour-
able share in his success."

The International Scientific Series. 283

LONDON, September 13, 1871.

My DEAR SISTER : I am astonished to write this date —
how the time slips ! Of myself what shall I say ? I have
constantly reported myself better of an infernal cold which
has had me in its clutches a month. I have been down
sick and confined to my room with it for nearly a week.
I am certainly better to-day than for the past several
days.

I have been immensely reconciled and comforted men-
tally by my progress. Mr. Appleton will be here in a few
days, and then the business aspect of affairs can be set-
tled.

I have turned up a new thing with regard to Spencer.
He has heard that Emerson characterized him as a " stock
writer," which means a " job writer." His disgust is un-
speakable ; he has been for the past week gathering up the
proofs that he has had one method from the beginning,
that he has never written a single article proposed by any-
body else; that he had the law of evolution worked out as
the basis of a philosophy before Darwin or Wallace ever
published a line about it. You know he applied at first for
a Government situation to help him. He yesterday handed
me the letters to Government on his behalf from Huxley,
Tyndall, Mill, Latham, Fraser, Hooker, Holland, Grote, and
Sir G. C. Lewis. It astonished me. They recognized as
far back as 1858 that he was the man to make a new or-
ganon of philosophy.

I play billiards every night with Spencer after dinner ;
game fifty, but one red ball, which thins out the chances*.
Scratches here are flukes. Spencer gives me thirty, and
then I get to fifty first about as one to three. But I do a
stupendous amount of fluking, sometimes to Spencer's
great disgust. We started the other night and I fluked up
to fifty before he got one. He stands aghast ! I assure
him that it is merely my general way.

284 Edward Livingston Youmans.

*

LONDON, October 7, 1871.

Things are getting thick and exciting. I can't leave yet,
and know no more when I shall return than I did at first.
I am here to do a certain work, and do it I shall.

Henry S. King & Co., a new concern, are to be the
London publishers of the series. They will drive it with
energy, and are bound to make a success. The only ap-
parent remaining difficulty is to transfer authors to the new
house. Several are sure, some doubtful, and there are four
hopeless, but their places can be supplied. It is infinitely
fortunate that Mr. Appleton has been here to advise with,
decide, and close matters on the spot. . . .

As to my returning, don't think about it. I am bound
to this enterprise, and, much as I want to go, I shall be
guided absolutely by its requirements. I'm the man to do
the work ; nobody else can. If the thing shapes as it now
promises I shall go to Berlin. Bancroft knows all about
the project, and told Mr. Appleton he wanted me to come
by all means. The learned men of Germany are soon to
be gathered there, and B. knows them. My hopes are
therefore that I shall be detained a month or six weeks
longer, so good-bye for the present.

LONDON, October 21, 1871.

We know the lessons of caution pretty well — that nothing
is sure till realized — but caution may become a disease, and
then we can realize and still not feel sure. My project is
now as certain as any human thing contingent upon human
conditions can be. I had a hope in this direction when I
left you, but the result immensely transcends it. All the
arrangements have been closed with Mr. King, and on the
most liberal basis. I am going to Berlin next week — first,
to get some new authors for the series'; second, to get the
series republished ; third, to get Spencer republished in
German ; fourth, to get a German student for Spencer to

The International Scientific Series. 285

assist in carrying out his great sociological project, which
I will explain to you when I return.

It is now in my power to extend the scheme largely,
and now is the moment to do it. The series in five years
will run up to seventy-five or one hundred volumes. It
will be the world's popular cyclopaedia of reading science.
Spencer is delighted but half bewildered ; every once in a
while he breaks out, "Who would have thought such a
result would arrive from your first beginnings with me?"
The letter in the Times, of course, greatly pleases him.*
He says this whole movement is going to revolutionize the
position of English authors.

LONDON, November 2, 1871.

King proves to be our man — a wide-awake, whole-
hearted fellow. The thing is now just as much a success
as a prospective thing can be, and I shall be easy, but there
has been so much to do which I alone can do that it has
worn upon me hard. I mean to take it easier, come what
will. I go by Paris to Berlin, and Spencer goes to Paris
with me. We expect to go to-morrow, if I can. The days
are crowded with incidents relating to the enterprise, but I
have neither time nor strength to write of them. I began
a letter to the Times on copyright, but have had to post-
pone it till I come back.

PARIS, November 12, 1871.

Things are still going prosperously with the interna-
tional scheme. France is committed, and I have just re-
ceived a French note from the publisher pledging ten
books from the ablest men in France. One of them will
soon be ready. Prof. Ribot, one of Spencer's translators,
who lives at Laval, two hundred miles away, came to Paris
to meet us. He has nearly done a book entitled Heredity :
A Psychological Study — in first, its facts ; second, its laws ;

* Mr. W. H. Appleton had just written an excellent letter on inter-
national copyright, which was published in the London Times.

286 Edward Livingston Youmans.

third, its causes ; fourth^ its consequences. He is able, and
will make a first-rate book, which I presume the committee
will pass. I was so doubtful of France that I did not
think it worth attempting, and should not have come here
at all if Spencer hadn't proposed it; but it has been a
profitable week, and to have got French co-operation in
the undertaking will be a great thing. I leave to-morrow
morning for Berlin via Cologne.

Complicated with all my embarrassments here — short
time, nobody at home, difficulty of interpretation, torments
with cab-drivers, etc. — has been another thing. Spencer
wanted to do some work here, and tried to get an amanu-
ensis, vexing his soul for three whole days, and, failing at
last, I could do no less than offer to write for him. Hux-
ley pitched into him — gently — recently about his nongov-
ernment theories, and attacked a special point of his Social
Organism. Spencer couldn't stand it, so he said, " Hux-
ley has been rampaging round about long enough; he must
be pulled up." I wrote twenty pages of manuscript; the
article is to be very able and instructive, and Huxley will
get more than he bargained for. It will appear in the
Fortnightly.

But it is nearly night. I have to go and see if I can
find Milne Edwards at the Garden of Plants, to pack, and
do several other things, for all business must be dispatched
to-night, as we start early to-morrow morning.

BERLIN, November ij, 1871.

I am now in the capital of the German Empire, unable
to understand a word that anybody says. I got here
Tuesday night late, and had a pretty hard fight to find a
hotel ; but I am well situated at the Hotel d'Angleterre,
which, being interpreted, means the English Hotel, though
it is quite Dutch enough. I have had to hire a " commis-
sioner." He is a pretty good kind of a Dutchman.

France was dispatched quickly because Paris is France.

The International Scientific Scries. 287

It is otherwise here. The men are scattered, and Mr. Ban-
croft says that although everybody can read here, and
there is great boasting of "universal education," yet there
is no place in the world where there is on the part of the
learned such contempt for popular education, or such shal-
low and worthless trash as they write when they attempt to
write for " the people." He says this business of mine will
be a new thing to them, and it remains to be seen how they
will regard it. He has invited Helmholtz, Virchow, and
Du Bois-Reymond to meet me at dinner on Sunday, and I
shall then probably be able to find out something of the
prospect. I had a letter to Haeckel, of Jena (six hours
from here), from Huxley, and have sent it to him with a
message, but have heard nothing yet. I am not sanguine
about results here ; everything is so scattered.

. . . Germany is not going to suit me. They are too
cocky. "We don't want your translations; we can make
our own books; the talent is here," is the way the publish-
ers talk. On the other hand, I find that scientific men here
have a contempt for " popularization " more intense than
anywhere else. They ostentatiously despise it and the
countries that tolerate it. It looks like a very bad market
for my pigs, but I am going to know more about it before
I get through. I shall meet Helmholtz, Virchow, and
Du Bois-Reymond at Bancroft's on Sunday, and I shall try
and find out a few things. But it will not trouble me if
they don't want the series. I am bound to have something
out of them, which will strengthen us. I have called on
Asher, a leading publisher here. He says I hold all the
cards so far as authors are concerned, and cannot fail to
win, but as for the publishers he don't see it. He talks
English, and is wide awake. I am afraid there is no show
to get Spencer translated here. They have never heard of
him, and there is great contempt for English " philosophy."
While they do not jump headforemost into my traps, I

288 Edward Livingston Youmans.

have nevertheless a great respect for these Dutchmen.
They are strong, self-reliant, and honest.

Bancroft is extremely obliging and attentive. I have
met Helmholtz, Reymond, and Virchow at his table, and it
was pleasant and interesting, of course, but business was
interdicted, and nothing was gained. I shall go to Leipsic
in a day or two to satisfy myself about some things, and
then work my passage back to London. It is a horrid,
stupid place here.

BERLIN, November 23, 1871.

And so you wonder that I can care for anything ! Well,
I don't much — not much; the caring time is past — dregs
only remain. Half a hundred years, and to what end ?
What a confounded sell life turns out to be! The only
interest is in studying it. I am afraid there is too much
truth in that old philosophic view, that " the interest is in
the chase and dies with the capture." And so I think I
shall go to bed at ten o'clock, two hours earlier than usual.
To bed ! and such a bed — not a sheet, not a blanket, but
only a kind of narrow feather-bed ; they call it down that
you have to sleep under, and you can't sleep under it. I
woke up a hundred times during the night with divers
parts of my body out in the air. One hauls them in, but
to what purpose ? You reawaken with only a variation of
the exposure. I have augmented my cold here, and shall
quit the ranch to-morrow. It seems to me that if a social
organism were constructed especially to get the least out
of life, to thwart it all round and make discomfort a policy,
these Dutch would take the premium !

And on that I went to bed, and here I am, November
25th, at Leipsic, a hundred miles south of Berlin. I had a
letter to one important man ; he is dead. To another, and
he is so sick I have been unable to see him. It snows,
rains, sleets, and is dark, muddy, and detestable in Leipsic.
Not a publisher can speak a word of English in Leipsic.

The International Scientific Series. 289

I got lost, and could not remember the name of my hotel,
and wandered through the mud, and asked the Dutchmen
where I lived in Leipsic. I feel that I am at the extremest
point of my Quixotic career in Leipsic. I turn round to-
morrow, and start for home via Berlin, Brussels, Brunswick,
Ostend, Dover, and London. ... It is the morning of Sun-
day, 26th, and I am packed for Berlin. I have this morn-
ing seen the sick man — Prof. Charmac, a passionate physi-
ologist, rich, who is going to build a great popular school of
physiology — in wretched health; speaks English fluently;
had a letter to him from Foster; is in sympathy with my
project, and will help the German end of it. I shall be in
Berlin to-night ; shall try and leave there to-morrow night
for Brunswick, if I can get through. My bane and the
bane of my enterprise is overhaste. The Dutch are pro-
digiously slow. They continue as ever to have their doubts,
and I find it awful hard work to wait. Still, it will have to
be done but once, like gravitation and evolution, and so I
contrive to be patient.

But things were moving in deliberate old Ger-
many much faster than our good friend realized, and
the tone of the next letter is more cheerful.

LONDON, December 2, 1871.

DEAR SISTER : I am back from Germany more dead
than alive, but still a good deal vital. It has been a
strange experience, that of the last month, but it has been
a success as far as such an expedition could be so. I wrote
you of France. Germany came into line more readily, and,
I think, more effectually. I have arranged for the exten-
sion of the series to Germany. Brockhaus, the great
house of Leipsic, will probably publish the series, paying
foreign authors seven and a half per cent. There is a Ger-
man committee, of which two members are professors of
the University of Berlin — Virchow and Rosenthal — the third

2QO Edward Livingston Youmans.

being Prof. Charmac, of the University of Leipsic. Ger-
many is more ripe for the movement than even England ;
its best men can be procured. It was Huxley's name
which carried the thing there. Spencer will in time reap
his greatest conquest in Germany. The whole nation is
pervaded with religious skepticism, and they are without
any philosophic guidance. Spencer's subject on the list
interested them more than any other, and with the publica-
tion of his little book, which I bullied him to write,* there
will be a prompt demand for the Philosophy. When I
wrote this to Spencer the old fellow waked up, went down
to King after some circulars, and entered at once upon the
work of finding a writer. . . .

I told Spencer what you wrote me about Fiske and sent
him Fiske's circular. It did the business at once. He
immediately ordered extra title-pages posted into all his
volumes — Synthetic Philosophy — and blew himself up for
being such a fool as to listen to the Leweses and others
when he proposed it at first. f He cuffs Huxley hand-

* " This work has been written at the instigation of my American
friend, Prof. Youmans." — Spencer, Study of Sociology, Preface.

f For some time it had been felt desirable to have a distinctive name
for Mr. Spencer's system of philosophy. Among many reasons for this
there was the fact that there was a vague notion afloat that any syrtem of
philosophy built up from scientific data by scientific methods must be
some form of " positive philosophy " ; and inasmuch as Comte had appro-
priated that title and made it notorious, there was a fine opportunity for
bemuddling things. Writers for the press insisted upon calling Spencer,
Huxley, and scientific philosophers generally, " positivists." Considering
that Spencer has always repudiated each and every distinctive doctrine
held by positivists, this was very absurd and very annoying. There were
further reasons why a name for Spencer's philosophy was deemed desir-
able. Accordingly, in 1867 Mr. Spencer decided to adopt the name Syn-
thetic Philosophy, and put it upon the title-pages of his volumes, but after
discussing the matter with some of his friends he concluded not to do so.
See above, pp. 234, 236, 251, 252, 255.

In the course of my lectures at Harvard University, in the spring of

The International Scientific Series. 291

somely in the Fortnightly, which I send.* I advertised for
a German student of history to undertake a part of his

1871, I used the name "Cosmic Philosophy" to designate Mr. Spencer's
system, and this name grew in favour with me as I used it in various con-
nections. I first made a formal and public use of it in a circular printed
in the autumn of 1871. As soon as Spencer saw this circular he adopted
the epithet " Synthetic," as Youmans relates above. When I was in Lon-
don in 1873, and on the point of publishing my Outlines of Cosmic Phi-
losophy, I had a friendly discussion with Spencer as to the propriety
of baptizing his system of philosophy by a title different from the one
which he had himself given it. Advice was sought from Lewes and Hux-
ley. Lewes simply fell back upon his old position, that all scientific phi-
losophy ought to be called " positive," and so he condemned both our
names. Huxley, on the other hand, suggested that since the name " Syn-
thetic " had been offered to the public, the name " Cosmic *' had better be
offered also, and let time decide between them — let the fittest survive.
Accordingly I adhered to the name " Cosmic," stating at the same time in
my preface that Spencer did not approve the name. His objection to
" Cosmic " was the same as my objection to " Synthetic," viz., that it was
not a distinctive name. It seems to me now that both objections were
sound, and fatal ! I do not believe that either will survive. The dis-
tinctive feature of Spencer's system is that it is " Evolution Philosophy."
That would be a somewhat cumbrous name, but I dare say that if in some
way or other the word " evolution " could from the start have been wrought
into Mr. Spencer's title-pages, it might have prevented a vast amount of
popular misapprehension. It would early have helped to associate the
doctrine of evolution with the name of its true founder more closely than
with Mr. Darwin, whose discoveries were concerned simply with one de-
partment of the subject. "Evolutionism" and "Spencerism" are synony-
mous terms ; " evolutionism " and " Darwinism " are not, as is proved by
the fact that a man may be an enthusiastic Darwinian and still scout at
the doctrine of evolution as a metaphysical chimera ; such was the case
with the late Chauncey Wright.

As for displacing the ridiculous epithet " positive," I do not believe
that either " synthetic " or " cosmic " was ever worth a groat. The stupid
old public (begging its pardon, nothing personal intended !) would prob-

* See article " Specialized Administration " in Spencer's Essays, Vol.
Ill, a reply to " Administrative Nihilism," in Huxley's Critiques and

Addresses.

292 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Descriptive Sociology, and think we shall get a suitable
man.

SAVILE CLUB, December 16, 1871.

MY DEAR SISTER : I have fixed upon December 3oth to
sail, and shall go in the Russia, the quickest and safest for
the winter passage. There is still much to do in the next
fortnight, and I shall want the whole of it, yet the body of
the work is done. It will go on though I leave. Last
Monday night I met Spencer and Tyndall at Huxley's at
dinner to consider matters. It was precious different from
my first dinner there six months ago. They are fairly in

ably have gone on calling us all " positivists " to this day, had not Huxley,
once in a moment of happy inspiration, fired off the term " agnostic." It
took so beautifully that people have by this time almost forgotten that
there ever was any such thing as " positivism " ; and as a missile of theo-
logical vituperation the word "agnostic" is so innocent of all definite sig-
nificance that nobody need mind being pelted with it.

Since writing this footnote, I find among Mr. Spencer's letters the,
following, which explains my own objection to the name " Synthetic." It
was a question of a title for a brief exposition of Spencerian philosophy by
Dr. Gazelles :

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W.,^/^-//io, 1874.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I send on the annexed leaf a copy of the title-
page as I think it should run. Synthetic Philosophy would be a damper
to most, even when it was intelligible — which it would be to but few.
Evolution Philosophy will, on the contrary, be attractive, and will con-
vey some idea of the book. I have prefixed the word " Outline " to give
further definiteness to the conception. Truly yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

Outline of the Evolution Philosophy. By Dr. M. E. Gazelles. Trans-
lated from the French by the Rev. O. B. Frothingham. With an Appen-
dix by E. L. Youmans.

In using the name " Cosmic " I was actuated by the feeling that it
would be less unintelligible and less of a " damper " than the other name.
In a certain sense, too, " Cosmic " is a distinctive epithet as applied to a
philosophy which excludes miracle and exhibits law as the " harmony of
the world." No doubt, however, " Evolution Philosophy " was the title
best adapted for leading the " public " into wisdom's narrow path.

The International Scientific Series. 293

harness and trot quite smoothly. They took hold of work
as a matter of course, and are going to make a pretty good
committee. It seems to be universally agreed that we have
a great thing in prospect and well under way, and which
can hardly fail to result in large advantages to many au-
thors and to the public also. I am glad I came now, and
glad I stayed it out. It has been rough and tough, and
will fitly wind up with a winter passage home. Oh, how I
will sleep when I get on that ship !

Before sailing for home Youmans had not only
arranged for simultaneous publication in New York,
London, Paris, and Leipsic, but also opened negotia-
tions which in the future extended his plan to Milan
and St. Petersburg. The International Scientific
Series, launched with so much labour, amply justified
its projector's anticipations. In it the master hands of
science have written the latest word on themes whose
special study has won them their distinction. There
are many topics of importance for which no single
nation provides a sufficiently large circle of readers
for remunerative publication. Several such topics
have been treated in the^ series with reward to the
authors concerned. And not the least service of the
series was its proot that liberal private enterprise
could find its account in outrunning the tardy coun-
cils of a great nation in doing justice to authorship.
When the days of the projector of the series were
drawing to a close its fifty-seventh volume had ap-
peared— Mr. Heilprin's Geographical and Geological
Distribution of Animals. The first volume was Tyn-
dall's Forms of Water, which drew forth, among other
encomiums, one from Thomas Carlyle. The most
successful volumes have been Draper's Conflict be-

294 Edward Livingston Youmans.

tween Religion and Science, Josiah Cooke's New
Chemistry, and Spencer's Study of Sociology. This
last book was written at Youmans's suggestion, to
prepare the public for the Descriptive Sociology
which appeared in after years. The Study has passed
through eleven English editions, and has proved nearly
as popular as its author's Education.

It was unavoidable that in a programme so lengthy
some of the co-operators should drop out of the ranks.
My dear friend Clifford died before he had more than
outlined his proposed work, The Principles of Exact
Science explained to the Unmathematical. Prof. Je-
vons contributed Money and the Mechanism of Ex-
change, and a second volume was expected from his
pen at the time of his drowning. Our editor had to
face other difficulties in the execution of his task than
those due to mortality. When some of the contribu-
tions came in they proved too bulky or too technical
for inclusion and had to be rejected. There was not a
little grumbling in America at first at the fewness of
American contributors, but this died out as the list
gradually took up one after another name of authority
at home.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.
1872. Age, 51.

ON Youmans's return to America after completing
arrangements for the International Series, it seemed
an opportune time to establish the magazine so long
considered which should be a popular medium of
communication between men of original thought and
research and the general reading public. This, as we
have seen, had been for many years one of his most
cherished projects. The experiment with Appletons'
Journal had failed, through no fault of his ; it was time
to try again.

Between the International Series — especially the
book on The Study of Sociology, which Mr. Spencer
was now writing for it — and the starting of the Popu-
lar Science Monthly there was a curious causal con-
nection, which is shown in the following extracts :

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., January 8, 1872.
MY DEAR YOUMANS : I have, as I proposed before you
left, arranged with Knowles for publication of the Study
of Sociology in the Contemporary in successive installments.
He and the publisher, Strahan, express themselves as re-
joicing to make the agreement. No difficulty appears to
arise respecting the simultaneous publication in America,
so long as it is understood that the publication in some

(295)

296 Edward Livingston Youmans.

American periodical will not interfere with the publication
at the same date in that portion of the edition of the Con-
temporary which circulates in America. I have stipulated
for such interval as will allow of your having the sheets in
time to make simultaneous publication practicable. Pos-
sibly you have by this time taken some steps toward
making arrangements for me. I hope you have not made
any proposals for its publication in Appletons' Journal. To
this I should object. After so long a descending career in
respect of quality, I suspect that changing its character
would be very difficult, if possible; and until such restora-
tion of character is effected I should not like contributions
of mine to appear in it.

Should you start the proposed magazine with the under-
standing that you are to have full power in the management
of it, the case will be quite different. It strikes me that if
you had the help of your brother and sister, and if they
devoted their whole time to it, the management of such a
magazine might not be too much for you along with other

things.

NEW YORK, January 26, 1872.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have yours of the 8th inst. As
respects the sociological articles, I have not for a moment
thought of offering them to Appletons' Journal, but I have
not made proposals elsewhere, as, if we do start a monthly,
I am very anxious to avail myself of them. I shall accept
nothing except full control of such a periodical, the only
question being whether I will take it at all. My brother is
very anxious that I should do so, and my sister inclines to
it. I mean to have an opportunity very soon to know just
what the publishers are prepared to do and will report
promptly ; but there will be some little delay, probably, in
starting — if we do start — and I hope that you will not begin
over there until we are ready here. There would be no
harm if you had two or three of the articles done before
the first is printed. Indeed, this will be most desirable

The Popular Science Monthly. 297

whoever reprints here. You are to remember and provide
for this fact, that all our magazines are published two
weeks before date. The July magazine is in the market
the middle of June. . . . There is a furious attack upon
you in the Catholic World, under the title The Cosmic
Philosophy. The New Englander is also out with an on-
slaught, so there seems no danger that the Philosophy will

be neglected.

NEW YORK, January 2g, 1872.

MY DEAR SPENCER : 1 have been sorely tried about the
periodical. The Appletons are perfectly willing and per-
fectly indifferent. I have so much to do that I do not like
to court responsibility.

To get your articles would be a powerful incentive to
immediate action. On the other hand, there ought to be
deliberate systematic preparations, and it is also greatly
advantageous to start January ist. Other work besides
must be done. So unless the wind changes suddenly and
soon, we shall have no magazine this year.

What impels me to write to-day is that I have ascer-
tained the time conditions of the issue of your articles on
this side. To get a favourable insertion (in place I mean)
each article must be here six weeks before the date of its
appearance. For May it must be here by the middle of
March — must be sent by the ist of March. I have, of
course, made no arrangements as yet, but am able to give
you the conditions on which depend the market value of
your articles, and indeed the only conditions on which they
can appear in any American periodical at all. I am still
anxious about the phraseology of your letter. The Con-
temporary pays you for the English constituency. I know
they cannot afford to pay for the lead in America, or what
you would lose by leaving your articles with them. You
say that they stipulate that you shall not so dispose of the
article as to interfere with them. But the thing paid for
here is priority.

298 Edward Livingston Youmans.

LONDON, February i6t 1872.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: The difficulties you describe re-
specting the arrangements for publication in an American
magazine in such way that the requirements as to date
may be duly met, both for such magazine and the Contem-
porary, seem to me almost insurmountable. Your Ameri-
can custom of issuing a fortnight before date seems to
make anything like simultaneous publication out of the
question. Either your American magazine must be a fort-
night behind the American edition of the Contemporary,
or a fortnight before it, and such an arrangement seems
to me certain to be negatived by the one or the other, as
the case may be. Indeed, I should hardly like to ask Stra-
han to agree to an arrangement under which the articles
should appear in America a fortnight before the Contem-
porary arrived there.

Under these circumstances I see no other way of meet-
ing the difficulty than that of publication through some
other medium than a monthly periodical. I called two
days ago on Smalley, to ask him whether it was worth
while to make the proposal to the Tribune. He thought
it was, saying that from time to time they issue extra
sheets, and that it might not improbably be arranged that
the successive chapters should appear in them. Under
such an arrangement the difficulty as to date would almost
disappear. The publication in the Tribune might be al-
most simultaneous with the American issue of the Con-
temporary.

I am just about to commence the first chapter for the
Contemporary. It will appear on the ist of April. This,
of course, negatives my arrangement with an American
magazine. If you can arrange with the Tribune, well and
good. If not, the scheme of American publication must, I
suppose, drop.

Since I wrote to you, one of the chief Berlin publishers

The Popular Science Monthly. 299

(Duncker) has written to propose a translation of the Psy-
chology. Probably it will be arranged that some other
translator will execute this while Dr. Vetter is executing
First Principles and the Biology.

"Under the circumstances you name, I think you are quite
right in not commencing at present the contemplated maga-
zine. It will be better to wait until all the circumstances
are favourable and until you have had leisure for laying
out your plans completely, especially as meanwhile you
have quite enough to do in preparing for your great liter-
ary scheme.

You do not in either letter give me any account of your-
self. How is it you have not yet got an amanuensis, as I
urged you to do ? You will inevitably break down if you
don't economize your energies.

Ever yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

NEW YORK, March 8, 1872.

MY DEAR SPENCER : Your letter regarding the articles
came the other day and has much perplexed me. I had
arranged for their publication in the Galaxy, which has now
a large circulation and is a first-rate medium for such a
purpose. Briefly, neither the Atlantic nor Harper's were
available for the purpose. The Galaxy has forty thousand
circulation, and for the past year has been dipping a good
deal into serious discussions. I regret having said any-
thing about simultaneous publication, as I. might have
known that the Contemporary would not be issued here be-
fore it was in England. Our periodicals have to be printed
early to transport them to distant places, but they are not
published until the 2oth, and therefore cannot reach Eng-
land before the first of the ensuing month. Besides, it is a
common and regular thing to publish articles here in this
manner — although, of course, from English magazines that
are not reproduced here.

If you make no regular arrangement the articles will be

3OO Edward- Livingston Youmans.

at once plundered, and when that thing begins there is no
knowing where it will end. I have from the beginning
guarded against this result with all care, furnishing every-
thing through Appletons early. But as your name becomes
valuable the danger increases, necessitating more vigilance.
Another element of apprehension has come into the case—
Appleton's course favouring copyright has made him many
and ugly enemies lately. As respects the Tribune, I have
not yet been able to see Greeley.

It will not be so good as the Galaxy would be, for the
newspaper dies in twelve hours, and, besides, it is presi-
dential campaign year, and the papers are already going
mad with politics.

NEW YORK, March 14, 1872.

MY DEAR SPENCER: I saw Greeley last night with refer-
ence to publishing your articles. He is as ignorant as a
Bushman and as prejudiced as a papist, so that conver-
sation on the subject is hardly possible. "As for sociol-
ogy," said he, " Fourier proclaimed more, thirty years ago,
than this generation can appreciate." When your name
was mentioned he broke out that he was " dead and for-
ever opposed to that whole laissez-faire school, and if the
articles contained any of that, he didn't want them." I
urged him as much as I could, and he ended by saying,
"When your articles come, let us see them."

But if the Tribune prints the papers, what then ? Not
being in an accessible monthly, they must be reproduced
in pamphlets by somebody. I see no other way but that
you get Mr. King to stereotype the chapters in the form of
the series and send us the plates. We can strike off a
small edition with a large margin, and supply it to those
who wish, and thus forestall piracy.

I shall be uneasy until I know what you are going to
do about those articles — whether we are to have them early
or not.

The Popular Science Mont lily. 301

NEW YORK, April j, 1872.

MY DEAR SPENCER : A thousand thanks for your favour
of March i3th, with article on Study of Sociology inclosed.
I was beginning to be worried about it, and was on the
point of telegraphing you to telegraph me as to what you
would do. You did wisely in sending it, and I decided
upon our course two minutes after getting it.

I determined to have a monthly at once, and in time to
open with this article. It was vital that these articles be
not exposed to the temptation to reprint them in pam-
phlets. Two houses have gone into the business; they
are printing series of scientific tracts at a shilling, and have
both announced your volume. They will seize upon the
first thing offered. We have secured the " Specialized Ad-
ministration " only by advertising it almost daily ourselves
as a pamphlet, to get time to issue it as a book. Remem-
ber this : you have become popular here, and are therefore
in more peril than before. The courtesies of the trade
yielding to priority and recognizing the right of a publisher
to the works of his author have a certain value with us,
but if once broken through the spell dissolves — that author
is not protected. So-and-So has gone in upon his works,
and they are now open. This has been done over and over
again, and it will not do to leave your things lying around.
When I could not get the use of another periodical, and we
had to fall back upon the newspapers, it became indispen-
sable to publish as a pamphlet. I have accepted the situa-
tion and have done so — with additions.

I received your article less than a week ago. We have
started a monthly of 128 pages. The first part of it is now
printing; the last pages will be closed up to-morrow, and
we will have it out in five days more. Of course, we had
to go in on selected articles ; but with yours for original
and a translation by my sister from the French, a short
article by myself, and fragments by my brother, we shall

3O2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

make a very fair show, and as we shall print in better style
than any other magazine, the thing will do. We shall have
a large sale on the first two numbers at any rate. Nothing
happens as expected, but often the unexpected is best. I
am utterly glad that things have taken the course they
have. I have long wanted a medium of speech that I can
control, and now I shall have it. It will consolidate plans
and facilitate work.

We shall depend on your second article to open also
the second number ; I hope it will be sent as early as the
first. I have not got my amanuensis yet, but soon shall.

April 23, 18^2.

Considering that our gestation was so short, the under-
taking has proved very satisfactory. The stroke is unusu-
ally applauded, and the incoming support is more than we
expected. That which started us and which I was most
anxious about — the chance of your articles — is well secured.
The first one is attracting a good deal of attention, and is
being steadily called for. If we get your second in time
we shall be made.

June 2, 1872.

The unexpected success of the Monthly has increased
my anxiety about it, and kept me a good deal on a stretch.
We first printed 5,000 each of Nos. i and 2, have printed
2,000 of each since, and they are now both out of print, and
have been so half the time for the last several weeks. We
shall print 7,000 of No. 3, and it would not surprise me if
the first three numbers went up to 10,000. The publishers
say it is a certain thing, and are greatly pleased, but the
American rage for novelty cannot fail to be a large factor,
and I indulge in no large hopes. Still, I shall do my best
to sustain it. I like the work much, and if it continues to
succeed I shall have no further solicitude about remunera-
tive occupation.

The Popular Science Monthly. 303

August 21 1 1872.

Chapter V has just come, and it is splendid. This
series is going to do a grand work ; it hits us every time
exactly where we live. The papers as they appear will be
extensively read, and, although we are in the midst of a
presidential convulsion, they are already attracting great
attention. The volume cannot fail to do sharp execution.
Have you any definite idea of its extent ? If so, I shall be
glad to know. There is a good deal of inquiry about the
Psychology.

As soon as the sociological series breaks I mean to in-
troduce some parts of the Psychology into the Monthly,
the sales of which, I am happy to say, steadily continue.
I was prepared for a marked falling off during the furious
heat and business stagnation of midsummer, but the cir-
culation is well sustained, and there is a constant call for
back numbers.

I posted to you a World two days ago, with the alleged
report of a European tourist on European philosophers.
You will find in it some novel and remarkable statements
concerning yourself and your friends. Our newspaper
press is simply damnable. " Interviewing " has come to be
a regular feature of it, and under its guise are put forth
the most preposterous inventions, while the extravagant
and the absurd are sure to be caught up and universally
circulated. But all this cannot be helped, but must be
taken philosophically. Fiske's lecture on the Composition
of Mind has been published in Hammond's Psychological'
Journal, published by the Appletons. John has gone in
pretty strong on Psychology. I will send it to you. My
sister is very well, and is working steadily at her second
book of Botany. The religious press is getting uneasy
about the Monthly, and beginning to threaten us. Ever
yours, E. L. YOUMANS.

304 Edward Livingston Youmans.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., October 12, 1872.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I have just finished the second
volume of the Psychology, and expect to have it issued in
a bound form in less than a fortnight.

I find on looking back that it is just twelve years since
I commenced. Having now got half through, it might be
inferred that it will take another twelve years to finish. I
see reason for hoping, however, that ten will suffice.*
Considerably more than two years, I believe, have gone in
interruptions — partly due to occasional relapses of health,
partly to the second edition of First Principles, partly to
various incidental essays and articles, and partly to the
arrangement and superintendence of the Descriptive So-
ciology, which during the earlier stages occupied much
time. Indeed, now that I put them down, these interrup-
tions account, I think, for more than two years' loss of
time. As I am much better now than I was when I com-
menced, and as I do not see the likelihood of much inci-
dental writing hereafter, I am inclined to hope that after
completing the Study, etc., ten years will suffice to carry
me through.

Your last number has reached me, as also the copy of
the World, in which I find myself " interviewed " in a some-
what romancing style ; for, while I recognize some things
in it as having been said to me, there is much in it which I
certainly did not say — notably the passages from First
Principles which I am represented as repeating.

May I suggest that you are hardly giving the method
of dictation a fair trial. Neither the hand of your late
amanuensis nor the hand of the one by whom you wrote
last implies the ability to write with tolerable rapidity. If
you employ a slow writer, you will not only lose valuable

* More than twenty, alas ! have since elapsed, and because of unfore-
seen ill health the series is not yet quite finished. Happily, since 1890 it
has been advancing more rapidly, and the end seems almost in sight.

The Popular Science Monthly. 305

time, but may get impatient with the system itself, and
condemn it as unsatisfactory. By all means get a quick
writer. Ever yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

The laborious work connected with the magazine
did not prevent Youmans from once more trying to
give a few lectures ; but this time he broke down at
the very start, and was soon back in his editorial office

again.

ASHLAND, November 20, 1872.

DEAR SISTER : Things are precious bad. I ought not
to have undertaken this job. I am sick through and
through with the ugliest cold I -ever had — headache, sore
throat, soreness of chest, and a universal aching to the
marrow of the bones. I could not get a fire in a room at
Akron, and was freezing all day. I got into a sweat dur-
ing the lecture, and that clinched the thing. Had to leave
at 5.30 in the morning. No vehicles to train, so I got a
bed in a nigger hole near the station and shivered in it all
night. I had a good deal of fever, and did not get a wink
of sleep. It was an awful night, but I got the cars and
slept through a fifty-mile ride — or dozed through it. I did
not think I should be able to lecture at all, but I went to
bed and rested as well as I could, and of course I had to
try it. I contrived to talk an hour, and could not stand
up any longer. I had a good deal of broken and uncom-
fortable sleep last night, but am awful stiff and sore this
morning ; and more — I have to ride back into the country
several miles in a cold snowstorm to Lodi. I shall under-
take it. So things go, and I will telegraph you. I have
long known that I am very shaky, but I did not realize
how little remnant of vitality and resistance there is left.

Having thus seen how The Popular Science
Monthly came into existence at the time when it was
becoming more than ever apparent that our friend's
14

306 Edward Livingston Youmans.

career as a lecturer was ended, we may quote his own
words in the Editor's Table of the opening number, in
which he denned its scope and aim :

The Popular Science Monthly has been started to help
on the work- of sound public education, by supplying in-
structive articles on the leading subjects of scientific in-
quiry. It will contain papers, original and selected, on a
wide range of subjects, from the ablest scientific men of
different countries, explaining their views to non-scientific
people. A magazine is needed here which shall be devoted
to this purpose, for, although much is done by the general
press in scattering light articles and shreds of information,
yet many scientific discussions of merit and moment are
passed by. It is therefore thought best to bring this class
of contributions together for the benefit of all who are in-
terested in the advance of ideas and the diffusion of valu-
able knowledge.

The increasing interest in science, in its facts and prin-
ciples, its practical applications, and its bearings upon opin-
ion, is undeniable ; and, with this augmenting interest,"
there is growing up a new and enlarged meaning of the
term which it is important for us to notice. By science is
now meant the most accurate knowledge that can be ob-
tained of the order of the universe by which man is sur-
rounded, and of which he is a part. This order was at first
perceived in simple physical things, and the tracing of it
out in these gave origin to the physical sciences. In its
earlier development, therefore, science pertained to certain
branches of knowledge, and to many the term science still
implies physical science.

But this is an erroneous conception of its real scope.
The growth of science involves a widening as well as a pro-
gression. The ascertainable order of things proves to be
much more extensive than was at first suspected; and the
inquiry into it has led to sphere after sphere of new investi-

The Popular Science Monthly. 307

gation, until science is now regarded as not applying to
this or that class of objects, but to the whole of Nature —
as being, in fact, a method of the mind, a quality or char-
acter of knowledge upon all subjects of which we can think
or know.

What some call the progress of science, and others call
its encroachments, is undoubtedly the great fact of modern
thought, and it implies a more critical method of inquiry
applied to subjects not before dealt with in so strict a
manner. The effect has been, that many subjects once
widely separated from the recognized sciences have been
brought nearer to them, and have passed more or less com-
pletely under the influence of the scientific method of in-
vestigation. Whatever subjects involve accessible and ob-
servable phenomena, one causing another, or in anyway
related to another, belong properly to science for investiga-
tion. Intellect, feeling, human action, language, education,
history, morals, religion, law, commerce, and all social re-
lations and activities, answer to this condition ; each has
its basis of fact, which is the legitimate subject-matter of
scientific inquiry. Those, therefore, who consider that ob-
servatory watching, laboratory work, or the dredging of the
sea for specimens to be classified, is all there is to science,
make a serious mistake. Science truly means continuous
intelligent observation of the characters of men as well as
of the characters of insects. It means the analysis of mind
as well as that of chemical substances. It means the
scrutiny of evidence in regard to political theories as in-
exorable as that applied to theories of comets. It means
the tracing of cause and effect in the sequences of human
conduct as well as in the sequences of atmospheric change.
It means strict inductive inquiry as to how society has
come to be what it is, as well as how the rocky systems
have come to be what they are. In short, science is not
the mystery of a class, but the common interest of rational

308 Edward Livingston Youmans.

beings, in whom thinking determines action, and whose
highest concern it is that thought shall be brought into the
exactest harmony with things — and this is the supreme
purpose of education.

If, in this statement of the scope and work of science,
we have not laid stress upon those great achievements by
which it has given man power over the material world, it
is not because we undervalue them. They are noble re-
sults, but they are abundantly eulogized, and their very
splendour has operated to dim the view of other conquests
less conspicuous but even more important. Telegraphs,
steam engines, and the thousand devices to which science
has led, are great things ; but what, after all, is their value
compared with the emancipation of the human spirit from
the thralldom of ignorance, which the world owes to this
agency ? Rightly to appreciate what science has accom-
plished for humanity, we must remember not only that it
has raised men to the understanding and enjoyment of the
beautiful order of Nature, but that it has put an end to the
baneful superstitions by which for ages men's lives were
darkened, to the sufferings of witchcraft, and the terrors of
the untaught imagination which filled the world with malig-
nant agencies.

It is this immense extension of the conception of sci-
ence, in which all the higher subjects of human interest are
now included, that .gives it an ever-increasing claim on the
attention of the public. Besides its indispensable use in
all avocations, and its constant application in the sphere of
daily life, it is also profoundly affecting the whole circle of
questions, speculative and practical, which have agitated
the minds of men for generations. Whoever cares to know
whither inquiry is tending, or how opinion is changing,
what old ideas are perishing, and what new ones are rising
into acceptance — briefly, whoever desires to be intelligent
as to contemporary movements in the world of thought —

The Popular Science Monthly. 309

must give attention to the course of scientific inquiry. Be-
lieving that there are many such in this country, and that
they are certain to become more numerous in future, The
Popular Science Monthly has been commenced with the in-
tention of meeting their wants more perfectly than any
other periodical they can get.

The work of creating science has been organized for cen-
turies. Royal societies and scientific academies are hun-
dreds of years old. Men of science have their journals in
all departments, in which they report to each the results of
original work, describe their processes, engage in mutual
criticism, and cultivate a special literature in the interests
of scientific advancement.

The work of diffusing science is, however, as yet but
very imperfectly organized, although it is clearly the next
great task of civilization. The signs, however, are promis-
ing. Schools of science are springing up in all enlightened
countries, and old educational establishments are yielding
to the reformatory spirit, modifying and modernizing their
systems of study. There is, besides, a growing sympathy
on the part of men of science of the highest character with
the work of popular teaching, and an increasing readiness
to co-operate in undertakings that shall promote it. There
is, in fact, growing up a valuable literature of popular sci-
ence— not the trash that caters to public ignorance, wonder,
and prejudice, but able and instructive essays and lectures
from men who are authorities upon the subjects which they
treat. But the task of systematically disseminating these
valuable productions is as yet but imperfectly executed,
and we propose to contribute what we can to it in the pres-
ent publication.

The Popular Science Monthly will make its appeal not
to the illiterate, but to the generally educated classes. The
universities, colleges, academies, and high schools of this
country are numbered by hundreds, and their graduates by

3io Edward Livingston Youmans.

hundreds of thousands. Their culture is generally literary,
with but a small portion of elementary science ; but they
are active-minded, and competent to follow connected
thought in untechnical English, even if it be sometimes a
little close. Our pages will be adapted to the wants of
these, and will enable them to carry on the work of self-
instruction in science.

Thenceforward the editorial duties of the Monthly
absorbed the chief energies of Mr. Youmans, and its
twenty-eight volumes issued under his care form the
principal record of his remaining years. While it was
his main intent to give in popular form an account of
the progress of the several departments of science, he
never lost sight of the aim to show wherein the scien-
tific method was applicable to the larger questions of
life — of education, social relations, morals, government,
and religion. In enlisting contributors to his pages he
did not find it easy to get them to steer between over-
simplification on one hand and an undue technicality
of expression on the other. The following letter to
one of his contributors is eminently characteristic :

•

MY DEAR SIR: Your article is excellent, and will be read
by many with appreciation ; but when I looked over the
proof it occurred to me that it had some faults of presenta-
tion, perhaps due to your lack of practice in putting abstract
things before common readers. Our scientific readers, of
course, will have no trouble in understanding you and
will enjoy your argument, but nine tenths of the patrons
of the Monthly will get but a partial comprehension of it.
Of course so abstract a topic as the Mathematics of Evo-
lution may be expected to require some intellectual force
to grasp it, and I am well content with your main exposition.
Still I think some serious and systematic attention on your

The Popular Science Monthly. 3 1 1

part to the artifice of clear and familiar statement, which
will give you access to ordinary minds, is very important.
I do not mean for a moment that your writing is obscure,
but only that your composition would be improved if you
had in your mind's eye a person of common intelligence
and quite unacquainted with the subject you are seeking
to explain. You would then stop and think by what han-
dling or illustration the view so clear to you could be
brought into his apprehension. I am speaking from the
Popular Science standpoint about a deficiency which marks
many of our scientific writers. Generally the deeper and
more thorough their science, the poorer is their power of
exposition. Excuse me for throwing out these suggestions,
but with your unusual ability of statement and command
of appropriate language, if you would study the art of
getting at the mind of the multitude, as a dramatist has to
study it in elaborating his points with reference to their
effect upon theatre goers, you could do very important and
increasingly needed work in the field of popular and scien-
tific education.

Have you any leisure to write, and do you care to ac-
complish anything in that direction ? If yes, and you have
the necessary works at hand, I should like you to try to
make a thoroughly popular and simplified statement of the
doctrine of the " dissipation of energy." I want a report
in the Monthly of the state of that question, explaining
what it is, what we know, and what we don't know about
it. What say you ? Ever and truly yours,

E. L. YOUMANS.

He had very often to perform the common edi-
torial function of returning unsuitable manuscripts,
but always with most kindly consideration. Among
authors who are to-day prominent might be named
several whose first efforts submitted to Youmans were

312 Edward Livingston Yomnans.

found unacceptable, but who were plainly and kindly
told wherein lay their deficiencies. Not seldom an ar-
ticle would be offered him unsuitable for the Monthly,
but such as some other editor might be glad to pub-
lish. In that case the indication would be given, usu-
ally accompanied by an introductory card. It was in
his treatment of callers that Youmans's good nature
was most severely tested. At all hours to his office
there would come inventors with models to be " no-
ticed," writers with bulky bundles of book manuscript
for examination, and readers to argue down some state-
ment published in the Monthly. He could instinc-
tively discriminate between the callers who had a right
to his time and those who had not. A crank or bore
would hear something like this : " My good sir, your
manuscript is very probably all that you claim, and
I should be glad to have the leisure to examine it in
detail ; but you see how it is. I have ever so much
work that I must finish to-day, and so I am obliged
to forego the pleasure."

Youmans's extreme kindliness is well illustrated
by the effect produced upon the author of a rejected
manuscript, who wrote him the following letter :

DR. E. L. YOUMANS.

DEAR SIR : Your reasons for not putting my lecture in
The Popular Science Monthly are good and sufficient, and
perfectly satisfactory to me. You must both have and
deserve troops of friends, if the very kind notice you took
of my paper marks your habitual manner with new contribu-
tors, and I can only thank you, and say you were quite
right in rejecting it.

Can you be as correct in some of your remarks ? Is
Herbert Spencer anything but a " religious destructive " ?
Does that philosopher exist in any other relation to religion

The Popular Science Monthly. 313

than that of destroyer ? What is religion ? Manifestly a
collection of beliefs and emotions founded upon erroneous
views of the construction and methods of operation of this
and other worlds. Spencer teaches a true cosmos. He
must therefore destroy religion wherever he impinges upon
it. How could any conclusion be other than a "bald nega-
tion" ? When it is shown that religion vanishes in the
presence of science, what can you do but write finis then
and there ? The affair is closed. The job is done. To a
mind comprehending the facts and theories of science and
(I will add) understanding the writings of Spencer, " re-
ligion " can no more be entertained than a hobgoblin. It
becomes a zero, an excommunicated x, a nothing floating
in vacua.

From this mess of crudity one might readily infer
that Youmans would have had no use for the writer's
article. If he had deemed it necessary to answer this
letter, he would probably have gently conveyed some
intimation of the fact that the writer was very far
from " understanding the writings of Spencer."

After the new magazine had been running about a
year and a half Youmans wrote to Spencer:

There can be no doubt that the Monthly is doing an
important work in this country. We continue to print
12,000, although the monthly demand fluctuates around
11,000, and seems to be stationary for the last few months.
But the bound volumes sell steadily though moderately,
and new subscribers frequently order from the beginning.
We have, however, worked up a very deep feeling of hos-
tility, and hear constantly of people who " won't have it in
the house." I call your attention to a promised series of
articles, of which the first will be in the October number on
The Primary Concepts of Modern Physical Science, by a

3H Edward Livingston Youmans.

Western lawyer.* I send you two Scnbners with marked
articles that will interest you to glance over, as indicating
the depth of the stir among us. Dr. Holland has not got
over the drubbing I gave him on evolution, and he has got
up this panic with a view " to do the business " for us, and
it is unquestionably acting against us. But it is also acting
powerfully against him, for the religious world is disgusted
at his disclosure of the depth and extent of skepticism, and
is pitching into him. As an example, my father and mother
refuse to hear the articles read, alleging that "it is the
work of some infidel."

. . . Other magazines publish wickeder articles than we
do, and nobody objects, but we are under suspicion because
we sail under the flag of science.

Early in 1874 we find him writing:

The Popular Science Monthly only holds its own for
the last few months, and I think there are some symptoms
that we are beginning to lose something with the declining
novelty of the enterprise. People bought it from curiosity
and a sense of duty, and various motives aside from their
desire to read it. The newcomers now only about bal-
ance those who fall away. I mean, if possible, to make it
more popular.

To this Mr. Spencer characteristically replied :

I think you ought to be satisfied if The Popular Science
Monthly " only holds its own " if you have reached a cir-
culation of 12,000. This is, I think, far beyond what you
originally expected to reach, and you can hardly expect to
go on increasing without check. I am rather inclined to

* Hon. J. B. Stallo, of Cincinnati, since minister to Italy, a thinker of
rare acuteness. The articles now form a volume in the International
Scientific Series.

The Popular Science Monthly. 315

shake my head when you talk about making it more popu-
lar. This is just the tendency which all things set up with
a high standard have to guard against — the tendency to
make material success the object, to the overlooking of the
original object.

Such advice was congenial to Youmans, and he
never allowed himself to be diverted from his original
purpose. If timid and narrow-minded people were
thrown into a flutter by things said now and then in
the Monthly, he had the satisfaction of getting little
else but praise from the men whose esteem was worth
having ; as, for example, in the following letter from
that embodiment of sound sense and sturdy despiser
of sciolism, Dr. Holmes :

BOSTON, May j, 1874.

DEAR DR. YOUMANS : I received, a day or two since, the
copy of Dr. Carpenter's Mental Physiology, and thank you
for your kindness in transmitting it. I shall write to Dr.
Carpenter, to whom I have for so many years been under
frequent obligations, and whose works I have known ever
since I began teaching anatomy and physiology, and tell
him how glad I am to have in a collected form his original
and most interesting observations and ideas with reference
to the great problems which transcend all others in in-
terest— the mechanism and the springs of this perpetual
mental movement which we can no more arrest than we
can the beating of our hearts, though we can modify it as
we can the acts of respiration.

I must take this opportunity to tell you how much I
depend on The Popular Science Monthly. It comes to me
like the air they send down to the people in a diving bell.
I seem to get a fresh breath with every new number. Be-
lieve me, dear Dr. Youmans,

Very truly yours, O. W. HOLMES.

316 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The Popular Science Monthly has now been with
us more than twenty years, its founder's mantle hav-
ing fallen upon his younger brother, Dr. William Jay
Youmans, by whom it is now edited. Its character
has always been of the highest, and it has exerted
an excellent influence not only as a diffuser of valu-
able knowledge, but in training its readers to scientific
habits of thought in so far as mere reading can ever
contribute to such a result.

CHAPTER XV.
VARIOUS AFFAIRS.

1872-1878. Age 51-57.

IN the autumn of 1872 Mr. Youmans did what he
could to make Prof. Tyndall's visit to America pleas-
ant and successful. It will be remembered that the
great physicist had said that he would not carry away
from this country a penny earned by his lectures here.
His net profit of $13,000 he very generously placed in
the hands of trustees, of whom Youmans was one, the
annual income to be devoted to aiding young Ameri-
cans desirous of prosecuting original research in the
laboratories of Europe. In the course of a few years
it became advisable to change the application of the
income of the trust, which is now divided between
Harvard University, Columbia College, and the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania.

Among the letters received from Prof. Tyndall
during the autumn of 1872 was the following:

BOSTON, Octobers, 1872.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Thanks many for both your let-
ters, which interested and amused me greatly. This open-
ing of the International Series is very gratifying. I think
in founding it you have entered upon a most important
enterprise.

I have received a letter from Mr. Winthrop, of Boston,
which interests me greatly. He is descended from John

(317)

318 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Winthrop, who came over in 1630, and who married Mar-
garet Tyndale, whose great-grandson was the most distin-
guished professor of natural science in New England of his
time. Is not this curious ?

The lectures are going on, but they are difficult. The
people crowd to hear them, and Mr. Lowell declares that
never previously were they held so fast in the lecture
room. I give them an hour and a half, though warned
that they would not stand more than an hour. Still the
lectures by no means please myself, one reason being that
I am at sea as regards the intellectual level of my audi-
ence.* . . .

Go on and prosper, my dear Youmans, in the work you
have undertaken. I hardly know any man in Europe or
America who enjoys your opportunity of doing good, and
the best of it is that it is an opportunity created by your-
self.

Give my affectionate regards to the Methodists. I will
not return railing for railing, but, contrariwise, blessing.
Yours ever, JOHN TYNDALL.

From Tyndall's numerous letters to Youmans,
many of which are concerned with business or else
with affairs of strictly private interest, I have culled a
few pleasant and characteristic passages :

* An error which has played the mischief with more than one British
lecturer in America, notably with the lamented Freeman, who thought it
necessary to tell his audiences in Boston and St. Louis simple outlines of
English history known to every schoolboy. As I remember Tyndall's
lectures, however, he did not go far astray in this direction. Any British
lecturer will always be safe in addressing any American audience he is
likely to meet in exactly the same way that he addresses his audiences at
the Royal Institution in London or at the Philosophical Institution in
Edinburgh.

Various Affairs. 319

LONDON, May 26, 1873.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I was somewhat concerned yes-
terday to gather from a letter of yours to Spencer that the
religious world were bearing hard upon you — seeking to
damage Appleton, and in so far damaging you ; but your
letter of this morning, which is all brightness, dissipates
my concern. Surely, surely, a man like you must have
labour room in the wide area of the States. The men on
this side whom you work with are not scoffers ; and if they
didjiot lead the movements of the age, trust me, these move-
ments would fall into more irreverent hands.

Those that have seen The Popular Science Monthly
here call it "a delightful magazine."

Yours ever, JOHN TYNDALL.

September jj, 1874.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Thanks, many and hearty, for
your cordial letter. I have just time to say that before
this week ends a revised copy of the Belfast Address
shall be on its way to you.

It has caused tremendous commotion. How foolish
they are ! Their wisdom would have been shown in letting
the thing alone, but they are not Wisdom's children.

Cardinal Cullen has just appointed three days of prayer
to keep infidelity out of Ireland !

Yours ever, JOHN TYNDALL.

P. S. — I caught a glimpse of Spencer yesterday, and
shall dine with him to-morrow. He is flourishing.

September 28, 1874.

MY DEAR MR. APPLETON : The Address, separately pub-
lished, is going off with exceeding rapidity. The third
thousand was called for in three days.

Yours ever faithfully, JOHN TYNDALL.

320 Edward Livingston Youmans.

P. S. — Being busy just now, I have merely glanced at
Dr. Youmans's remarks; but I have seen sufficient to as-
sure me of the sagacity, and, indeed, eminent ability which
mark his mind in the treatment of great questions. I often
think that had he been less hampered by his ailments in
youth he would have made a profound mark on his day and
generation. Even as it is, he is doing this.

March 77, 1876.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I am thoroughly obliged to you
for your excellent letter. It gave my wife and myself
great joy to read it. In fact, there is a pith and power in
your mode of expressing yourself which I have rarely seen
equalled, and which it does one good to read.

I never thanked you for your defence of me in The
Popular Science Monthly. Let me do so now. It was
quite sufficient — quite as much as I either desired or de-
served.

I wish Bastian had permitted me to treat him tenderly.
I expressed this wish to himself, but, as Huxley says, ten-
derness shown to him is sure to be misinterpreted. It is
surprising how rapidly he is going to pieces on the first
real shock. He had a great number of believers, but their
ranks are now wofully thinned. I sometimes feel in a re-
lenting mood toward him, but the matter is too grave to
be glossed over.

The Fragments, I expect, will be out in a week or so.
I have ordered them to send you stereotype plates.

Ever faithfully yours, JOHN TYNDALL.

An advance guard or extreme wing of the Unitari-
ans, in 1872, organized themselves into the Free Re-
ligious Association, founding the Index as their organ,
with Francis Ellingwood Abbot as editor. The asso-
ciation's first president was Rev. O. B. Frothingham,

Various Affairs. 321

and Youmans was upon the list of vice-presidents,
which included Ralph Waldo Emerson. In 1873 the
association met in New York, when Youmans deliv-
ered an address, in Cooper Union, on The Religious
Work of Science.* In reference to this address I find,
in a letter to his mother a few days later, the following :

I saw Mr. Beecher the other day, and he was very full
of his compliments about my sermon at the Cooper Insti-
tute, and thought I had mistaken my calling and should
have been a preacher. He said my address was like a
poultice, and if scientific men generally would soften things
in that way, all parties would get along a great deal better.
We must remember, however, that Beecher is a foxy fellow,
and knows how to say smooth things.

In the summer of 1873 my dear friend's health be-
gan to be seriously impaired ; his editorial labours
were arduous ; the International Scientific Series de-
manded constant care ; he was working too hard.
Commenting on a long letter from him, wherein his
ailments had been described in detail, Mr. Spencer
began a series of remonstrances, continued for years
afterward. His friend was exhorted in the kindest
way to cease from overwork, to husband his strength,
to take such timely recreation that he might in the
long run be able to do the more. As a first measure
of practical reform he was advised to engage an amanu-
ensis. In response to Spencer's appeals, he would
promise to amend his methods, to work fewer hours,
to take regular exercise, to let subordinates assist him
as much as possible. But reform, however earnestly
resolved upon, was never systematically carried out.

* It is given in full below, pp. 491-501.

322 Edward Livingston Youmans.

A restless anxiety to push all tasks to completion, a
natural buoyancy which for the greater part of the
time ignored the evidences of ill-health, united to keep
him at the oar when mind and body should have had
relaxation and rest. His was the case of the man wise
for others, not wise for himself. Next year, 1874, no
sooner did his health somewhat improve than he be-
gan to carry out his project, long entertained, of a
Cyclopaedia of Household Science, organizing a corps
of investigators and writers. His direction and super-
vision of their work entailed new burdens of responsi-
bility and toil. Yet never was he too busy or too
weary to serve the cause of evolution, or to elucidate
the true position of its philosopher. On the 5th of
June he delivered a lecture before the New York
Liberal (Positivist) Club on Herbert Spencer and the
Doctrine of Evolution. This lecture appeared in the
Monthly for the following November, and is reprinted
as an appendix to Mr. Frothingham's translation of
Cazelles's Outlines of Evolution.*

In the autumn of 1874 overwork entailed its accus-
tomed penalty ; his health again became poor, and his
eyes were so much affected that he had to submit to
curtailment in both reading and writing. The next
year the interests of the International Scientific Series
required his presence in Europe. While abroad he
had his cyclopaedia constantly in mind, and gathered
together many hints and much material for it. He
examined new applications of science in the house-
hold ; investigated sanitary appliances and the newest
methods of heating, lighting, and ventilation. Con-
vinced that among practical arts cooking was only

* This very able and important paper is given in full below, pp. 502-551.

Various Affairs. 323

second in importance to agriculture, he paid frequent
visits to the South Kensington School of Cookery,
and here Miss Youmans entered as pupil to gather for
him such knowledge as practical training might afford
in furtherance of his scheme.

Among the many literary projects which Youmans
organized for himself or for others to execute I find
one which for some reason or other was not carried
out. It is mentioned in a letter to his brother, Mr.
Earle Youmans, of Winona, Minn., who, in com-
pany with a younger brother, Mr. Addison Youmans,
has for years carried on a very large business in
lumber, and is, I should judge, eminently qualified to
deal successfully with the interesting and important
subject mentioned.

NEW YORK, December 75-, 1874.

DEAR BROTHER EARLE : I think you should not give
up the lectures. The failure of an audience in Winona
amounts to nothing. The subject is the next great thing
any way, and has got to be considered by this people. I
believe political economy, so called, is to take a new shape
in the near future and become a branch of scientific sociol-
ogy. Hitherto it has been treated too much in its abstrac-
tions, and its great laws and results when so stated are too
complex to be grasped by the mob. A lecture on the evo-
lution of business, that should treat the subject historically
and begin with the crudest exchange of the lowest races
and trace it through to its largest unfoldings, would make
it more concrete and link it on to the diversified workings
of human nature in such a way that it could be understood
by everybody and could be made attractive as well as in-
structive. Spencer's Descriptive Sociologies are an unex-
plored mine of this kind. If you will get up some lectures
and work at them regularly, and not be in a hurry about it,
you can have the Cooper Institute to deliver them in and

324 Edward Livingston Youmans.

three thousand people to hear them. I could get them into
Hewitt's Saturday night course next year, and then publish
them in the Monthly. The lectures are of course free, but
that makes no difference. Hewitt has been hunting for
something of the sort five years.

Come down, at any rate, as soon after New Year's as you
can, and we will get the thing going. We start a new
series the first of the year that we think of calling The
Popular Science Library. The volumes will be sold at a
dollar, will have about one hundred and fifty pages, and
Eliza's translation of Quatrefages will be the first. It
will be a capital place for a thoroughly elementary book
on political economy such as might be worked out by the
route of these lectures.

The correspondence is full of remarks and allusions
interesting to readers who are interested in Youmans
or in Spencer or in the doctrine of evolution, and the
judicious reader (to whom the power of skipping
when he chooses belongs as an inalienable right) will
not find fault with me as I proceed to string together
a few extracts covering the seven years from 1873
to 1880.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., August 26, 1873.
MY DEAR YOUMANS : I greatly regret to hear that you
have been out of condition and that things have been going
unsatisfactorily in respect of work. I wish I could per-
suade you to adopt persistently the policy of having an
efficient amanuensis. Once establish the habit of dictating,
and you would, I am sure, find it a great economy of en-
ergy and a great relief; and it is clear to me that your
state of health is such as to make it highly important that
you should economize your energies. Instead of post-
poning the matter of an amanuensis and hoping to get satis-
factorily fixed presently, as you have continually said, you

Various Affairs. 325

ought to make that the one thing to be settled before all
other things as the means to more easily doing other things.
As to the cost, depend upon it you would find it pay.

Will you excuse me if I also suggest that I think you are
apt to spread your energies over too many things. It strikes
me that in your state of health you will have to learn the
art of saying " No " in respect of many undertakings sug-
gested to you or which you suggest to yourself. Lecturing
you have, if I understand rightly, given up ; and I should
advise you to adhere rigorously to this course of abstinence.
You had better also abandon all idea of doing anything
with the Descriptive Sociology. Let it be issued by the
Appletons as other things have been and take its own
course. In fact it strikes me that your policy should be to
limit yourself exclusively to the International Series and
the magazine.

I am just back from Scotland, much earlier than I in-
tended, having met with very bad weather, very little amuse-
ment, and unsatisfactory health ; for though during this
last season I was rejoicing at having been able to bear so
much work, I found when I got away that I had overstepped
the limits and underwent some collapse. I am still con-
siderably below par, but hope to get round presently.

Ever yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

The following refers to Youmans's important lec-
ture before the Liberal Club, reprinted below, pages

502-551:

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, June 20, 1874.
MY DEAR YOUMANS : Two days ago I got your letter,
and yesterday the copy of The World. Of course I cannot
but rejoice at the complete success of your address and ex-
position. But while it is a source of satisfaction to me to
have such able defence and advocacy, I see abundant rea-
son to congratulate you upon the clearness and power of

326 Edward Livingston Youmans.

that which is wholly your own. Your sketch of the pre-
existing state of opinion, and of the irrational compromise
which had been made by scientific men is admirable, and
you bring into a vivid light their failure to recognize the
changed position of things that had grown up, and the
necessity for a total reorganization of thought. So well
have you put the matter that every one who reads must see
that such a change was impending, and that the last gen-
eration of scientific men, narrowly disciplined by their
special studies, were incapable of seeing it. You have put
in immense claims for me, and doubtless greatly astonished
your audience, and will greatly astonish also the more nu-
merous readers of your address. Now, however, that you
have given the facts in their narrative form, referring to
the sources and their dates, there will be, one would think,
no gainsaying your general assertion — though, indeed, one
must expect that with the usual perversity many will go on
saying what they did before spite of its demonstrated un-
truth.

I see you finally decided to have your say about Emer-
son. It is very pungent, and will, I should think, cause
considerable sensation. If, as you say, controversy has
been growing hot, we may expect it to grow hotter now
that you have added to it these burning criticisms.

The German translation of First Principles is finished
and about to go to press. It strikes me that it might not
be amiss to prevent the erroneous idea about my relations
to Darwin from spreading in Germany, as it has in France
and elsewhere, and to this end it would be as well to send
a copy of your address in The World to the German trans-
lator, Dr. B. Vetter, Seilergasse, Dresden, Germany. Prob-
ably he will write a translator's preface, and he might take
occasion to warn readers against the error.

Various Affairs. 327

July 12, 1874.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I had quite intended during the
week to write and send you the paragraph I named to fill
the cut-out space, but I have been so busy preparing to
leave for Scotland on Tuesday that I have been unable. I
must leave it to you to do it or not, as you see fit.

What I thought desirable was to reindicate, in the brief-
est way, the growth of the idea* onward from 1842, its
growing comprehensiveness and definiteness, the recogni-
tion of the process of selection in the case of human be-
ings, the adoption of the idea of increasing heterogeneity
and its gradual extension in various directions, the reap-
pearance of these ideas in the Psychology in a combined
form, with the idea of integration as joining differentiation
and the entire interpretation of mind on evolution princi-
ples; then to indicate that in 1857 the law of evolution,
considered inductively as increasing heterogeneity, was
enunciated as universal as well as the deductive interpreta-
tion of it as due to the instability of the homogeneous and
the multiplication of effects; and that the doctrine as it
now stands was thus, in its universality and its chief out-
lines, set forth two years before the Origin of Species ap-
peared. You have clearly enough stated at the end this
independent origin of the doctrine ; but what strikes me is
that this fact would be much more clearly seized if in the
narration you briefly indicated the stage it had reached be-'
fore Darwin published. But I leave this hint for you to
act on or not, as you think well.

November 6, 1874.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : On my return to town last night,
after a week's absence, I found among various other things
your last number of the Monthly. I had no idea you were

* I. e., the growth of the idea of evolution in his own mind.

328 Edward Livingston Youmans.

going to reproduce your lecture there. I am immensely
indebted to you for all the trouble you are taking to rectify
current misconceptions; and, what with your lecture, and
this republication with its sundry improvements, and the
publication of the volume, you will do it very effectually.

NEW YORK, November 24, 1874.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have yours of October 8th, re-
garding the lecture in the Monthly. I see many indica-
tions that it is doing pretty effectual work. It seems to
have gone counter to current opinions regarding yourself
and Darwin much more strongly than I was prepared for.
I have had many letters and messages acknowledging in-
debtedness for its statements. On the whole, it was an
excellent job, though it has taken a prodigious long time.
Mr. Emerson is amusing. He protests that he has been
quite misunderstood, and never applied the term "stock
writer" to Mr. Spencer in any disparaging sense.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, January 29, 1875.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I was glad to get your letter of
the i3th. I think you are running a great risk with your
eyes in using them before they are quite strong again.
You had much better postpone your Chemistry and take
your rest first. It is this endeavour just to finish some-
thing in hand before leaving off that is the cause of nearly
every breakdown. I have seen it so in myself and in all
around me. Pray take warning. Instead of the common
attitude, This business must be done even at the cost of
health, the attitude should be, My body must be attended
to even at the cost of business.

NEW YORK, April 3, 1875.

MY DEAR SPENCER : You are making very clean work
with this matter of Origin of Religion, but in certain re-
spects the cleaner the worse. There is great irritability in

Various Affairs. 329

the theological mind since Tyndall's bombshell,* and I
have my foot pretty well into the difficulty. Our concern
is very sharply watched.

My Chemistry is still dragging through the press, the
Monthly has to be attended to, and I have just had one of
my eyes cauterized. From these complications you can
infer the difficulty I have in getting away.

Old students of Mr. Spencer's works will recollect
the amusing vehemence with which he was attacked
in the British Quarterly Review of October, 1873, and
January, 1874, by a young Cambridge mathematician
named Moulton. The articles contained many lu-
dicrous misconceptions ; among other things the
writer actually accused Mr. Spencer of identifying
persistence of force with conservation of energy ! f
In two letters from Spencer to Youmans I find allu-
sions to this affair which have some interest, since
Cayley and Sylvester are probably the two greatest
English mathematicians of the nineteenth century.

April if, 1874.

Last night Hirst gave me the satisfactory information
that Cayley entirely agrees with me in the controversy with
Moulton, and thought Moulton deserved all he got.

April 14, 1875.

I received a few days ago a piece of information that
gratified me extremely. Sylvester came up to me at the
club and told me that he had recently been at Cam-
bridge, where he had dined at the fellows' table at the
college to which Moulton belongs. Moulton's name came

* I. e., the celebrated Belfast Address.

f The reply to the reviewer may be found in Spencer's Essays, vol. iii,
PP- 307-34L
15

33° Edward Livingston Youmans.

up, and it led to a conversation respecting the contro-
versy. He said that there was but one opinion about
the matter, namely, that Moulton had committed himself
grossly. He said that there was quite a " chorus " of ex-
pressions of " wonder " that he should have made such a
blunder. Sylvester said that the unanimity of the verdict
was just as though Moulton had compromised himself
among a number of mathematicians by a serious error in
mathematics.

That this should be felt in his own university and in his
own college, in spite of the esprit de corps, is remarkable,
and more than I should have thought possible. It relieves
me greatly.

Youmans's visit to England in the summer of 1875
did not recruit his strength so much as had been
hoped ; that great fund of vitality had been drawn
upon too lavishly. He returned to New York in
November.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W. LONDON, November 29, 1873.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I have been often thinking of you
since you left, in consequence of the very bad weather we
have had, fearing that you must have been dreadfully tossed
on the Atlantic, and perhaps so disgusted as to repent of
your resolution to repeat your visits.

The new edition of Bain has reached me. I think it
greatly improved, and, though he takes to the doctrine of
evolution in rather a gingerly way, still he has made a great
step for one brought up under the regime of pure em-
piricism. The book is admirable from a natural history
point of view.

Some things of interest have occurred since you left.
The Professor of Philosophy at Copenhagen sends me a
work on Modern English Philosophy, of which a large part

Various Affairs. 331

is devoted to the synthetic philosophy, and in a letter giv-
ing his cordial adhesion he proposes to translate some of
the essays into Danish, regretting that there is not a suf-
ficient public for the large works. Dr. Vetter is beginning
to translate the Biology, and the French translation of the
Biology, Gazelles tells me, is finished — the fifth volume
being in Bailhere's hands. I heard the other day, too, that
the Japanese are beginning to translate !

I hope to get a letter shortly telling me of your safe
arrival.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, December iS, 1875.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I am very sorry indeed to have
an account of your health that is so unsatisfactory alike
by what it says and by what it implies. To think that you
should have come over here mainly to recruit, and now
that you should be apparently no better than when you
left, and all because you would go on working and worry-
ing instead of resting ! Your intention to be careful now
amounts to nothing ; you have all along been intending
that and doing the contrary. That you will either cut
short your life or incapacitate yourself is an inference one
cannot avoid drawing, seeing that in your case, as in a
host of other cases, experience seems to have not the
slightest effect. It is a kind of work-drunkenness, and you
seem to be no more able to resist the temptation to work
than the dipsomaniac resists alcohol. Excuse my strong
expressions. I use them in the hope that they may do some
good, though it is a very faint hope. ... As though ful-
filment of some passing purpose was necessary, and main-
tenance of life unnecessary ! What is the use of all this
propagation of knowledge if it is to end in such results ?

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, December 28, 1875.
The other day I received some news from Russia which
will interest you. A professor at Kiev proposes, in con-
junction with his colleagues and pupils, to translate the

332 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Descriptive Sociology. He tells me, to my surprise, that
all my books have now been translated into Russian with
the exception of the Descriptive Sociology, which will thus
soon be added to the list. Further he tells me that he has
proposed to the Historical Society of Kiev to make a like
classification and tabulation of Russian history. The name
of this Russian is Lontchitzice.

NEW YORK, May ig, 1876.

MY DEAR SPENCER : Your father's little work on In-
ventional Geometry is now in the hands of the printers,
and we shall bring out a neat edition of it in the form of
Macmillan's Science Primers, of which Hooker furnished
the last, on Botany. I propose to include the Inventional
Geometry in this series, and it will be the best of the lot,
although it involves too honest work to suit our teachers
and our habits. I trust it will have sale enough at any
rate to pay expenses, and in here and there a mind it will
bear fruit. I think you told me, when some time ago I
spoke of reprinting it, that you would make a little preface
for it, recognizing the benefit you had yourself derived from
its method. If you can now send me a few lines to that
effect, or saying whatever you wish about it, I shall be very
glad, as they will be valuable in drawing the attention of
teachers to the book and to the method it illustrates.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, September /j, 1876.
MY DEAR YOUMANS : I returned from Scotland about a
week since and am just getting into work again. . . . Since
I wrote last I have received a copy of the Italian transla-
tion of the Education, and also a copy of the translation of
three parts of it into Danish. The first part of the Ger-
man translation of Biology is, I believe, through the press.
The first volume of the Sociology is to be undertaken by
Dr. Vetter as soon as the Biology is out of hand, and he

Various Affairs. 333

will commence the Psychology as soon as this first volume
of the Sociology is issued.

A curious fact turned up the other day which will in-
terest or, at any rate, amuse you. I think I told you years
ago that the name Youmans, differently spelt Yeomans, is
not uncommon in Derbyshire. While staying at Derby a
few days on my way to the south, I fulfilled an intention I
have long entertained of going over to the village whence
our family came — Kirk Ireton, in Derbyshire — with the view
of tracing ancestry farther back than my great-great-
grandfather, respecting whom I have information in a law
deed. While in the village I observed within a stone's
throw of the house in which my grandfather was born a
sign with the name Geo. Yeomans on it. This is not all.
When I returned here, and was examining the law papers,
I found among them plans of some cottages that had be-
longed to our family in Kirk Ireton, with the tenant's name
written on the plans. One of the tenants' names was Yeo-
mans. So you see it is within the bounds of possibility
that our families came from the same neighbourhood, per-
haps from the same village.

I write this letter chiefly to intimate that I am back, and
shall be glad to hear from you.

In the course of 1876 it had become clear that the
rapid progress of chemical science necessitated a fresh
revision of the ever-popular Class-Book of Chemistry ;
so Youmans began the work, with Mr. Froebel and
Miss Shaw as assistants, and finished it in the course
of the next two years.

It was in this summer of 1876, one of the fiercest
seasons even of this land of sweltering heat, that Prof.
Huxley and his wife made their visit to the United
States. The visit was for recreation, and Huxley gave
no formal lectures except in New York, when he point-

334 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ed out the evidences for Darwinism furnished by sun-
dry newly found American fossils. His journey was
carried out according to the plan outlined in the fol-
lowing letter :

EDINBURGH, June 27, 1876.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : Your letter of the fourteenth
reached me this evening. My lectures in London begin on
October 4th, so that I must leave New York not later than
September 23d. I suppose a White Star sails on that day.
I have laid out my course roughly as follows, on the sup-
position that we arrive in New York at the end of the first
week in* August (that gives me just seven weeks clear) :

First week, Marsh's fossils, New Haven.

Second week, Agassiz, Newport.

Third week, Fiske, Petersham.

Fourth week, American Association, Buffalo.

Fifth week, tour to Nashville, taking Mammoth Cave on
the way.

Sixth week, Baltimore, where I am to give an address,
and Philadelphia.

Seventh week, lectures in New York. THREE !

I will take for lecture days September i8th, 2oth, 22d,
and be off on the 23d, leaving the whole population of
New York on the quay in tears at my departure.

Now I think this is behaving very properly. I quite
agree with you that I may as well give three lectures as
two, and the topic shall be the direct evidence of evolu-
tion. I cannot bring diagrams, so you must provide me
with blackboard space and abundant chalk. That is the
only stipulation I have to make; the rest you must arrange
at your own sweet will.

As to publication of the lectures, I would rather leave
the point open. Instead of getting the leisure I expected,
here I am harassed with another confounded commission
in the Scottish universities, which wastes half my time and

Various Affairs. 335

throws all my plans out of gear. Pray offer my best thanks
to Prof. Marsh for his courtesy ; I hope to avail myself of
it very largely.

At Buffalo my mouth shall drop nothing but buttered
pearls, such as we dispense at the British Association. My
wife and I will devote ourselves mainly to Niagara.
Ever, my dear Youmans, faithfully yours,

T. H. HUXLEY.

NEW YORK, September 15, 1876.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I think I told you that a gentle-
man in Wisconsin had offered to index your work for us.
He has sent us the index for the First Principles, which is
now in the printers' hands, and is well done. He is at pres-
ent occupied upon the Sociology, and we shall have that
ready so as not to hinder the printing.

This gentleman's name is Leland. I have had my eye
on him for five years as an assistant or co-worker, and
have now engaged him on my Cyclopaedia for two years.
He is now a cashier in a bank, is a thoroughgoing man of
business, a practiced bookkeeper, a writer on currency and
social reforms for The Nation and other periodicals, a good
practical geologist and botanist, and a man who has your
works almost by heart. He is a vigorous and steady worker,
and I count on his pulling me through, as I am badly break-
ing in the power of accomplishment. Although he will be
mainly occupied on the Cyclopaedia, Mr. Leland will give me
assistance on the Monthly, and wherever he can be of best
use.

We expect the Huxleys to come to-night. Huxley will
give his three lectures in New York next week, and sail
next Saturday. His tour has been a laborious ovation
rather than a restful vacation, for which he can blame no-
body but himself. If he had been less good-natured he
would have been more free.

336 Edward Livingston Youmans.

LONDON, January 16, 1877.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : The chapter which I have just com-
menced is The Family, and will contain a good deal of inter-
esting matter. In the first place, evidence of the relation
between polygamy and the militant state of the race and of
monogamy along with the rise of the industrial state ; fur-
ther, a criticism on the doctrines of Sir Henry Maine, show-
ing their inapplicability to all stages of society below the
pastoral, and showing why the family as it enters into mod-
ern civilizations acquired the traits derived from the pas-
toral state ; and further, an important contrast between the
fundamental principles of family ethics and the fundamental
principles of social ethics, indicating the evils which arise

from confusing the two.

NEW YORK, March 2, 1877.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have given a note to Mr. E. Mc-
Clintock, of Milwaukee, for yourself. He is a very nice
fellow, a profound mathematician, and stands very high in
the Northwest. His business is that of an insurance
actuary, and his head has broken down so that he has had
to stop. I think he was anxious to speak to you, but was
very modest about it.

A prejudice is growing up against me as a great fighter.
I am inclined to stop the controversial policy, and let things
shift for themselves, as it is less and less matter how they go.

The outlook is not clear. As an illustration of how flat
the book trade has been for the past six months, I may
mention that my five per cent on the International Series
yields me but three hundred dollars for the lot. But now
that we have a usurper foisted into the presidential chair
by sheer political trickery we may hope for more pros-
perity.

ARDTONISH TOWER, September 9, 1877.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I start south on next Thursday,
and expect to be in town next day. The last week has
been doing me great good.

Various Affairs. 337

I was amused by the applause of the Comtists. It is
droll to see them taking the proof that religions have all
arisen from ancestor worship as justification of the " re-
ligion of humanity." Hereafter I shall have to point out
how odd it is that Comte should have proposed a rehabili-
tation of ancestor worship at the very time when our eman-
cipation from it is becoming tolerably complete !

I was not sorry either to see them defending Noyes &
Co. against me. It will serve usefully to bring out the
contrast. Ever yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, LONDON, October 12, 1877.

DEAR BROTHER : The weather has been fine since my
arrival, unusually dry and bracing for London, and I have
both enjoyed it and improved by it. I have been out a
good deal, walked much, and driven some in the omnibus,
and altogether I feel a great deal better for the experience.
The stir and action was what I needed, and it comes now
in the best shape, as I make all my excursions with some
object.

Mr. Spencer, I think, looks extremely well, but he can-
not keep steadily at his work. It is probable that slight
circumstances derange him now more than formerly. He
talks of the possibility of his not being able to get through
with his enterprise, and proposes to outline some important
feature of his Principles of Morality at odd times, so that
this most important portion of his work shall not be left
blank in case of a breakdown. He is going very thor-
oughly through the Study of Sociology, revising it with a
view to style, proposing to make it his most perfect work
in this respect. It is funny that a volume which I bullied
him into preparing should be chosen for this honour. It is
interesting to look over the volume and see what thorough
work he is making with it ; every page is blackened with
erasures and slashings.

Edward Livingston Youmans.

LONDON, October /<?, 7^77.

MY DEAR WIFE : I have now been here a week and two
days. It seems as if it had been two months. As I wrote
to Jay, I am very glad I came. It was important for busi-
ness reasons, and it has afforded the break I needed, or at
all events the test of my condition, which it was important
I should have. And it turns out that there was a pretty bad
state of physical deterioration and lack of vigour. A cold
fastened upon me at first, and I have not been able to
throw it off. I am better of it, but it hangs about me and
almost unfits me for anything.

I have not seen the Tyndalls yet, as they have been out
of town and will not return till the last of next week. I
went with Mr. Spencer to the Huxleys' last Sunday evening,
and we had a very quiet hour and a half, there being no-
body there. They asked particularly after you, and Mrs.
Huxley referred repeatedly to the lunch you gave her.

Went down to King's, at Epping. I was miserable, and
could hardly get through it (and here comes Spencer, who
has taken up my case and is heading me off in everything
and fights my doing anything; and he says: "What! is
not one sheet enough ? I never saw anything like it. No
wonder you are so pale and miserable ! you don't know
what rest means.") The Huxley family is all well grown,
and they are very cosy. Huxley says he is very well, but
he does not look it. I have assigned a fortnight from to-
day on which to sail (in the Germanic), and shall probably
do so, but Spencer is strongly opposed to it> and insists
very emphatically on my staying.

LONDON, October 29, 1877.

DEAR SISTER : Nothing remains but to write, and there
is little to write of but personal experiences. These are
monotonously varied. On Friday I felt a little aching in
my right wrist in writing ; on Saturday it became very
painful to write. Saturday evening my arm became in-

Various Affairs. 339

tensely painful, and I began to grow anxious. I went to
bed, but did not sleep much, as my arm was never free
from pain. Sunday morning I was pretty badly off, and
was thoroughly scared. It was so much like the old at-
tack of inflammatory rheumatism I had in my forearm at
Saratoga that I began to contemplate another siege. I
could dress myself only with great difficulty, doing every-
thing with my left hand. My right wrist was much swoll-
en, and it pained me acutely to touch it. Spencer was in
a great fume. Lord, how he did give it to me at breakfast !
It was Sunday, and the day was splendid. He forbade my
going out. We were to dine at Busk's in the evening, and
that I had to give up. After preaching till he was tired
about my imprudence, etc., he went out to a druggist's
and had some liniment made, brought it in, and called
"Jeames," the waiter, who came. Then he told me to
" take off my coat," which with " Jeames's " help I did, and
it nearly killed me. Then the servant was ordered to rub
my arm with the liniment. The brute went at it and nearly
killed me. It was horribly excruciating, but he kept at it,
rubbing around the sore place, and finally I took it up my-
self, and by very gentle friction at first I was able, after a
time, to increase the friction, and in an hour the acute pain
was all gone. I repeated the process half a dozen times,
and in the evening was nearly all right again. While in
the morning I could hardly bend my fingers, at night I
could grasp firmly with my hand. I slept well ; and, al-
though the wrist is stiff and somewhat sore this morning, I
write with only a little aching. The swelling, however, is
not quite all gone yet. It is raining like great guns, and I
am again forbidden to go out. It is just as well. This
sitting in the house and doing nothing is a great thing,
and I think is doing me much good.

Spencer went to Busk's, and put his dressing-gown on
me over my coat before he left, and covered my pate with

34-O Edward Livingston Youmans.

his smoking-cap, and so I snoozed by the fire. I shall have
to abate my ambition to do things, and take it easier in this
wretched November till I can get out of it. ... Charles
Peirce isn't read much on this side. Clifford, however,
says he is the greatest living logician, and the second man
since Aristotle who has added to the subject something
material, the other man being George Boole, author of The
Laws of Thought. Clifford is in miserable health.

November 5, 1877.

MY DEAR SISTER: Yesterday morning Spencer asked
me if I would go over to see the Leweses in the afternoon,
as they were recently back from the country. So I went.
Coming back, he said he didn't go to Leweses any more on
Sunday unless to take a friend, but he lunched there not
infrequently, and they had it all to themselves without in-
terruption. There was not only great cordiality, but pro-
found respect and admiration for Spencer on the part of
the Leweses. I enjoyed it. I was more at my ease than
before, and could study them. They both look immensely
older, but are both intellectually strong. She is mortal
homely, but very attractive from the brightness of her face
when talking. She speaks, however, too deliberately, with
too studied an air, and almost a dash of self-consciousness.
The conversation was light, and did not run into discussion.
Mrs. Lewes asked after you and your work in regard to
children, expressing a hearty commendation of it, and say-
ing she had seen your Botany- and it interested her — all of
which, bear in mind, she certainly never got from me. A
sister of Lady Amberley came in with her husband, a Mr.
Howard, who will be an earl in a short time, and presently
we left. Spencer went to the club and I went to Huxley's
last evening.

/
Soon after his return to America he paid a visit to

a newly married niece at her home in Connecticut,

Various Affairs. 341

and upon getting home again to New York he wrote
her the following characteristic epistle :

NEW YORK, January /j>, 1878.

MY DEAR NIECE : It was both jolly and queer to find
you " settled," for it is only the other day that I saw you
brought out of the bedroom fresh, ruddy, and squalling,
when you at once became official rag baby for the neighbour-
hood. It seems about six weeks ago, and now you are at
the head of a concern yourself, and will be a grandmother
long before the century is out. So it did seem funny to see
you ruling an establishment on the Naugatuck under an
assumed name.

Yet I greatly enjoyed the visit, for, although it was a
sort of milestone showing how fast life is spinning away, I
did not allow this reflection to trouble me, but rather drew
encouragement from it that I am getting pretty nearly
through. . . .

I was glad to see that you had not gone through the
cooking school in vain. Stick to the subject ; keep at it.
I tell you that cooking and housekeeping make up the one
satisfying, happifying, and ever-paying thing for a woman.
Study it ; practice it ; improve it ; and make some one point
ahead at least every three days. The range plays a better
music than the piano, as time will show.

Few men realized so thoroughly and constantly as
Youmans to how vast an extent the physical, intellec-
tual, and moral elevation of mankind is going to be
effected by the simple, obscure, and unambitious
achievement of making the home comfortable and
.pleasant. Upon current political matters his judg-
ment was equally sound, and the relations between
cause and effect were quite clear to him.

342 Edward Livingston Youmans.

NEW YORK, January <?, 1878.

MY DEAR SPENCER: Times are still tight. The promise
of revived business which was made in autumn has not
been kept. To me things now look worse than ever. The
collapse that you feared would come crashing after the
war was escaped, but I fear the essential difficulty was only
postponed. The people have now leisure to contemplate
the stupendous rottenness of the whole greenback war
policy, by which they were sold to the speculators of the
world and buried under an avalanche of indebtedness.

The spirit of repudiation is rife among the people, and
in some places rampant and unchecked. How much sound-
ness remains in American financial feeling will be tested
by the result of the present tremendous effort to pay off
the national bonds in depreciated silver. Hence the con-
tinued depression and prostration of business and the har-
vest of bankruptcies and defalcations, in which the element
of fraud is so frequent and prominent as to cause wide-
spread alarm. There is continued inquiry about your
books, and I yesterday sent a letter to the West replying
to questions about new editions. People are very ignorant,
and there is no end to the work of explanation.

March 8, 1878.

Our country has entered upon the course of deliberate
repudiation. This is what I could not have believed pos-
sible, for I have always believed that, whatever else were
let go, the Americans would have maintained their trading
integrity on the simple ground of self-interest. You will
have in the Pall Mall Gazette of to-day the intelligence of
the passage of the Silver bill over the President's veto.*
When the veto message was read there was not a solitary
man in the House or in the Senate to say a good word for

* The reference is to the infamous Bland bill.

Various Affairs. 343

it, which is wholly unprecedented in the history of such
transactions, and, moreover, gives the clue to the present
wretched situation. The President has not a friend in
either party. He was swindled into his place, and every-
body knows it — a fact which strips him of all real weight
and influence. The consequence has been a sort of de-
moralization of parties which has made it possible for the
wealthy mining interests of the West to enter the field and
carry all before them. Had Tilden been inaugurated there
would not have been the shadow of a chance of the present
scandalous result. He would have wielded his party with
its strong majority in the House, so that the question of
paying our bonds in depreciated currency would not even
have been opened. But with the imbecility of the Admin-
istration and the chaotic condition of parties that has come
from it the measure was rushed through with as much favour
on one side as on the other.

As for myself, I am just now pretty well, but have not
been worth much for some time back. I am fortunate in
one thing : my brother is very efficient ; and as he acquires
experience and confidence, he gives me great relief. He
takes the brunt of the Monthly, and is helping vigorously
on the Cyclopaedia, which goes slowly, but is still moving.

I have recently taken up my violin f for the first time
in a systematic way. I got a teacher — a young German-
American — a trained and skilful player, who knows the
thing through and through, and is as stupid as a brute in
all that pertains to teaching. So I have the double absorp-
tion of mechanical practice and picking explanations out

f Mr. Spencer, in his anxiety for his friend's health some time previous
to this, had sought out and presented to Mr. Youmans an excellent old
English fiddle, believed to be the work of the famous maker the elder
Foster. It did, indeed, afford him some diversion, and revived pleasant
early associations. The instrument is greatly prized by a favourite nephew,
to whom it was bequeathed, and who has made considerable progress in
music, in accordance with his uncle's wish.

344 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of the teacher. He takes pupils, and follows the business
of instruction, and is strong in his blind and absurd rules,
so that I have made good proficiency in his hands. Un-
fortunately, bad habits being worse than no habits, and not
being very plastic myself, I get on slowly, but have re-
covered some of the facility in execution which I had thirty
years ago, and am making practice already a source of
considerable amusement. My only difficulty is that I can-
not get the time needed.

Your papers have been received with general expres-
sions of interest and commendation, but there have been
no notices so full as to be worth sending. Peirce (of the
Logic, you know) was so pleased with the article on
Trophies that he bought the whole set of Descriptive
Sociologies.

CHAPTER XVI.

WINTER IN THE RIVIERA.

1878-1879. Age 57-58'

IT is evident that by 1878 Mr. Youmans's vital
power had been diminished far more than I realized
at the time. He was not wont to complain or to talk
much about his ailments, and that glorious vigour of
emphasis which was the outcome of his whole-souled
enthusiasm never flagged. It was difficult to asso-
ciate such a voice and such energy with anything short
of giant strength. I remember once mentioning to
Mr. Spencer that I had lately found Youmans in fine
condition ; but when Spencer, in his next letter, reported
this to Youmans with congratulations, our friend tersely
replied, " If Fiske thought I was well it was because
he mistook noise for health."

It was in the autumn of 1878 that I first noticed in
that face, usually so bright and beaming, a weary and
haggard look which gave me some anxiety. Too
many labours and cares, prolonged with little or no
respite, were doing their work. This led Spencer to
insist upon Youmans joining him in a vacation journey
in the south of France. How they fared will appear
in the course of the following correspondence :

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, July 22, 1878.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: I have seen a good deal of Prof.
Marsh while he has been over here, and had the opportunity

(345)

346 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of showing him some civility by asking him to join a pic-
nic at Weybridge that I gave this year to some dozen or
more friends (as I did also last year). He seemed to en-
joy it much, and is, as I gather, enjoying his stay here
greatly. He is evidently doing very careful work in the
preparation of his monographs on these fossil types and
promises to do good service for us.

How are you bearing the heat ? I see from the accounts
that in America people have been suffering greatly. You
ought to get away to some bracing seaside place, and both
escape the heat and take some rest, lolling about on the
sands and cultivating idleness. There is one part of culture
which it seems to me you have not duly regarded and which
I commend to you, namely, the culture of passive recep-
tivity in respect of surrounding impressions — that kind of
mood of mind which takes its enjoyment in lying on the
grass on a sunny day looking up through the trees.

If you happen to get hold of a newly published work
entitled The People of Turkey, by a Consul's Daughter,
you will find in Volume II, pages 200-202, a passage that
will interest you. It gives an account of a school estab-
lished and carried on by an intelligent Greek who, educated
in Germany, is founding his system of teaching upon my
books ; and you will find it stated that his methods, having
proved successful, " will eventually be adopted in all the
educational establishments of the Greeks." It is curious
to find that people in Greece, as well as in Russia, both of
which places we regard as in so uncivilized a state, are
showing themselves so much more receptive than Western
people.

You do not say anything about coming over to the meet-
ings of the association. Depend upon it, a sea voyage
would, as before, do you a great deal of good, and probably
be in the end an economy of time.

Winter in the Riviera. 347

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., September 2*] \ 1878.

I wish I could make you more fully realize the fact than
you generally do that care for health and the relaxation
needed to put yourself in better state are really demanded
by regard for your work, and that you will in the long run
be able to do much more in discharging your obligations
if you do not persist in working when ill than if you do
persist. In fact, it seems to me that now you are running
considerable risk of failing altogether to do what you have
undertaken to do, as well as bringing upon yourself other
evils, and that regard for the interests of the Appletons,
as well as your own interests, should make you decide upon
taking a good holiday. Pray come over here as soon as
you can, and after spending a month with me here, which
would give you the opportunity of looking after various
matters, you might then accompany me for a couple of
months to the shores of the Mediterranean.

If you could make up your mind to come with me and
do a little idling in pleasant places, I am convinced that
you would find it in the long run a great economy of time.
As to not seeing how such things are possible, I hold it to
be an instance of the absurd fanaticisms of men like your-
self who think that the one thing impossible is to let busi-
ness go by default, and that the only thing possible is to
sacrifice health and life to it.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., October jo, 1878.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I am looking forward with some
anxiety to the receipt of a letter from you, which I suppose
cannot now be much longer delayed.

Pray yield to my pressure, and to the pressure which I
doubt not others also put upon you. You have always on
past occasions been glad that you came over, and if you
act upon the induction, which you may reasonably do, you
may conclude that you will afterward be glad if you come

348 Edward Livingston Youmans.

over now. My going abroad will very much be determined
by your answer. It is quite out of the question for me to
go alone, for I am convinced, judging from past experience,
that if I did go I should be in a short time so weary of my
solitary state, relieved only by my work and walking about,
that I should shortly come back again. With you, however,
it would be different. I should enjoy the journey much,
and, I doubt not, derive great benefit from it.

You will see that the Academy says that I am going to
Algiers, but this is a mistake. Algiers has been one of the
places I have talked about and which it appears has been
remembered by the gossips who circulate and publish these
statements ; but I have decided in favour of the south of
France, moving along the Mediterranean shore from place
to place, from Marseilles to Nice and Mentone.

Pray come and join me. For once in your life resolve
to take a little pleasure and relaxation. You have not so
very great a length of life left that you can with wisdom
put it off. You should remember that you have not only
got to do your work, but you have got to live ; and ever
since I have known you you have been thinking only of
the work and never of the living.

NEW YORK, November 75-, 1878.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I have decided to spare two months
to be with you, and this is also the amount of time that you
proposed to me to spend in France. When I got your last
letter I at first thought I would telegraph you and then
take the first ship ; but I did not know when you would be
prepared to leave, and it might be some time yet. If you
wish to leave London before the holidays, telegraph me as
soon as this comes. In that case I shall try to take the
Germanic, December yth.

I must, however, say again, that I am in a miserable
condition for such an expedition, and will probably give
you as much occupation in dragging me around as you

Winter in the Riviera. 349

will want. It will certainly alleviate your monotony, if
that is the main thing. I will try not to bore you with the
matters that are occupying my own mind, and which I
shall hope to forward somewhat by this break and cutting
loose from other things. There is a good deal of such
talk over here as Bob Lowe has given utterance to in the last
Contemporary about sociology, and it must be met. More-
over, it is the coming subject, and an important one to
prepare for. I have not much more work in me, but I
would like to direct the remnant that way, and shall want
to ask you a lot of questions. Nothing but the desire to
be in some way useful to yourself in promoting your work,
and at the same time of helping myself in the way proposed,
would induce me to encounter another winter passage
across the Atlantic. But I will be ready when I hear from
you.

NEW YORK, December 3, 187 8.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I got your peremptory dispatch
on Friday, and immediately set about making arrangements
to comply with it. No ship at all encouraging for this sea-
son was going immediately, and the best I could do was to
take passage in the Germanic for Saturday next (December
7th), which I hinted to you in a telegram yesterday.

The death of Mr. Lewes is announced ; was it not unex-
pected ? I know he has not been in very good health, but
I supposed he had learned to take care of himself, and
being not old, I have been accustomed to think that he
would be good for another decade.

In her own low condition of health, the loss of her hus-
band must be very severely felt by Mrs. Lewes.

STEAMSHIP GERMANIC, December 16, 1878.

DEAR BROTHER : . . . Near Liverpool — nobody knows
how near — supposed to be about five miles off, at anchor in
a dense fog. Should have landed at seven o'clock. The
sun shines brightly, and I suppose the fog is perhaps thirty

35° Edward Livingston Youmans.

or forty feet deep, but it is as thick as pea soup, and we
can't see ten feet from the ship. No wind and no pros-
pect of change. The express we calculated on taking
leaves at eleven. Everybody was up early, but some have
gone back to bed, and some to their cards, and many are
profaning on deck. I telegraphed Spencer from Queens-
town, " Due Tuesday afternoon in London." Impossible.
Vicissitudes of travel.

LONDON, December 18, 1878.

DEAR SISTER : I got off at Liverpool at half past one ;
got through the customhouse at ten minutes of two ; got
to Lime Street Station at two ; got the train with not a
second to spare, and got into London at half past eight, the
train being an hour behind time. Spencer met me at the
door. He is very well, and was ready to start on the in-
stant for the Continent. Everything was ready, tickets
taken through, circular notes procured, etc. . . . We shall
be off at nine to-morrow morning by Dover and Calais to
Paris, where we spend one day, and then take the night
train for Marseilles, and that is all I know. I expect it
will be two months to a day, and he proposes to spend
about a week in a place. Miss Shickle is to send his post
to him, so in future you will write to me here, directing
37 Queen's Gardens, and no time will be lost or extra ex-
pense in early sending through Layton. ... I shall be
put through like anything, but I guess it will do me good.
I have no time to write another line. Love to all.

LONDON, December 20, 2878.

DEAR SISTER: We started two hours ago from 37,
wrapped and packed as if we were going to Greenland. It
was as dark as midnight, the gas being lit in the streets,
and even then we could hardly get round. I am now
writing in the Charing Cross Station, with one gas burner
about seven feet above me, and the room is so dark the
people can scarcely be seen. We were to take the train

Winter in the Riviera. 351

for Folkestone and Boulogne at 10.30. Got here, and
found it leaves at 1.40. Spencer had erred a week in his
consultation of the tables. He came all the way over
here to get a revised table, and then read it wrong. He
has a cold and a little sore throat, and slept last night with a
respirator on, by which he breathes through a mass of wire
gauze like a regenerator in a caloric engine. He wears it
all the time now. He was awfully cut up about the stu-
pidity of his proceeding, which will work in my favour in
future. It is quite providential. He was not disposed to
leave me alone here for three hours, but I just bullied
him to go to the Athenaeum Club, which is close by, and
toast his shins by a warm fire, get a good hot lunch, and
then come here just in time to leave. We get into Paris at
11.20 P.M. Bailliere, Alglave, and Ribot are to breakfast
with us to-morrow morning, and Ribot has engaged places
for to-morrow night's train for Marseilles. 1 groped my
way over to Macmillan's, go-t the last number of Nature,
and a phrase book for French. Then went to Williams &
Norgate, and had a good chat with Williams, who is a very
nice man, and has Spencer's books in special charge. He
spoke very warmly about my coming, and said it was of
great moment to Spencer, whose whole trouble is with his
spirits. I have something very interesting to say to you
about his forthcoming work, but must postpone it now.

HYERES, FRANCE, December 24, 1878.

DEAR SISTER : I said I should write a history of our
tour, but it will never be written, because such experiences
as we have had cannot be written. The Mediterranean
was a priori to Spencer, and I hope all his philosophy is not
like it, for results do not accord with predictions. We had
a great time getting here, our two portmanteaus costing
us more trouble than we could get in America out of the
movement of ten trunks to Winona ; we were chasing and
waiting for parties who could not understand us at Bou-

352 Edivard Livingston Youmans.

logne, Paris, Lyons, Toulon, and this place (pronounced
He-air!). We have been freezing to death all the way from
London, but hoping constantly for the land of warmth, and
we haven't found it yet. There are orange trees loaded
with uneatable oranges, and there are palms, olives, and
numberless tropical fruits, but it is as cold as Greenland
still ; it don't feel like a tropical country.

It is a poor country supported by English visitors. The
hotel is called " Le Grand Hotel des lies d'Or " (Isles of
Gold). That is, you climb a hill behind through a garden,
and thence see some islands of the Mediterranean, which
are about three miles off. So the hotel takes its name
from the isles. . . . We are resting, giving the animal a
chance. Spencer will let me do nothing but walk and eat.
Can't read or write. Have to steal moments to write
letters, and hence haven't written much. He is working
like ten horses in quest of what he came for — relaxation !
So we walked two hours this afternoon on the piazza,
seventeen feet long and ten feet wide, passing each other
at every turn. Lord, how the people stared ! But Spencer
didn't care, and I am sure I shall never see them again.

Friday, December 2jth.

The morning is pleasanter ; it has stopped raining; and
now we shall have to start through the mud in quest of the
" rest " we are after. Spencer is the same and not the
same; his qualities abide, but they grow; while not relax-
ing a jot of his theoretic laissez faire, he is still more irri-
tably denunciatory of people doing as they can and may.
He meddles with me, and interferes with me, and criticises
me, and takes care of me, all for my good, of course, in the
most assiduous manner. I am beginning to count on
momentary escape from his vigilance to do a little writing
or reading. — At this point he came for a walk, " a slight
ramble of half an hour." It was very wet and muddy, but
we rambled through the lanes and alleys, up and around

Winter in the Riviera. 353

the side of the mountain behind us, climbing for an hour,
steady pull. Then he struck off into an obscure path that
promised more direct descent. We lost the path, and lost
our way, and had to plunge down a steep, broken, rocky,
muddy side of the great hill full of gorges and deep chan-
nels. It was an old olive orchard, old and half dead; the
trees are about the si?e of apple trees, and their tops look
as if covered with sage leaves. We got back after a two
hours' tramp, and I was quite used up. Then we had
"breakfast" at twelve o'clock. Then another tramp of
twenty minutes, at the end of which I back out. He has
gone on, but will be back for me to get another pull before
dinner. This is the history now, with nothing for diversion
but to hear these Englishmen quarrel over the comparative
merits of the different stopping places along the coast and
the different hotels. There is nothing of interest in it all
to me, except so far as it may become promotive of hy-
gienic advantage to Spencer and myself. He professes
great benefit already, boasting of eight hours' sleep the three
previous nights each, and he falls asleep almost every time
he sits down. He slept nearly all the time in the cars, and
is evidently making up for his past losses. If nothing
happens, it will undoubtedly do him great good.

... I promised to write of his Morals, which is to be a
great thing, of course, though I have not seen it. Four
chapters are in type, and all is done, or mostly done, but
the last three chapters of the Data of Ethics. He will
publish it in a volume in April / I judge that it is to be
immense, from the titles of his chapters which he has re-
hearsed to me. He is now revising the first four chapters,
but will not let me see them till they are all corrected and
all together, which it will take two or three weeks to bring
about. It will now begin to be seen what "evolution" is
for, and I find the main reason why he has jumped over to
ethics is that people had got tired of waiting for some
16

354 Edivard Livingston You mans.

result, and the ethical writers — mainly Sidgwick, of Cam-
bridge— have said, " After all, morality is found to have
nothing to do with evolution." / can begin to see that it
does, and how it does. . . . Here comes Spencer, bullying
me for writing, and I tell him this is the last letter I will
write in the next seven weeks.

HYERES, FRANCE, December ji, 1878,

It is the last day of the year, our last day in this place.
We shall leave to-morrow for Cannes fifty miles distant,
and what it will turn out to be I neither know nor care, so
we get away from here. One Englishman said last night,
" This is a beastly, stinking hole," which is an accurate
description of the place. ... I slept but little last night,
owing to the mosquitoes, which are abundant, and fiercer
than at home. It is still rainy, cloudy, and muddy, so as
to make going out a misery ; yet we go out vigorously and
regularly and with long pulls. I hope in the coming places
we shall have better walking, but come what will, there is
to be but seven weeks more of it. And when wre shall
have had a week's experience each of seven more "beastly,
stinking holes," I shall have had enough of this region.
" Knowest thou the land ? " Certainly I do — all I want
to. We go this afternoon three miles to the seaside by
rail, and back on foot, to see some Roman antiquities ! ! !

I have packed, and it is no small job ; ready to move
to-morrow. And we leave a sad lot at the Hotel of the
Golden Isles — all consumptive, or attending upon some-
body who has consumption. I have not seen the first case
of anybody who came here for pleasure alone. . . . We
have had our last dig through the mud of this miserable
region, wandering here and there in search of a dryer place,
and always finding a worse one. But I think there is
virtue in the exertion. It seems to me I am better for it;
and Spencer insists that I am growing stronger, but he is
interested in bulling this Mediterranean stock. Spencer

Winter in the Riviera. 355

has received no letters in five days, and he is greatly
excited at somebody's derelictions. I have heard nothing
yet, but suppose it is not time, and there is probably noth-
ing to hear. When I get to Cannes, if the circumstances
allow it, I expect to begin work, in subordination, however,
to my picking-up errand. Spencer is very well. This
agrees with him. He liltes to walk and to talk and to
teach, and will sit down in the wet anywhere, and at any
time, to give an explanation. He is a good teacher, but it
is iate — the last of 1878 — late to be still taking lessons.

CANNES, FRANCE, January 2, 1879.

DEAR SISTER : We left Hyeres New Year's morning, at
10.45, for this place, stopping at Toulon an hour to wait
for the Nice train, and got breakfast at 12.30 at a common,
cheap cafe". It was a new experience, and interesting.
Everything was clean, and-the cooking was excellent. The
provision was doubly abundant. First, cold ham, bread
and butter; second, free wine; third, fish; fourth, a chop
with beans (pods); fifth, beefsteak pudding; sixth, me-
ringue ; seventh, Roquefort cheese and fruit. Price, 2
francs.

We got into Cannes a little after four o'clock ; it had a
different air from " He-air." It is a rich, prosperous water-
ing place — a kind of Saratoga on a side hill. We passed
along the Mediterranean coast some distance, shooting
through gorges and tunnels as the ridges ran down to
the water. The rocks are old red, and the shore is broken,
indented with bluff, picturesque rocks.

Spencer had telegraphed for rooms at the Hotel Mont
Fleury (Hotel of the Flowery Mountain). We were the sole
passengers in its omnibus. We started, and went a mile
straight through a narrow street, very narrow, level, and
unattractive. This flat part of the town is broken up into
patches with chateaus surrounded by trees and low walls.
People may look in, but they must be kept out. Then we

356 Edward Livingston Youmans.

began to rise, and when we had got up twenty feet there
was a big hotel (Congress). We went round the end of it
and up fifteen or twenty feet higher, and then round the
end of another hotel (States), then round that, up another
little hitch, back farther to the Hotel of the Flowery
Mountain. Altogether there is about as much mountain as
Chester Hill. As soon as we had got up Spencer proposed
we should go to the paste restante for letters ; so we started
back on foot, and found the mud worse than at " He-air."
It was an awful pull. No letters; and when I got back I
was so used up I could hardly get to the room. Table
d'hote at 6.30. A small sally mangy for so large a house,
which is full, though there seems to be nobody in it — no
piazzas, areas, parlours, or places of parade. We were
awfully jammed at table, and nearly suffocated from the
closeness of the room. — At this point Spencer comes to
start out back of the house up to whatever we may find,
... It grew steeper, and we wandered round for an hour
up muddy, long roads and paths to the summit, which gives
a fine view of the town beneath and the bay, as well as of
some distant mountains. The scenery is fine and clear, and
the air mild and very pleasant. . . . The place is quiet, and
both Spencer and myself slept well last night, having mos-
quito nets which were effectual — the first time, Spencer
says, he ever slept under one. — Back again from another
pull. This time it has been through the town, but it is
all the same. The mistral to-day has dried the mud, and
the walking is better, but I am utterly tired out. It
would seem as though this would either kill or cure. I am
abundantly conscious of the stupidity of all I have been
writing, but there seems nothing else to say or talk about.

Spencer pegs away at his revising an hour or two a day,
but is greatly and continuously disgusted at not getting
letters, having had but one or two in a week from Eng-
land. As anything written within ten days after I started

Winter in the Riviera. 357

would be here by this time, I conclude nothing was written,
and it is a satisfaction to think there was no occasion for
it. Prices here are frightful. I told Spencer his frolic
would turn out expensive. He replied, " It would merely
make so much less to be left and spent on the Descriptive
Sociology " — with which he is evidently getting tired.

CANNES, FRANCE, January 7 or 8, 1879.

We have now been a week in Cannes, and leave here to-
morrow. We have had five beautiful days here that have
been both enjoyable and profitable. I am undergoing a
sharp discipline ; and what between a" revolutionized diet,
cessation of smoking, and triple my former exercise, I ought
to pick up. — At this point I was meddled with by my laissez-
faire friend, and now resume at Nice. And it would take a
big book to tell it all. It is now Wednesday, and I should
think must be the loth. We started yesterday morning
from Cannes, and got to Nice in an hour. . . .

I had a fire in my room last night, but could not get
warm till toward morning. Routed at eight as usual, but,
thank Goodness ! it rains so hard we can't go out. So we
have fires in our respective rooms, and Spencer has just been
in to show me how to bring the table round close to the
little fireplace, and then put one side of the rug in the
chair and wrap it round my legs, so as not to utterly freeze
to death before the fire.

I spoke to you about Spencer's new work, The Data of
Ethics. I have not seen it yet, as the corrections of the
first four chapters have not come. But I have got the
titles of the chapters, and now send them. When they are
published the question will cease to be asked, " What has
evolution to do with morality ? "

This is the first systematic, scientific treatment of
ethics, and its effect will be to rank morality with the sci-
ences, to give it the intrinsic authority of science, and to
vindicate evolution againSt the sceptical cui bono.

358 Edward Livingston Youmans.

NICE, FRANCE, January 13, 1879.

DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER : . . . To-day has been
very fine. I had a long walk in the morning, and another
this afternoon. Mr. Spencer went off by rail to Mentone
to-day to reconnoitre for a place, as we propose not to
jump in again so suddenly. I took advantage of his ab-
sence to write an editorial, which I mail to Jay to-day. I
shall try and squeeze out another in time for the March
Monthly. . . .

MENTONE, January 27, iSfq.

DEAR SISTER : . . . I have not seen a paper from the
United States these three weeks, and am therefore in the
dark as to weather there — as well as everything else. But
perhaps it is best; as, if there were home news, I should
inevitably be reading it, and my eyes are very bad. Spen-
cer doctors them often and vigorously, but the muscular
tone is low, and is kept so low by the depressing weather
that congestion continues. If the weather should clear up
I think it would find me better. I use my eyes the least
possible, and read but very little. Nor do I write much,
but jot down various things. If we could have bright, ex-
hilarating weather, I should be able to get some things in
shape soon to use. Since Spencer has commenced working
with my eyes and begins really to find out in how bad a
state the left eye is, he is very vehement against my read-
ing at all, or even writing. He says : " I never saw a per-
son subject to such changes of aspect; sometimes your
face looks coloured and healthy, and at other times pale,
flabby, and haggard ; and from what I can see it is reading
that makes the change. It is clear to me that you will have
to stop writing and go to lecturing." — At this point he
came, and we had an hour and a half of digging through
the mud.

As for leaving, I am ready and anxious, but Spencer re-
sists it, saying he is not coming down here for nothing.

Winter in the Riviera. 359

We don't talk much about it, but he is determined to have
his time out, and thinks it will be best for me to stick to it
also, and I should agree with him if the weather were
favourable for improvement.

I have now quite given up hearing anything from home,
and content myself with the consciousness that no news is

good news.

MENTONE, January jo, 1879.

MY DEAR MOTHER: It is a magnificent morning, but I
am so tired from yesterday's jaunt that I shall not go out
with Spencer to tramp ; and although I am writing but little,
and not reading at all, I will use the interval to send you a
few words.

The weather has changed, the clouds are gone, and now
everybody begins to cry out from the heat. And at mid-
day it is tremendous — that is, the sun has immense power,
and in walking one sweats as if mowing. We went on a
four hours' tramp yesterday afternoon. The first three
hours I suffered much from the heat, but at four o'clock
the sun went behind the clouds, and the temperature
dropped instanter, so that the cold penetrated and chilled
me despite all efforts at brisk walking, and I, moreover,
got a cold, which kept me coughing during the night. We
have to exercise great care here from the extremes of the
weather ; not that they are greater than at home, but that
we are easier thrown off our guard. We yesterday clam-
bered up a mountain to an old village of stone houses, with
narrow, steep streets, and everything tumbling down, so that
it looked as if people could not possibly stay in it. The
village is probably fifteen hundred years old, if not more,
was built by the Romans, and occupied by the Saracens,
who ravaged all this coast. There are the remains of an
old ruined, tumble-down castle, which many people come
up to visit, but it did not interest me. The squalor and
wretchedness of the inhabitants, however, was dreadful, and
yet in the midst of it there was a Catholic church all gilt

360 Edward Livingston Youmans.

and decked out in great style. All the ground hereabout
is terraced, and in many places the dirt is brought in to
make rooting for vines and other plants. Water is their
great trouble ; it is saved everywhere, in stone tanks
of all sizes, and every little trickling rill is led along a
stone water course to where it can be made useful for irri-
gation. The steep hills are all worked up in this way ;
the necessities of a poor population for probably thou-
sands of years continually having led to the utilization of
every foot. But what I meant to say to you and pa, when
I sat down, was that you must look out for the cold espe-
cially in the mornings, when the pulse is lowest. Be careful
of exposure, and take a little stimulus every morning before
you get out of bed. February and March are trying
months, and people's brains are given them to take care

with.

MENTONE, Febi uary 4, 1879.

DEAR SISTER : Last night there came four of your
letters of December iQth, 23d, 27th, and 3ist, two later
ones having been received three or four days ago when I
wrote you last. . . .

I am getting up an appetite for exercise, and regret
that it is raining to-day, so that I have to keep indoors.
Yesterday morning we walked an hour and a half, part way
up hill ; and in the afternoon we took a tramp to a mon-
astery on a distant eminence, with a good deal of steep
climbing. It was a two hours' pull, and I kept up and
came out of it not at all used up. It is my improvement
in this which makes Spencer think if I would follow his
directions in all things implicitly I would be born again.
. . . Spencer will not budge from here till the time is up,
and gets angry if I propose going before. He also insists
that I should stop a month in London, and have not less
than a three months' break. Hearing nothing, and not
being stirred up with home difficulties, I have been in-
clined to listen to his syren song, and hurry nothing. But

Winter in the Riviera. 361

your letter dissipates the illusion, and I must get back to
work as promptly as possible. What a year of continuous
outdoor life and activity, and total, abstinence from books,
might do for my eyes I can't say ; it would no doubt im-

prove them, at any rate.

LONDON, March /, 1879.

DEAR BROTHER : I wrote and sent out to be posted for
Thursday's mail an editorial to go first in the April
Monthly. I now send a review of Bain's new book.

You will thus eke out another month. I have not
heard whether the Germanic has arrived, but presume she
has, and that she will go Thursday, and at all events I ex-
pect to leave here Wednesday afternoon for Liverpool.
The weather continues simply detestable, and I have been
feeling very sharply the effects of it ; but it is a little
better to-day, and I feel it decidedly. I have been bothered
to snatch intervals to get these things done, for Spencer
watches me constantly and will listen to nothing. He does
not know that I have written anything for the Monthly.

STEAMER GERMANIC, March 7,
MY DEAR SPENCER : I had a pleasant ride to Liverpool
on time, with a lively, fresh companion, a Methodist, who
vigorously undertook my conversion. He began thus: "If
we smash up, sir, are you insured — I don't mean in the
accident company, but in the Grand Salvation Insurance
Company ? No ? Then I have the advantage of you ; I
took out a policy twenty years ago." I told him there was
a great deal of bogus insurance nowadays, and gave him
the history of my father's experience in being swindled by
a fraudulent fire insurance company, and then put it to
him as a necessary business precaution that the validity of
the corporation and the soundness of the transaction
should be looked into. Being a business man he saw the
point, and I had a great deal of fun with him.

362 Edward Livingston Yonmans.

NEW YORK, March 18, 1879.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I am back again safe, sound, and
satisfied. My return was even finer than my passage over,
the sea being like a lake the whole distance.

I find all well here and enjoying the opening of the
spring. The sky is clear and the sun bright, although it is
still cold. My brother has improved a great deal as a con-
sequence of taking responsibility, and I mean he shall get
still further benefit from it. I found the Appletons in a
very pleasant mood, but have not yet had time to broach
business. There are many things to attend to, some of
which have been neglected.

NEW YORK, June j, 1879.

MY DEAR SPENCER : To-day rounds me up to fifty-
eight, and I am making a holiday of it, which gives quite a
new sensation. It amounts to little practically, as I am
good for nothing to work anyway, being again crippled,
confined, and suffering a good deal of pain by a rheumatic
relapse of my right foot. I had been better for some days
so that I could get about comfortably, though unable to
wear an ordinary shoe.

The Chicago Times printed my reply to Van Buren
Denslow and I sent you a copy.

You are of course aware before this of the " strike "
Fiske has made with his new lectures in Boston, and which
has led to a repetition in London. If he succeeds there it
will be a great card for him.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYS WATER, W., June 20, 1879.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: That was a capital letter of yours
in the Chicago paper. The points were all admirably
grasped and clearly put. A better expositor I cannot im-
agine. It is clear to me from this letter, and from all the
various things you have from time to time written, that the
lectures you have been scheming would be admirably

Winter in the Riviera. 363

adapted to convey general conceptions of the doctrine of
evolution to the public mind ; and further, that besides put-
ting them so clearly and simply you would make them ex-
tremely interesting. It seems to me that you cannot do a
better thing than carry out your plans in that direction,
and, at any rate for a time, drop other matters. I have no
doubt that the better mood of mind that would arise, alike
from the different mode of life as well as from the successes
that I doubt not would result, would more than anything
else conduce to your improved health.

Now that I am not with you and cannot play the bully
over you daily, I see you are relapsing into your old mal-
practices. So far from abiding by the principle of doing all
your writing by dictation, you seem to me to be going more
in the opposite direction, for the last three letters I have
had from you have been in your own hand. However, it is
no use saying anything.

LONDON, July 4, 1879.

Fiske's lectures at University College ended satisfac-
torily, and were greatly applauded at the close. He and
Holt and I have had two country excursions, one to Rich-
mond and one to Windsor.

October /, /(?/<?.

I am glad to find you writing in a more cheerful style,
and hope that your more sanguine view of your state will
be borne out by the results. I was glad to see in the last
number of the Monthly that you are notifying publicly
your intention of resuming lecturing. In a certain measure
it commits you, and will serve to decide you in favour of
that course when otherwise you might hesitate.

I do not see why you should have grown " morbidly
timorous about speaking of your [my] views?" So far as
I remember, you have always been perfectly correct in your
statements, and extremely lucid. Even when it has been a
mathematical question you have done extremely well.

364 Edward Livingston Youmans.

April iq, 1880.

I got this morning the two copies of the New York
Times, and read with amusement and satisfaction the ac-
count of the row at Yale College that has been produced
by the introduction of the Study of Sociology as a text-
book. Very probably this local fight will set going a gen-
eral fight, which will be highly advantageous no doubt.

NEW YORK, May n, 1880.

MY DEAR SPENCER : Your suggestions regarding the
Yale College affair come in the nick of time. I had an
editorial in type on the subject which was not very satis-
factory, and your hints enabled me to improve it. The
Yale College flurry is over, so far as exciting public criticism
is concerned, but the antagonism is deep, and will quietly
deepen still more.

I am getting sensibly stronger and feeling better, but I
am old, sore, and decrepit in my legs and feet. I walk,
however, considerably and increasingly, and hope to gain
permanently by it. But I suspect an early old age is upon
me, and that I must go tottering through my remnant of
days.

I am rejoiced to hear that you are not only holding out
well but are advancing, so that you can again take hold.
Don't you think you can take your vacation next year on
the Rocky Mountains ? I want to cross the continent very
much, but hate to go alone. Meditate upon it. Our claim
is at least as good as that of Egypt.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, May 26, 1880.
MY DEAR YOUMANS: I was glad to have so good an
account of you in point of health. By all means keep up
your exercise. If you can do that, and increase it little by
little, I should think you will gradually get rid of the rem-
nant of mischief arising from your rheumatic affection.

Winter in the Riviera. 365

If, as I suppose, there are deposits and stiffenings, these,
providing you do not again bring on an attack, will in
course of time, under fit regimen, decrease gradually. Are
you thinking of making any lecturing excursion ? If you
could do it with moderation, and make everything subor-
dinate itself to your physical requirements, it might prove
beneficial in all respects; for a little excitement of that
kind, being, I have no doubt, to you pleasurable, would
benefit your physical state.

Fiske and his wife are coming to lunch with me to-day,
and I have asked Masson to meet them. Fiske has given
two lectures at the Royal Institution, but I have not heard
either. I was out of town when the first was delivered,
and yesterday, when the second was delivered, my attend-
ance at an Athenaeum committee was imperative. Huxley
spoke with praise of the first lecture.

As to coming over to you, I have so much to do, and
the three months' absence in Egypt during the winter has
retarded me so much, that I cannot think of it at present.
I must (after sundry smaller matters are got out of hand)
continue the Political Institutions and complete and publish
the part before I think of anything in the shape of a long
holiday.

CHAPTER XVII.

LAST YEARS.
December, 1880, to January, 1887. Age, 59-65.

DURING the years 1880 and 1881 Mr. You mans
was working with customary vigour in behalf of inter-
national copyright. Questions connected with this
subject grew out of his work in Europe ten years be-
fore, in establishing the International Scientific Series.
In 1871 Mr. W. H. Appleton had taken a decided
stand in favour of international copyright, and was
powerfully supported and re-enforced by Youmans,
who returned to the subject again and again, and did
excellent service in arousing and instructing public
opinion.

A letter from Tyndall shows that before the end
of 1880 the question of Youmans's health was becom-
ing serious :

LONDON, December 29, 1880.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : We this day laid the remains of
George Eliot in the Highgate Cemetery, and this morning,
while I was preparing to join the band of mourners, your
letter reached me. A large and reverent crowd surrounded
the grave as the coffin, loaded with garlands, was let down
into it.

Last night, at Kew, I had a long conversation with Asa
Gray regarding the trust, and he, I confess, dissipated a
good deal of the fear that I entertained as regards the
trouble imposed upon the trustees. Your letter this morn-

(366)

Last Years. 367

ing comes in the nick of time to confirm my desire to leave
the trust in the form originally contemplated. The ar-
rangement you have made is in the highest degree satis-
factory.

We did, as you surmise, return from the Alps strong
and well. I am glad that you liked the address upon the
Sabbath, but I did not know that you would consider it
suitable for the pages of The Popular Science Monthly. It
is a pleasure to me to see it there, and a still greater
pleasure to learn that it is likely to produce a good effect.
Longman has published it as a separate pamphlet. An
audience of three thousand heard its delivery with marked
attention, and, I think I might add, with enthusiasm.

A long letter written with your own hand reached me
in Switzerland. One expression in it gave me very deep
concern, and that was where you referred to .the state of
your own health. I trust it is now better, and that for a
long time to come you will be able to continue the good
work on which you have been hitherto engaged.

Believe me, dear Youmans, yours ever faithfully,

JOHN TYNDALL.

In February, 1881, in the midst of hard work, there
came the sudden blow which after a while was to be
attended with fatal results :

NEW YORK, April 20, 1881.

MY DEAR SPENCER : It was ten weeks ago day before
yesterday that I was struck with a chill, the result of writing
in a cold room, and came down with pneumonia. I was
prostrated bodily and mentally from the outset. I grew
better, but the stupid nurse washed me with cold water,
which brought on a relapse with pleurisy. I got better
again and became very smart, so that the doctor began to
omit his visits. I was too weak and emaciated to walk or
stand, but I could sit up for considerable intervals; but my

368 Edward Livingston Youmans.

brother, coming down from the West, dropped in, and in the
excitement I became exhausted.

The pleuro-pneumonia came on again in an exaggerated
form, and I had a hard time with it. I am again much bet-
ter, but the left lung is in a bad way, and, I fear, threatens
long to remain so ; but I am free of pain, have a good ap-
petite, am gaining strength, and begin to walk around the
room, though with a very tottering step. I was terribly
reduced, the first month living chiefly upon brandy. But
I am still forbidden to sit up more than half an hour at a
time, or to leave the room, or to see anybody, or to talk
much, or do anything. But I am hoping that with this
abundant experience of the ease of relapse I may be able
to guard myself better, and hope to get out of this tire-
some place before long. Yet the one mitigating thing is
that the weather for the last three months has been terrible,
and is still sour cold. Of course, in a business way, the
last three months have been a blank.

May 6, 1881.

I am only now beginning to understand how fast and
how far I went down during the first month of my sickness.
The recovery is very slow and tedious. I can mark a cer-
tain small improvement with each passing week, but I fear
it will be a good while yet before I can get out of the house.
I am, however, free from pain, have strength to sit up most
of the time, and to walk about some, though it seems,
whenever I rise, that I weigh a ton. I am able to read
considerably and to write some, and this makes life com-
fortable. I have just helped Jay through his July Monthly,
and have quite enjoyed it. I received the proof of your
forthcoming article, and Jay wanted me to write something
about it; but it is too long and close for me to deal with it
now, with but five hours allowed to do it. When I get a
little stronger I am going over the whole series carefully,
that I may be qualified to say something about it. I re-

Last Years. 369

ceived and read with much interest the letters on copy-
right. Thanks ; they will come in play, but I think it
would hardly be best to republish them now. I am sur-
prised at the stupid perversity that some of your people
display. It is as bad as our open and shameless greed.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, May 20, 1881.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I am glad to get your letter
giving me an account of your continued improvement,
however slow. I was going to say that I hoped this seri-
ous illness will be a warning to you : always of two things to
choose the less dangerous, and not the more dangerous;
but I fear that all suggestions of the kind will be futile, for
it is not in you to be careful.

I am glad, however, you resisted your brother's sug-
gestion to write some comment upon the last chapter sent.
He ought to know better than suggest to you to do any-
thing in the way of work. What you want is some one to
suggest the leaving it undone.

NEW YORK, May 27 1881.

MY DEAR SPENCER : As regards myself, I am only able
to say that, not being worse, I must be better than when I
last wrote. My shortness of breath and debility continue,
which makes the getting about painful, especially if there
is a staircase to be climbed. I, however, go out, and have
been to Mount Vernon. The jaunt was exhausting, but I
hope it will prove beneficial. While in the country my
brother gave me some letters which came during my illness,
when I was not in a condition to be disturbed by business.

In one of those letters you explain that your coming
chapters will deal with the subject of the Militant and In-
dustrial Types of Government. I consider that the most
interesting and the most important part of your series of
papers ; we cannot get enough of this kind of discussion
for our magazine. There is no salvation for this continent
except in the acquirement of some proximately scientific

37° Edward Livingston Youmans.

conception of the nature of Government. We are without
the stability that comes from long habit,* and without any
guidance in the shape of national theory. I am so clear
that this is the next subject of supreme public moment that
I am glad to devote the Monthly largely to its elucidation.

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, June 13, 1881.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I got your last letter some three
or four days ago, and regret to hear that you are not
gaining strength more rapidly than appears. However, if
you are avoiding relapses, that is something; and now that
you have, I suppose, favourable weather, we will hope the
progress will be more rapid. You ought to stay down in
the country and bask in the sun ; or, if too hot, then in the
shade of a tree. Lounging about in the open air, doing
nothing except, if you can, carrying on a lively conversa-
tion, is the best thing for you.

* If my old friend were now here at my elbow, he would not merely
pardon but would earnestly thank me for pointing out the fallacy in this
offhand remark. It is one of those common fallacies into which every
thinker and writer is liable to be betrayed, and no one would have ac-
knowledged it more quickly than Youmans. It arises from the prevalent
loose fashion of regarding American history as beginning with the Declara-
tion of Independence, or at farthest with the settlement of Jamestown.
The fallacy is that a " new people " cannot have old political habits. In
point of fact, however, we Americans are not a new people, and we are
not " without the stability that comes from long habit." We possess this
stability in an extremely high degree, and it is just this ingrained stability
of political character, the result of long ages of political habit, that is our
chief safeguard against turbulence. What were our forefathers doing at
Lewes and Runnymede, or in the days of Henry II and Becket ? What
were they doing in their open-air assemblies in Friesland and Sleswick be-
fore Hengist's keels ploughed the North Sea? They were slowly and
surely building up that stability of political habit by which we, their chil-
dren, have profited in many a crisis within the memory of living men.
Properly to understand the American people and their political acts, one
must habitually carry in mind the whole series of ages between Arminius
and Cromwell.

Last Years. 371

I am glad to see that you take the same view as I do
with respect to the supreme importance of true political
theory, especially for you in the United States. I do not
believe that a true theory will do much good, but one may
at any rate say, contrariwise, that an untrue one does a
great deal of harm; and at present much mischief is going
on among you as a result of untrue theories.

I find myself not adequately acquainted with the state
of things in America in respect of some of the traits of in-
dustrialism on which I am commenting. When you get the
chapter you will probably be able either to give me in-
formation bearing on sundry other points, or to indicate
some recent books in which I shall get information, so that
by the time the volume goes to press I shall be prepared
for making the chapter more complete. I presume, from
your wishing to have the series continued, that it excites
with you some interest, but you have not told me anything
about this.

After my experience last year in going to and from
Alexandria, on each of which occasions I had a three days'
voyage, my fears of sea travelling in respect of entailed
sleeplessness are somewhat diminished, and consequently I
have of late been entertaining the thought that I may pos-
sibly come over to see you. If so, it will be, I think, in the
latter half of next year. At present I say this to yourself
only, not having come to any positive decision.

MOUNT VERNON, N. Y., July 8, 1881.

MY DEAR SPENCER : I believe I wrote you that I was
going to try Saratoga. I did so for a week, and although
it was a tedious job yet I gained something by it. I
endured the exposure without injury.

The bronchitis is disappearing, but the soreness and
strain from extensive pleural adhesion continue. I can
now be so much out that I expect more marked improve-
ment. I have yours of June i3th. Thanks for the important

372 Edward Livingston Youmans.

hints on lounging, which I will try to follow. In regard to
the reception of the articles on Political Institutions, it has
of course been far from what we could wish, but has been
much as we might have expected. I am not aware that
they have elicited intelligent discussion or criticism in any
quarter. They have been noticed, with other articles by
the newspapers — that is, simply referred to and generally
with undiscriminating praise.

There have been a few bursts of impatience, and one
unhappy man in Pennsylvania wrote as follows : u I sent
you five dollars for the Monthly some months ago ; either
stop those stupid articles of Spencer or stop my subscrip-
tion." This afforded me exactly the opportunity I wanted
for a discussion, but I had not strength for it. I have,
however, been perfectly satisfied to go on with the series,
because I know the papers are extensively read. They
come before the public in a form that cannot fail to secure
some attention, and there are many men to whom it is im-
portant that they should be furnished. Our circulation is
not large, but the magazine is much read. It is the most
worn of all in the clubs and libraries. If we depended upon
what the press says of the Monthly we should stop it to-
morrow. It gets the least critical attention of all the
magazines. There is the same commendatory mention of
it every month where it is referred to at all. But there is a
sort of dread of it, partly from incapacity to understand it,
partly from religious prejudice, and very much because of
its contrast to the light and lively journals that cater so
skilfully to popular ignorance. I think our patronage is
quite independent of anything the papers may or may not
say. ...

I think we could run the Monthly solely on the contri-
butions that are sent us pro and con in relation to your
ideas and works.

So I am delighted that your experiences at length

Last Years. 373

make it possible to entertain the idea of coming to the
United States. There will be much to interest you, and it
is on every account desirable that you should pay this
country a visit, if possible. Our fifty million people will
soon be a hundred million, and they are developing a con-
tinent at a rate which must be seen to be understood. We
are loose and getting wild on social matters, and the car-
penter theory of government is predominant. Whatever
the result may be, the experiment is a grand one, and you
should not let it pass without some careful scrutiny. I
hope that the project will look increasingly feasible, and as
soon as it is fairly settled in your mind I wish you would

let me know.

NEW YORK, August 30, 1881.

MY DEAR SPENCER : The last installment on Industrialism
has come. That and the preceding are two mighty chapters.
. . . I am latterly much better and more in the spirit of
work. I hardly mind a single pair of stairs, but a second
pair leaves me exhausted. I have still a good deal of sore-
ness connected with the lung constriction, but I think it is
gradually diminishing, and I hope that some tolerable sound-
ness may be regained before cold weather is again upon us.
My "goings from town" have hitherto been "jobs." I
hope to go to Saratoga for a week or two in September to
enjoy it. I suppose you will be back in London by the
time this gets there, and I trust you will return with the
full benefit of your vacation. There are great fishing
places on this continent in Canada and elsewhere, and I
think you had better plan to give next August to the sport
on this side.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, W., September 21, 1881.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I arrived back in town the night
before last, and found your letter waiting for me. I am
glad to hear that you are gaining strength, not so glad to
hear that you are "more in the spirit of work." If instead
of this you would write. " more in. the spirit of p.lay,"" it

374 Edward Livingston Youmans.

would be very much better. The worst of you is, the
moment you get a little extra strength you use it up too
fast. Pray take a good long holiday instead of your short
ones. As I have often urged upon you, it is an economy
of time in the end.

I am rather amused at your proposing to tempt me
over early in August by Canadian salmon fishing. The
suggestion has its temptations, but I have a strong im-
pression as to the terrible infliction of mosquitoes and other
kinds of flies, of which I am rather intolerant, and of which
I remember reading as entailing great irritation on those
who are led to Canada by the prospect of sport. I like to
take my pleasure neat. If the drawbacks are considerable
I would rather not have it at all. My present intention is
rather to postpone until the last ten days of August my
voyage, so as to arrive in New York about the end of the
month. My friend Potter, with whom I have just been
staying, and with whom I consulted, has been many times
over with you, and he recommends me to go forthwith to
the North and to spend the first week or ten days in seeing
Niagara and something of Canada, so as to avoid the heat,
which is still considerable in the early part of September.

You say respecting your lungs that you ''hope some
tolerable soundness may be regained before the cold
weather is upon us." By all means do not simply hope, but
take the most strenuous measures for insuring this result.

I am glad that you like the two chapters on The
Militant Type and The Industrial Type. They are, in fact,
the culminating chapters of the part, and, indeed, of the
whole work, in point of importance.

The next extract which I take from Spencer, re-
plying to a letter from Youmans giving an account of
the progress of the agitation for international copy-
right, is full of profound wisdom :

Last Years. 375

I wish your American public could be made to feel the
utter viciousness of the plea commonly put in in defence
of your piratical system — that it is essential for your insti-
tutions that the people should have access to knowledge,
unrestrained by regard for the author's claims. The truth
which, instead of this, should be impressed upon them, but
which I fear nothing will make them recognize, is, that free
institutions can exist and work well only in virtue of an all-
pervading equity. The coercive form of government, itself
implying an over-riding of men's rights, is capable of main-
taining a tolerably stable social state among citizens whose
regard for one another's rights is comparatively small :
force does what conscience fails to do. But in proportion
as a government becomes non-coercive, and is the concom-
itant of a social system based upon contract, and the
working together under voluntary co-operation, things can
go well only in proportion as citizens have such natures as
prompt them to respect one another's claims. Already the
well working of your institutions is perturbed in all kinds of
ways by dishonesty. Any increase of dishonesty will even-
tually in some way or other cause their collapse ; their only
salvation is increase of honesty. Hence, so far from its be-
ing needful, as your people allege, that the necessity is
diffusion of knowledge at the expense even of honesty, it
is, contrariwise, needful that there should be a diffusion of
honesty even should there be some consequent impediment
to the spread of knowledge. It is, I suppose, hopeless to
try to make them see this.

In the summer of 1882 Youmans's long-felt desire
to welcome our friend Spencer to America was grati-
fied. Mr. Spencer was accompanied by an old friend,
Mr. Edward Lott, of Derby, a traveler of experience, a
man of skill in smoothing the difficulties of a rapid tour,
blessed with imperturbable good nature, and withal
a trusty shield against reporters and intrusive visit-

376 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ors. One interview, however, with Mr. Spencer was
published in the leading newspapers of the Union. It
contained his famous dictum that Americans are grad-
ually losing their liberties, through not insisting on
their rights in what they are pleased to consider small
matters. The interview provoked much comment and
criticism. Followed up as it was by his widely quoted
speech at Delmonico's, and within a few months by his
papers on Man vs. The State, reprinted in The Popular
Science Monthly, he may be credited with having
helped forward two important movements : first, that
which tends to arouse public conscience with regard
to the dangerous encroachments of monopolies and
buccaneering corporations of all kinds ; second, that
which issues in the increasing habit of holiday-making,
which disperses every summer a growing percentage
of the dwellers in cities along the seashore, among
meadows, hills, and forests.

Mr. Spencer's delicate health had rendered him in-
capable of accepting a tithe of the hospitality proffered
him, but the desire that he should be entertained at a
public banquet before his embarkation was so warmly
expressed that to decline was out of the question. On
November 9th, therefore, the banquet took place at
Delmonico's. The event is memorable in the annals of
New York entertainments, not only for the brilliant
company it assembled, but for the permanent value of
much that was said by the speakers of the evening.
Mr. Spencer was so exhilarated by the splendid occa-
sion that its excitements left him better rather than
worse.

Among the few letters connected with the period
while Spencer was in America I find the following
pleasant and characteristic effusion from Mr. Beecher :

Last Years. 377

BROOKLYN, Arovember 2, 1882.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: All of Saturday is free to Mr.
Spencer. I will ride with him, talk with him, be silent with
him, eat with him, or do anything except commit suicide
with him.

We dine at one o'clock. If he will, he shall have oysters
or lobsters, beef or mutton, game or fish, or all of them;
tea, coffee, or wine — and if the latter, I will give, him better
port than New York can produce; or he shall have Madeira
or sherry or claret or champagne; or if the British blood
calls for beer, he shall have that — English ale, brown stout
of the finest, German beer, lager beer; and such is my wish
to please him that I will even give him cold water. He shall
have all these, or, if he prefer, he shall not have any of them.
If I had had him in Peekskill yesterday he would have seen
such a glory of colour as would have made him exclaim,
14 This is the gate of heaven ! "

I have a complete set of his works, and he may read
them if he likes, though I have several bushels of old ser-
mons which might edify him, perhaps, more.

Of course you are expected to come also, and, unless on
a doctor's prescription, you will not be expected to take any
intoxicating beverage ! Faithfully yours,

HENRY WARD BEECHER.

p. S. — November 3d, at your office. I learn that Spencer
is on his back at Newport. That ends it. All viands and
all wines are banished, and strict asceticism resumes its
sway.

The winter of i882-'83 I spent in London and saw
much of Spencer, whose health was then too poor for
him to do much work. We were beginning to feel
anxious about Youmans's health, as appears in the fol-
lowing letter :
17

3/8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, April 12, 1883.

DEAR YOUMANS : I am glad to hear that though you
have had difficulties with the severe winter you have never-
theless got through it thus far without serious mischief. I
hope what remains will do you no harm. Next winter
pray do not take the risky course of trying to bear it ; but
take the safe course, and infer that you will not bear it with
impunity. It is this running of risks because on previous
occasions it has been done with impunity that habitually
leads to fatal results.

I am glad to report myself considerably better. The
bad weather is pretty well ended; and since the improve-
ment set in I have been gaining ground considerably, so
that I am now doing a little work without much inconven-
ience. However, my sleeping has been considerably worse
than usual for the last week; and I am to-day going down
to Brighton for a few days to try and get some decent
nights. Fiske is going to accompany me as my guest for a
day or two. . . .

I lately took up a book at the Athenaeum entitled Nat-
ural Law in the Spiritual World, by Henry Drummond. I
found it to be in a considerable measure an endeavour to
press me into the support of a qualified theology by show-
ing the harmony between certain views of mine and alleged
spiritual laws. It is an interesting example of one of the
transitional books which are at present very useful. It
occurs to me that while the author proposes to press me into
his service, we might advantageously press him into our own
service. Just look at the book and see.

CONEY ISLAND, September j>, 1883.

DEAR SPENCER : The erroneous view of your relation
to Darwin is very widespread, and Fiske told me, on his re-
turn from England, that he was surprised to find how gen-
eral it was there. It should not be suffered to extend and

Last Years. 379

•

get confirmed for lack of explicit contradiction and expos-
ure. The truth of the case will no doubt come out sooner
or later, but sooner in proportion to the facilities for cor-
recting the false view.* I am very glad of what you say in
regard to the article supplementary to that upon music, and
I hope you will be able to bring it about in the course of
the coming year.

Beecher has been lecturing this summer with great ac-
ceptance and to large audiences on the religious bearings
of evolution ; but his work is very crude, being of the same
sort as his address at the dinner. It is no doubt better than
that, and Beecher is rapidly improving ; but he has taken
up the subject very late in life, and has not had the time, as
he never had the proper preparation, for mastering the
philosophy.

Could I have found a decent excuse for printing in the
Monthly the address I prepared for the dinner I should
have been satisfied, f I wanted the views there stated to
go on record in the line of contributions I have published,
and which form a distinctive feature of the periodical. I am
not among the fortunate mortals who do work that is to
survive. Yet The Popular Science Monthly is bound up in
all the American public libraries, and it will hold its place
there by sheer force of its bulk — it will hold over at least

* I have set forth the relations of Spencer's work to Darwin's in a way
that is entirely satisfactory to Mr. Spencer (as he assures me) in an essay
on The Doctrine of Evolution : Its Scope and Influence, published in The
Popular Science Monthly, September, 1891, and republished by the Apple-
tons in a volume of essays by various writers, entitled, Evolution in Phi-
losophy, Science, and Art. I may add that the same view of the case, as
I set it forth in my Cosmic Philosophy in 1874, was equally satisfactory
to Mr. Darwin.

f It is contained in the little volume, Herbert Spencer in America,
published by the Appletons in 1883. It is not reprinted in the present
volume, because the same points are given more fully in the essay re-
printed below, pp. 502-551.

380 Edward Livingston Youmans.

into the next century ; and I am contented that it contains
evidence that I knew a good thing when I saw it.

Has Sumner sent you his new little book ? It is quite
well worth looking over. He presents the anti-philanthropic,
anti-meddling side with considerable point and freshness. *

37 QUEEN'S GARDENS, October j, i88j.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: By this post I send you a copy (if
I can get one) of to-day's Times; if not, by as early a post
as I can. It contains a report of the meeting of the Church
Congress, which will be interesting and probably useful to
you — the address of Prof. Flower, and other papers on the
topic of evolution. Theological opposition to the doctrine
is rapidly disappearing, and before the end of the century
will be forgotten. . . .

I returned two days ago from Gloucestershire, where
the fortnight has been very beneficial, especially the first
week, during which the weather was fine and I got plenty of
outdoor games; lawn tennis, bowls, and quoits, with bil-
liards'in the evening, did me a great deal of good.

I have got a copy of Sumner's little book, but have not
yet had time to look over it. I am glad he is taking the
turn you describe, and wish others who entertain kindred
views would devote themselves to active propagation of
them, for at present there is a most disastrous movement
in the other direction. Indeed, I have almost given up all
hope of seeing it checked, for the wave has become too
vast. We are on the highway to communism, and I see no
likelihood that the movement in that direction will be
arrested. Contrariwise, it seems to me that every new step
makes more difficult any reversal, since the reactive por-

.* What Social Classes owe to each other, by Prof. W. G. Sumner, of
Yale University, one of the clearest and strongest of American thinkers. It
is a golden little book, and ought to have had a sale of half a million copies,
instead of that stupid Looking Backward, the success of which is a
sufficient commentary upon Puck's remark, " What fools these mortals be !"

Last Years. 381

tion of the public seems likely to become weaker and
weaker.*

* I take rather a more hopeful view than is here suggested by Mr.
Spencer. The love of private property is strong in men, and those who
possess property are the strongest part of society, as they ought to be and
always will be. Unjust inroads upon private property are oftenest made
either by greedy sharks who lobby for tariff taxes upon articles of prime
necessity, or by well-meaning philanthropists who wish to have one enjoy-
ment after another made " free " (which can only be done by taxing the
competent people for the benefit of the incompetent), or else by unscrupu-
lous politicians who seek to subsidize a class of voters by granting them
pensions or other gratuities. Our country has suffered greatly from .such
abominations, but the reaction, which has been growing in strength for
several years, is already very powerful. It was shown, among other things,
in the total defeat of the Blair Education bill, and also in the Democratic
victories of 1890 and 1892, which to a large extent must be interpreted as
a rebuke to McKinleyism. A notable symptom is the declaration in the
Democratic national platform of 1892, presaging the revival of the sound
doctrine that government has no right to levy taxes for any other purpose
than revenue. There are indications that this doctrine will ere long pre-
vail, and that the monstrous edifice of trusts and monopolies, overswollen
fortunes, labour unions, walking delegates, boycotts, and general bedevil-
ment which a high-tariff policy has built for us will topple over and dis-
appear. That will involve quite a wholesale destruction of the seeds of
communism.

In spite of many appearances to the contrary, the robust political phi-
losophy of Jefferson and Van Buren, which is substantially that of Mr.
Spencer, is very strongly rooted in the American mind ; and now that we
are recovering from the evil effects of our brief but violent spasm of mili-
tancy, it is beginning again to assert itself. In view of the comparative
freedom of the United States from militancy it seems not improbable that
in the next half century we shall advance toward a sound and healthy in-
dustrialism more steadily and rapidly than Europe. Excess of militancy,
whether exhibited in actual warfare or in the maintenance of vast arma-
ments, is attended with symptoms of social retrogression, and among these
symptoms are the tendencies toward socialistic legislation against which
Mr. Spencer has so powerfully protested. They are temporary symptoms,
of course. As long as the competents are stronger than the incompetents
there is no chance for a general and permanent establishment of socialism
or of communism. Possibly such systems may achieve a temporary estab-

382 Edward Livingston Youmans.

NEW YORK, November 28, 1883.

MY DEAR SPENCER : . . . Your communications found
me in a somewhat uncomfortable condition. I have long
anticipated tumbling downstairs and breaking my neck,
for only rarely can I see where the top of a staircase be-
gins ; so night before last I made the experiment, and fell
down a flight of side steps on the street. The glare of gas-
lights blinded me, and it was a new place and so I tumbled.

The result was a Colles's fracture of my left wrist, the
same that my wife had of the right wrist a couple of years
ago. It was very painful for the first twenty or thirty
hours, but is now tolerably comfortable, and I am able to
get the bandaged arm in a sling.

It will be awkward for a month or six weeks, but I ex-
pect no very serious inconvenience. Fortunately I am in
pretty good physical case, having taken considerable exer-
cise latterly, so that I think the reparative processes will
go on rapidly.

February 26, 1884.

So, after twenty years of battling, the sales of your
works are larger the last than any preceding year — a little
fact which I have not forgotten in dealing with the Edin-
burgh Review. I got a point on the old quarterly by show-
ing that it is too late to play over- again the trick it played
on Thomas Young eighty years ago.

The bones of the family continue to break. My sister's
carriage was upset ten days ago, breaking her left arm
above the elbow, and so badly spraining her shoulder that
she has been confined to her bed ever since.

lishment in one or more countries, which will then serve as a melancholy
example for the rest of mankind, somewhat as Spain has served in the last
three centuries. In Cromwell's time there was more danger of the civilized
world succumbing to "divine right of kings" than there is now of its suc-
cumbing to communism ; yet the danger has been so successfully averted
that monarchy has ceased even to be a bugbear.

Last Years. 383

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, May 27, 1884.

MY DEAR YOUMANS : I saw Mr. Appleton a week or
more ago, and he gave me an unfavourable report of you.
I had not gathered from your accounts of yourself that the
winter had so much told upon your lungs as to cause such
an increased difficulty in breathing that you always in get-
ting up to your office use the lift instead of going up one
flight of stairs. This is very sad, and shows how mistaken
you were in not deciding early in the winter on going South.

You must do better next time ; and to that end the best
plan will be for you to come over here and spend the
winter with me, either here or abroad. As you see by one
of the inclosed extracts, which has in one or other form
appeared in many of the newspapers, the public insist that
I shall go abroad somewhere. As they have failed in send-
ing me to Australia, they seem to mean that I shall go to
the Riviera, and not only that I shall go, but that I shall
live there permanently. The decision was quite news to
me; but nevertheless it jumps with my intention in so far
as that I had contemplated flying south next winter; for
though I do not suffer from our own winter in the ordinary
way, I suffer from it in the depressing effects of cold.
Perhaps Capri and Sicily and the south of Spain may be
the places; and if I go, you must come over and go with
me, as before.

NEW YORK, June 13, 1884.

MY DEAR SPENCER : . . . I thank you much and very
sincerely for your note after you had seen Mr. Appleton,
proposing that I come over for another winter with you in
the South. I am certainly in a very bad way, and it would
no doubt have been better had I gone somewhere South
the past winter.

In fact my satchel was packed in February for such an
escape, when my sister broke her arm, and the case proved
so bad that I could not leave. I have, however, survived

384 Edward Livingston Youmans.

the severe winter, and am now getting more strength, but
my breathing continues very short, and I have evidently
the use of a much diminished portion of my lungs. What
the summer may do for me I cannot say, but I hope some-
thing. There is, however, hardly enough left of vigour to
justify the hope that I could again safely cross the At-
lantic ; and if I did I fear I should be rather a burden than
a helpful companion. But all the same, your invitation is
pleasant, and most cordially appreciated.

November //, 1884.

... As for myself, I think I can report my health as on
the whole considerably better. The recent fine autumnal
weather has been very favourable, and I have been able to
increase my exercise and gain corresponding strength.
The state of my lungs puzzles me, as there seems to be
some change of symptoms, and I am much inclined to in-
terpret them favourably; but I shall soon consult one of
our best authorities on pulmonary matters and get at the
present significance of the case. I am every way ex-
tremely well except the lung irritability and constant
shortness of breath.

I am able to take pretty long walks if at a moderate
pace, but the slightest quickening of movement sets the
heart to pounding, which I suppose means a demand for
more arterialization of the blood than the lungs can give.
I still talk of going away, but how to get away and where
to go are not easy questions to answer.

No doubt imperfect arterialization of the blood
was the most serious feature of the case. From the
desperate attack of pneumonia combined with pleurisy,
in 1881, Youmans had never really recovered. The
continued and incurable adhesion of the lung- to the
pleura robbed it of half its efficiency, and under this
wretched mechanical difficulty, in spite of the delusive

Last Years. 385

moments of exhilaration or encouragement that came
from time to time, my gallant old friend's life was
steadily ebbing away. The case in many outward
respects simulated pulmonary consumption. The ap-
proach of winter filled him with dread, but inexorable
tasks prevented his retreat southward until February,
when, accompanied by his sister, he went to Thomas-
ville, Georgia. Meanwhile in Spencer's letters the
note of alarm is very distinctly heard :

38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, LONDON, W., January j,
MY DEAR YOUMANS : I have been looking for a letter
from you for some little time, and hope that the rather
long interval does not indicate any disturbance in your
health from the cold weather, although I decidedly fear it.
I regret greatly that you so persistently resist the sugges-
tions to go South, and continually hope that you may run
risks without evil, although you have so many times ex-
perienced evil from doing this.

January fj, 1883.

The long interval since I heard from you leads me to
fear that you are ill, or at any rate suffering seriously from
the cold weather. Pray go South.

January 14, 1883.

After sending off my note yesterday, in some anxiety
about your state, I was glad to get a letter from you this
morning which relieved me a little, though not fully, for it
appears that the winter is telling upon you, if not in a re-
newed pulmonary attack, still in other ways.

Why will you, against your better knowledge, yield to
this American mania of sacrificing yourself in trying to do
more work ? You accept in theory the gospel of relaxa-
tion ; why can you not act upon it ? What is the use of
both abridging life and making it full of physical miseries,
all in the hope of achieving a little more, arid eventually

386 Edward Livingston Youmans.

being baulked of your hope by the very eagerness to
achieve ? You have done quite enough already in the way
of working for the public good. Pay a little regard to
yourself, and let things drift. As for trying to brave out
again the winter in New York, you have already had amply
sufficient lessons of the mischief of taking the risky course,
and I should have thought that you would be willing to
take the prudent one. Excuse my plain speaking, but it is
grievous to me to see you deliberately killing yourself.

February 4, 1885.

I should like to hear something about you. It is now
a month since I gathered that you were in a very shaky
state, and that you were feeling obliged to go South.

What has happened ?

March 23, 1883.

There has just been published here a book entitled Can
the Old Faith live with the New ? by the Rev. George
Matheson, D. D., evidently a Scotch Presbyterian, for he
dates from Annelan, on the Frith of Clyde. It is really a
very clever attempt to show that the evolution doctrine is
not irreconcilable with the current creed. Accepting evo-
lution in its widest extent as no longer to be gainsaid, and
accepting also the metaphysics accompanying it — taking
these, indeed, as established — the aim is, as I say, to show
that the old faith may live with the new. It will, I think,
therefore be an admirable means of introducing evolution
doctrines into the ordinary mind. When you get back,
pray get hold of it and see whether something cannot be
done with it as a reprint. I should think Beecher would
rejoice over it and take its doctrines as texts.

I hope you will be getting your breathing apparatus into
better order down South. Why have you not let me know
something of the results of the change ? I dare say you
find it difficult to kill time away from your work, but this
is better than to let time kill you while at your work.

Last Years. 387

Little advantage, however, had come to Youmans
from his sojourn in Georgia. Its dreariness went far
to outweigh any good results that might have come
from the softness of climate, and it is probable that
his disease was too far advanced to be arrested by
change of scene. Soon after he had returned home
Youmans told me that he would far rather die in
New York than live in Georgia. There was no Cen-
tury Club in Thomasville, no thronged and bustling
Broadway, no familiar faces of old friends, no daily
round of cheerful duties. The balmy breezes from
the Gulf were all very well, and the first sight of the
negro " in his native jungle " was more or less enter-
taining ; but such things could not reconcile poor
Youmans to the pain of lifelong habits brought to a
halt. Keenly conscious of all that remained to be
done if long-cherished plans were ever to be carried
out, there came upon him with overwhelming force a
sense of waning powers and numbered days, and he
returned to New York rather worse than when he
left it.

His attention for the next three months was more
or less occupied with the controversy that grew out
of the positivist Mr. Frederic Harrison's attack upon
the views set forth in Spencer's Religious Retro-
spect and Prospect. Mr. Harrison's article, in its
title, stigmatized Spencer's theory as The Ghost of
Religion. Mr. Spencer replied with a paper entitled
Retrogressive Religion, by which phrase he happily
characterized the dismal rubbish inflicted upon an
extremely small part of the world by the half-crazed
Comte as the "religion of humanity." Whenever
a positivist wishes to express withering scorn for
anything he does not like he selects as the most

388 Edward Livingston Youmans.

abusive epithet available the word " metaphysics " ;
and accordingly the title of Mr. Harrison's next paper
proclaimed Spencer's views to be " agnostic meta-
physics." Once more Mr. Spencer replied in an arti-
cle called Last Words about Agnosticism. All these
articles, by both antagonists, were published in the
Nineteenth Century, and reprinted in The Popular
Science Monthly. Mr. Harrison's papers, while char-
acterized by his usual brilliancy of style, were sadly
unscrupulous. They abounded in shameless gar-
blings and misrepresentations of Mr. Spencer's views,
insomuch that to some unbiassed readers (whose
opinions I from time to time solicited) the writer
seemed to be sacrificing all other considerations to
the single end of parading before his audience with
airs of victory. A more charitable, if less probable,
construction might excuse him on the ground that
perhaps "he didn't know any better." Whether he
felt himself to be getting worsted, after all said and
done, of course one cannot say ; but, curiously enough,
after Spencer's last article — which, as Mr. Harrison
himself declared, he regarded as a challenge to fur-
ther discussion — he suddenly changed his audience.
Instead of replying to Spencer in the Nineteenth Cen-
tury he had recourse to the Pall Mall Gazette, and
poured forth a fresh volley of misrepresentations be-
fore a new set of readers.*

* One of Harrison's remarks in this Pall Mall article reminds me of a
little incident in my experience which may be worth preserving. In a
preceding article he had alluded to Spencer's Descriptive Sociology as " a
pile of clippings made to order." He now went on to say : " I have cer-
tainly cast no insinuations whatever on the three conscientious gentlemen
who carried out Mr. Spencer's directions to tabulate ' all classes of facts ' ;
but it is too much to ask me to believe either that they knew nothing of

Last Years. 389

By this time so much interest had been aroused in
the controversy as to make it morally certain that the
articles would be collected and issued in book form in
America. Such a thing might be done by any of the
horde of pirates permitted by the absence of an inter-
national copyright law to infest this (quoad hoc) bar-
barous land ; or it might be done by an honourable
house like the Appletons, paying to both writers the
customary royalty. Under these circumstances You-
mans collected the articles and published them in a
small volume entitled The Nature and Reality of Re-
ligion. To Mr. Harrison's Pall Mall article footnotes
were added, pointing out its misrepresentations. Mr.
Spencer was consulted as to the republication, and
Mr. Harrison, for reasons duly set forth by Youmans,
in his article hereto appended, was not. It was natural
enough that Mr. Harrison, already somewhat touchy
at having the worst of the argument, should have
been irritated at this. But the case admitted of ex-
Mr. Spencer's theories, or that they did not tabulate such facts as they
judged would be most useful to him. One would as easily believe that
when Mr. Gladstone's secretary is directed to tabulate electoral facts he
has not the least idea whether the Premier is about to use them in favour
of reform or against it." Mr. Harrison seems to think that the mental atti-
tude of a scientific investigator is like that of an ex parte advocate trying
to make a point ! Naturally enough, for, like the savage, the primitive
man, and most of us, he judges the unknown by the known. His remarks
recall to me what happened one evening about twenty years ago, when I
was dining at 37 Queen's Gardens with Spencer and his assistant, Dr.
Richard Scheppig, a pleasant and accomplished German scholar, who com-
piled some parts of the Descriptive Sociology (among others the Mexican
part, in which, by the way, are some grave errors). I happened to ask Dr.
Scheppig for his opinion on some point involved in the doctrine of evolu-
tion, and I shall never forget his delicious reply, or think of it without
laughing : "I do not know anything whatever about evolution ; I am a
historian ! "

3QO Edward Livingston Youmans.

planation, to which he would not listen. For a mo-
ment he so far forgot himself as to impute mean
pecuniary motives to Spencer and Youmans — an im-
putation which he soon felt obliged to withdraw.
The effect upon Spencer was to make him telegraph
at once to the Appletons to stop the sale of the book,
destroy the plates, and debit the loss to his account.
As matters had taken such a shape, Youmans could
hardly do otherwise than suppress the book out of
consideration for Spencer's feelings. He published,
however, in The Popular Science Monthly for Au-
gust, 1885, an article Concerning the Suppressed
Book, which is here reprinted in full,* and in which,
as every candid reader will admit, his own conduct is
amply justified. One cannot woftder that Mr. Harri-
son objected to a form of publication in which his own
articles and Mr. Spencer's appeared side by side !

The last time that I ever saw my best and dearest
friend was at his home in New York in March, 1886,
and for the first time there came over me the chill
feeling that I must soon lose him. To accustom my-
self to the thought of the world without him was not
easy — it has not yet become easy ; but I could not de-
ceive myself, like the " everybody "to whom he alludes
in the following letter. Dr. Thomas, by direction of
the Penn Club, had invited him to Philadelphia as the
special guest of the club. His reply was :

247 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, April 23, 1886.
MY DEAR OLD FRIEND : I have to thank you for your
very kind letter of April 8th, with its pleasant, not to say

* See below, pp. 562-583.

Last Years. 39 1

flattering, invitation to accept at some suitable time the
hospitality of your Penn Club.

I thank you most cordially for this offer, which I as
sincerely appreciate as if it were in my power to comply
with it. But I am physically broken down, emaciated to
a skeleton, with strength enough to barely creep around a
little. . . .

Everybody assures me, loudly and simultaneously, that,
though a little thin, 1 never looked better ; that there is
nothing much the matter, and that as soon as the weather
gets settled I shall pick up and be all right again, and, as
Sancho Panza remarks, " according as they say true, so
help them God."

At any rate, should it ever become physically possible,
I will avail myself of the proffered hospitality of your club.
I am a member of the Authors' Club and the Century Club,
but have not been able to attend either of them this
winter. Ever sincerely yours,

E. L. YOUMANS.

This is the last of Youmans's letters that I have
now at hand ; but there are several letters to him
from Spencer in this last year, from which I make the
following extracts:

LONDON, Februaiy 20, 1886.

MY DEAR YOUMANS: I often find myself repeating the
proposition, which I fancy you have before now heard me
express, that each of us, as he gets older, needs a keeper.
As internal judgment and will get weaker they require to
be supplemented by external judgment and will. But the
worst of it is that at the time when this kind of govern-
ment is most needed it is very commonly most resisted.

I very much fear that you are in a condition in which
something approaching to coercion is called for. When I
advised that you should submit yourself to the winter re-
quirements and stay indoors altogether, I did not think of

3Q2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

an evil which ought to have been obvious — namely, that,
with your diminished lung capacity, the continued breathing
of a more or less vitiated air would be doubly detrimental.
Lungs with good capacity must manifestly feel the evil of
a bad air much less than lungs of diminished capacity. It
seems now highly probable that your depressed and ener-
vated apathetic state is in large measure due to this double
diminution of respiratory action and consequent lowered
state of vital activity. Purer air and artificially aided cir-
culation (as by massage) will, I am quite sure, brighten the
aspect of things to you and make you feel that it is better
to fight on even under difficulties than to surrender. I
may say, by way of example, that I have myself of late had
very discouraging views, my circulation a while since
being so bad that I dared not walk from here across to my
office or down to the bottom of the Gardens. Indeed, I
was so bad that sometimes I could not stand up without
producing intermission of the pulse. However, I have
persevered, and, on the whole, with considerable improve-
ment ; so that ricw the tendency to intermission has
almost disappeared, and my spirits as well as my power of
writing have greatly improved. Be encouraged therefore,
by my experience, to feel pretty sure that by judicious
management the state of things, even when apparently very
serious, can be got over.

July 20, 1886.

I was much saddened yesterday to receive a verification
of the fears I have been for some weeks entertaining, that
your silence was due to illness. Perhaps the condition of
things is not so bad as you think ; for, as I know from re-
cent personal experience, one is apt to put unduly unfavour-
able interpretations on the facts. Doubtless it may be said
that friends do the reverse ; but on the whole the estimates
of medical men and friends are perhaps the more to be
trusted.

Last Years. 393

It is well, however, that you can take so calm a view of
the matter as your description and reflections imply; and
it may be that, when life has to be carried on under the
conditions you describe, the desire for continuance of it
may fitly decrease. "What is the use of more to-days ?"
asks Emerson, referring to days of ordinary life. And if,
as one feels in the latter part of life, even under conditions
of tolerable health, more days are not particularly to be
longed for, it seems reasonable enough that when they
bring only suffering and weariness one may feel no great
anxiety for prolongation.

. . . Whatever comes, we may at any rate, both of us,
have some satisfaction in the consciousness of having done
our work conscientiously, prompted by high motives; and
whenever it ends, the friendship between us may be looked
back upon by the survivor as one of the valued things of
his life.

But more letters may still pass between us, my dear old
friend; and in that anticipation I continue yours, with very
affectionate regard, HERBERT SPENCER.

BRIGHTON, September 77, 1886.

I should like to have a report of your state. The last
account, which came to me through your brother, seemed
to imply that he and those around you were almost hope-
less of any improvement, and were looking forward with
greatly depressed feelings.

Whenever I have thought of you of late I have thought
of you as suffering under your sultry August weather — bad
enough to bear by one in health, and dreadful to bear by
one whose lungs are in large measure incapacitated. It
must have been a grievous trial, and I wonder you have
borne it. With affectionate regards and sympathies,

Ever yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

394 Edward Livingston Youmans.

7 MARINE SQUARE, BRIGHTON, November 21, 1886.

I was delighted to have so good a report of you, and
hope that the next will show a great deal of improvement.

I was somewhat surprised, however, by the statement
that you are going back to New York. Is it because further
driving out is now out of the question, and that the being
near your medical man is a matter of more moment than
being in the country air? One thing I very much fear,
namely, that you will be led to live in the stove-heated *
air of your American houses in winter ; and this cannot
fail to be injurious. Cannot you manage to live in rooms
heated after the English fashion, by a fire, and without
heated air, and make up the needful extra warmth by extra
clothing — sitting in your overcoats, wraps, etc. ? This
would be far better than breathing such air as your Ameri-
can houses have, judging from what sample I had of it.

The next is the last :

7 MARINE SQUARE, BRIGHTON, January i, 1887.

MY BEAR YOUMANS: It is a long time since I heard
anything about you, and I am getting anxious to have a
report. Pray let me know how you have fared during the
cold weather.

I cannot report favourably of myself. It is still the old
story — improvement and then relapse. The last relapse
was due to a cold, which, of course, in my present state,
pulled me back considerably. " The malice of fate " from
which I have suffered ever since last May has been almost
incredible.

1 have great difficulty in killing the time, especially now
that I am kept wholly indoors by the weather, being unable

* Of course he does not mean the comparatively innocent old-fash-
ioned stove, but the hot-air furnace and the steam radiator, those twin
inventions of the devil. Youmans's house in New York, however, was
heated by an improved method, and was admirably ventilated.

Last Years. 395

to walk about or to read or talk to any extent, or even to
play games. I pass my hours on the sofa wearily enough,
as you may imagine. What little work I do is at the Auto-
biography.

Though the day suggests it, it is absurd for me to wish
you, or for you to wish me, a happy New Year. There is
not much happiness remaining in store for either of us.

Pray dictate a few lines when you get this.

Ever yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

This sad letter found Youmans on his death-bed.
On the 1 8th of January he passed away without pain,
retaining even to the last something- of the blithe drol-
lery that was always so charming. His burial place is
a beautiful site at Woodlawn.

During Youmans's long illness abundant testimony
was borne to his singular capacity for friendship ; con-
stant inquiries, anxious and sympathetic, came not
only from within the bounds of the city where he
lived and laboured but from distant States and prov-
inces— from beyond the sea. His friendship had a
rare quality : not only was it manifested in counsels
well considered, and in a generosity lavish in compari-
son with his means, but in a constant thoughtfulness
which deemed no service too slight to be worth ren-
dering. He was always magnanimous, patient, slow
to take offence, an ingenious framer of excuses for
others. To forfeit his good-will demanded an un-
usual case of meanness or wickedness. Mere folly or
failure in the conventional sense would not do it. If
he ascertained anything to the discredit of an ac-
quaintance he merely deducted it from what he knew
in his favour — he never let it cancel a good record, as
so many people do.

396 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Himself one of the plain people, as Abraham Lin-
coln used to call them, he knew what they were and
what they wanted. In concluding our survey of his
life, what impresses us most, I think, is the broad
democratic spirit and the absolute unselfishness which
it reveals at every moment and in every act. To Ed-
ward Youmans the imperative need for educating the
great mass of the people so as to use their mental
powers to the best advantage came home as a living,
ever-present fact. He saw all that it meant and means
in the raising of mankind to a higher level of thought
and action than that upon which they now live. To
this end he consecrated himself with unalloyed devo-
tion ; and we who mourn his loss look back upon his
noble career with a sense of victory, knowing how the
good that such a man does lives after him and can
never die.

SELECT WRITINGS.

SELECT WRITINGS.

i.

MENTAL DISCIPLINE IN EDUCATION.

ALL educational inquiries assume that man is individ-
ually improvable, and therefore collectively progressive.
Through varied experiences he is slowly civilized, and
there is a growth of knowledge with the course of ages.
But while thought is ever advancing, it is the nature of in-
stitutions to fix the mental states of particular times ; and
there hence arises a tendency to conflict between growing
ideas and the external arrangements which are designed to
express and embody them. Thought refuses to be station-
ary; institutions refuse to change, and war is the conse-
quence.

This fact is familiarly illustrated in the case of govern-
ment. Ideas and character, having outgrown the arbitrary
institutions of the remoter past, there has arisen between
them an antagonism, of "the results of which modern his-
tory is full. So, too, religious conceptions having devel-
oped beyond the ecclesiastical organizations to which
they at first gave rise, a struggle arose in the sixteenth
century, which, resulting in the Protestant Reformation,
has persisted under various aspects to the present time.
And so it is also with the traditional systems of mental
culture. Educational institutions which have been be-
queathed to us by the past, and which may have been

(399)

4OO Edivard Livingston Youmans.

suited to their times, have fallen out of harmony with the
intellectual necessities of modern life, and a conflict has
arisen which is deepening in intensity with the rapid
growth of knowledge and the general progress of society.

The friends of educational improvement maintain that
the system of culture which prevails in our higher institu-
tions of learning, and which is limited chiefly to the ac-
quisition of the mathematics, and of the ancient languages
and literature, was shaped ages ago in a state of things so
widely different from the present that it has become inade-
quate to existing requirements. They urge that since its
establishment the human mind has made immense ad-
vances; has changed its attitude to nature and entered
upon a new career; that realm after realm of new truth
has been discovered ; that ideas of government, religion,
and society have been profoundly modified, and that new
revelations of man's powers and possibilities, and nobler
expectations of his future, have arisen. As man is a being
of action, it is demanded that his education shall be a
preparation for action. As the highest use of knowledge
is for guidance, it is insisted that our Collegiate establish-
ments shall give a leading place to those subjects of study
which will afford a better preparation for the duties and
work of the age in which we live.

The adherents of the traditional system reply that all
this is but the unreasoning clamour of a restless and inno-
vating age, which wholly misconceives the true aim of a
higher culture, and would reduce everything to the stand-
ard of a low and sordid utility. They maintain that
knowledge is to be acquired not on account of its capabil-
ity of useful application, but for its own intrinsic interest ;
that the purpose of a liberal education is not to prepare for
a vocation or profession, but to train the intellectual facul-
ties. They, therefore, hold that Mental Discipline is the
true object of a higher culture, and that for its attainment

Mental Discipline in Education. 401

the study of the ancient classics and mathematics is supe-
rior to all other means. From the tone assumed by its de-
fenders, when speaking of its incomparable fitness to de-
velop all the mental faculties, it might be inferred that this
scheme of study was formed by the help of a perfected
science of the human mind. Nothing, however, could be
more erroneous. Not only was that system devised ages
anterior to anything like true mental science, but it ante-
dates by centuries the whole body of modern knowledge.
There was abundance of vague metaphysics, but hardly a
germ of that positive knowledge of the laws of mind which
could serve as a valid basis of education. The predomi-
nant culture of modern times had its origin, more than
eight hundred years ago, in a superstition of the middle
ages. A mystical reverence was attached to the sacred
number seven, which was supposed to be a key to the order
of the universe. That there were seven cardinal virtues,
seven deadly sins, seven sacraments, seven days in the
week, seven metals, seven planets, and seven apertures
in a man's head, was believed to afford sufficient reason
for making the course of liberal study consist of seven
arts, and occupy seven years. Following another fancy
about the relation of three to four, in a certain geomet-
rical figure, these seven arts were divided into two groups.
The first three, Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric, comprised
what was called the Trivium ; and the remaining four,
Arithmetic, Geometry, Astronomy, and Music (the latter
as a branch of Arithmetic), formed the Quadrivium. This
scheme has been handed down from age to age, and with
but slight changes, still predominates in the higher institu-
tions of learning, and still powerfully reacts upon the infe-
rior schools.

Passing by various embarrassing questions suggested by
the hypothesis that the one perfect method of bringing the
human mind to its highest condition has not only been
18

4O2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

found, but has been actually organized into educational
institutions for hundreds of years — a hypothesis which dis-
credits the whole movement of modern intellect in its edu-
cational bearings — let us take up this question of mental
discipline. The subject is not only intrinsically impor-
tant, but its importance is greatly heightened when an old
and widely established system, challenged by the spirit of
the age, yields the point of the usefulness of the knowl-
edge it imparts, and offers as its sole defence its superior
merits as a system of mental training; and still more im-
portant does it become when the idea is so constantly and
vehemently iterated as to acquire all the force and tenacity
of a superstition, and breed a regular cant of education,
which serves as the stereotyped apology for numberless
indefensible projects and crudities of instruction. The
writer recently opened a huge volume on Heraldry, and
the very first passage which struck his eye in the preface,
urged the claims of that subject to more general study on
the ground of its excellence as a mental discipline.

I propose, in the present Introduction, first, to point out
the defects of the traditional system as a means of disci-
plining the mind ; and, second, to show the superior claims
of scientific education for this purpose.

The claims put forth in behalf of the prevailing scheme
are as multitudinous and diverse as the tastes and capaci-
ties of those who offer them — a natural result, perhaps,
in the absence of any considerations so decisive as to com-
mand general agreement ; but those most commonly urged
are, that the grammatical acquisition of the dead languages
best disciplines the memory and judgment, and the study
of mathematics the reason. Let us briefly notice these
points first :

That the acquisition of words exercises the memory is
of course true — those of living languages as well as dead

Mental Discipline in Education. 403

ones, but their assumed merit for discipline raises the ques-
tion how they exercise it. Memory is the capability of re-
calling past mental impressions, and depends chiefly upon
the relations subsisting among these impressions in the
mind. If they are arbitrary, the power of recall depends
upon multiplicity of repetition, and involves a maximum
outlay of mental force in acquisition. If, however, ideas are
arranged in the mind in a natural order of connection and
dependence, this principle becomes the most important ele-
ment in commanding past acquisitions. The conditions
are then reversed; the outlay of effort in acquisition is
reduced, and the power of recall increased. Now the
memory cultivated in the common acquirement of language,
is of this lowest kind. The relation between words and
the ideas, or objects, of which they are the signs, is acci-
dental and arbitrary. Although philological science is be-
ginning dimly to trace out certain natural relations between
words and the things they signify, it will not be claimed
that this is made at all available in the ordinary study of
Latin and Greek ; indeed, the most thorough-going advo-
cates of these studies claim that their disciplinal value is
in the ratio of the naked retentive power which they call
into exercise. But the memory cannot be best disciplined
by a mental procedure which neglects its highest law. If
the power of recovering past states of consciousness de-
pends upon the natural and necessary connections among
ideas, then those studies are best suited for a rational dis-
cipline of this power which involve these natural relations
among objects. On both grounds the sciences are prefer-
able to dead languages, as instruments of culture. For if
it be held desirable merely to task the memory by a dead
pull at arbitrary facts (and there are not wanting those
who hold to this notion of discipline), then it is only neces-
sary to use the innumerable facts of science, without re-
gard to order ; but when we take into account the immense

404 Edward Livingston Youmans.

importance of methodizing mental acquisition, and utiliz-
ing the principle of natural association among the elements
of knowledge, the immeasurable superiority of the sci-
ences for this purpose becomes at once apparent. This
is happily illustrated by some observations of Dr. Arnold,
respecting the memory of geography. He says :

And this deeper knowledge becomes far easier to remember.
For my own part I find it extremely difficult to remember the posi-
tions of towns, when I have no other association with them than
their situations relatively to each othei. But let me once understand
the real geography of a country — its organic structure, if I may so
call it ; the form of its skeleton, that is, of its hills ; the magnitude and
course of its veins and arteries, that is, of its streams and rivers ; let
me conceive of it as a whole made up of connected parts ; and then
the positions of towns viewed in reference to these parts becomes at
once easily remembered, and lively and intelligible besides.

If now it be said that it is not mere memory of words
that is contended for, but the discipline and judgment af-
forded by the grammatical study of the structure of lan-
guage, the crushing answer is that a dead language is un-
necessary for this discipline, which is far better secured by
the systematic study and thorough logical analysis of the
vernacular tongue.* Perhaps there is no point in educa-
tion in which there is so universal and intense an agree-
ment among independent thinkers, as in condemning the
folly of beginning the acquisition of foreign languages,
living or dead, by the study of their grammar— the method
in general use among those who defend it as a mental dis-
cipline. The usual school practice of thrusting the young
into the grammar, even of their native tongue, is well
known to be one of the most efficient means of the artifi-
cial production of stupidity ; but the habit of introducing

* See Prof. Jewell's able paper on the Logical Analysis of the Eng-
lish Language, in Proceedings of New York University Convocation.

Mental Discipline in Education. 405

them to a foreign language through this gateway, is a still
more flagrant outrage. The natural method of acquiring
speech is the way we all acquire it; the knowledge of
words first, then their combination into sentences, to be
followed by the practical use of the language; rules and
precepts may then be intelligently applied. But to begin
with these is to put the complex before the simple, the ab-
stract before the concrete, generals before particulars, and,
in short, to invert the natural order of mental processes,
and to work the mind backward, under the plea of disciplin-
ing it. An eminent living authority in philology, Prof.
Latham, in a lecture before the Royal Institution of Great
Britain, observed :

In the ordinary teaching of what is called the grammar of the
English language, there are two elements. There is something pro-
fessed to be taught which is not ; and there is something which, from
being already learned better than any man can teach it, requires no
lessons. The latter is the use and practice of the English tongue.
The former is the principles of grammar. The facts, that language
is more or less regular ; that there is such a thing as grammar ; that
certain expressions should be avoided, are all matters worth know-
ing. And they are all taught even by the worst method of teaching.
But are these the proper objects of systematic teaching ? Is the
importance of their acquisition equivalent to the time, the trouble,
and the displacement of more valuable subjects, which are involved
in their explanation ? I think not. Gross vulgarity of language is a
fault to be prevented ; but the proper prevention is to he got from
habit — not rules. The proprieties of the English language are to be
learned, like the proprieties of English manners, by conversation and
intercourse ; and a proper school for both is the best society in which
the learner is placed. If this be good, systematic teaching is super-
fluous ; if bad, insufficient. There are unquestionably points where
a young person may doubt as to the grammatical propriety of a cer-
tain expression. In this case let him ask some one older, and more
instructed. Grammar, as an art, is undoubtedly the art of speaking
and writing correctly — but then, as an art, it is only required for foreign
languages. For our own we have the necessary practice and familiarity.

406 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The true claim of English grammar, to form part and parcel of
an English education, stands or falls with the value of the philological
knowledge to which grammatical studies may serve as an introduc-
tion, and with the value of scientific grammar, as a disciplinal study.
I have no fear of being supposed to undervalue its importance in this
respect. Indeed, in assuming that it is very great, I also assume
that wherever grammar is studied as grammar, the language which
the grammar so studied should represent, must be the mother tongue
of the student, whatever that mother tongue may be. This study is
the study of a theory ; and for this reason it should be complicated
as little as possible by points of practice. For this reason a man's
mother tongue is the best medium for the elements of scientific
philology, simply because it is the one which he knows best in prac-
tice.

It thus appears that to secure the disciplinary uses of
grammatical study, not even a foreign language is neces-
sary, much less a dead one.

When it is remembered that the Hebrew language had
no grammar till a thousand years after Christ ; that the
masterpieces of Greek literature were produced before
Aristotle first laid the grammatical foundations of that
language ; that the Romans acquired the Greek without
grammatical aid, by reading and conversation ; that the
most eminent scholars of the middle ages and later, Alfred,
Abelard, Beauclerc, Roger Bacon, Chaucer, Dante, Pe-
trarch, Lipsius, Buddeus, and the Scaligers — Latin scholars,
who have never since been surpassed, learned this lan-
guage without the assistance of grammar ; that Lilly's
grammar, in doggerel Latin verse, was thrust upon the
English schools by royal edict of Henry VIII, against the
vehement protest of men like Ascham, and that the de-
cline of eminent Latinists in that country was coincident
with the general establishment of this method of teaching ;
that Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio gave to the world
their immortal works two hundred years before the appear-
ance of the first Italian Grammar ; that Shakespeare, Mil-

Mental Discipline in Education. 407

ton, Dryden, Addison, Pope, Young, Thomson, Johnson,
Burns, and others, whose names will live as long as the Eng-
lish language, had not in their childhood learned any Eng-
lish grammar ; that Corneille, Moliere, La Fontaine, Pas-
cal, Bossuet, Boileau, and Racine, wrote their masterpieces
long before the publication of any French grammar ; that
men like Collet, Wolsey, Erasmus, Milton, Locke, Gibbon,
Condillac, Lemare, Abbe Sicard, Basil Hall, Home Tooke,
Adam Smith, and a host of others, have emphatically con-
demned the method of acquiring language through the
study of grammar ; that the most eminent masters of lan-
guage, Demosthenes, Seneca, Malherbe, Clarendon, Mon-
tesquieu, Fenelon, Voltaire, Rousseau, Montaigne, Boileau,
Dante, Galileo, Franklin, Gibbon, Robertson, Pope, Burns,
Byron, and Moore, acknowledge that they attained their
excellences of style by the study and imitation of the best
models of writing ; and finally, that mere grammarians are
generally bad writers : when we recall facts like these, we
can begin to rate at something like their true value the
claims of the grammatical study of defunct forms of
speech for mental training. That there is a useful disci-
pline in the critical study of language, as in the critical
study of most other things, is not denied ; but that it has
either the transcendent importance usually assumed, or
that it cannot be substantially acquired by the mastery
of modern tongues, is what the advocates of the dead lan-
guages have failed to prove.*

Let us now notice the discipline of mathematics, the
claims of which to an important place in a liberal scheme
of education are of course unquestionable. Dealing with
conceptions of quantity under various forms of expression,

* For confirmation of the statements in this paragraph see Marcel on
Language, in two volumes. London: Chapman & Hall, 1853. It is not
creditable to American education that this able work has not been repub-
lished here.

408 Edward Livingston Youmans.

and with a varying application to universal phenomena,
they are an indispensable key to universal science, and
their basis is, therefore, a broad and solid utility. But the
devotees of tradition are not satisfied with this ; they make
extravagant claims for mathematics, on the ground of the
discipline they afford, and then usurp for them an edu-
cational predominance to which they are not entitled. In
their subordinate place they are invaluable ; as a too en-
grossing subject of study, injurious. Mathematics are
suited to form habits of continuous attention by dealing
with trains of proof, to help the imagination steadily to
grasp abstract relations, and to familiarize the mind with a
system of necessary truth. But they do not afford a com-
plete exercise of the reasoning powers. They begin with
axioms, self-evident truths, established principles, and pro-
ceed to their conclusions along a track each step of which
is an intuitive certainty. But it so happens that in our
mental dealings with the experiences of life, the first, the
most important, and most difficult thing is to get the data
or premises from which to reason. The primary question
is, What are the facts, the pertinent facts, and all the facts,
which bear upon the inquiry ? This is the supreme step ;
for, until this is done, reasoning is futile, and it may be
added that, when this is done, the formation of conclusions
is a comparatively simple process. Now mathematical
training cannot help to this important preliminary work ;
it leaves its cultivator to the blind acceptance or blind re-
jection of his premises. Those, therefore, who have ex-
clusively pursued these studies, so as to form mathematical
habits of thinking, have no preparation for the practical
emergencies of thought, where contingencies are to be
taken into account, where probable evidence is to be
weighed, and conclusions from imperfect knowledge are to
be formed and acted upon. The pure mathematician is
therefore liable to a one-sided and erratic judgment of

Mental Discipline in Education. 409

affairs. An exclusive mathematical discipline must, therefore,
be held as an actual disqualification for the work of life.*

It is important to notice that, so far as the mode of ex-
ercising the mind is concerned, mathematical discipline
does not correct the defects of lingual discipline, but rather
confirms them. We hence see how it was that mathemat-
ics so perfectly harmonized with philology as to have been
early and naturally incorporated with it in the same scheme
of culture. Both begin with the unquestioning acceptance
of data — axioms, definitions, rules ; both reason deduc-
tively from foregone assumptions, and therefore both ha-
bituate to the passive acceptance of authority — the highest
mental desideratum in the theological ages and establish-
ments which gave origin to the traditional curriculum.

To those familiar with the literature of this discussion,
the objections here presented will not be new ; but there

* Dugald Stewart remarks : " How accurate soever the logical process
may be, if our first principles be rashly assumed, or if our terms be in-
definite and ambiguous, there is no absurdity so great that we may not be
brought to adopt it ; and it unfortunately happens that, while mathemat-
ical studies exercise the faculty of reasoning or deduction, they give no em-
ployment to the other powers of the understanding concerned in the inves-
tigation of truth. On the contrary, they are apt to produce a facility in
the admission of data, and a circumscription of the field of speculation by
partial and arbitrary definitions. ... I think I have observed a peculiar
proneness in mathematicians to avail themselves of principles sanctioned
by some imposing names, and to avoid all discussion which might tend to
an examination of ultimate truths, or involve a rigorous analysis of their
ideas. ... In the course of my own experience I have not met with a
mere mathematician, who was not credulous to a fault ; credulous not
only with respect to human testimony, but credulous also in matters of
opinion ; and prone, on all subjects which he had not carefully studied, to
repose too much faith in illustrations and consecrated names." Pascal
also observes : " It is rare that mathematicians are observant, or that ob-
servant minds are mathematical, because mathematicians would treat mat-
ters of observation by rule of mathematic, and make themselves ridiculous
by attempting to commence by definitions, and by principles."

Edward Livingston Youmans.

are certain considerations growing out of the recent progress
of thought, which have a powerful bearing upon the question,
and which it is desirable now to present. And first, What is
the real significance of the phrase " discipline of the mind " ?

By mental discipline in education is meant, that sys-
tematic and protracted exercise of the mental powers
which is suited to raise them to their highest degree of
healthful capability, and impart a permanent direction to
their activity. The mind takes a set or stamp from the
character of the knowledge it acquires, and the mode of
activity which these acquisitions involve, and, in this way,
mental habits are formed. But, what is the basis of this
great fact of mental habits, by which so spiritual an agency
as mind becomes fettered ? It is a property of the organic
constitution, and its consideration brings us down to the firm
physiological basis of the whole subject.

There are two methods of studying mind. The old
metaphysical method simply takes note of the mental ef-
fects which are manifested in consciousness, but modern
psychology goes deeper, and takes into account the con-
ditions under which these manifestations arise. It no
longer admits of denial or cavil, that the Author of our
being has seen fit to connect mind and intelligence with
a nervous mechanism : in studying mental phenomena,
therefore, in connection with this mechanism, we are study-
ing them in the relation which God has established, and,
therefore, in the only true relation. There is still a pow-
erful prejudice against this proceeding. Literature and
Theology continue to pour their contempt upon that " mat-
ter " which infinite wisdom has consecrated to the high
purpose of manifesting mental effects, while the scientific
study of the organ of thought has been, until very re-
cently, outlawed by the state.* Yet nothing is more cer-

* Human dissections having been, until lately, illegal.

Mental Discipline in Education. 4 1 1

tain than that in future, mind is to be studied in connec-
tion with the organism by which it is conditioned : when
we begin to deal with the problem of mental discipline,
metaphysics no longer avail ; it is the organism with which
we have finally to deal.

When it is said that the brain is the organ of the mind,
it is meant that in thinking, remembering, reasoning, the
brain acts. It is now admitted that all impressions made
upon the brain, and all actions occurring within it, are ac-
companied by physical changes. Thought usually goes on
so quietly, and seems so far removed from bodily activity,
that we are easily betrayed into the notion that it is car-
ried on in a region of pure spirit ; but this is far from being
the truth. The changes of states of consciousness, the
course of thought, and all processes of 'the understanding,
are carried on by a constant succession of nerve excite-
ments and nerve discharges. The brain is not a chaos of
parts thrown together at random ; it consists of hundreds
of millions of cells and fibres, organized into symmetrical
order, so as to produce innumerable connections, crossings,
and junctions of exquisite delicacy. The simple elements
of mind are built up into complex knowledge by the law
of association of ideas ; and the mental associations are
formed by combinations of currents in the brain, and are
made permanent by the growth and modification of cells
at the points of union. When a child associates the sight,
weight, and ring of a dollar, with the written word and
verbal sound that represent it so firmly together in its
mind that any one of these sensations will instantly bring
up the others, it is said to " learn " it. But the real fact of
the case is, that the currents formed by visible impressions,
vocal movements and sounds, are often repeated together,
and are thus combined in the brain, and fixed by specific
growths at their points of union, and in this way the men-
tal associations are cemented by cerebral nutrition. And

Edward Livingston Youmans.

thus the child goes on multiplying its experiences of the
properties of objects and of localities, persons, actions,
conduct ; he observes, compares, contrasts, infers, and
judges, and all this growing and complex mass of acquisi-
tion is definitely combined in the growing and perfecting
organ of the mind.

The basis of educability, and hence of mental disci-
pline, is, therefore, to be sought in the properties of that
nervous substance by which mind is manifested. That
basis is the law that cerebral effects are strengthened and
made lasting by repetition. When an impression is made
upon the brain, a change is produced, and an effect remains
in the nerve substance ; if it be repeated, the change is
deepened, and the effect becomes more lasting. If we have
a perception of an object, or if we perform an action only
once, the nervous change is so slight that the idea may
perhaps never reappear, and the act never be repeated ;
if experienced twice, the tendency to recur is increased ;
if many times, this tendency is so deepened, and the links
of association become so extended, that the idea will be
often obtruded into thought, and the action may take
place involuntarily. Intellectual " capacity " is thus at
bottom an affair of physical impressibility, or nervous ad-
hesiveness. Regard being had to the law that all nutritive
operations involve repose, cohesion or completeness of
association depends upon repetition. Of course, constitu-
tions differ widely in this property, some requiring many
more repetitions than others, to secure acquirement.* This
view leads to important practical conclusions.

* To illustrate the two modes of viewing mental phenomena, I will
quote a couple of extracts from eminent authorities, reprobating the per-
nicious practice of " cramming" for examinations. Dr. Whewell, content
with the metaphysical method, observes : " I may add my decided opinion
that no system of education which is governed entirely or even mainly by
examinations, occupying short times with long intervening intervals, can

Mental Discipline in Education. 413

When it is perceived that what we have to deal with in
mental acquirement is organic processes, which have a
definite time rate of procedure, so that, however vigor-
ously the currents are sustained by keeping at a thing, ac-
quisition is not increased in the same degree ; when we see
that new attainments are easiest and most rapid during
early life — the time of most vigorous growth of the body
generally ; that thinking exhausts the brain as really as
working exhausts the muscles, and that rest and nutrition
are as much needed in one case as the other; when we see
that rapidity of attainment and tenacity of memory involve
the question of cerebral adhesions, and note how widely
constitutions differ in these capabilities, how they depend
upon blood, stock, and health, and vary with numberless
conditions, we become aware how inexorably the problem
of mental attainment is hedged round with limitations, and
the vague notion that there are no bonds to acquisition
except imperfect application disappears forever.*

ever be otherwise than bad mental discipline. Intellectual education re-
quires that the mind should be habitually employed in the acquisition of
knowledge, with a certain considerable degree of clear insight and inde-
pendent activity."

Mr. Bain takes the psychological view, and reaches the vital dynamics
of the case. He says : " The system of cramming is a scheme for making
temporary acquisitions, regardless of the endurance of them. Excitable
brains, that can command a very great concentration of force upon a sub-
ject, will be proportionably improved for the time being. By drawing upon
the strength of the future, we are able to fix temporarily a great variety
of impressions during the exaltation of cerebral power that the excite-
ment gives. The occasion past, the brain must lie idle for a correspond-
ing length of time, while a large portion of the excited impressions will
gradually perish away. This system is exceedingly unfavorable to per-
manent acquisitions ; for these the brain should be carefully husbanded,
and temporarily drawn upon. Every period of undue excitement and
feverish susceptibility is a time of great waste for the plastic energy of the
mind.

* See page 348.

414 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The doctrine of mental limitations, which we thus find
grounded in the organic constitution, puts the philosophy
of education at once on the basis of the economy of mental
power. The student is constantly told that his time is
limited, and exhorted not to waste it ; but his forces of
acquisition are equally limited, and it becomes a question
of still higher importance how to economize these, for it
is possible sedulously to save the moments while squander-
ing half the energies of the mind in bad application. Ob-
viously if intellectual power has its fixed bounds, the su-
preme question is, How can the highest results be attained
within those bounds ?

Nature's method of economizing power is by repetition
of actions in constantly varying conditions. The celestial
order is maintained by endless repetition of axial and or-
bital revolutions. The operations of the world are carried
on by using over and over again the same stock of re-
sources ; matter and force circle round and round through
the mineral, vegetable, and animal phases ; in the growing
plant leaves undergo constant transformation into other
organs, while the animal skull is formed of modified ver-
tebral spines. And so in the urifoldings of the mental
world, Nature is constantly falling back upon old acquisi-
tions, and using them to produce new effects. In the pro-
cess of acquirement, ideas and aptitudes once mastered are
constantly wrought into higher and more complex combi-
nations. The organ of thought being a vast reduplication
of the same simple elements, the growth of thought results
from an endless repetition of the same simple operations.

The child, through numberless repetitions of effort, at
length gets the aptitude of using its hands for ordinary
purposes. But this faculty once secured, serves for life in
all the ordinary emergencies of action. The necessity for
new and varied movements involves no new acquisitions ;
within the range of ordinary activity the early aptitudes

Mental Discipline in Education. 415

suffice. But if in any case manipulations of special delicacy
and precision are required, as in learning to draw, a new
acquisition must be made. Yet here the same thing occurs.
The new acquirement may be utilized in other similar ap-
plications ; if the child have first learned to draw, the apti-
tude will serve also in learning to write.

Again, the instrumental performer, by long drill, ac-
quires a great number of movements, according to the range
of his musical sensibility, so that learning new pieces is
but little else than new combinations of old sequences —
the new acquisition being, in fact, but a new grouping of
old acquisitions. So also in the purely intellectual opera-
tions. In learning geometry, the mind having grasped the
preliminary definitions, axioms, and postulates, uses them
over and over in solving the successive problems ; while
mathematical genius consists mainly in the ready ability
to identify the old elements under the disguises of the
new cases. In fixing the conception of a new mineral, plant,
or animal, the naturalist recalls the characteristics of known
specimens which most nearly resemble them, and super-
adds to these the new features. The same thing holds in
learning languages. The mastery of Latin reduces the labor
of acquiring Italian, French, and Spanish, into which it
largely enters ; and we find new words to be easy in pro-
portion as they consist of old familiar articulations. In
historical studies, revolutions, campaigns, negotiations, and
political measures, are repeated by the same nation at suc-
cessive epochs, and by one government after another, so
that a new history is but a varied reading of old ones; the
really new features bearing but a small proportion to those
already fixed in the student's mind. The vast mental econ-
omy which would arise throughout civilization by the gen-
eral adoption of decimal coinage, weights, and measures, is
but another illustration of the principle ; a few simple arith-
metical acquisitions would serve the requirements of all

416 Edward Livingston Youmans.

who deal with relations of quantity. In short, our reason
has been aptly define4 as " the power of using old facts in
new circumstances," and this is the secret of the production
of vast effects with limited resources.*

Now this principle, as it affords the true key to intellec-
tual progress, must become the organizing law of education.
We find that extent of mental attainment depends, not
alone upon intellectual effort, but upon the order of rela-
tions among objects of thought. Of course, mental capa-
city is the first factor in acquisition, but that being given,
the scale of possible attainment depends absolutely upon
the order of the course of study. Education cannot make
capacity, but it controls the conditions by which the least
or the most can be made of it. If the methods of study
be such that the mind encounters broad breaks in its course,
and is abruptly shifted into new lines of effort, so that past
conceptions are not carried on to a progressive unfolding,
mental growth is checked and power lost. The extent to
which one fact or principle is a repetition or outgrowth of
another, in the serial relation of subjects, determines the
rate of mental movement, which can only become steady
and rapid in continuous ranges of effort. As in the out-
ward world, the past creates the future along unbroken
lines of dynamic sequence and causation, so in the mental
world, there must be a corresponding continuity of move-
ment by which the past creates the future in intellectual
evolution.

We have here the touchstone of educational systems,
and the fatal condemnation of the current theory of disci-
pline. How grossly that theory violates the law of mental
economy, and, indeed, actually provides for waste of power,
will be apparent by glancing briefly at its origin. The

* For a full working out of this doctrine, see Bain's Senses and Intel-
lect.

Mental Discipline in Education. 417

notion of mental gymnastics was borrowed from that of
bodily gymnastics. In early times, useful labor being re-
garded as menial and degrading, the superior classes sought
the activity needed for health in various artificial exercises.
The old Greek gymnastics was a system of athletic exer-
cises cultivated for the attainment of physical development,
and had no reference to the preparation of men for the oc-
cupations of industry. The ancient philosophers held that
it was as degrading to seek useful knowledge as to practice
useful arts; hence, subjects of study were chosen as intel-
lectual gymnastics and to acquire mental discipline, and
this, not as a preparation for valuable mental labor, but as
an end in itself. Not the game, but the excitement of the
chase; not the truth, but the exhilaration of its pursuit,
were the mottoes of culture. Under these circumstances
no vulgar question of economy could arise; mental power
was ostentatiously wasted, and with the necessary conse-
quences— truth unsought was not found ; the ends of cul-
ture being ignored, there was neither conquest of nature
nor progress of society.

Not only does the principle of vicarious discipline in-
volve enormous mental waste, but the system of studies
employed to secure it grossly violates the great law of ac-
quisition, which should become the basis of education.
That system is neither an outgrowth of the proper educa-
tion of childhood, nor does it flow on into the intellectual
life of manhood : it is a foreign body of thought, uncon-
genial and unaffiliated, thrust into the academic period, and
destroying the unity and continuity of the mental career.
The young student is detached from all his early mental
connections, expatriated to Greece and Rome for a course
of years, becomes charged with antiquated ideas, and then
returns to resume his relation with the onflowing current
of events in his own age. The radical defect of the tra-
ditional system is, that it fails to recognize and grasp the/

41 8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

controlling ends of culture. Misled by the fallacy that,
through a scheme of aimless exercises for discipline, men-
tal power n.ay be accumulated for universal application, it
sees no necessity of organizing education with explicit
reference to ultimate and definite purposes, and it thus for.
feits its right of control over the educational interests of
the time. For that there are great and well-defined aims,
revealed with more clearness in this age than ever before,
to which a higher mental culture should be subservient,
does not admit of intelligent question. If the classical
system grasps the conception of education, in its ends as
well as its beginnings, as a preparation for the activities of
life ; and of discipline, as the formation of habits to guide
a constantly unfolding mental career ; and of knowledge,
as consisting of a chain of relations, along which the mind
is to move in accomplishing that career ; if it unfolds the
order of the world, and puts the student in command of
the ripest and richest results of past thinking; if it quali-
fies best for the relations of parenthood, citizenship, and
the multiform responsibilities of social relation ; if it equips
for the intelligent and courageous consideration of those
vital questions which the progress of knowledge and aspi-
ration are forcing upon society ; if it fits most effectually
for these supreme ends, then, indeed, it affords a proper
discipline for the needs of the time ; but if the student,
after having faithfully mastered his collegiate tasks, finds,
upon entering the world of action, that his acquisitions are
not available — that he has to leave them behind him and
begin anew, then his preparation has been a bad one ; time
has been irretrievably lost, power irrecoverably wasted, and
the chances are high that he will give the go-by to modern
knowledge, and thin down his intellectual life to the lan-
guid nursing of his classical memories.

It is well known that, in numerous cases, the success
of educated men may be directly traced to neglect of the

Mental Discipline in Education. 419

regular college studies, or to their neutralization by the
vigorous pursuit of other subjects; and equally notorious
that in numberless other cases, where the student has sur-
rendered himself to college influences and conquered his
curriculum, exactly in proportion to his fidelity has been
his defeat. He has mastered a disqualifying culture. In
hundreds of instances it has been the lot of the writer to
listen to expressions of bitter regret on the part of college
graduates at the misdirected studies and the misapplied
time which their " liberal " education had involved. «* O
that I had some knowledge of those imminent questions
that are urging themselves on public attention, in place of
my college lumber / " is a stereotyped exclamation in these
cases. And this turn of expression discloses the worst
aspect of the matter,, for the lumber cannot be got rid of.
The mind is not a reservoir to be emptied and refilled at
pleasure. The student has not been preparing a soil for
future sowing; he has sown it, and to extirpate the roots
will consume half a lifetime. In the most plastic period
of receptivity he has been making acquisitions and forming
habits which, by coercing his attention and engrossing his
thoughts, will operate powerfully to obstruct subsequent
mental operations ; for if they do not help, they must inev-
itably hinder.

In the preceding pages, after pointing out some of the
special disciplinary defects of the traditional scheme of
study, I have endeavored to show that in its very concep-
tion of mental training there is involved enormous waste of
power, and in its course of study a total nonrecognition
of the great law by which alone the highest mental attain-
ment can be reached. I have also shown that this errone-
ous conception of discipline, by ignoring the great ends
of culture, and the adaptation of studies to them, not only
wastes power, but gives a false preparation for life. It re-

420 Edward Livingston Youmans.

mains now to indicate how these errors and defects may be
remedied by scientific education.

Let it be remembered that this culture does not deny
the importance of mental discipline, but only the wasteful
policy of vicarious discipline. The question has three as-
pects. The ancients employed the useless fact A for dis-
ciplinary purposes, and ignored the useful fact B. The
adherents of the current theory propose to learn first the
useless fact A to get the discipline necessary to acquire
the useful fact B ; while a rational system ignores useless
A and attacks B at once, making it serve both for knowl-
edge and discipline. The ancient view was more reason-
able than that which has grown out of it. It wanted one
acquisition, and it made it ; the prevailing method wants
one, and makes two ; and as it costs as much effort to
learn a useless fact as a useful one, by this method half
the power is wasted.

The moment that the conception of value attaches to
power, the idea of its economy inevitably arises, and this is
fatal to its vicarious application. Hence gymnastics are
never thought of as a preparation for industrial occupation.
The employer who should resort to them would quickly
come to bankruptcy, for he knows that the laborer has
but a limited amount of power, all of which it is necessary
to utilize ; and he understands that the needed aptness
comes in the regular course of occupation, and in that way
alone. In the world of business, where results become
quickly apparent, and a wrong policy works speedy disas-
ter, the notion of discipline for a special activity, and not
through it, could not be entertained, and it only lingers in
the world of mind and education because there effects are
more remote, complex, and indefinite, and the conse-
quences of a wrong principle are less readily detected.
With the growing perception of the relation between
human thought and human life, it will be seen that by far

Mental Discipline in Education. 421

the most priceless of all things is mental power ; while one
of the highest offices of education must be strictly to econo-
mize and wisely to expend it. Science made the basis of
culture, will accomplish this result.

We have affirmed the broad principle of mental limita-
tions, but let none suppose that its necessary corollary is
narrow and stinted mental results. It has been explained
how this consequence is to be escaped. A limited outlay
of energy with results so vast as to seem out of all pro-
portion with it, is exactly the miraculous problem which
Nature has solved. It was at first supposed that prodi-
gious quantities of power were required to work the At-
lantic cable — an error which probably led to its destruc-
tion ; but electricians have been recently startled by the
discovery that the force generated in a lady's thimble, or
even in a percussion cap, is sufficient to operate the ocean
telegraph. The lesson of this experience is, that a knowl-
edge of the laws of power is essential to prevent waste
of power ; and this is no more true in physical dynamics
than in mental. Let none indulge apprehensions that this
doctrine of limits to acquirement darkens the future of
education, or derogates from man's mental dignity. What
the human mind has already accomplished is our starting
point. Working waywardly, in isolation, by arbitrary
methods, upon chaotic materials, and in ignorance of the
mighty secret of its power, grand results have nevertheless
been achieved, and they are the indices of attainment
under the worst conditions. But in the new revelation of
a cosmical order, and of the correlation and interde-
pendence of all truth, Science utters a pregnant prophecy
of the mind's future destiny, and vindicates her right to
take control of its future unfolding.

The ideal of the higher education demanded by the
present age, especially in this country, where it is becom-
ing most general, is a scheme of study, which, while it

422 Edward Livingston Youmans.

represents the present state of knowledge, and affords a
varied cultivation and a harmonious discipline, shall at
the same time best prepare for the responsible work of life.
For this the study of languages and mathematics is neces-
sary, but far from sufficient. Other sciences are to be sup-
plied and a curriculum framed, which, conforming to the
true logical order of subjects on the one hand, shall equally
conform to the order of unfolding the mental faculties on
the other, thus reaching an integral discipline through liv-
ing and applicable knowledge.

There is great significance in the fact that the prevail-
ing higher culture is without a foundation. Professing to
devote itself exclusively to the moulding and evolution of
mind — sinking knowledge itself into nothingness in com-
parison with this effect — its method does not reach back to
those beginnings of culture which far outweigh in impor-
tance all subsequent action. And this is no trifling criticism
of that method. Is it possible for a truly philosophical
system of training the mental powers to have been organ-
ized for centuries in all the higher institutions, and not
have reacted with controlling power upon the processes of
primary instruction ? Here a true method must begin, and
here scientific education does begin. Commencing early,
and commencing with Nature, it lays the foundation of cul-
ture in the systematic exercise of the observing powers.
In childhood there is a vast capability of accumulating sim-
ple facts. The higher forms of mental activity not having
come into exercise, the whole plastic power of the brain is
devoted to the storing up of perceptions, while the vigour of
cerebral growth insures the highest intensity of mental ad-
hesiveness. The capability of grasping relations being low,
it makes but little difference at first what objects are pre-
sented to attention ; words or things, with meaning or with-
out, and in the most arbitrary order, stick readily in the
memory. Skilful guidance at this period is of the very

Mental Discipline in Education. 423

highest importance. When curiosity is freshest, and the per-
ceptions keenest, and memory most impressible, before the
maturity of the reflective powers, the opening mind should
be led to the art of noticing the aspects, properties, and
simple relations of the surrounding objects of Nature. This
should be guided into a growing habit, and the young pupil
gradually trained to know how to observe, and what to ob-
serve among all the objects of its unfolding experience. It
should be encouraged to collect many of the little curiosi-
ties which awaken its attention, and required carefully to
preserve them; but to do all this judiciously is delicate
work. The custodian of the child must know something of
the objects of Nature, and much of the nature of the young
pupil. Above all other things, teachers qualified to do this
work are the desperate need of the age. To perfect the
object method, and train instructors to its discriminating
use, is one of the great functions of Normal Schools, and
must become the practical basis of a rational system of
education. Let it be remembered that there is nothing
forced or artificial here : the scenes of childish pleasure and
exuberant activity furnish the objects of thought. In cre-
ating an interest in these things a bent is given in the true
direction ; the valuable habit of observing and seeking is
formed, while the numberless disconnected shreds of knowl-
edge are incipient acquisitions, which will grow with time
into the ripened forms of science.

With such a preparation, the transition is natural to the
regular study of the sciences, in which the observing and
reasoning powers are to be systematically cultivated. For
this purpose the first to be taken up are mathematics, phys-
ics, or natural philosophy, and chemistry, as they deal with
the clearest and simplest conceptions, and depend upon the
fewest and most definite conditions. The adaptation of
mathematics to cultivate deductive reasoning has been no-
ticed. Physics trains equally to accuracy and precision of

424 Edward Livingston Youmans.

thought; but, beginning with observation, it exercises the
reason inductively. From particulars we pass to generals,
from observed facts to principles, by the mental process of
induction, which is a powerful instrumentality. When we
contemplate the vast extent of the facts which form the
body of the various sciences, and the marvellous rapidity
with which they are still accumulating, the task of their ac-
quisition seems appalling, and utterly beyond all grasp of
the intellect. But there is an order of Nature by which
individual facts are connected and bound together, and
there is a corresponding capacity in the human mind of
seizing upon those relations, of binding the facts into
groups, and of dealing with them, as it were, at wholesale
or in masses. This is the faculty of generalization, by
which wide-reaching principles replace or represent the in-
finitude of details, which they include. Indeed, the advance
of science essentially consists in the successive establish-
ment of such general principles which rise one above an-
other in higher and higher stages, until a few simple laws
are found to explain and represent the wide range of phe-
nomena to ^hich they apply. But now mark, that while in
this way knowledge is simplified, the mind is called into
higher action. The abstraction of a common law from
many facts, while it relieves the memory of the burden of
a large portion of them, makes a greater demand upon the
understanding. In proportion as knowledge is compressed
in bulk, its quality becomes, as it were, more intense ; and
just to the degree to which this operation is carried, is
greater intellectual effort required to master it. Thus, in
gaining command of the facts of nature and rising to a
comprehension of the order of the universe, we are at the
same time securing the highest and most salutary form of
mental discipline ; and a form of it, it may be added, for
which the traditional system of culture makes no provision.
The physical sciences, moreover, afford a discipline in

Mental Discipline in Education. 425

deductive reasoning the same as mathematics, but of a still
more valuable character. For while mathematics deals
with the smallest number of ideas, those of space and num-
ber, which may be abstracted entirely from all material ex-
istence, physics includes, in addition to these, the concep-
tions of matter and force, although it deals with them in
their universal properties and forms; and it thus comes
nearer to the realities of experience. Deduction is the
most common and practical form of mental activity. We
are constantly reasoning from our general notions or opin-
ions to particular facts and circumstances. Induction lays
the mental foundation by showing us how correctly to ar-
rive at these general notions; deduction guides their con-
stant application ; — the physical sciences afford the best
training-ground for both.

The mental advantages to be derived from a more thor-
ough study of the physical sciences have been very clearly
and impressively presented in a late discourse by Mr. John
Stuart Mill,* and his view so strongly confirms the present
argument as to justify extended quotation :

The most obvious part of the value of scientific instruction, the
mere information that it gives, speaks for itself. We are born into
a world which we have not made ; a world whose phenomena take
place according to fixed laws, of which we do not bring any knowl-
edge into the world with us. In such a world we are appointed to
live, and in it all our work is to be done. Our whole working power
depends on knowing the laws of the world — in other words, the
properties of the things which we have to work with, and to work
among, and to work upon. We may and do rely, for the greater
part of this knowledge, on the few who in each department make
its acquisition their main business in life. But unless an elementary
knowledge of scientific truths is diffused among the public, they
never know what is certain and what is not, or who are entitled to

* Inaugural address delivered to the University of St. Andrew, Febru-
ary i, 1867. By John Stuart Mill.

426 Edivard Livingston Youmans.

speak with authority and who are not : and they either have no faith
at all in the testimony of science, or are the ready dupes of charlatans
and impostors. They alternate between ignorant distrust, and blind,
often misplaced, confidence. Besides, who is there who would not
wish to understand the meaning of the common physical facts that
take place under his eye ? Who would not wish to know why a
pump raises water, why a lever moves heavy weights, why it is hot
at the tropics and cold at the poles, why the moon is sometimes
dark and sometimes bright, what is the cause of the tides ? Do we
not feel that he who is totally ignorant of these things, let him be
ever so skilled in a special profession, is not an educated man but an
ignoramus ? It is surely no small part of education to put us in in-
telligent possession of the most important and most universally in-
teresting facts of the universe, so that the world which surrounds us
may not be a sealed book to us, uninteresting because unintelligible.
This, however, is but the simplest and most obvious part of ^ the
utility of science, and the part which, if neglected in youth, may be
the most easily made up for afterward. It is more important to
understand the value of scientific instruction as a training and dis-
ciplining process, to fit the intellect for the proper work of a human
being. Facts are the materials of our knowledge, but the mind itself
is the instrument : and it is easier to acquire facts, than to judge
what they prove, and how, through the facts which we know, to get
to those which we want to know.

The most incessant occupation of the human intellect throughout
life is the ascertainment of truth. We are always needing to know
what is actually true about something or other. It is not given to
us all to discover great general truths that are a light to all men and
to future generations ; though with a better general education the
number of those who could do so would be far greater than it is.
But we all require the ability to judge between the conflicting opin-
ions which are offered to us as vital truths ; to choose what doctrines
we will receive in the matter of religion, for example ; to judge
whether we ought to be Tories, Whigs, or Radicals, or to what
length it is our duty to go with each ; to form a rational conviction
on great questions of legislation and internal policy, and on the
manner in which our country should behave to dependencies and to
foreign nations. And the need we have of knowing how to dis-
criminate truth, is not confined to the larger truths. All through

Mental Discipline in Education. 427

life it is our most pressing interest to find out the truth about all the
matters we are concerned with. If we are farmers we want to find
what will truly improve our soil ; if merchants, what will truly in-
fluence the markets of our commodities; if judges, or jurymen, or
advocates, who it was that truly did an unlawful act, or to whom a
disputed right truly belongs. Every time we have to make a new
resolution or alter an old one, in any situation in life, we shall go
wrong unless we know the truth about the facts on which our resolu-
tion depends. Now, however different these searches for truth may
look, and however unlike they really are in their subject-matter, the
methods of getting at truth, and the tests of truth, are in all cases
much the same. There are but two roads by which truth can be
discovered : observation and reasoning ; observation, of course, in-
cluding experiment. We all observe, and we all reason, and there-
fore, more or less successfully, we all ascertain truths : but most of
us do it very ill, and could not get on at all were we not able to fall
back on others who do it better. If we could not do it in any degree,
we should be mere instruments in the hands of those who could :
they would be able to reduce us to slavery. Then how shall we best
learn to do this ? By being shown the way in which it has already
been successfully done. The processes by which truth is attained,
reasoning and observation, have been carried to their greatest known
perfection in the physical sciences. As classical literature furnishes
the most perfect types of the art of expression, so do the physical
sciences those of the art of thinking. Mathematics, and its applica-
tion to astronomy and natural philosophy, are the most complete ex-
ample of the discovery of truths by reasoning ; experimental science,
of their discovery by direct observation. In all these cases we know
that we can trust the operation, because the conclusions to which it
has led have been found true by subsequent trial. It is by the study
of these, then, that we may hope to qualify ourselves for distinguish-
ing truth, in cases where there do not exist the same ready means of
verification.

In what consists the principal and most characteristic difference
between one human intellect and another ? In their ability to judge
correctly of evidence. Our direct perceptions of truth are so limited ;
we know so few things by immediate intuition, or, as it used to be
called, by simple apprehension — that we depend for almost all our
valuable knowledge on evidence external to itself; and most of us

428 Edward Livingston Youmans.

are very unsafe hands at estimating evidence, where an appeal can-
not be made to actual eyesight. The intellectual part of our educa-
tion has nothing more important to do than to correct or mitigate
this almost universal infirmity — this summary and substance of nearly
all purely intellectual weakness. To do this with effect needs all the
resources which the most perfect system of intellectual training can
command. Those resources, as every teacher knows, are but of
three kinds : first, models ; secondly, rules ; thirdly, appropriate
practice. The models of the art of estimating evidence are furnished
by science ; the rules are suggested by science ; and the study of sci-
ence is the most fundamental portion of the practice. . . . The
logical value of experimental science is comparatively a new subject,
yet there is no intellectual discipline more important than that which
the experimental sciences afford. Their whole occupation consists
in doing well, what all of us, during the whole of life, are engaged
in doing, for the most part badly. All men do not affect to be rea-
soners, but all profess, and really attempt, to draw inferences from
experience : yet hardly any one, who has not been a student of the
physical sciences, sets out with any just idea of what the process of
interpreting experience really is. If a fact has occurred once or
oftener, and another fact has followed it, people think they have got
an experiment, and are well on the road toward showing that the
one fact is the cause of the other. If they did but know the im-
mense amount of precaution necessary to a scientific experiment ;
with what sedulous care the accompanying circumstances are con-
trived and varied, so as to exclude every agency but that which is
the subject of the experiment — or, when disturbing agencies cannot
be excluded, the minute accuracy with which their influence is calcu-
lated and allowed for, in order that the residue may contain nothing
but what is due to the one agency under examination ; if these things
were attended to people would be much less easily satisfied that
their opinions have the evidence of experience ; many popular
notions and generalizations which are in all mouths, would be
thought a great deal less certain than they are supposed to be ; but we
should begin to lay the foundation of really experimental knowledge,
on things which are now the subjects of mere vague discussion,
where one side finds as much to say and says it as confidently as an-
other, and each person's opinion is less determined by evidence than
by his accidental interest or prepossession. In politics, for instance, it

Mental Discipline in Education. 429

is evident to whoever comes to the study from that of the experi-
mental sciences, that no political conclusions of any value for practice
can be arrived at by direct experience. Such specific experience as
we can have, serves only to verify, and even that insufficiently, the
conclusions of reasoning. Take any active force you please in poli-
tics, take the liberties of England, or free trade ; how should we
know that either of these things conduced to prosperity, if we could
discern no tendency in the things themselves to produce it? If we
had only the evidence of what is called our experience, such pros-
perity as we enjoy might be owing to a hundred other causes, and
might have been obstructed, not promoted, by these. All true
political science is, in one sense of the phrase, a priori, being de-
duced from the tendencies of things, tendencies known either through
our general experience of human nature, or as the result of an anal-
ysis of the course of history, considered as a progressive evolution.
It requires, therefore, the union of induction and deduction, and the
mind that is equal to it must have been well disciplined in both. But
familiarity with scientific experiment at least does the useful service
of inspiring a wholesome scepticism about the conclusions which the
mere surface of experience suggests.

The discipline of observation and strict reasoning af-
forded by the exact sciences, mathematics, physics, and
chemistry, pure and applied, being secured, we then pass
to the study of the biological sciences, botany, zoology,
physiology, geology. A new order of truths and new cir-
cumstances of knowledge are here encountered, to which
the sciences just considered are an indispensable introduc-
tion, but for which, the mental habits they form are not an
adequate preparation. We are still carefully to observe,
still to reason from facts to general principles, but the facts,
though equally positive, are now so different — so complex,
inaccessible, and indefinite, as to embarrass inference, and
call for a higher exercise of the judgment. Experiment
or active observation, which plays so prominent a part in
physics and chemistry, is here greatly limited ; we cannot
isolate the phenomena, and turn them round and round,

430 Edward Livingston Youmans.

and inside out, so as to compel a revelation of their
secrets : hence, in proportion as the sources of error be-
come more numerous and fallacies more insidious, a subt-
ler exercise of the reason is demanded — more circumspec-
tion in weighing evidence and checking conclusions, and a
severer necessity for suspension of judgment. As the bio-
logical sciences deal with the laws of life and the phenom-
ena of living b'eings, man in his animal constitution and
relations, is included in their subject-matter, while the
problems presented exercise the mind in a manner similar to
the formation of judgments upon human affairs. Com-
plete or demonstrative induction being impossible, we are
compelled to form conclusions from only a part of the
facts involved, and to anticipate the agreement of the rest.
This is reasoning from analogy, a powerful but perilous
mode of proceeding; one which we are compelled con-
stantly to adopt in our mental treatment of the concerns
of life, and for which biological studies are eminently suited
to give the requisite discipline.

Another advantage of the study of these subjects is
afforded by the comprehensiveness and perfection of their
classifications. No other subjects, compare with zoology
and botany in these respects. Not only do they furnish
inexhaustible material for the exercise of memory, but by
the presentation of facts in their natural relations they
exercise it in its highest and most perfect form. It is
maintained by Agassiz that classifications in natural his-
tory are but reports of the order of Nature — expressions
of her profoundest plan ; and he even goes so far as to in-
terpret them as a divine ideal programme of constructions,
of which the living world is but the execution. However
this may be, it is certain that they open to us the broadest
view of the relations and harmonies of organic nature, and
are best fitted to discipline the mind in dealing with large
co-ordinations, and the comprehensive arrangement of

Mental Discipline in Education. 431

objects of thought, whether in the arts, the professions,
business, or science.

Dr. Whewell, in his defence of the absorbing attention
given to mathematics and physics, in the University of
Cambridge, has urged the necessity of admitting, as means
of education, only those subjects the truths of which are
demonstrated and settled forever. But what is the extent
of the field of the absolutely unquestionable ? Mathe-
matics do indeed present truths upon which rational be-
ings can never disagree ; but supposing that the student
becomes a little inquisitive, and ventures to ask something
about the grounds and origin of these truths, he is in-
stantly launched into the arena of polemical strife, and his
teacher, from being a frigid expositor of self-evident prin-
ciples, is suddenly transformed into an ardent partisan.
Dr. Whewell has been the lifelong champion of certain
views respecting the nature of mathematical conceptions,
which are sharply contested, and have certainly no more
than held their own in philosophical conflict. In the field
of physics, also, has not the present generation witnessed
one of the deepest and most comprehensive revolutions
which the history of science records — the acceptance of a
totally new view of the nature and relations of forces ?
What, indeed, is the object of education, the leading out
of the mind, if not to arouse thought and provoke inquiry,
as well as to direct them ? Is the student's mind a tank to
be filled, or an organism to be quickened ? It may be
well pleasing to indolent and arrogant pedagogues never
to have their assertions questioned, but it is wholesome
neither for themselves nor their students.

Important as may be the mental preparation for deal-
ing with certainties, it is still more important to prepare for
dealing with uncertainties : to ignore this, arrests education
at an inferior stage, and but ill prepares for the emergencies
of practical life. It is matter of notoriety that the so-

43 2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

called liberal culture is no adequate protection against nu-
merous fallacies and impostures which are current in so-
ciety ; and to so great an extent is this true that it is com-
mon to question whether, after all, for our real needs, edu-
cation is better than ignorance. But there is an " educated
ignorance," which, for the great end of guiding to action
and ruling the conduct, is as worthless as blank ignorance.
Take the charlatanries of medical treatment ; take the
question of so-called " spiritual manifestations," and we
find persons of reputed culture and good sense venturing
opinions, adopting practices, and professing to " investi-
gate," in the completest ignorance of all the conditions of
thinking — all the canons of inquiry which have conducted
to truth in this high and complex range of subjects.

To meet these and kindred emergencies of our social
experience, we require an education not merely in dead
languages, mathematics, and physics, with perhaps a super-
added smattering of physiology and geology, but such a
training in the fundamental organic sciences as shall con-
stitute a thorough biological discipline.

The direct and powerful bearing of biological studies
upon an understanding of the nature and relations of man
has been so well stated by Mr. Mill, in the address already
referred to, in speaking of the educational claims of physi-
ology, that I cannot forbear making another extract :

The first is physiology ; the science of the laws of organic and
animal life, and especially of the structure and functions of the human
body. It would be absurd to pretend that a profound knowledge of
this difficult subject can be acquired in youth, or as a part of general
education. Yet an acquaintance with its leading truths is one of
those acquirements which ought not to be the exclusive property of
a particular profession. The value of such knowledge for daily uses
has been made familiar to us all by the sanitary discussions of late
years. There is hardly one among us who may not, in some position
of authority, be required to form an opinion and take part in public

Mental Discipline in Education. 433

action on sanitary subjects. And the importance of understanding
the true conditions of health and disease — of knowing how to acquire
and preserve that healthy habit of body which the most tedious and
costly medical treatment so often fails to restore when once lost,
should secure a place in general education for the principal maxims
of hygiene, and some of those even of practical medicine. For those
who aim at high intellectual cultivation, the study of physiology has
still greater recommendations, and is, in the present state of advance-
ment of the higher studies, a real necessity. The practice which it
gives in the study of Nature is such as no other physical science
affords in the same kind, and is the best introduction to the difficult
questions of politics and social life. Scientific education, apart from
professional objects, is but a preparation for judging rightly of Man,
and of his requirements and interests, But to this final pursuit,
which has been called par excellence the proper study of mankind,
physiology is the most serviceable of the sciences, because it is the
nearest. Its subject is already Man : the same complex and manifold
being, whose properties are not independent of circumstance, and
immovable from age to age, like those of the ellipse and hyperbola,
or of sulphur and phosphorus, but are infinitely various, indefinitely
modifiable by art or accident, graduating by the nicest shades into
one another, and reacting upon one another in a thousand ways, so
that they are seldom capable of being isolated and observed sepa-
rately. With the difficulties of the study of a being so constituted,
the physiologist, and he alone among scientific inquirers, is already
familiar. Take what view we will of man as a spiritual being, one
part of his nature is far more like another than either of them is like
anything else. In the organic world we study Nature under disad-
vantages very similar to those which affect the study of moral and
political phenomena : our means of making experiments are almost
as limited, while the extreme complexity of the facts makes the con-
clusions of general reasoning unusually precarious, on account of the
vast number of circumstances that conspire to determine every result-
Yet, in spite of these obstacles, it is found possible in physiology to
arrive at a considerable number of well-ascertained and important
truths. This, therefore, is an excellent school in which to study the
means of overcoming similar difficulties elsewhere. It is in physiol-
ogy, too, that we are first introduced to some of the conceptions
which play the greatest part in the moral and social sciences, but

434 Edward Livingston Youmans.

which do not occur at all in those of inorganic nature. As, for in-
stance, the idea of predisposition, and of predisposing causes, as dis-
tinguished from exciting causes. The operation of all moral forces
is immensely influenced by predisposition : without that element, it is
impossible to explain the commonest facts of history and social life.
Physiology is also the first science in which we recognize the influ-
ence of habit— the tendency of something to happen again merely
because it has happened before. From physiology, too, we get our
clearest notion of what is meant by development or evolution. The
growth of a plant or animal from the first germ is the typical speci-
men of a phenomenon which rules through the whole course of the
history of man and society — increase of function, through expansion
and differentiation of structure by internal forces. I cannot enter
into the subject at greater length ; it is enough if I throw out hints
which may be germs of further thought in yourselves. Those who
aim at high intellectual achievements may be assured that no part of
their time will be less wasted, than that which they employ in be-
coming familiar with the methods and with the main conceptions of
the science of organization and life.

Physiology, at its upper extremity, touches on Psychology, or the
Philosophy of Mind ; and without raising any disputed questions
about the limits between Matter and Spirit, the nerves and brain are
admitted to have so intimate a connection with the mental opera-
tions, that the student of the last cannot dispense with a consider-
able knowledge of the first. The value of psychology itself need
hardly be expatiated upon in a Scottish university ; for it has always
been there studied with brilliant success. Almost everything which
has been contributed from these islands toward its advancement
since Locke and Berkeley has, until very lately, and much of it even
in the present generation, proceeded from Scottish authors and Scot-
tish professors. Psychology, in truth, is simply the knowledge of the
laws of human nature. If there is anything that deserves to be
studied by man, it is his own nature and that of his fellow-men : and
if it is worth studying at all, it is worth studying scientifically, so as
to reach the fundamental laws which underlie and govern all the rest.
With regard to the suitableness of this subject for general education,
a distinction must be made. There are certain observed laws of our
thoughts and of our feelings which rest upon experimental evidence,
and, once seized, are a clue to the interpretation of much that we are

Mental Discipline in Education. 435

conscious of in ourselves, and observe in one another. Such, for
example, are the laws of association. Psychology, so far as it
consists of such laws (I speak of the laws themselves, not of their
disputed applications), is as positive and certain a science as chemis-
try, and fit to be taught as such.

The discipline and the knowledge conferred by study of
the preceding group of sciences form the true preparation
for that higher class of studies, mental, moral, political, and
literary, which completes the course of a true liberal educa-
tion. Although not themselves ranked as sciences, these
extensive and important subjects are constantly becoming
more and more scientific in their conceptions and methods,
and hence form the natural sequel of a systematic scientific
culture. Physiology passes insensibly into psychology, the
central science, upon which hinge logic, sociology, political
economy, history, ethics, aesthetics, and literature. Mental
phenomena are manifestations of life, and their laws are
derivatives of the laws of life ; only throngh a knowledge
of the former, therefore, is it possible to reach a true un-
derstanding of the latter. Logic treats of the laws of evi-
dence and proof, by which things and their relations are
truly represented in thought.* Sociology considers the re-
lations among human beings and the forces which act upon
them in society, and it hence only becomes possible through
a prior knowledge of the vital and mental organization of
man ; political economy, a branch of this subject, treating
of industrial and commercial questions, depends upon the
same conditions. History is a record of the course of
human experience in its multiform phases, and the key to
its right interpretation is that knowledge of the character
of the Actor and the circumstances of action which it is the
prerogative of science alone to give. Ethics, or moral
science, determines the principles which should guide the
right ruling of conduct, and depends upon every science

* See page 45.

436 Edward "Livingston Youmans.

9

which can throw light on the progress of the intellect, the
evolution of the emotions, and the limits of moral liberty
and responsibility imposed by the conditions of physical
organization or social circumstances. ^Esthetics, which
regards the beautiful in Nature, and gives rise to the fine
arts, depends upon the laws of feeling and sensibility. Its
principles are founded in the constitution of human nature,
and will probably be yet reduced to a scientific system. To
work out its great ideas of " unity," " harmony," " propor-
tion," and the laws of beauty, it awaits a better psychology
and a deeper penetration into the true spirit of Nature.
Literature is that great body of expression of thought
upon a vast variety of subjects, the proper judgment of
which depends upon the extent and accuracy of our knowl-
edge of the truth of things in reality, conception, and ex-
pression.

Thus does scientific culture reach its ultimate and ex-
alted ends. Its course is along a line of connections
which are causal and dynamic ; its ideas constantly flow-
ing on and widening out until they embrace all the higher
subjects of human interest and inquiry. The order of
dependence of facts and principles must here impera-
tively determine the true order of study. To pass directly
from languages and mathematics to the complex questions
of man and society, is to violate the continuity of Nature's
logic ; to carry false methods of reasoning and judgment
into the highest spheres of thought, and to provide for
those errors of theology and vices of practice which are so
lamentably conspicuous in the management of social and
public affairs. Only by that scientific discipline which
confers a steadfast faith in the universality of law, and
only as the discipline of mathematical and physical studies
is corrected and amplified by familiarity with biological
conceptions, will it be possible to secure a class of thinkers
who can grapple with the upper grade of questions in

Mental Discipline in Education. 437

which the best welfare of society is involved. The culture
afforded by these higher subjects is also varied, copious,
and quickening. They give breadth, adaptiveness, and en-
larged effect to the discipline of the preparatory sciences,
and cultivate mental pliancy, readiness of judgment, and
practical sagacity.

If it be objected that this scheme is too vast, I reply,
first, the student is not expected to grasp the details of
the various sciences, but only to master their leading prin-
ciples. At least one science, however, should be thor-
oughly acquired by every well-educated person — should be
carried into detail, pursued experimentally, and pushed to
its boundaries. The student should be brought face to
face with the stem problems of Nature, and taught to
wrestle with the difficulties she offers; only thus can he
truly know how much is meant by the word " truth," and
get the discipline that will give value to his other scientific
studies. But while the thorough attainment of a single
science may serve for training in method, it is highly desir-
able, and in a mental point of view completely possible,
to master two, say inorganic chemistry and botany. They
represent separate orders of scientific truths ; both are at-
tractive to fascination, and their opportunities of study are
universal.

But, secondly, this scheme is not too extended, because
its arrangement economizes mental power in the highest
degree. Wasting no force for mere discipline, it gives the
entire energies of the mind to the direct attainment of
knowledge, while the natural sequence of subjects, and the
constant reappearance and re-employment of old acqui-
sitions in the track of progress, guarantees a rapidity of
mental advancement and a comprehensiveness of attain-
ment without parallel in past experience. With a rever-
ent acquiescence in the finite limitations of mind, science
nevertheless gives the clue to reaches of thought and splen-

43 8 Edward Livingston Youmans.

dours of achievement which old routinists regard with in-
credulity. When Nature becomes the subject of study,
the love of Nature its stimulus, and the order of Nature
its guide, then will results in education rival the achieve-
ments of Science in the fields of its noblest triumphs.

What now is the basis of relative valuations among
subjects of thought ? These subjects fall into three cate-
gories— ist, the objects of Nature; 2d, their mental rep-
resentations ; 3d, the devices for marking and distinguish-
ing them ; and the various terms employed to express these
relations may be thus exhibited :

The External World Mind Language.

Things Ideas Words.

Presentation Re-presentation Re-representation.

Physics Metaphysics Philology.

Objective Realities Subjective Symbols Artificial Symbols.

Objects and Relations ) Nature's Instruments ) Man's Instruments
to be known ) for the work ) for the work.

In this scheme we build upon the solid foundation of
objective nature, and place first that which we find first
in the order of the world — the fabric of being into which
we are introduced at birth — which was here before we came
and will remain when we are gone. Man's first and his
lifelong concern is with his environment, the objective
universe of God, the theatre of his activity, ownership, am-
bition, enjoyment, and the multifarious instrumentality of
his experience and education. It is a realm of law, and
therefore he can understand and control it : a scene of irre-
sistible forces which crush him if he is ignorant, and serve
him if he is wise. But in what manner are created intelli-
gences to deal with the organism of nature in which they
have such varied and vital interests ? By its ideal recrea-
tion for the individual. The brain duplicates the universe
in miniature ; hence, the passage from things to thoughts ;

Mental Discipline in Education. 439

from objective realities to their ideal symbols. We here,
as it were, take one step away from outward nature and
enter a world of representation, which is of great impor-
tance to us because of the still greater importance of that
which it represents. The overlooking of this fact has
been the error of ages. Men have been fascinated with
the curious phenomenon of mental representation, and have
dwelt upon it in utter neglect of that which is represented.
Confessedly of high interest, they have forgotten that it is
forever subordinate to the original order for which it
stands. Losing themselves in the contemplation of this
mystery, metaphysicians have often fallen into a kind of
sceptical hallucination as to whether, after all, there are
any realities back of the ideas ; or, granting an external
world, they have held it to be of very trifling account, as
all its truths are to be excogitated from the realm of pure
ideas. Modern psychology inverts this order, and teaches
not only that a knowledge of Nature depends upon the
direct study of Nature, but that our knowledge of mind it-
self, of the relations among ideas, depends upon our prior
understanding of the relations of phenomena and of the
laws of action in the environment. It was this danger of
being beguiled with mere symbols that called forth the
sagacious adjuration of Newton, "Oh, physics, beware of
metaphysics ! " Mr. Mill thus points out the mischievous
consequences of the error in the case of logic :

The notion that what is of primary importance to the logician in
a proposition, is the relation between the two ideas corresponding to
the subject and predicate (instead of the relation between the two
phenomena which they respectively express), seems to me one of the
most fatal errors ever introduced into the philosophy of logic, and
the principal cause why the theory of the science has made such
inconsiderable progress during the last two centuries. The treatises
on logic, and on the branches of mental philosophy connected with
logic, which have been produced since the intrusion of this cardinal
error, though sometimes written by men of extraordinary abilities and

440 Edward Livingston Youmans.

attainments, almost always tacitly imply a theory that the investiga-
tion of truth consists in contemplating and handling our ideas, or
conceptions of things themselves ; a doctrine tantamount to the as-
sertion that the only mode of acquiring knowledge of Nature is to
study it at second-hand, as represented in our own minds. Mean-
while, inquiries into every kind of natural phenomena were incessantly
establishing great and fruitful truths on most important subjects by
processes upon which these views of the nature of Judgment and
Reasoning threw no light.*

Another step brings us to language — the system of
marks and labels for thought — the " signs of ideas." These
are the implements furnished by art for dealing with ideas
of things. Through the association of ideas with visible
symbols, language becomes the embodiment of thought,
and there arises a relation among words growing out of the
relations among ideas, which again grow out of the. rela-
tions among things. Both rest upon the order of Nature
which science reveals ; but that order is twice refracted
through distorting media, and although the semblance of
science is to be found in both, yet so many imperfections
are introduced at each change, that we are only safe by
keeping the intellectual eye steadily fixed upon the primal
source of truth. The overshadowing error of present edu-
cation is the propensity to accept words in place of the ideas
and things for which they stand, and from which they borrow
all their value. This false estimate has been well character-
ized by the observation that " words are the counters of wise
men, but the money of fools." Of course, most of the reali-
ties of knowledge are inaccessible to us ; we know them only
through their verbal signs; but all the more necessary is it
that we should never forget that we are dealing with third-
hand representations. Words are the tools of the thinker,
which he must know how to handle, or they are useless ;
but the sensible mechanic remembers that his tools are for

* Mill's System of Logic, vol. i, p. 98.

Mental Discipline in Education. 441

nothing but use, and hence spends the least possible time
in grinding and polishing them. Words are the vehicles of
thought; but as the farmer, who, having ten thousand dollars
to invest in his business, should put nine thousand of it in
wagons to carry his produce to market, reserving only one
thousand to buy a farm, would be justly chargeable with
stupidity, so the student who invests the principal share of
his time and power in variously constructed vehicles of
thought, with a corresponding neglect of what they are to
carry, is chargeable with an analogous folly. So much
of the study of language, and in such forms as are neces-
sary to its intelligent use, is demanded in education ; but
while this places the study upon explicit grounds of utility,
by the principle of utility should it be limited. But the
lingual student, captivated by the interest of word studies,
loses the end in the means. A plough was sent to a bar-
barian tribe : they hung it over with ornaments, and fell
down and worshipped it. In much the same manner is
language treated in education.*

The old scholasticism sported with symbols, ideal and
verbal ; science makes a serious inquest into the reali-
ties for which they stand. The greatest secular event in
history was this inversion of values among subjects of
thought, and the rise of science and conquest of Nature
which followed ; and an event of no less moment will be
the carrying out of this great intellectual movement in
education.

As respects discipline, these considerations present the
question thus: Shall it consist in the mere futile flourish-
ing of the instruments of inquiry, or shall it be obtained

* " There is no study that could prove more successful in producing
often thorough idleness and vacancy of mind, parrot-like repetition and
sing-song knowledge, to the abeyance and destruction of the intellectual
powers, as well as to the loss and paralysis of the outward senses, than our
traditional study and idolatry of language." — Prof. Halford Vaughan.

442 Edward Livingston Youmans.

by their employment upon the ends for which they are de-
signed ?

In this discussion I use the term Science in its true and
largest meaning, which is nothing less than a right inter-
pretation of Nature — a comprehension of the workings of*
law wherever law prevails. Knowledge grows. Its germs
are found in the lowest grades of ignorance, and develop
first into the improved form of common information, which
then unfolds into the definite and perfected condition of
science. It matters nothing whether the subjects are stones
or stars, human souls, or the complications of social rela-
tion ; that most perfect knowledge of each which reveals
its uniformities constitutes its special science, and that
comprehensive view of the relations which each sustains to
all in the cosmical order, realizes the broadest import of the
conception. Science, therefore, is the revelation to reason
of the policy by which God administers the affairs of the
world. But how inadequate is the conception of it general-
ly entertained, even among men of eminent literary cultiva-
tion, who seem to think the highest object of understanding
the things of Nature is merely to slake a petty curiosity!*

* Mr. Carlyle writes : " For many years it has been one of my constant
regrets, that no schoolmaster of mine had a knowledge of natural history,
so far at least as to have taught me the grasses that grow by the wayside,
and the little winged and wingless neighbours that are continually meeting
me, with a salutation which I cannot answer, as things are ! Why didn't
somebody teach me the constellations, too, and make me at home in the
starry heavens, which are always overhead, and which I don't half know
to this day ? I love to prophesy that there will come a time, when not in
Edinburgh only, but in all Scottish and European towns and villages, the
schoolmaster will be strictly required to possess these two capabilities
(neither Greek nor Latin more strict !), and that no ingenuous little denizen
of this universe be thenceforward debarred from his right of liberty in
these two departments, and doomed to look on them as if across grated
fences all his life ! " No hint is here given of that transcendent order of
truth to which surrounding objects are but the portals.

Mental Discipline in Education. 443

A common form of misapprehension is that which limits
science to the consideration of " mere matter," and then
reproaches it with being a cold materializing pursuit. But
science deals with forces as well as matter ; and when those
who make this reproach will indicate just how much re-
mains when the actions of power upon matter are exhausted,
they will, perhaps, widen their conceptions upon the sub-
ject. Not only do the great lines of scientific thought con-
verge to the supreme end of elucidating the regnant sub-
jects of man and society, but its influence is powerfully felt
even in the highest regions of philosophical speculation.*

* Prof. Masson, in his lively little work, Recent British Philosophy,
remarks : " In no age so conspicuously as in our own has there been a
crowding in of new scientific conceptions of all kinds to exercise a perturb-
ing influence on Speculative Philosophy. They have come in almost too
fast for Philosophy's powers of reception. She has visibly reeled amid
their shocks, and has not yet recovered her equilibrium. Within those
years alone which we have been engaged in surveying there have been de-
velopments of native British science, not to speak of influxes of scientific
ideas, hints, and probabilities from without, in the midst of which British
Philosophy has looked about her, scared and bewildered; and has felt that
some of her oldest statements about herself, and some of the most impor-
tant terms in her vocabulary, require re-explication. I think that I can
even mark the precise year 1848 as a point whence the appearance of an
unusual amount of unsteadying thought may be dated — as if, in that year of
simultaneous European irritability, not only were the nations agitated
politically, as the newspapers saw, but conceptions of an intellectual kind
that had long been forming themselves underneath in the depths were shaken
up to the surface in scientific journals and books. There are several vital
points on which no one can now think, even were he receiving four thou-
sand a year for doing so, as he might very creditably have thought seventeen
years ago. There have been during that period, in consequence of revela-
tions by scientific research in this direction and in that, some most notable
enlargements of our views of physical nature and of history — enlargements
even to the breaking down of what had formerly been a wall in the minds
of most, and the substitution on that side of a sheer vista of open space.
But there is no need of dating from 1848, or from any other year in par-
ticular. In all that we have recently seen of the kind there has been but

444 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Yet it is by denying this, and insisting that science consists
in collecting stones, labelling plants, and dabbling in chem-
ical messes, that the adherents of tradition strive to ren-
der it obnoxious to popular prejudice. In defending the
policy of the Great English Schools which contemptuously
ignore almost the whole body of modern knowledge, the
able Head-master of Rugby puts the case on the explicit
ground that science deals only with the lower utilities,
while classical studies carry us up to the sphere of life and
man ; that science only instructs, while they humanize. But
we have seen that such a view is indefensible. Science be-
ing the most perfect form of thought, and man its proper
subject, the sharply defined question is, whether he is to be
studied by the lower or the higher method. Is the most
thorough acquaintance with humanity to be gained by cut-
ting the student off from the life of his own age, and set-
ting him to tunnel through dead languages, to get such
imperfect and distorted glimpses as he may of man and so-
ciety in their antiquated forms; or by equipping him with
the best resources of modern thought, and putting him to
the direct and systematic study of men and society as they
present themselves to observation and experience ? In all
other departments it is held desirable, as far as possible, to
place directly before the student his materials of inquiry :
why abandon the principle in the case of its highest appli-
cation ?

Our question thus assumes another aspect : for the best
discipline of the human mind, shall we make use of those
higher forms and completer methods of knowledge which
constitute the science of the present age, or shall we use
the lower and looser knowledge and cruder methods of
the past ?

the prolongation of an action from Science upon Philosophy that had been
going on for a considerable time before."

Mental Discipline in Education. 445

Science also has great advantage, as a means of mental
discipline, in the incentives to which it appeals for arousing
mental activity, its motives to effort being such as the
pupil can be made most readily to appreciate and feel.
The reasons for studying the dead languages are not such
as to act with inspiring force upon beginners : hence
motives to exertion have largely to be supplied by external
authority, which necessitates in the school discipline a de-
cided coercive element, while those who administer it,
having little sympathy with " new-light " notions about
making study pleasurable, lighten the student's tasks by
the enlivening assurance that wearisome toil is evermore
the price of great results.

This is the old ascetic misconception of the controlling
aims of life — false everywhere, fatal in education. The
free and healthy exercise of the faculties and functions is
so pleasurable as to be universally spoken of as a " play " ;
who, then, has the-right to turn it into dreary and repulsive
task work ? The love of enjoyment is the deepest and
most powerful impulse of our nature, and the educational
system which does not recognize and build upon it violates
the highest claim of that nature. The first thing to be
done by the teacher is to awaken the pupil's interest, to
engage his sympathies and kindle his enthusiasm, for these
are the motors of intellectual progress; it is then easy to
enchain his attention, to store his mind with knowledge,
and carry mental cultivation up to the point of discipline.

This is of the first importance. Flogging has been the
accompaniment of education for centuries; and although
the humanizing agencies are slowly bringing us out of this
barbaric dispensation, yet the penal policy, or that which
makes the fear of pain, in one shape or other, the chief
incentive to effort, is still prevalent. This not only ap-
peals to the lowest motives, but is self-defeating. Pain-
ful feelings are antivital, depressing, fatal to mental spon-

446 Edivard Livingston Youmans.

taneity, and therefore a hindrance to acquisition : agreeable
emotions, on the other hand, are stimulating, and favour
nervous impressibility and spontaneous impulsion. The
instinctive love of pleasurable activity which is so marked
in youth becomes therefore a most powerful means of men-
tal improvement. Government appeals to the dread of
punishment as a motive to right conduct ; but who will
compare the influence it thus exerts upon the beneficent
activities of society with the general stimulation to this
result which springs from the desire of happiness ? A
scientific system of culture, which deals with the imme-
diate objects and the living agencies of the world, is suited
to employ this higher class of motives. The interest of an
unperverted mind in the things of twenty centuries ago can
never equal its interest in the things of to-day. It can-
not for a moment be admitted that an empty and useless
shell of a fact has the same relation to the mind that a liv-
ing and applicable one has. Nothing can arouse, quicken,
and mould it like the realities with which it has to deal. It
has been well said that " everywhere throughout nature we
find faculties developed through the performance of those
functions which it is their office to perform, not through
artificial exercises devised to fit them for those functions."
A system of culture, therefore, which ignores the thou-
sand immediate pressures and solicitations upon feeling and
thought, by which human beings are stirred, can neither
shape the mind into harmony with its actual circumstances,
nor reach the deepest springs of impulse and exertion.
The intellect follows the lead of the heart; and with the
slow emergence of right ideas respecting the uses of the
world, we shall discover that the real scene of human
action and enjoyment is also the true source of inspiration
and of the noblest incentives to effort. The end of a
rational culture being to adjust the student's relations to
his own age, it will employ for the purpose all those sub-

Mental Discipline in Education. 447

jects which come home to him most directly; and that
these are best fitted for rousing and sustaining a pleasur-
able mental activity is both declared by reason and con-
firmed by experience.

And this leads me finally to observe that a mental cul-
ture, based upon science, and applied to the great questions
of the time, will give a type of mental discipline marked
by the elements of vigour and courage, and suited to brace
the mind for the serious work which comes before it with
the advance of society. In this respect the classical cul-
tivation is so faulty as hardly to deserve the name of dis-
cipline. Its ideal is European, and is shaped into accord-
ance with the requirements of the European system : it is
that of the refined and elegant scholar, fitted for medita-
tive retirement in some cloistered seclusion or " sacred
shade," immersed in the past, and disinclined to meddle
with the present. But what Sydney Smith calls " the safe
and elegant imbecility of classical learning," is not the
preparation needed by the cultivated mind of this country.
Here all the cumbrous machinery for taking care of people
and superseding thought — Monarchy, Nobility, and State-
Church, are gone, and we are thrown back upon first prin-
ciples, to work out the great problem of a self-governing
society, for weal or for woe. The finished classical
scholar blinks the issues, and shirks the responsibilities of
his time. He is disgusted with the " noise and confusion "
of this degenerate utilitarian age, and longs to bury him-
self in the quietness of the past. " In proportion as the
material interests of the present moment become more and
more engrossing, more and more tyrannical in their ex-
actions, in the same proportion it becomes more necessary
that man should fall back on the common interests of
humanity, and free himself from the trammels of the
present by living in the past," says the advocate of the
English universities, Dr. Donaldson. But this will not do

448 Edward Livingston Youmans.

here. Not to " fall back," but to press forward should be
the motto of American education. Not to escape the
present and live in the past, but resolutely to accept the
presept, thanking God for its opportunities, and to live
rather in the future, is the high requirement of mental
duty. And herein is the character of the two systems
shown, that while the one looks forever backward, the
other leads steadfastly forward. Science, therefore, pierc-
ing the future, and working toward it through the pres-
ent, engages naturally with those great subjects of pub-
lic interest which are no longer to be postponed or
evaded.

The classicists are fond of presenting the issue as be-
tween liberal culture and money-making, and triumphantly
contrast the refined and generous feelings which cluster
around the former, with the vulgar and sordid motives
which characterize the latter. But the real issue is far
different from this. The mind of our age is confronted
with a host of urgent questions, such as the Perils of Mis-
government, the Limits of Legislation, the Management
of Criminals, of the Insane, the Congenitally Defective,
and the Pauper Class ; the operation of Charities, the
Philosophy of Philanthropy, the relations of Sex and
Race, International Ethics, the Freedom of Trade, the
Rights of Industry, Property in Ideas, Public Hygiene,
Primary Education, Religious Liberty, the Rights of In-
vention, Political Representation, and many others, which
inosculate and interfuse into the great total of practical
inquiry which challenges the intellect of our times; and it
is this which the classical scholar evades, when he shrinks
from the present and retires into the past. And well he
may ; for the mastery of the languages and literatures of
Greece and Rome, and culture in unprogressive studies,
furnish neither suitable ideas nor mental habits for this
kind of work. Science, grounding itself in the order and

Mental Discipline in Education. 449

truth of Nature, armed with the appropriate knowledge, and
inspired with the hope of a better future, to which it sees
all things tending, enters the great field as properly its
own, and will train its votaries to that breadth of view, that
robust boldness of treatment, and that patient and dispas-
sionate temper which the imminent questions of the times
so decisively demand.

In his late instructive lecture on the Development of
Ideas in Physical Science, Prof. Liebig shows that it has
been a slow organic growth, depending upon deeper con-
ditions than the mere favour or opposition of Church or
State. He shows that in Greece the progress of science
was arrested by its slave system ; points out the necessity
of abounding wealth to give leisure for thought and cul-
ture, and the importance of those social conditions which
bring into intimate intercourse all classes of thinkers and
workers, upon the mutual co-operation of which the ad-
vance of science and of society depends. He says : " Free-
dom, that is the absence of ail restrictions which can pre-
vent men from using to their advantage the powers which God
has given them, is the mightiest of all the conditions of
progress in civilization and culture"; and he adds that "it
can hardly be doubted that among the peoples of the North
American Free States, all the conditions exist for their de-
velopment to the highest point of culture and civilization
attainable by man."

These are weighty considerations for the educators of
this country. Institutions are but expressions of ideas and
habits ; and the European policy, governmental and eccle-
siastical, is grounded upon a culture suited to its neces-
sities, and which has grown up with it in the course of
ages. Both idolize the past ; both worship precedent and
authority, and both dread independent inquiry into first
principles: one recoils from Freedom, as the other from
Science. Freedom and Science, on the other hand, have

45O Edward Livingston Youmans.

had a coeval destiny ; have suffered together, and grown
together. Both break from prescription and throw them-
selves upon Nature, and the watchword of both is Progress,
which consists not in rejecting the past, but in subordinat-
ing and outgrowing it, in assimilating and reorganizing its
truth, and leaving behind its obsolete forms. In the last
century we threw off the trammels of the repressive sys-
tem, and entered upon the experiment of Free Institutions ;
but it avails little to shift the external forms if the old ideas
are not replaced by new growths of thought and feeling.
Our system of Popular Education is the first great construc-
tive measure of National progress, and this has yet to be
moulded to its purposes through a system of higher institu-
tions, organized into harmony with the genius of American
circumstances and the great requirements of the period.

In the preceding pages I have quoted Mr. J. S. Mill's
able presentation of the claims of Scientific Studies; but
lest I be accused of partiality in the use of his authority,
it is proper to add that in the same address he makes also
a strong argument for the Classics. It is not pertinent
here to criticise this branch of his argument, as the claims
of the classics are put less on the usual ground of " disci-
pline" than on certain high utilities of scholarship. But
while, as the reader has seen, Mr. Mill urges the impor-
tance of Scientific Studies for all, an examination of his
argument for the Classics will show that it is applicable
only to those who, like himself, are professional scholars,
and devote their lives to Philological, Historical, or Critical
Studies.

II.

ON THE SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF HUMAN
NATURE.

PERHAPS the most correct conception of science that
has yet been formed is that which regards it as the high-
est stage of growing knowledge. Ideas about men, like
those about other subjects, undergo development. There
is a rude acquaintance with human nature among barba-
rians : they observe that the young can be trained, and that
men are influenced by motives and passions; for without
some such knowledge their limited social relations would
be impossible. These primitive notions have been gradu-
ally unfolded by time into the completer and more accurate
ideas which mark the civilized state. Yet the prevailing
knowledge of human nature is still imperfect and empir-
ical— that is, it has not expanded into rational principles
and general laws. That it will become still more perfect
accords with all analogy ; and if this process continues, as
it undoubtedly must, there seems reasonable hope of the
formation of something like a definite Science of Human
Nature.

That the scientific method of inquiry is inadequate and
inapplicable to the higher study of man, is a widely preva-
lent notion, and one which seems, to a great extent, to be
shared alike by the ignorant and the educated. Holding
the crude idea that science pertains only to the material
world, they denounce all attempts to make human nature a
subject of strict scientific inquiry, as an intrusion into an
illegitimate sphere. Maintaining that man's position is

(451)

452 Edward Livingston Youmans.

supreme and exceptional, they insist that he is only to be
comprehended, if at all, in some partial, peculiar, and tran-
scendental way. In entire consistence with this hypothesis,
is the prevailing practice; for those who by their function
as teachers, preachers, and lawgivers, profess to have that
knowledge of man which best qualifies for directing him in
all relations, are, as a class, confessedly ignorant of science.
There are some, however, and happily their number is in-
creasing, who hold that this idea is profoundly erroneous,
that the very term " human nature " indicates man's place
in that universal order which it is the proper office of
science to explore ; and they accordingly maintain that it
is only as "the servant and interpreter of nature " that he
can rise to anything like a true understanding of himself.

The past progress of knowledge, as is well known, has
not been a steady and continuous growth : it has advanced
by epochs. An interval of apparent rest, perhaps long
protracted, is brought to a close by the introduction of
some new conception, which revolutionizes a department
of thought, and opens new fields of investigation, that lead
to uncalculated consequences. Those who have watched
the later tendencies of scientific thought can hardly fail to
perceive, tjiat we of the present age are entering upon one
of those great epochs in our knowledge of man. Standing
at the head of the vast system of being of which he forms
a part, it is inevitable that the views entertained concern-
ing him at any age will be but a reflex of the knowledge of
nature which that age has reached. So long as little was
known of the order of the universe, little could be under-
stood of him in whom that order culminates. Those tri-
umphs of science which are embodied in external civiliza-
tion are well fitted to kindle our admiration ; but they are
of secondary moment when compared with the consequences
which must flow from the full application of the scientific
method to the study of man himself.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 453

The method of regarding man which tradition has trans-
mitted to us from the earliest ages, is, at the outset, to
cleave him asunder, and substitute the idea of two beings
for the reality of one. Having thus introduced the notion
of his double nature — mind and body as separate independ-
ent existences — there grew up a series of moral contrasts
between the disjointed products. The mind was ranked as
the higher, or spiritual nature, the body as the lower, or
material nature. The mind was said to be pure, aspiring,
immaterial ; the body gross, corrupt, and perishable ; and
thus the feelings became enlisted to widen the breach and
perpetuate the antagonism. Having divided him into two
alien entities, and sought all terms of applause to celebrate
the one, while exhausting the vocabulary of reproach upon
the other, the fragments were given over to two parties —
the body to the doctors of medicine, and the spirit to the
doctors of philosophy, who seem to have agreed in but one
thing> that the partition shall be eternal, and that neither
shall ever intrude into the domain of the other.

As a necessary consequence of this rupture, the living
reality, as a subject of study, disappeared from view, and
the dignified fraction was substituted in its place. Not
man, but mind, became the object of inquiry. With the dis-
appearance of the actual being, went also the conception of
individuality, and there remained only mind as an abstraction,
to be considered as literally out of all true relations as if
the material universe had never existed. The method thus
begun has been closely pursued, and for thousands of years
the chief occupation of philosophic thought has been to
speculate upon the nature and operations of mind as mani-
fested in consciousness. Admitting the legitimacy of the
inquiry, and that it has to a certain extent yielded valid
results, it is clear that the effect of the divorce was fatally
to narrow the course of investigation and to prevent all
free and thorough research into the reality of the case ;

454 Edward Livingston Youinans.

thus justifying the charge, of emptiness and fruitlessness
which is now so extensively made against metaphysical
studies. From Plato to Sir William Hamilton, who in-
scribed upon the walls of his lecture room, " On earth there
is nothing great but man; in man there is nothing great but
mind" a method has been pursued so confessedly vacant
of valuable results, that its partisans have actually denied
the attainment of truth ,to be their object: declaring that
the supreme aim of philosophy is nothing more than to serve
as a means of intellectual gymnastics.*

In pointed contrast with this view is the method of
modern science. In a spirit of reverence for the order and
harmony of Nature where all factitious distinctions of great
and small disappear ; striving to dispossess herself of preju-
dice, and to aim only at the attainment of truth ; rejecting
all assumptions which can show no better warrant than that
they were made in the infancy of the race, she begins with
the simple examination of facts, and rises patiently and
cautiously to the knowledge of principles. The study of
man is entered upon in the same temper, and by the same
methods, that have conducted to truth in other depart-
ments of investigation. Finding the notion of his duality,
as interpreted in the past, with its resulting double series
of independent inquiries, to be erroneous, science proceeds
at the outset to reunite the dissevered fragments of hu-
manity, and to reconstitute the individual in thought as
he is in life, a concrete unit — the living, thinking, acting
being which we encounter in daily experience. It is now
established that the dependence of thought upon organic
conditions is so intimate and absolute, that they can no
longer be considered except as unity. Man, as a prob-
lem of study, is simply an organism of varied powers and
activities; and the true office of scientific inquiry is to

* See the opening lectures of Hamilton's Metaphysics.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 455

determine the mechanism, modes, and laws of its ac-
tion.

My purpose, on the present occasion, is to show that the
doctrine which has prevailed in the past, and still prevails,
is doomed to complete inversion ; that the bodily organism
which was so long neglected as of no account, is in reality
the first and fundamental thing to be considered ; and that,
in reaching a knowledge of mind and character through the
study of the corporeal system, there has been laid the firm
foundation of that Science of Human Nature, the comple-
tion of which will constitute the next and highest phase in
the progress of man. Of course, so vast a subject can re-
ceive but scanty justice in the limits of a lecture: the ut-
most that I can hope to do will be to present some decisive
illustrations of the dependence of mental action upon the
bodily system, and to point out certain important results
which have been already arrived at by this method of in-
quiry. A hasty glance, in the first place, at the several
steps by which it has been reached, will help to an under-
standing of the present state of knowledge upon the sub-
ject.

The establishment of the modern doctrine, that the
brain is the organ of the mind, naturally led to a train of
researches into the conditions of the connection. The in-
strument of thought, being a part of the living system, is,
of course, subject to its laws, and our understanding of its
action becomes dependent upon the progress of physio-
logical knowledge. Physiology, again, depending upon the
various physical sciences, the higher investigation could
proceed only with the general advance of inquiry. The
discovery of the circulation of the blood laid the founda-
tion for the modern science of physiology ; but that dis-
covery did not reach its full significance until chemistry
had revealed the constitution of matter, and the reciprocal
action of its elements : only then was it possible to arrive

456 Edward Livingston Youmans.

at the great organic laws of waste and repair, of digestion,
nutrition, and respiration. The brain, in its functional
exercise, was found to depend, equally with all other living
parts, upon these processes. The discovery of the minuter
structure of the brain resulted from the application of the
perfected microscope. Its grey matter was found to con-
sist of cells, and the white substance of fibres of amazing
minuteness — the cells being regarded as the sources of
nerve power, while the fibres serve as lines for its dis-
charge.

When a tolerably clear conception of the structure of
the nervous system had been reached, physiology imme-
diately propounded the question of its mode of action.
The first decisive response was made a number of years
ago, by Sir Charles Bell, who found that there are two
great systems of nerves, which perform different functions ;
one conveying impressions from the surface of the body to
the centres, and another transmitting impulses from the
centres to the muscles, and thus controlling mechanical
movement. This discovery was of the gravest importance.
It had been contemptuously asked, What has anatomy to
do with mind ? Bell silenced this cavilling forever by
showing that it first revealed a definite mental mechanism,
and traced out some of the fundamental conditions of the
working of mind.

A few years later, Dr. Marshall Hall made another very
important step in determining the organic conditions of
mental activity, by the discovery of the independent action
of the spinal cord. It had hitherto been held that the
brain was the sole seat of nervous power. All impressions
were supposed to be conducted directly to it, and all man-
dates to the muscles to issue from it ; and as the brain was
the seat of consciousness and volition, these operations were
thought to be essentially involved in every bodily action.
But Dr. Hall demonstrated that the spinal cord is itself a

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 457

chain of nerve centres, and that impressions reaching it
from the surface through the sensory nerves may be im-
mediately reflected back, through the motor nerves, upon
the muscles, thus producing bodily movements, without the
brain being at all involved. This is termed reflex action.
Thus, if the foot of a sleeper be tickled, it will be jerked
away — that is, the impression from the skin is conveyed to
the spinal centre, and an impulse is immediately reflected
back, which contracts the proper muscles of the limbs, and
the foot is withdrawn. The most perfect example of it,
however, is where stimulus at the surface produces move-
ments of the limbs after division of the cord from the head,
and therefore in total unconsciousness. The discovery of
reflex action was the first step in the systematic elucidation
of the spontaneous movements, or what is known as the
automatic system in animal mechanisms.

But reflex action has another aspect. When an impres-
sion passes upward along the cord to the nervous masses
at the base of the brain, it first flashes into consciousness
and becomes a sensation. Reflex effects now take place,
in which sensation and consciousness are implicated. Wink-
ing, sneezing, coughing, swallowing, are examples : we are
conscious of the actions, but they are not the results of
volition. The will may, indeed, exert a partial control
over them, but they are usually of an automatic character.
Thus far, the part of the nervous mechanism called into
action is the spinal system, and the ganglionic masses at
the base of the brain known as the sensorium. This appa-
ratus is not peculiar to man ; he shares it with the entire
vertebrate series, and it is regarded as the source of all
purely instinctive actions.

The establishment of these fundamental facts in refer-
ence to the working of the mental mechanism of our nature
— the definite separation of a large part of its actions from
that higher sphere of intellection and volition to which

458 Edward Livingston Youmans.

they had hitherto been assigned — was a signal event in the
progress of physiological inquiry, as it quickly led to the
extension of the principle of automatism to the cerebrum
itself. This portion of the brain is now regarded as the
organ of all the higher mental activities — the seat of ideas
and of the complex intellectual operations, memory, imagina-
tion, reason, volition. The most obvious case of reflex
cerebral action is where a remembered or suggested idea
produces a spontaneous movement. Thus the recollection
of a ludicrous incident may excite an involuntary burst of
laughter, the remembrance of a disgusting taste may cause
vomiting. When ideas are associated with pleasure or
pain, a class of powerful feelings is produced — the emo-
tions, which become the springs of impulsion, or reflex
activity. Those bursts of movement which are peculiar
to the various emotions, as anger, terror, joy, and which
we term their expressions, are examples of cerebral spon-
taneity.

These facts prepare us to understand the scope and
limits of voluntary activity, the function of which is to
restrain the impulsive tendencies, and direct the bodily
movements to various ends. In voluntary action the will
does not replace or dispense with the involuntary system,
but rather uses it. Its action is limited by the laws of the
vital mechanism with which it works. Of all the number-
less movements going on in the organism, volition has con-
trol only of the muscular, and of these but partially. It
cannot act directly upon the muscles, but liberates nerve
force in the brain, which in turn produces muscular con-
traction. The voluntary powers determine the end to be
accomplished, and employ the automatic system to execute
the determination. I will a given action, and of the many
hundred muscles in my system, a certain, and perhaps a
large number, will be called into simultaneous exercise, re-
quiring the most marvellous combinations of separate ac-

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 459

tions to accomplish it : but the will knows nothing of this;
it is concerned with the result alone.

In the formation of habits and in the processes of edu-
cation, voluntary actions are constantly becoming reflex,
or, as it is termed, " secondarily automatic." Thus learn-
ing to walk at first demands voluntary effort, but at length
the act of walking becomes automatic and unconscious. So
with all adaptive movements, as the manipulatory exercises
of the arts;' they at first require an effort of will, and then
gradually become " mechanical," or are performed with
but slight voluntary exertion. And so it is, also, in the
purely intellectual operations, where the cerebral excite-
ment, instead of taking effect upon the motor system, ex-
pends itself in the production of new intellectual effects,
one state of consciousness passing into another, according
to the established laws of thought. Here, also, the agency
of the will is but partial, and the mental actions are largely
spontaneous. In the case of memory, we all know how
little volition can directly effect. We cannot call up an
idea by simply willing it. When we try to remember some-
thing, which is, of course, out of consciousness, the office
of volition is simply to fix the attention upon various ideas
which will be most likely to recall, by the law of association,
the thing desired. We have all experienced this impotence
of the will to recover a forgotten name, or incident, which
may subsequently flash into consciousness after the atten-
tion has long been withdrawn from the search. The same
thing is observed in the exercise of the imagination. It is
said of eminent poets, painters, and musicians, that they
are born, and not made ; that is, their genius is an endow-
ment of nature — a gifted organism which spontaneously
utters itself in high achievements, and they often present
cases of remarkable automatism. When Mozart was asked
how he set to work to compose a symphony, he replied, " If
you once think how you are to do it, you w,ill never write

460 Edward Livingston Youmans.

anything worth hearing; I write because I cannot help it."
Jean Paul remarks of the poet's work : " The character
must appear living before you, and you must hear it,
not merely see it ; it must, as takes place in dreams, dic-
tate to you, not you to it. A poet who must reflect whether,
in a given case, he will make his character say Yes, or No,
to the devil with him ! " An author may be as much as-
tonished at the brilliancy of his unwilled inspirations as his
most partial reader. " That's splendid ! " exclaimed Thack-
eray, as he struck the table in admiring surprise at the
utterance of one of his characters in the story he was writ-
ing. Again, the mental actions which constitute reasoning
have an undoubted spontaneous element, the office of voli-
tion being, as in the former cases, to rivet the attention to
the subject of inquiry, while the gradual blending of the
like in different ideas into general conceptions is the work
of the involuntary faculties. You cannot will a logical
conclusion, but only maintain steadily before the mind the
problem to be solved. Sir Isaac Newton thus discloses the
secret of his immortal discoveries : " I keep the subject
constantly before me, and wait till the first dawnings open,
by little and little, into a full light."

But corporeal agency in processes of thought has an
aspect still more marked ; the higher intellectual opera-
tions may take place, not only independent of the will, but
also independent of consciousness itself. Consciousness
and mind are far from being one and the same thing. The
former applies only to that which is at any time present in
thought; the latter comprehends all psychical activity.
Not a thousandth part of our knowledge is at any time in
consciousness, but it is all and always in the mind. An
idea or feeling passes out of consciousness, but not into
annihilation ; in what state, then, is it ? We cannot be sat-
isfied with the indefinite statement, that it is stored away
in the receptacle or chamber of memory. Science affirms

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 461

an organ of mind, and demands an explanation, in terms of
its action. As the thought passes from consciousness,
something remains in the cerebral substratum, call it what
you will — trace, impression, residue. What the precise
character of these residua may be is perhaps questionable,
but it is impossible to deny their existence in some form
consistent with the nature of the cerebral structure and
activity. All thoughts, feelings, and impressions, when
disappearing from consciousness, leave behind them in the
nerve substance their effects or residua, and in this state
they constitute what may be termed latent or statical mind.
They are brought into consciousness by the laws of asso-
ciation, and there is much probability that in this uncon-
scious state they are still capable of acting and reacting,
and of working out true intellectual results.

There are few who have not had experience of this un-
conscious working of the mind. It often happens that we
pursue a subject until arrested by difficulties which we can-
not conquer, when, after dismissing it entirely from the
thoughts for a considerable interval, and then taking it up
again, the obscurity and confusion are found to have cleared
away, the subject is opened in quite new relations, and
marked intellectual progress has been made. Nor can we
explain this by assuming that the arrest was simply due to
weariness, and the clearer insight to ther estoration of vigour
by rest, as after a refreshing night's sleep. Time enters
largely as an element of the case ; weeks and months are
often required to produce the result, while the entirely
new development which the subject is found to have under-
gone, seems only explicable by the intermediate and uncon-
scious activity of the cerebral centre. The brain also re-
ceives impressions and accumulates residua in partial or
total unconsciousness. In reading, for example, we gather
the sense of an author most perfectly while almost oblivi-
ous of the separate words. And thus, as* Dr. Maudsley re-

462 Edward Livingston Youmans.

marks, " the brain not only receives impressions uncon-
sciously, registers impressions without the co-operation of
consciousness, elaborates material unconsciously, calls
latent residua again into activity, without consciousness,
but it responds also as an organ of organic life to the in-
ternal stimuli, which it receives unconsciously from other
organs of the body." *

Science now teaches that we know nothing of mental
action, except through nervous action, without which
there is neither thought, recollection, nor reason. An
eminent authority upon this subject, Dr. Bucknill, says:
" The activity of the vesicular neurine of the brain is
the occasion of all these capabilities. The little cells
are the agents of all that is called mind, of all our sen-
sations, thoughts, and desires ; and the growth and reno-
vation of these cells are the most ultimate conditions of
mind with which we are acquainted." And again ; " Not
a thrill of sensation can occur, not a flashing thought, or a
passing feeling can take place without a change in the liv-
ing organism, much less can diseased sensation, thought,
or feeling occur without such changes."

These facts sufficiently disclose the agency of the bodily
system in carrying on mental action ; but the view becomes
still more impressive when we observe to what an extent
corporeal conditions influence and determine intellectual
states.

The weight of the human brain ranges from sixty-four
ounces to twenty ounces, and, other things being equal, the
scale of intellectual power is held to correspond with its
mass. Cerebral action has thus an enormous range of limita-
tion, due to the variable volume of the mental organ, but
it is also modified in numerous ways and numberless degrees
by accompanying physiological conditions. The brain is an

* The Physiology and Pathology of Mind, by Dr. Maudsley, p. 20.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 463

organ of power; power depends upon change, and change
upon circulation ; the lungs and heart are therefore immedi-
ately involved. To high and sustained mental power, ample
lungs and a vigorous heart are essential. And these organs,
again, fall back upon the digestive apparatus, which, if
feeble, may impair the capacity of a good heart, sound
lungs, and a well-constituted brain. Digestion, and even
the caprice of appetite, thus stand in direct dynamic rela-
tion to intellectual results.

As the brain is more largely dependent than any other
organ upon the torrent of blood which pours through it,
we find that even a transient variation in the supply dis-
turbs the course of thought. If a portion of the skull is
removed and pressure be made upon the brain, conscious-
ness disappears ; and the same thing occurs in fainting,
from suspension of the circulation. With invigorated ac-
tion of the heart there is a general exaltation of the men-
tal powers, while an enfeebled circulation depresses mental
activity. Apoplectic congestion produces stupor and in-
sensibility ; inflammation of the grey substance causes de-
lirium ; while inflammation of the fibrous portion produces
torpor and diminishes the power of the will over the mus-
cles. In thus saying that the state of the blood influences
the mind, we do not use the term mind in any vague or ab-
stract sense; we mean that it affects our views, opinions,
feelings, judgments, actions. Change of circulation alters
our mental pitch, and with it our relation to the universe.
Dr. Laycock observes : " In the earliest stage of general
paralysis there is a feeling of energy. Everything, there-
fore, appears hopeful to the patient ; large enterprises, the
success of which he never doubts, occupy his mind, and he
rushes sometimes into the most extravagant and wasteful
speculations. This is the stage of erethism of the capil-
laries of the part of the brain affected, when it is just
sufficient to excite increased cerebral vigour. If, how-

464 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ever, from any cause, this activity declines, so as to sink
below par, a precisely opposite state of consciousness
arises, and the patient may fall into a profound melancholy
and be insanely hopeless, distrustful, and anxious as to all
events, past, present, and to come."* Even the variation
in the quantity of blood which enters the brain, by simply
taking the recumbent position, may affect mental activity
in a marked degree. Persons who, through overexertion
of mind, have impaired the contractility of the cerebral
vessels, often become intensely wakeful after lying down,
although very drowsy before, and sometimes can only sleep
in the erect position. Dendy mentions the case of an
individual who, when he retired to rest, was constantly
haunted by a spectre, which attempted to take his life ;
though when he raised himself in bed the phantom van-
ished.

Persons have had their entire character changed by an
apparently trifling interference with the circulation of
blood in the head. "A person of my acquaintance," says
Dr. Hammond, " was naturally of good disposition, amiable
and considerate, but after an attack of vertigo, attended
with unconsciousness of but a few minutes' duration, his
whole mental organization was changed ; he became de-
ceitful, morose, and overbearing." Tuke and Bucknill
mention the instance of a conscientious lady, who recovered
from the brain congestion accompanying smallpox with
her disposition greatly changed. The susceptibility of
conscience had increased to a state of actual disease, dis-
turbing her happiness, and disqualifying her for the duties
of life.

A blow on the head may produce marked mental de-
rangement. The memory may be dislocated, events oblit-
erated, and whole passages from the past life expunged:

* Correlations of Consciousness and Organization, vol. ii, p. 325.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 465

the faculty of speech may be partially or wholly destroyed,
the memory of words confused, or entire parts of speech
lost.

Mental perversions are also caused by certain changes
in the properties of the blood. A fluid of amazing com-
plexity, holding in exquisite balance the constituents from
which the whole being is elaborated, all delicacies of feel-
ing and niceties of thought depend upon its purity. " Pol-
ished steel is not quicker dimmed by the slightest breath
than is the brain affected by some abnormal conditions of
the blood."

If the poisonous products of bodily waste are not con-
stantly swept from the system, the cerebral changes are
disturbed and the mind stupefied. Foods, drinks, and
drugs affect specifically the appetites, passions, and
thoughts. To become exhilarated and joyous, man
charges his blood with wine; to exalt the sensations, he
takes hashish ; to secure a brilliant fancy and luxurious
imagination, he uses opium ; to abolish consciousness of
pain, he breathes vapour of chloroform. Swedenborg had
a peculiar class of visions "after coffee." "A person I
know," observes Dr. Laycock, " after taking morphine, in
a fever, was haunted by hideously grotesque and fiendlike
spectres ; they then shortly changed into groups of comical
human faces, and finally altered to forms of the human fig-
ure of the most classic beauty, and then disappeared." And
this learned inquirer maintains that the pictorial productions
of the insane vary in a definite order, the early stages of
excitement enabling the artist to execute beautiful concep-
tions of figures and landscapes; then, as the disease ad-
vances, he passes into comic delineations, and ends with
the grotesque, or hideous.

Those fluctuations of feeling with which all are more or
less familiar, the alternations of hope and despondency,
are vitally connected with organic states. In high health,

466 Edward Livingston Youmans.

the outlook is confident, there is joy in action, and
courage in enterprise; but with a low or disturbed cir-
culation, thin, morbid blood, and bodily exhaustion, there
is depression of spirits, gloom, inaction, paralysis of will,
and weariness of life. That variability of mental state
which is so striking and general an experience with the
literary and artistic classes, the periods when work is im-
possible, the moods of sluggish and unsatisfactory effort,
the seasons of steady and successful accomplishment, and
the moments of rare exaltation, capricious as they may
seem, are but the exponents of varying constitutional con-
ditions.

But the part played by the organism becomes still more
apparent when we consider the mode of action of the
nervous system in producing mental effects. It has been
stated that this system is composed of fibres and cells ;
hence the simplest conceivable case of nervous activity is
where a cell and fibre become active, producing an excite-
ment and a discharge, the highest action of the organ
being nothing more than a complex system of excitements
and discharges. In sleep, for example, a fly lights upon
the face, producing an impression, or change, which causes
a discharge along the nerves to the grey matter of the
spinal cord. Here force is again liberated, which is dis-
charged along another set of nerves upon the appropriate
muscles, which, being contracted, bring the hand to the
place where the fly settled. This is the course of power in
a simple reflex action. But when the brain is called into
conscious exercise in the higher processes of intellection
just the same thing occurs. A person may be engaged in
tranquil thinking, when one idea leads on to another in a
natural train of association — that is, where the excitement
of one state of consciousness is discharged into another,
forming a succession of cerebral changes. In this quiet
course of thought, a ludicrous idea or a witty combination

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 467

may arise, when a large amount of feeling, or nerve excite-
ment, is suddenly awakened. This may be discharged in
several directions. One portion may be spent upon the
muscles of the face and chest, producing laughter ; another
portion may pass along the nerves leading to the stomach,
perhaps stimulating digestion ; and a third may be ex-
pended in producing other states of consciousness or new
trains of ideas. Mental action is thus manifested as
definite and limited nervous action, and when we speak of
the unfolding of mind, as in education, the fact signified is
the growing adaptation of the brain and nervous apparatus
to produce more and more complex effects in accordance
with their necessary mode of working.

The child comes into the world a little fountain of
spontaneous power. For certain purposes its nervous
mechanism is perfected, channels of discharge are open,
connections are ready formed, and reflex actions go on
from the first. The infant also inherits the capabilities
of its type — that is, the possibility of high development
which belongs to man as distinguished from inferior
creatures ; and it also inherits the special tendencies and
aptitudes of its particular ancestors. The order of the
surrounding universe now begins to take effect upon it,
and working within its organic limits, which of course vary
widely in different cases, its education begins. Impres-
sions pour in through the senses, and begin to open chan-
nels of discharge through the nerve centres. The child
sees and desires an object, but has more or less difficulty
in connecting the sensation with the movement necessary
to seize it. By numberless efforts a nervous path is at
length formed, and when a desirable object is seen, the
sensation discharges upon the proper muscles, producing a
suitable movement, and the hand grasps it. So with walk-
ing and speaking ; by repeated exertions lines of nervous
discharge are completed, and the sensations involved are

468 Edivard Livingston Yonmans.

co-ordinated with the movements of locomotion and utter-
ance. Repetition strengthens association and facilitates
action ; that which is difficult at first, requiring a large
expenditure of voluntary effort, at last seems " to go of
itself." Upon this point Dr. Carpenter remarks : "There
can be no doubt that the nerve force is disposed to pass in
special tracks, and it seems probable that while some are
originally marked out for the automatic movements, others
may be gradually worn in by the habitual action of the
will, and that thus when a train of sequential actions origi-
nally directed by the will has been once set in operation,
it may continue without any further influence from that
source." *

Thus, in committing to memory a poem, or in learning
a piece of music, voluntary effort wears a path of asso-
ciation, so that each word or sound automatically suggests
the next, and we can either repeat the words or hum the
air in silence, or link on the automatic movements of ex-
pression : but by sufficient repetition the words and sounds
become so closely associated, that when the first bar of the
melody or the first stanza of the poem is awakened, it will
cost an effort to prevent running through with them. In
this way, as the child grows to maturity, brain connections
are established between sensations, ideas, and movements ;
they become automatic and powerful, and give rise to fixed
habits. Peculiarities of gait, attitude, gesture, and speech,
and the iteration of set phrases, become partially auto-
matic, their paths of discharge getting so deeply worn that
repetition occurs involuntarily. The same thing is seen
also in the higher region of ideas and beliefs. Long-es-
tablished associations and opinions survive their rejection
by reason : convince a man of his lifelong errors to-day,
and he reasserts them to-morrow, so strong is the tend-

* Principles of Human Physiology. Fifth edition, p. 699.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 469

ency of thought to move in its long-accustomed cerebral
tracks.

Now, when we experience a feeling, or think a thought,
or determine an act — that is, in every case of excitement
and discharge — there is a partial decomposition of the
nervous structure in action. In every such act there is loss
of energy, or partial exhaustion, the cells and fibres fall
below par, and the equilibrium is restored by the nutrition
of the weakened part. Brain repair thus takes place in ac-
cordance with the modes of mental action, and, as in the black-
smith's arm muscular nutrition is commensurate with its
exercise, and augments power, so in every special kind of
mental exercise, cerebral nutrition co-operates to raise the
standard of nervous power. As waste accompanies exer-
cise, and repair follows waste, the nutrition of the organ
is determined by the modes of mental activity — given asso-
ciations and ideas become patterns, as it were, in con-
formity to which the brain is moulded. In this way the
organic processes re-enforce mental acquisition, and as-
similation tends to perpetuate states of feeling and modes
of thought and action. Throughout infancy, childhood,
and youth, when nutrition is in excess, the brain is thus
adapted to its circumstances, and grows to the order of im-
pressions and ideas which it receives.

We have seen that the office of volition is to determine
the course of thought and direct bodily actions to specific
ends. This capability is the noblest element of our nature,
but is greatly variable in different individuals by habit and
constitution, and is inexorably limited in all. The will is
not an absolute despot, with unbounded authority to do
what it lists, but rather a constitutional President, exercis-
ing vast power, it may be, but strictly subject to the laws
of the organic state. Its regnant prerogative, as we have
seen, is that of controlling the attention, by which it is
enabled to wield the entire energy of the organism to the

4/O Edivard Livingston Youmans.

accomplishment of its purposes. In this way the auto-
matic system becomes a means of exalting the office of
volition, and making it in an eminent degree the arbiter of
individual destiny. But in the exercise of its prerogative
the will is governed by the same great law which rules all
the other powers, namely, the acquirement of strength by
exercise. Only through that constant exertion by which
energy is accumulated can the will gain command of the
thoughts and mastery of the impulses. By continual prac-
tice the organism grows, as it were, into subordination, and
the voluntary powers become habitually predominant. The
will is thus, in an eminent degree, capable of education,
but when we see how it is enfeebled in bodily debility and
utterly extinguished in numerous morbid states of the sys-
tem, it becomes apparent to what an extent physiological
conditions must enter into the policy of its intelligent man-
agement. Even its limited freedom, as physicians well
understand, is only coincident with healthy bodily action.

Sufficient, I trust, has now been said to show that
mental operations are so inextricably interwoven with cor-
poreal actions, that to study them successfully apart is
altogether impossible. The mental life and the bodily life
are manifestations of the same organism, growing together,
fluctuating together, declining together. They depend
upon common laws, which must be investigated by a com-
mon method ; and science, in unravelling the mysteries of
the body, has thrown important light upon the workings
of the mind. It only remains now to point out, that when
subjected to the Baconian test of " fruitfulness " — of prac-
tical application to the emergencies of experience — the sci-
entific method of regarding human nature, incomplete as it
may be, already stands in marked contrast to the prover-
bial barrenness of the old metaphysics. I will briefly refer
to two or three such applications.

One of the gloomiest chapters of man's social history is

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 471

that which records the treatment of the insane. Those
upon whom had fallen the heaviest calamity possible in
life, were looked upon with horror, as accursed of God, and
treated with a degree of cruelty which seems now incredible.
Asylums were dark and dismal jails, where their inmates
were left in cold, hunger, and filth, to be chained and
lashed at the caprice of savage keepers. And this bar-
barism continued in countries claiming to be enlightened
down to the middle of the present century. Let me men-
tion a solitary instance, of which the literature of the sub-
ject is full.

Said Dr. Conolly, in a lecture in 1847 : "It was in the
Female Infirmary at Hanwell, exactly seven years ago,
that I found, among other examples of the forgetfulness
of what was due either to the sick or insane, a young
woman lying in a crib, bound to the middle of it by a strap
around the waist, to the sides of it by the hands, to the
foot of it by the ankles, and to the head of it by the neck ;
she also had her hands in the hard leathern terminations of
canvas sleeves. She could not turn, nor lie on her side,
nor lift her hand to her face, and her appearance was mis-
erable beyond the power of words to describe. That she
was almost always wet and dirty, it is scarcely necessary
to say. But the principal point I wish to illustrate by men-
tioning this case is, that it was a feeble and sick woman
who was thus treated. At that very time her whole skin
was covered with neglected scabies, and she was suffering
all the torture of a large and deep-seated abscess of the
breast." "Again," he remarks, "old and young, men and
women, the frantic and the melancholy, were treated worse
and more neglected than the beasts of the field. The cells
of an asylum resembled the dens of a squalid menagerie ;
the straw was raked out, and the food was thrown in through
the bars, and exhibitions of madness were witnessed which
are no longer to be found, because they were not the sim-

4/2 Edward Livingston Youmans.

pie product of malady, but of malady aggravated by mis-
management."

Now, these statements represent a condition of things
as old as history, and we are called upon to account for it.
Granting that the insane were dangerous, and required re-
straint, and granting all that may be urged concerning the
barbarity of the times, we have yet to find the cause of the
apparently gratuitous ferocity of which they were the vic-
tims ; and this we do find in the legitimate consequences
of the prevailing theory of human nature. The ancient
philosophy taught that the body is to be despised, de-
graded, renounced. This view was adopted by theology,
and thrown into a concrete and dramatic shape, which made
it more capable of vivid realization by the multitude. It
pronounced the body to be " a sink of iniquity," the " in-
trenchment of Satan," a fit residence for demons. The
lunatic was one who had incurred Divine displeasure, and
was given over to the powers of darkness, by whom he was
" possessed." This doctrine, of which witchcraft was one
of the developments, abundantly explains the attitude of
society toward the victims of mental disorder. What more
suitable than dungeons, scourgings, and tortures for the de-
tested wretch, who was thus manifestly forsaken of God
and delivered over to the devil ? The merciless brute who
inflicted untold sufferings upon these unhappy beings
deemed himself, like the Inquisitor, but an instrument for
executing the will of Heaven.

It availed nothing that, for thousands of years, there
had been a broad current of intense and powerful thought
in the channels of poetry, polemics, oratory, philosophy,
politics, theology, and devotion. All this multifarious
culture was powerless to arrest the evil consequences of
a radically erroneous view of human nature, for the simple
reason that the discovery of truth was not among its ob-
jects. It was only when a class of men, participating in

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 473

the new spirit of modern times, and drawn to the investiga-
tion by the necessities of their profession, entered earnestly
upon the study of the body, that views were reached which
have revolutionized and humanized the treatment of the
insane. Discovering that the mind is dependent upon the
organism, and that its disordered manifestations are the
results of organic derangement, they found that insanity is
not a devil to be exorcised but a disease to be cured.
After a sharp struggle with popular ignorance and tradi-
tional prejudice, the better views have triumphed, and
society is beginning to reap the beneficent consequences
of their labours : the stern and violent measures, that
served but to aggravate the malady, have given place to
gentle and kindly treatment, which is found to be of itself
a most potent means of restoration.

The management of the idiotic, or feeble-minded,
equally illustrates the argument. Throughout the past
no movement was made for the relief of this wretched
class, and no one dreamed that anything could be done
for them ; but the progress of Physiology has made a new
revelation in this field also. Dr. Edward Seguin, in his
recent able work upon The Treatment of Idiocy by the
Physiological Method, observes : " Idiots could not be
educated by the methods, nor cured by the treatment,
practised prior to 1837 ; but most idiots, and children
proximate to them, may be relieved, in a more or less com-
plete measure, of their disabilities by the physiological
mode of education."

These facts have a profound significance. They not
only show that to be practicable which the world had never
suspected to be possible, and that science is true to her
beneficent mission in the higher sphere as well as in the
lower ; they not only show that a change of method in the
study of human nature ended some of the grossest barba-
risms of the past, but they involve this deeper result — that

21

474 Edward Livingston Youmans.

by reaching a knowledge of the true causes of insanity and
imbecility, we gain command of the means of their preven-
tion, and arrive at the principles of mental hygiene. And
this leads to the consideration of those wider consequences
to society at large which the modern method of inquiry is
beginning to produce.

This is perhaps best illustrated in the establishment of
what may be called the law of mental limitations. The old
contrast between matter and mind led to the growth of an
all-prevalent error upon this point. To matter belongs
extension or limitation in space ; but mind is inextended,
and therefore it has been inferred to be unlimited : being
indefinite, it was supposed to be unbounded in its nature.
But force also is inextended, although rigorously limited
and measurable ; and as mind is nothing more nor less than
mental power, it must be subject to the laws of power, and
work within quantitative limits, like any other form of
force. Power, again, is but the accompaniment of material
change, and is hence restricted in quantity by the amount
of that change ; and as mind is accompanied by cerebral
transformation, it must have a necessary limit in the quan-
tity of cerebral transformation. In, therefore, considering
man as a being in whom mind is conditioned by a bodily
organism, the limitation of mental effects becomes a prac-
tical question of the very highest importance.

The doctrine of the conservation of energy and the
mutual convertibility of the various forces is now accepted
as a fundamental truth of science. Nor is there any
ground for regarding the vital forces as an exception to
the principle. That the organism cannot create its own
force, that its energy is entirely derived from the food in-
gested, and which, in this point of view, is merely stored
force, is beyond question ; and the source being thus
limited, that its expenditure in one direction makes it im-
possible to use it in another, is equally evident. This

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 475

principle applies, even in a more marked degree, to the
cerebral system. Every one knows that hearty digestion
and violent exercise lower the mental activity — that is, the
forces are diverted from the brain, and thrown upon the
stomach and muscles.

That the purely intellectual powers are also subject to
limitation is unquestionable. All minds are fissured with
incapacities in one direction or another — clipped away on
this side or on that — all are fragmentary. There may be
great mathematical ability, but no imagination ; fine
poetical gifts, without logical faculty ; large executive
power, coupled with deficient judgment. Dr. Whewell
had a powerful memory for books, but a very bad one for
persons ; Sir William Hamilton cultivated the lore and his-
tory of philosophy at the expense of his power of origina-
tion and organization ; Prescott was so irresolute that he
could only spur himself to his literary tasks by the stimulus
of betting with his secretary that he would do a certain
amount of work in a given time ; Theodore Parker was
loaded with erudition, but exclaimed on his premature
deathbed, " Oh, that I had known the art of life, or found
some book, or some man to tell me how to live, to study,
to take exercise." The greatest men are all dunces in
something : Shakespeare and Newton illustrate the law as
absolutely as the veriest weakling of the asylum. The
full-orbed intellect is yet to come, and will doubtless
bring with it the " perpetual motion " and the Jews'
" Messias."

These phenomena find no explanation in the old hypoth-
esis of mind as a vague, spiritual entity ; they throw us
back immediately on the organism whose acknowledged
limitations offer at once a solution of the mystery. These
mental inaptitudes may be either organic deficiencies, or a
result of concentrating the cerebral energy in certain
directions, and its consequent withdrawal from others.

476 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Thus viewed, every attainment involves the exercise of
brain power — each acquisition is a modification of cerebral
structure. All sensations of objects and words that we
remember, all acquired aptitudes of movement ; the asso-
ciations of the perception of things with visible symbols,
vocal actions and sounds, the connection of ideas with feel-
ings and emotions, and the formation of intellectual and
moral habits, are all concomitants and consequents of the
only kind of action of which the brain is capable — are all
the products of organic nutrition ; and the rate and limit
of acquisition, as well as the capacity for retention, are
conditioned upon the completeness of the nutritive pro-
cesses. As each acquirement involves a growth it is
evident that acquisition may reach a point at which the
whole organic force is consumed in conserving it, and
further attainments can only be made at the expense of
the decay and loss of old ones. Hence, if we overburden
the brain, as in school " cramming," nutrition is imperfect,
adhesion feeble, and acquisition quickly lost.

The one great physiological law upon which bodily and
mental health are alike dependent is the alternation of
action and repose which results from the limitation of
power. The eternal equation of vital vigour is, rest equals
exercise. That tendency to rhythmic action, which seems
to mark all displays of power in the universe, is con-
spicuously manifested in the organic economy, allowing
the muscles of respiration eight hours' repose out of
twenty-four, and six hours' rest to those of the heart.
The cerebral rhythm is diurnal ; except that rest which
parts of the brain may obtain when only other parts are
in action, the organ finds its appropriate repose in sleep.
" Half our days we spend in the shadow of the earth, and
the brother of death extracteth a third part of our lives,"
says the eloquent Sir Thomas Browne ; that is, the perio-
dicities of cerebral action are defined by astronomic cycles ;

On tlie Scientific Study of Human Nature. 477

the brain and the solar system march together. Exercise
and repose are equally indispensable to mental vigour ;
deficiency of exercise produces mental feebleness ; de-
ficiency of rest, disease. But there lurks in this statement
a deeper and more dangerous meaning than at first
appears. The equilibrium once lost is most difficult to re-
store— there is a fatal persistence in the morbid state. It
is a general law of the animal economy, that when the vital
powers are from any cause depressed below a certain
point, they are not easily, and sometimes are never, re-
paired. A large loss of blood, or a profound exhaustion,
may entail effects upon the constitution which will last for
years, perhaps for life. As might be expected, the brain
illustrates this principle more impressively than any other
portion of the system : if worked beyond its limits, there is
produced a rapid exhaustion of power which renders re-
pose impossible. The exhaustion of overwork is accom-
panied by excitement, which tends to perpetuate the work
and accelerate the exhaustion. The will is thus swamped
in the uncontrollable mobility of the automatic system, the
attention becomes insanely exalted, the brain will not be
ordered to rest, and words of warning are wasted. When
his physicians admonished Sir Walter Scott of the impend-
ing consequences of excessive mental labour, he sadly re-
plied : " As for bidding me not work, you might as well tell
Molly to put the kettle on the fire, and then say ' Now don't
boil.' "

We live in an age of intense mental activity and ever-
increasing cerebral strain. Steam and electricity are
tasked to bring daily tidings of what is happening all over
the world, and impressions pour in upon the brain at a rate
with which nothing in the past is comparable. The fierce
competitions of business, fashion, study, and political am-
bition, are at work to sap the vigour and rack the integrity
of the mental fabric, and there can be no doubt that there

478 Edward Livingston Youmans.

is, in consequence, an immense amount of latent brain
disease, productive of much secret suffering and slight aber-
rations of conduct, and which is liable, in sudden stress
of circumstances, to break out into permanent mental de-
rangement. The price we pay for our high-pressure civili-
zation is a fearful increase of cerebral exhaustion and dis-
order, and an augmenting ratio of shattered intellects.
We are startled when some conspicuous mind, strained be-
yond endurance, as in the cases of Hugh Miller, or Admiral
Fitzroy, crashes into insanity and suicide, yet these are but
symptoms of the prevailing tendencies of modern life.

And here I call attention to the deep defects of that
predominant scheme of culture which not only ignores the
human brain, and the sciences which illustrate it, as objects
of earnest systematic study, but explodes upon it all the
traditional contempt which it cherishes for material nature.
*' This hasty pudding within the skull," said Frederick
.Robertson, as he epitomized, in a single expression, the
stupid prejudice of the prevailing " scholarship." Poor
Robertson ! smitten down in the midst of a noble career,
by the consequences of overtasking, dying of brain disease
in the prime of manhood : — how cruelly did Nature avenge
the insult !

Men admire the steam-engine of Watt and the calcu-
lating engine of Babbage ; but how little do they care for
the thinking engine of the Infinite Artificer ! They ven-
erate days, and dogmas, and ceremonials ; but where is the
reverence that is due to that most sacred of the things of
time, the organism of the soul ! We speak of the glories
of the stellar universe ; but is not the miniature duplicate
of that universe in the living brain a more transcendent
marvel ? We admire the vast fabric of society and govern-
ment, and that complicated scheme of duties, responsibili-
ties, usages, and laws which constitutes social order ; but
how few remember that all this has its deep foundation in

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 479

the measured march of cerebral transformations! We
point to the inventions, arts, sciences, and literatures,
which form the swelling tide of civilization : but were they
not all originated in that laboratory of wonders, the human
brain ? Geological revelations carry us back through
durations so boundless, that imagination is bewildered,
and reason reels under the grandeur of the demonstration ;
but through the measureless series of advancing periods,
we discover a stupendous plan. Infinite Power, working
through infinite time, converges the mighty lines of
causality to the fulfilment of an eternal design — the birth
of an intellectual and moral era through the development
of the brain of man, which thus appears as the final term of
an unfolding world.

The ultimate and decisive bearing of the foregoing
views upon plans and processes of instruction can hardly
fail to have been perceived. The scientific method of
studying human nature, important as may be its relation
to the management of the insane and feeble-minded, and
valuable as is its service in establishing the limits of mental
effort, must find its fullest application to the broad subject
of education. For, whatever questions of the proper sub-
jects to be taught, their relative claims, or the true method
of teaching may arise, there is a prior and fundamental in-
quiry into the nature, capabilities, and requirements of the
being to be taught, upon the elucidation of which all other
questions immediately depend. A knowledge of the being
to be trained, as it is the basis of all intelligent culture,
must be the first necessity of the teacher.

Education is an art, like Locomotion, Mining, or
Bleaching, which may be pursued empirically or rationally,
as a blind habit, or under intelligent guidance; and the
relations of science to it are precisely the same as to all
the other arts — to ascertain their conditions and give law

480 Edward Livingston Youmans.

to their processes. What it has done for Navigation, Teleg-
raphy, and War, it will also do for Culture. The true
method of proceeding may be regarded as established, and
many important results are already reached, though its
systematic application is hardly yet entered upon. Al-
though there is undoubtedly a growing interest in the
scientific aspects of the subject, yet what Mr. Wyse wrote
twenty-five years ago remains still but too true. He says,
" It is unquestionably a singular circumstance, that, of all
problems, the problem of Education is that to which by
far the smallest share of persevering and vigorous atten-
tion has yet been applied. v The same empiricis-m which
once reigned supreme in the domains of chemistry, astron-
omy, and medicine still retains possession, in many in-
stances, of those of education. No journal is kept of the
phenomena of infancy and childhood ; no parent has yet
registered, day after day, with the attention of an astrono-
mer who prepares his ephemerides, the marvellous develop-
ments of his child. Until this is done there can be no
solid basis for reasoning ; we must still deal with conjec-
ture." And why has nothing been done ? Because, in the
prevailing system of culture, the art of observation, which
is the beginning of all true science, the basis of all in-
tellectual discrimination, and the kind of knowledge which
is necessary to interpret these observations; are universally
neglected. Our teachers mostly belong to the old dispensa-
tion. Their preparation is chiefly literary ; if they obtain
a little scientific knowledge, it is for the purpose of com-
municating it, and not as a means of tutorial guidance.
Their art is a mechanical routine, and hence, very naturally,
while admitting the importance of advancing views, they
really cannot see what is to be done about it. When we
say that education is an affair of the laws of our being, in-
volving a wide range of considerations — an affair of the
air respired, its moisture, temperature, density, purity, and

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 481

electrical state ; an affair of food, digestion, and nutrition ;
of the quantity, quality, and speed of the blood sent to the
brain ; of clothing and exercise, fatigue and repose, health
and disease ; of variable volition, and automatic nerve ac-
tion ; of fluctuating feeling, redundancy and exhaustion of
nerve power ; an affair of light, colour, sound, resistance ;
of sensuous impressibility, temperament, family history,
constitutional predisposition, and unconscious influence ;
of material surroundings, and a host of agencies which
stamp themselves upon the plastic organism, and reappear
in character ; in short, that it involves that complete ac-
quaintance with corporeal conditions which science alone
can give — when we hint of these things, we seem to be
talking in an unknown tongue, or, if intelligible, then very
irrelevant and unpractical.

That our general education is in a deplorably chaotic
state, presenting a medley of debased ideals, conflicting
systems, discordant practices, and unsatisfactory results,
no observing person will question ; that this state of
things is to last forever, we all feel to be impossible ;
and that its future removal can only come through that
powerful instrumentality to which we owe advancement
in other departments of social activity, is equally clear to
the reflecting. The imminent question is, How may the
child and youth be developed healthfully and vigorously,
bodily, mentally, and morally ? and science alone can
answer it by a statement of the laws upon which that de-
velopment depends. Ignorance of these laws must inevi-
tably involve mismanagement. That there is a large
amount of mental perversion, and absolute stupidity, as
well as of bodily disease, produced in school, by measures
which operate to the prejudice of the growing brain, is not
to be doubted ; that dulness, indociiity, and viciousness,
are frequently aggravated by teachers incapable of dis-
criminating between their mental and bodily causes, is also

482 Edward Livingston Youmans.

undeniable ; while, that teachers often miserably fail to im-
prove their pupils, and then report the result of their own
incompetency as failures of nature, all may have seen, al-
though it is now proved that the lowest imbeciles are no
sunk beneath the possibility of elevation.

The purpose of the foregoing remarks has been to
bring forward an aspect of man which cannot fail to have
an important influence upon processes of instruction. I
have endeavoured to illustrate the extent to which Nature
works out her own results in the organism of man. The
numerous instances of self-made men, who, with no ex-
ternal assistance, have risen to intellectual eminence, and
the still more marked instances where students have forced
their way to success in spite of the hindrances of an irra-
tional culture, testify to the power of the spontaneous and
self-determining tendencies of human character, while the
general overlooking of this fact has unquestionably led to
an enormous exaggeration of the potency of existing educa-
tional methods. In establishing this view, science both limits
and modifies the function of the instructor. It limits it by
showing that mental operations are corporeally conditioned,
that large regions of our nature are beyond direct control,
and that mental attainment depends in a great degree upon
inherited capacity and organic growth. It limits it by
showing that ancestral influences come down upon us as we
enter the world, like the hand of Fate ; that we are born
well, or born badly, and that whoever is ushered into exist-
ence at the bottom of the scale, can never rise to the top,
because the weight of the universe is upon him. It shows
how not to mistake the surface effects of an ostentatious
system for a thorough informing of character ; how not to
mistake the current smattering of languages, the cramming
for examinations, the glossing of accomplishments, the
showy and superficial pedantries of literature, and the
labelling of degrees, for true education.

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 483

The office of the teacher is thus narrowed but not
denied. If inherited organization is a factor of destiny
never to be cancelled, there is another factor in that culture
which rests upon a knowledge of the laws of life and
character. Science modifies the tutorial offices by disclos-
ing the direction of its real work, and guarding against
waste of effort, and specious and spurious results — by
showing that education does not consist in the acquisition
of knowledge to be siphoned into the intellectual receivers
of the schoolroom, but is rather to direct the working of a
mechanism over which neither its owner nor his teacher is
omnipotent — a mechanism in which effects follow causes,
and which always operates according to law. It shows the
instructor that he must take his pupil as he finds him ; not
a mental abstraction, to be classed with other "minds"
and worked by a universal formula, but a personal reality
— a part of the order of Nature, which never repeats itself
in a single case ; a being with individual attributes which
are inexorably bound within the limits of his organization.
It therefore demands of him to leave the lore which is
glorified by tradition until he has thoroughly grounded
himself in the elements of that knowledge of human nature
— of the springs of action and the conditions and possibili-
ties of real improvement, which alone can confer the
highest skill in quickening the intellect and moulding the
character.

I have thus attempted to prove that only by inverting
the rule of the past, which exalted the mind at the expense
of the body, and bringing the resources of modern induc-
tion to the study of the corporeal organism, can we arrive
at that higher and clearer knowledge of man, which will
make possible anything like a true Science of Human
Nature. I have pointed out the salutary results which
have already flowed from this method in the crucial test of
the treatment of the insane, and the vast benefits which

484 Edward Livingston Youmans.

society cannot fail to reap from that clearer perception of
the laws of vital and mental limitations which recent re-
search has so decisively established ; and I have also en-
deavoured to unfold the bearing of this view upon the sub-
ject of education ; but the results enumerated are far
from exhausting the broad applicability of the method.
The grand characteristic of science is its universality ;
what is it, indeed, but the latest report of the human mind
on the order of Nature ? Its principles are far-reaching
and all-inclusive, so that when a knowledge of the true
constitution of man is once attained, it confers insight into
all the multitudinous phases of human manifestation. The
same economy of power which science confers in the
material world, and by which we obtain a maximum of
effect from a minimum of force, she confers also in the
world of mind. When we have mastered the laws of
physical education we have the essential data for dealing
with questions of mental education, and these steps are the
indispensable preparation for an enlightened moral educa-
tion. And the same knowledge of the organism which
shows how it may be best developed, gives also the clue to
the understanding of its aberrant phenomena. That mys-
terious ground which has hitherto been the hot-bed of
noxious superstitions and dangerous quackeries, is re-
claimed to rational investigation, and the remarkable
effects of reverie, ecstasy, hysteria, hallucinations, spectral
illusions, dreaming, somnambulism, mesmerism, religious
epidemics, and other kindred displays of nervous mor-
bidity, find adequate explanation in the ascertained laws
of our being. This kind of knowledge is, furthermore,
not only of the highest value to all classes for practical
guidance, but the philosophical students of man, whether
viewing him in the moral, religious, social, aesthetic, ethno-
logical or historic aspects, must find their equal and indis-
pensable preparation in the mastery of the biological and

On the Scientific Study of Human Nature. 485

psychological laws which can alone explain the nature of
the subject of their research.

After what has been said, it will not be supposed that
I entertain any very extravagant expectations of the im-
mediate results to be obtained from improved methods of
dealing with human nature. On the contrary, one of the
most impressive lessons of science is that permanent
growths are slow, and that there are limits which cannot
be overpassed. Dealing largely with causes which only
work out their results in the fulness of time, it teaches
patience, hope, and labour ; and not the least of its salu-
tary influences will be, through wholesome discipline of the
imagination, and a rational control of the sympathies, to
check the waste of power upon impossible projects, and re-
strain those enthusiasms which are born of the feelings
rather than of the judgment. Nor do I believe that the
perfectibility of the human race is at hand through the
teaching of a little more physiology in schools, or that
science is to apply a calculus to human actions, and thus
supersede the common sense and practical judgments of
mankind. That there is a vast body of valid knowledge
concerning the nature of man which is reduced to applica-
tion, and serves for the management of conduct, is shown
in all the multifarious aspects of social activity : I simply
hold that this knowledge, valuable as it is, is yet imperfect
— in many respects deplorably imperfect — and must grow
to a higher state and a more scientific character : and that
the organized culture of the present age is bound to help
and not to hinder this tendency. The time, I think, has
come for demanding that the curriculum of modern liberal
education be so reconstructed that its courses of study
shall have a more direct and positive bearing upon that
most desirable end — a clearer understanding of the Laws
of Human Nature.

III.

WHAT WE MEAN BY SCIENCE.

IN the plan of this journal,* scientific subjects are to
have a prominent share of attention ; and as there is not a
little confusion in the popular mind as to the ideas con-
veyed by the term " Science," it is desirable to get a defi-
nite understanding of it. At all events, it is necessary to
indicate as clearly as possible the signification which will
be attached to the word in these pages.

In its prevailing use, the term science suggests a special
kind of knowledge which is different from common knowl-
edge, and pertains to a particular class of subjects which
are looked upon as foreign to the interests of common life.
It is generally regarded as relating to external or physical
objects, and calls up ideas of minerals, insects, drug shops,
or electrical exhibitions, with a copious literature of for-
bidding terms. In conformity with this notion, the science
department of popular journalism usually consists of a
mass of items thrust into an obscure place, where we are
briefly informed of the discovery of a new mineral or as-
teroid, a novel chemical process, a hitherto undescribed
zoophyte, or the latest inventive exploit in the way of
churns. Science has its periodicals professedly and
pfoperly devoted to the technical details and results of re-
search. These are minced and sorted, and then reproduced
for the edification of the public. This information is no

* Appletons' Journal, started in 1869, is the one here alluded to.

(486)

What we Mean by Science. 487

doubt useful, but, to offer it as affording any just idea of
science, is little better than a caricature. The time has
come when this noble term should be redeemed from these
degrading associations, and made to stand for the larger
and higher things which it now truly represents. Science
is not the peculiar property of a few curious persons, who
spend their days in watching bugs, or their nights in watch-
ing the stars. It is something, on the contrary, which be-
longs to the mind itself ; which pertains to our very modes
of thinking, and therefore concerns everybody. It is some-
thing to be used in reading, conversation, and business, at
home and in the street, week days and Sundays, in school^
at the lecture, and the political gathering. Let us see how
this is.

The literal meaning of the term science is to know.
But it has been found that there are two kinds of knowing:
we may know a subject loosely and vaguely, or with clear-
ness and precision. So important has this distinction now
become, that it is necessary to mark it in language, and so
the word science has come to be applied to one of those
kinds of knowledge ; it means, to know accurately. In the
course of time and experience, knowledge slowly passes
from the indefinite to the definite, from the vague to the
precise. This change is of the nature of a growth, and
hence, in its quality, science may be defined as the higher or
more perfect stage of developing knowledge.

For example, men, in the rudest ages, observed that the
days were longer in summer than in winter, and that there
was a constancy in the relative position and a regularity in
the movements of the stars : this was the dim beginning of
a knowledge which has grown at length into the splendid
science of astronomy. So it was known to everybody that
fuel disappears in combustion, and that stones are altered
by fire ; and these vague notions have been, in time, un-
folded into the science of chemistry. In like manner, it

488 Edward Livingston Youmans.

was understood, even in periods of earliest barbarism, that
with scarcity the price of food rises ; and that bits of metal
may be made serviceable to carry on exchanges : these
were the germs which have grown into a body of definite
and connected truths, which form the science of political
economy. Again, at the earliest dawn of intelligence, men
knew that objects seen together are apt to be remembered
together : this rudimental fact has been expanded in
modern times into the science of psychology.

Such being the essential character of science, the ques-
tion next arises, How much does the term comprehend ?
Our knowledge of Nature is all of this growing or pro-
gressive kind. In every aspect of the natural world the
explanations were at first crude and imperfect, and have
gradually ripened into greater distinctness and precision.
We are thus brought to the full breadth of meaning of the
term science, which is nothing less than the latest and
truest interpretation of the order of the world at which the
human mind has arrived. It is the perfected mode of
thinking in its application to all the phenomena of Nature
which can become the subjects of thought.

But it will be asked, What do you mean by Nature ?
We mean the whole system of appearances — objects and
actions — by whioh we are surrounded in the present state
of being. It includes the entire realm of existence and
activity, material and mental, with all their interconnec-
tions and interactions, which constitute the environment of
man. As the material world is but part of the natural or-
der, physical knowledge is but a part of science. Our
knowledge of mind and character, of the springs and limits
of human action, of the relations of men and the conditions
of social welfare, may be either loose and confused, or
definite and accurate. This kind of knowledge conforms
equally to the conditions of growth, and therefore has its
true scientific aspects. But we can only comprehend the

What we Mean by Science. 489

present attitude of the subject by referring to the re-
lations which subsist among the various departments of
thought.

The purely physical sciences, corresponding to the
material phases of Nature, are the simplest, and have been
developed first. By studying the internal or atomic
changes of matter, the science of chemistry has been ar-
rived at. Inquiries concerning the air have led to mete-
orology, and investigations into the earth's crust have
given rise to geology. But the intellectual movement thus
exemplified is far from stopping with an exploration of
material phenomena. Success here but sharpens the mind
for the further research, of truth. These departments of
physical study have their highest value as a preparation
for something beyond. They are but the training ground
of the human intellect for larger spheres of inquiry. The
development of the physical sciences has produced grand
and beneficent results, as all men know. But the advance
of industrial civilization, to which they have led, is far from
being their most important effect. Nor is their disclosure
of the order of material Nature, by which man has been
translated from the darkness of ignorance and superstition
into the light and hope of knowledge, by any means their
strongest claims to honour. It is in that higher education,
and nobler discipline of the human mind, which can alone
qualify it to enter upon the more exalted questions of the
real nature of man himself, and his true relations to the
surrounding world and to his fellow-men ^ it is here that
the nobler function of the physical sciences is to be sought.

That accuracy of thinking, which it is the business of
science to enforce, has led to the detection of those uni-
formities in the course, of Nature which we term law. More
and more clearly is it perceived that all kinds of action ex-
emplify cause and effect, and therefore conform to law ;
and more and more apparent is it also becoming that all

490 Edward Livingston Youmans.

measures of improvement, individual and social, must de-
pend upon our thorough understanding and vivid realiza-
tion of the conditions and laws upon which all improvement
depends. It is not sufficient to know, in a general way,
that fresh air is salutary and foul air injurious; the ap-
preciation of the effects must be so clear and intense as
•to control action like an instinct. To bring about this
state of mind, slowly, of course, in the mass of the peo-
ple, is the duty and destiny of science. Its supreme edu-
cational office is to teach men to think more carefully
and closely upon whatever subject they are required to
think. Its larger use is to habituate them to guard
against the disturbing influence of the feelings and the
warpings of prejudice, to look beyond the immediate
and to forecast distant consequences, to weigh evidence
and avoid those errors of judgment which lead to rash and
mistaken practice.

Imperfect knowledge is misleading ; the more accurate
it is, the better it serves for guidance. But this is no more
true in navigation or mining than it is in commercial busi-
ness or in teaching. The subjects, however, are in some
cases simpler than in others, and the simpler must ob-
viously serve as stepping stones to the more complex. It
is not that knowledge is to be carried over from one field
to another, but the mental training acquired in one field is
to be employed in another. Granted that eminent skill in
mathematics will not be a suitable preparation for a judge,
or expertness in chemistry qualify for the intelligent man-
agement of a prison ; granted that the knowledge conferred
by scientific studies, as at present arranged, is not that
demanded in dealing with the practical questions of every-
day life ; the fact nevertheless remains, that the cultiva-
tion of scientific — that is, accurate — habits of thought is the
best preparation for action in all circumstances of responsi-
bility.

IV.

THE RELIGIOUS WORK OF SCIENCE.

I HAVE been asked to speak on this occasion upon the
important subject of Religion and Science. Much has been
said concerning it, and much more will have to be said before
the public are duly instructed as to the relation they bear
to each other. I have had no time to prepare anything at
all worthy the greatness and interest of the topic, and can
only offer you some rough suggestions, very hastily drawn
up, concerning one of its aspects, viz., The Religious Work
of Science. There is deep meaning in the phrase "revolu-
tions of thought," for in the advance of opinion ideas not
only diverge, but they go round to opposite positions ; they
are not only modified, but reversed, and propositions long
held as true often turn out to be not only erroneous, but
the exact opposite of the truth. The earth, for example,
was first supposed to be flat — it is nowr known to be round ;
it was long believed to be stationary — it is now known to
be in rapid motion ; it was long considered as of very re-
cent origin — it is now recognized as having had an incal-
culable antiquity. Such total inversions of belief are
numerous in the past course of thought, and are destined,
I suspect, to become still more numerous in the future. I
think it will turn out that our present subject furnishes
another illustration of it. Science has long been regarded
and is still widely believed to be the antagonist of religion ;
the time is not distant when it will be accepted as its most
powerful ally and best friend.

(491)

492 Edward Livingston Youmans.

By science I understand that knowledge which is gained
by the intellect of the order of things around us, of which
we form a part, and of the laws by which that order is gov-
erned. Religion I understand essentially to be the feeling
entertained toward that Infinite Being, Power, or Cause, by
whatever name called, of which all things are the manifesta-
tion, and which is regarded and worshipped as the Creator
and Ruler of the Universe. It is the office of science to ex-
plore the works of God; of religion to deal with the senti-
ments and emotions which go out toward the Divine Au-
thor of these works. But if praise and adoration are due to
the Creator because of the harmony and grandeur displayed
in the creation, are not they working to distinctly religious
ends who reveal to us these grand characteristics of Divine
achievement ? To whom are we indebted for a knowledge
of the order that God has instituted in the universe? It is
to the men whose appreciation of it has been so high that
they have given their lives to the discovery of its truths ;
and if these truths are divine, is not the research in a pre-
eminent sense a religious work ? Among the ancients so
little was known of the operations of Nature that nothing
like a general order or system of laws was suspected. The
natural, in fact, was not differentiated in conception from
the supernatural. The whole scheme of things was bedded in
superstition and mysticism, and the human mind was given
over to the conceits and absurdities of an unbridled imagi-
nation. It was only with the rise of modern science, in the
recent centuries, that the idea of an order of Nature began
to dawn upon the world of thought. Copernicus led the
way by destroying the geocentric astronomy, and with it
the anthropocentric system of ideas that had grown up
around it. His theory of the planetary motions opened the
door to the conception of their true laws and causes. Kep-
ler and Galileo verified and extended his work, and pre-
pared the way for Newton, who struck out the universal

The Religious Work of Science. 493

law of attraction, which explains the celestial harmonies.
This closed the first great scientific epoch by the establish-
ment of the principle of natural order throughout space.
But if the order of the universe prevails through space,
must it not also prevail through time ? Inquiry now took
a new direction, the current widened, new sciences arose,
and another century of research revealed the grand truth
that the system of order and law is as vast and perfect in
its time relations as it had been shown to be in the relations
of space.

This mighty revelation of the workings of the Infinite
Power we owe not to those who devoted themselves pro-
fessionally to the exposition of the plans and purposes
of God, but to men of science who got neither sympathy
nor co-operation from that class. In their whole course
from the beginning of research, the scientific students of
Nature encountered two orders of obstacles. The first per-
tained to the character of the work. The discovery of new
truth is not an easy thing ; it is too precious to be had for
the mere asking. Under the best methods it is -a difficult,
painful, and uncertain pursuit, while the methods themselves
were only attainable through long experience. Nor is it
given to every earnest devotee of science to add to the stock
of original truth : while thousands strive, but few secure the
prizes. Moreover, the early investigatots were embarrassed
and constantly defeated by the inherited mass of errors and
prejudices by which judgment was warped and the mental
vision obscured. The idea that law is inflexible and uni-
versal throughout Nature was long unrecognized, and the
special students of science went no further than to assume
it in their own fields of investigation. Added to these diffi-
culties was the widespread and deeply rooted feeling
among the ignorant masses — which in this respect compre-
hend almost everybody — that existing knowledge was suffi-
cient, and that to pry into the mysteries of Nature was idle,

494 Edward Livingston Youmans.

if not irreverent and presumptuous. Such were some of
the necessary obstacles which scientific men had to over-
come in their religious task of unfolding the divine truths
which the Creator had embodied in the constitution of the
world. But they had difficulties to encounter of another
kind. The crude primitive ideas, by which the powers
above Nature were supposed to be constantly interfering
with its operations, were borne down the current of tradi-
tion, and, conforming to the general beliefs, were systemat-
ically maintained and defended. The theologians who
claimed to be authorized expounders of the divine policy
insisted not only that breaks and interruptions of the
natural order occurred, but they maintained that it is in
these breaches of it that the Creator is to be most con-
spicuously and impressively seen. Holding that the nor-
mal phenomena are of small concern, while their ruptures
alone disclose divine intervention, they left it to the men
of science to work out the natural order to its complete-
ness, and to vindicate the Almighty, whose wisdom is wit-
nessed not in the violations but in the perfection of his
works.

Certainly science has not been the enemy of religion in
this, but it is equally certain that theology has been the
adversary of science. It has been the business of theology
to defend accepted Opinions, and it has been the business of
science to question them and arrive at new opinions. What
the general issue has been would seem obvious, but upon
this parties differ. Prof. Hitchcock, at the Tyndall banquet,
said : " It seems sometimes as though science and religion
had met in a very narrow path on a dizzy ridge, and were
interlocking their antlers in a struggle that must be fatal
to one or the other of them. If it comes to this, I think
history suggests that science, and not religion, must go
down the cliff." Prof. Huxley thinks differently. In his
Lay Sermons he remarks: "It is true that if philosophers

The Religious Work of Science. 495

have suffered, their cause has been amply avenged. Ex-
tinguished theologians lie about the cradle of every science
as the strangled snakes beside that of Hercules, and history
records that whenever science and orthodoxy have been
fairly opposed, the latter has been forced to retire from the
lists, bleeding and crushed, if not annihilated." But be this
as it may, science has achieved its noble work, as all the
world now testifies. It has gained supremacy ov^r the
forces of Nature, it has established principles for the guid-
ance of human action, it has liberated the human mind
from the paralyzing fear and thralldom of superstition, and
opened a new and more hopeful dispensation for humanity.
But its grandest achievement is that it has recreated the
universe in thought, and, by elevating and expanding man's
conceptions of the sphere of harmony and law, has exalted
our reverential feelings toward the Infinite Power by which
it is ordered and sustained. So profound a revolution as
science has accomplished must be felt in every department
of thought, theological as well as others, and its influence
here is something more than a perturbation ; it is seen in a
radical modification of views. Less and less do we hear
from theologians of what is to be learned from the lapses
and suspensions of physical law, and more and more of the
teachings of its unbroken order. Theology begins to ac-
cord to science the leadership of thought, and avows her
readiness to accept whatever science can establish as truth.
Take a recent case.

Within the present generation scientific men have pro-
mulgated the doctrine that the universe did not come into
existence in the way generally believed, but that it has
been gradually unfolded, and that the world and all that it
contains are but the final terms in an immense series of
changes which have been brought about by natural causes
in the course of immeasurable time. No theory ever before
propounded by science was so all-disturbing as this. It re-

496 Edward Livingston Youmans.

sets all the problems of Nature and of man. If evolution
be a truth, then must we reconsider all the questions of
physics and ryietaphysics that have been settled under the
hypothesis ttyat all things came recently and suddenly into
existence as/ we now see them. If evolution be true, the
standpoint/ of all philosophical and scientific inquiry must
be changed; old explanations will not answer. The con-
venticjfi of orthodox theologians just held in this city did
shirk this question ; they gave it place and time and

provided for its consideration. A distinguished divine was
appointed to report upon it, which he did in an elaborate
paper on " The Religious Aspects of the Doctrine of De-
velopment." For science there is but one aspect to the
question, Is it true ? Theology has other interests to con-
sider, but the inquiry into its bearings presupposed the
possible verity of the theory. Dr. McCosh does not deny
it, but after surveying the succession of plants and animals
in the geological epochs, he said : " In looking at these
phenomena, men discover everywhere development or evo-
lution. It appears in inanimate nature, in suns, planets,
and moons being evolved out of an original matter in a
way which implies that the earth is older than the sun, and
must have existed in ages and had light shining upon it
before the sun took his solid form. It is a characteristic of
organized beings to produce others after their kind. Those
who view development in the proper light see in it only a
form or manifestation of law. Gravitation is a law of
contemporaneous nature, extending over all bodies simul-
taneously — over sun, moon, and stars the most remote.
Development is a law of successive nature, and secures
a connection between the past and the present, and, I
may add, the future, securing a unity and it may be a
progression from age to age. It is merely an exhibition
of order running through successive ages, as the other
is of order running through coexisting objects." Dr.

The Religious Work of Science. 497

McCosh then points out that there are difficulties with the
doctrine, and adds: "I am not sure that religion has any
interest in holding absolutely by one side or other of this
question which it is for scientific men to settle. I am not
sure that religion is entitled to insist that every species of
insect has been created by a special fiat of God, with no
secondary agent employed." Dr. McCosh again says: "It
is useless to tell the younger naturalists that there is no
truth in the doctrine of development, for they know that
there is truth which is not to be set aside by denunciation.
Religious philosophers might be more profitably employed
in showing them the religious aspects of the doctrine of
development, and some would be grateful to any who
would help them to keep their old faith in God and the
Bible with their faith in science."

In the discussion which followed, which was free from
bitterness, and which, if evincing some ignorance, evinced
also a wholesome desire for knowledge, one of the dele-
gates— the Rev. Dr. Brown, of large opportunities, as he
represented St. Petersburg, Cape of Good Hope, and Ber-
wick-upon-Tweed — declared that, as a botanist of twenty
years' standing, he accepted the development hypothesis.
Indeed, he declared his conviction " that the confirmation
or general adoption of the hypothesis of development will
ultimately exercise a beneficial influence on religion," which
benign influence will be due to the labours of the scientific
men who have worked the truth out in the pitiless hailstorm
of general execration. Dr. Hodge, of Princeton, the Boaner-
ges of orthodoxy, neither denied the doctrine of evolution
nor denounced its believers as unchristian, and was only so-
licitous about its theological relations. He said : " The great
question which divides theists from atheists, Christians from
unbelievers, is this, Is development an intellectual process
guided by God, or is it a blind process of unintelligible, un-
conscious force, which knows no end and adopts no means ? "
22

498 Edward Livingston Youmans.

It is worthy of note that the most retrograde position was
taken by a distinguished man of science. Dr. Dawson, the
geologist, proposed to relegate the question to scriptural de-
cision. Theologians no longer claim for the Bible the charac-
ter of an infallible scientific text-book ; Dr. Dawson avowed
it as his authority in biology. He is reported to have said
that " as regards varieties Darwin is well enough, but as
regards species I don't believe in it, because it comes in
conflict with the Bible." President Anderson was willing
to admit Darwinism, not as an established fact but as a
working hypothesis, which of course implied that it co-
ordinated the facts and expressed the truth more perfectly
than any other view. He said : " If a man talks to me about
evolution and believes in a God that unrolls the magnifi-
cent plan of the universe, I humbly thank God for such a
doctrine. When a development is put before me that ex-
cludes God, I don't believe a word of it."

We certainly cannot complain that the theologians view
the subject in a theological light, but they should be care-
ful that it is not a false light. What would Dr. Anderson
think of one who should annex the condition he proposes
to the acceptance of the law of gravitation or the atomic
theory ? The question of evolution is to be first settled by
evidence as true or false, and this, as Dr. McCosh admits,
it belongs to science alone to determine. If it be rejected
by science, there is an end of it for everybody ; if it be es-
tablished, nothing remains for theologians but to adjust it
in their system and put it to its proper theological uses.
We are here, however, chiefly concerned to note the regis-
ter of advancing liberality among the evangelicals, as in-
dicated by the discussion. They defer to science, and do
not shrink from the most obnoxious theories, as research
shows them to be true. They are to be congratulated on
their own development, which is so marked as to lend no
small support to the hypothesis. Twenty years ago Dr.

The Religious Work of Science. 499

Brown would have been ejected from such a convention by
explosive indignation, as leprous with heresy ; and if things
proceed at this rate, in twenty years more we shall expect
to see the whole Alliance rise to its feet in expression of
respect and gratitude when the names of Spencer and
Darwin are mentioned. I believe myself that evolution is
a grand objective truth of the universe, still much obscured
and beset with difficulties, but unmistakably outlined and
supported by a mass of evidence that preponderates over-
whelmingly. In a religious point of view it has but one
significance. Offering a grander conception of the cos-
mical order and a deeper insight into its wonderful workings
than had ever before been attained, it is the sublimest trib-
ute that the human mind has ever made to the glory of the
Divine Power to which it must be ascribed. With the ac-
ceptance of evolution the unworthy philosophy which has
sought to honour God by the derangements of his own
work comes to an end, and the argument passes into a new
phase. This we owe to science, and there is encouraging
evidence that theologians even of the orthodox stamp are
beginning to appreciate it and to be powerfully influenced
by it. Let me give an example of the large and enlightened
views which we now frequently hear from orthodox pulpits.
In a sermon preached before the British Association for
the Advancement of Science, in Edinburgh, 1871, the Rev.
Dr. Caird, now principal of Glasgow University, said :
" When God was so conceived as to place him outside of
Nature the tendency would be to seek the most significant
proof of his presence in interferences with her order, and
to regard the assertion of the absolute uniformity of her
processes as equivalent to a denial of Providence or the ex-
clusion of God." And there could be no question that a
false jealousy had often been entertained by sincere but
mistaken religionists with reference to the idea of natural
law and the ever-widening domain which science had won

500 Edward Livingston You mans.

for it. There was a stage of mental development in which
every unexplained fact or phenomenon was translated into
the direct expression of a divine will and purpose. But as
knowledge advanced the domain of the marvellous was
driven further and further back, and innumerable effects,
accounted for at first only by immediate supernatural
agency, began to be traced to the operation of natural
causes. Fixed sequences and relations displaced isolated
facts, and law began to take the place of arbitrariness and
caprice. And so step by step, as irregularity disappeared
and science shed on Nature its all-penetrating light, the
darkness in which superstition lived was chased away, and
its divinities exorcised from the world. But as the process
went on, it had unfortunately sometimes happened that
sincere but unenlightened friends of religion had exhibited
that jealousy of science which only superstition had just
cause to feel. The conflict on this ground between science
and theology was, however, a purely imaginary one. In
the observation of Nature and the tracing out of her
uniform sequences and laws there was, rightly viewed,
nothing that led to the suppression of a higher faith, and
such an influence could only be ascribed to scientific pur-
suits by setting up in the mind a false opposition between
law and personality. Men wanted to trace a personal
thought and agency, the marks of spiritual, supernatural
presence in the universe. But the unreflecting mind was
apt to associate personality with mere will, and to attach
to fixed movement, unbending order and adjustment, the
notion of something mechanical, of a blind, material
necessity, over which it was the prerogative of a per-
sonal intelligence to assert its superiority. This notion
was obviously one which deeper reflection and higher in-
tellect would tend to remove. For the more men ad-
vanced in intelligence, the more clearly did they begin to
see that it was only a vulgar necessity of thought which

The Religious Work of Science. 501

identified personality with changefulness, and arbitrariness
with sudden paroxysmal acts and special interferences.

What, then, I ask, to a thoughtful observer, would
be the kind of phenomena, the aspect of things and
events, which would look most like the signs of a per-
sonality and a will in Nature ? Surely these phenomena
and that aspect, from which the indications of anomaly
were most completely banished, and throughout which,
from beginning to end, reigned calm and changeless
order, unbroken sequence and continuity, the majestic
presence of power and law. Even if the modern theory of
evolution were conclusively established; even if it were
proved that as surely as the germ contains virtually the
full-grown plant, the whole history of the material universe
was potentially contained in the first atom, or "cosmic
vapor," and that not a single act of what was erroneously
designated supernatural creative power had ever been in-
tercalated into it, so far from excluding, this would only
be more profoundly consistent with the agency of an abso-
lutely personal intelligence. For it would be only more
fully significant of an intelligence in which the end was
ever presupposed in the beginning, and the beginning surely
prophetic of the end; and all things were woven together
by the grand necessities of thought.

Thus is it confessed that the inflexible order of the uni-
verse, as discovered and proclaimed by science, bears the
loftiest witness to its Divine Creator, and the revolution of
thought is complete. For the view long held as religious,
science has substituted a view that is more eminently re-
ligious. Shall we deny, then, that those who are deepening
and widening our conceptions of the realm of natural truth,
are doing an essentially religious work ? And may it not
be that the constructors of the philosophy of evolution
are entitled to a leading place among the evangelists of
our time ?

V.

HERBERT SPENCER AND THE DOCTRINE
OF EVOLUTION.

THE change that has taken place in the world of
thought within our own time, regarding the doctrine of
Evolution, is something quite unprecedented in the history
of progressive ideas. Twenty years ago that doctrine was
almost universally scouted as a groundless and absurd
speculation ; now, it is admitted as an established principle
by many of the ablest men of science, and is almost univer-
sally conceded to have a basis of truth, whatever form it
may ultimately take. It is, moreover, beginning to exert
a powerful influence in the investigation and mode of con-
sidering many subjects ; while those who avow their belief
in it are no longer pointed at as graceless reprobates or in-
corrigible fools.

With this general reversal of judgment regarding the
doctrine, and from the prominence it has assumed as a
matter of public criticism and discussion, there is naturally
an increasing interest in the question of its origin and
authorship ; and also, as we might expect, a good deal of
misapprehension about it. The name of Herbert Spencer
has been long associated in the public mind with the idea
of Evolution. And while that idea was passing through
what may be called its stage of execration, there was no
hesitancy in according to him all the infamy of its pater-
nity ; but when the infamy is to be changed to honour, by
a kind of perverse consistency of injustice there turns out
to be a good deal less alacrity in making the revised award.

(502)

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 503

That the system of doctrine put forth by Mr. Spencer would
meet with strong opposition was inevitable. Representing
the most advanced opinions, and disturbing widely cher-
ished beliefs at many points, it was natural that it should
be strenuously resisted and unsparingly criticised. Nor
is this to be regretted, as it is by conflict that truth is
elicited; and those who, after candid examination, hold
his teachings to be erroneous and injurious, are certainly
justified in condemning them. With such, at the present
time, I have no controversy, but propose to deal with quite
another class of critics. There are men of eminence, lead-
ers of opinion, who neither know nor care much for what
Mr. Spencer thinks or has done, but are quite ready with
their verdicts about him ; and, so long as it is not gener-
ally known to what an extent we are indebted to him for
having originated and elaborated the greatest doctrine of
the age, these superficial and careless deliverances from
conspicuous men become very misleading and injurious.
By many he is regarded as only a clever and versatile
essayist, ambitious of writing upon everything, and who
has done something to popularize the views of Mr. Darwin
and other men of science. For example, M. Taine, in a late
Paris journal, says : " Mr. Spencer possesses the rare merit
of having extended to the sum of phenomena — to the
whole history of Nature and of mind — the two master
thoughts which, for the past thirty years, have been giving
new form to the positive sciences ; the one being Mayer
and Joule's Conservation of Energy, the other Darwin's
Natural Selection." Colonel Higginson says: * "Mr. Spen-
cer has what Talleyrand calls the weakness of omniscience,
and must write not alone on astronomy, metaphysics, and
banking, but also on music, on dancing, on style." And
again : " It seems rather absurd to attribute to him, as a

* Estimating Spencer, in The Friend of Progress, 1864.

504 Edward Livingston Youmans.

scientific achievement, any vast enlargement or further
generalization of the modern scientific doctrine of evolu-
tion." To the same effect, Mr. Emerson, when recently
called upon by a newspaper interviewer to furnish his
opinions of great men, declared Mr. Spencer to be nothing
better than a " stock writer, who writes equally well upon
all subjects."

These are not the circumspect and instructive utter-
ances which we should look for from men of authority
whose opinions are sought and valued by the public ; they
are gross and inexcusable misrepresentations, and exem-
plify a style of criticism that is now so freely indulged in
that it requires to be met, in the common interest of jus-
tice and truth. By their estimates, of Mr. Spencer, the
gentlemen quoted have raised the question of his position
as a thinker, and the character and claims of his intellec-
tual work. I follow their lead, and propose, on the present
occasion, to bring forward some considerations which may
help to a more trustworthy judgment upon the subject.
Assuming the foregoing statements to be representative,
it will be worth while to see what becomes of them under
examination. My object will be, less to expound or to
defend Mr. Spencer's views, than to trace his mental his-
tory, and the quality and extent of his labours as disclosed
by an analysis and review of his published writings.

And first, let us glance at the general condition of
thought in relation to the origination of things when he
began its investigation. Character is tested by emergen-
cies, as well in the world of ideas as in the world of action ;
and it is by his bearing in one of the great crises of our
progressive knowledge of Nature that Mr. Spencer is to be
measured.

Down to the early part of the present century it had
generally been believed that this world, with all that it
contains, was suddenly called into existence but a few

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 505

thousand years ago in much the same condition as we now
see it. Throughout Christendom it was held with the
earnestness of religious conviction, that the universe was
a Divine manufacture, made out of nothing in a week, and
set at once to running in all its present perfection. This
doctrine was something more than a mere item of faith ;
it was a complete theory of the method of origin of natural
things, and it gave shape to a whole body of science, phi-
losophy, and common opinion, which was interpreted in ac-
cordance with this theory. The problem of origins was
thus authoritatively solved, and life, mind, man, and all
Nature, were studied under the hypothesis of their late and
sudden production.

But it was difficult to inquire into the existing order of
Nature without tracing it backward. Modern science was
long restrained from this procedure by the power of tradi-
tional beliefs, but the force of facts and reasoning at length
proved too strong for these beliefs, and it was demon-
strated that the prevailing notion concerning the recent ori-
gin of the world was not true. Overwhelming evidence was
found that the universe did not come into existence in the
condition in which we now see it, nor in anything like that
condition ; but that the present order of things is the out-
come of a vast series of changes running back to an indefi-
nite and incalculable antiquity. It was proved that the
present forms and distributions of mountains, valleys, con-
tinents, and oceans, are but the final terms of a stupendous
course of transformations to which the crust of the earth
has been subjected. It was also established, that life has
stretched back for untold millions of years ; that multitudes
of its forms arose and perished in a determinate succession,
while the last appearing are highest in grade, as if by some
principle of order and progression.

It is obvious that one of the great epochs of thought
had now been reached ; for the point of view from which

506 Edward Livingston Youmans.

natural things are to be regarded was fundamentally and
forever altered. But, as it is impossible to escape at once
and completely from the dominion of old ideas, the full
import of the position was far from being recognized, and
different classes of the thinking world were naturally very
differently affected by the new discoveries. To the mass
of people who inherit their opinions and rarely inquire
into the grounds upon which they rest, the changed view
was of no moment ; nor had the geological revelations
much interest to the literary classes beyond that of bare
curiosity about strange and remote speculations. To the
theologians, however, the step that had been taken was of
grave concern. They were the proprietors of the old view ;
they claimed for it supernatural authority, and strenuously
maintained that its subversion would be the subversion of
religion itself. They maintained, moreover, that the con-
troversy involved the very existence of God. The most
familiar conception of the Deity was that of a Creator, and
creation was held to mean the grand six-day drama of call-
ing the universe into existence ; while this transcendent
display of power had always been devoutly held as alike
the exemplification and the proof of the Divine attributes.
How deep and tenacious was the old error is shown by the
fact that, although it has been completely exploded ; al-
though the immeasurable antiquity of the earth and the
progressive order of its life have been demonstrated and
admitted by all intelligent people, yet the pulpit still clings
to the old conceptions, and the traditional view is that
which generally prevails among the multitude.*

To men of science the new position was, of course, in
the highest degree important. It was stated by Prof.
Sedgwick, in an anniversary address to the Geological So-
ciety of London in 1831, as follows : " We have a series of

* See Note A.

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 507

proofs the most emphatic and convincing that the approach
to the present system of things has been gradual, and that
there has been a progressive development of organic struc-
ture subservient to the purposes of life." The traditional
explanation of the origin of the world, and all that belongs
to it, being thus discredited, it only remained to seek
another explanation : If it has not been done one way, how
has it been done ? was the inevitable question. One might
suppose that the effect of the utter breakdown of the old
hypothesis would have been to relegate the whole question
to the sphere of science, but this was far from being done.
The preternatural solution had failed, but its only logical
alternative, a natural solution, or the thorough investi-
gation of the subject on principles of causation, was not
adopted or urged. The geologists occupied themselves in
extending observations and accumulating facts rather than
in working out any comprehensive scientific or philosoph-
ical principles from the new point of view. The result
was a kind of tacit compromise between the contending
parties — the theologians conceding the vast antiquity of
the earth, and the geologists conceding preternatural in-
tervention in the regular on-working of the scheme ; so
that in place of one mighty miracle of creation occurring a
few thousand years ago, there was substituted the idea of
hundreds of thousands of separate miracles of special
creation scattered all along the geological ages, to account
for the phenomena of terrestrial life. Two systems of
agencies — natural and supernatural — were thus invoked to
explain the production of effects. What it now concerns
us to note is, that the subject had not yet been brought
into the domain of science. One portion of it was still
held to be above Nature, and therefore inaccessible to ra-
tional inquiry ; while that part of the problem which was
withheld from science was really the key to the whole sit-
uation. Under the new view the question of the origin of

508 Edward Livingston Youmans.

living forms, or of the action of natural agencies in their
production, was as completely barred to science as it had
formerly been under the literal Mosaic interpretation ; and,
as questions of origin were thus virtually interdicted, the
old traditional opinions regarding the genesis of the present
constitution of things remained in full force.

It is in relation to this great crisis in the course of ad-
vancing thought that Herbert Spencer is to be regarded.
Like many others, he assumed, at the outset, that the study
of the whole phenomenal sphere of Nature belongs to sci-
ence ; but he may claim the honour of being the first to
discern the full significance of the new intellectual posi-
tion. It had been proved that a vast course of orderly
changes in the past has led up to the present, and is lead-
ing on to the future : Mr. Spencer saw that it was of
transcendent moment that the laws of these changes be
determined. If natural agencies have been at work in
vast periods of time to bring about the present condition
of things, he perceived that a new set of problems of im-
mense range and importance is opened to inquiry, the effect
of which must be to work an extensive revolution of ideas.
It was apparent to him that the hitherto forbidden ques-
tion as to how things have originated had at length come
to be the supreme question. When the conception that the
present order had been called into being at once and in all
its completeness was found to be no longer defensible, it
was claimed that it makes no difference how it originated
— that the existing system is the same whatever may have
been its source. Mr. Spencer saw, on the contrary, that
the question how things have been caused is fundamental ;
and that we can have no real understanding of what they
are, without first knowing how they came to be what they
are. Starting from the point of view made probable by
the astronomers, and demonstrated by the geologists, that,
in the mighty past, Nature has conformed to one system

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 509

of laws ; and assuming that the existing order, at any
time, is to be regarded as growing out of a pre-existing
order, Mr. Spencer saw that nothing remained for science
but to consider all the contents of Nature from the
same point of view. It was, therefore, apparent that life,
mind, man, science, art, language, morality, society, gov-
ernment, and institutions, are things that have under-
gone a gradual and continuous unfolding, and can be ex-
plained in no other way than by a theory of growth and
derivation. It is not claimed that Mr. Spencer was the
first to adopt this mode of inquiry in relation to special
subjects, but that he was the first to grasp it as a general
method, the first to see that it must give us a new view of
human nature, a new science of mind, a new theory of
society — all as parts of one coherent body of thought,
and that he was the first to work out a comprehensive philo-
sophical system from this point of inquiry, or on the basis
of the principle of Evolution. In a word, I maintain Spen-
cer's position as a thinker to be this : taking a view of Na-
ture that was not only generally discredited, but was vir-
tually foreclosed to research, he has done more than any
other man to make it the starting point of a new era of
knowledge.

For the proof of this I now appeal to his works. Let
us trace the rise and development of the conception of
Evolution in his own mind, observe how he was led to it
and how he pursued it, and see how completely it pervades
and unifies his entire intellectual career. Various explana-
tory details that follow I have obtained from conversations
with Mr. Spencer himself; but the essential facts of the
statement are derived from his works, and may be easily
verified by any who choose to take the trouble of doing so.

Mr. Spencer is not a scholar in the current acceptation
of the term ; that is, he has not mastered the curriculum of
any university. Unbiased by the traditions of culture, his

5io Edward Livingston Youmans.

early studies were in the sciences. Born in a sphere of life
which made a vocation necessary, he was educated as a
civil engineer,* and up to 1842, when he was twenty-two
years of age, he had written nothing but professional papers
published in the Civil Engineer and Architects' Journal.
But he had always been keenly interested in political and
social questions, which he had almost daily heard discussed
by his father and uncles. In the summer of 1842 he began
to contribute a series of letters to a weekly newspaper, the
Nonconformist, under the title of The Proper Sphere of
Government. It was the main object of these letters to
show that the functions of government should be limited
to the protection of life, property, and social order, leaving
all other social ends to be achieved by individual activities.
But, beyond this main conception, it was implied through-
out that there are such things as laws of social develop-
ment, natural processes of rectification in society, and an
adaptation of man to the conditions of social life. The
scientific point of view was thus early assumed, and society
was regarded not as a manufacture but as a growth. These
letters were revised and published in a pamphlet in 1843.

The argument, however, was unsatisfactory from its
want of depth and scientific precision, and Mr. Spencer de-
cided in 1846 to write a work in which the leading doctrine
of his pamphlet should be affiliated upon general moral
principles. By reading various books upon moral philoso-
phy he had become dissatisfied with the basis of morality
which they adopt ; and it became clear to him that the
question of the proper sphere of government could be dealt
with only by tracing ethical principles to their roots. The
plan of this work was formed while Mr. Spencer was still a
civil engineer; and it was commenced in 1848, before he
abandoned engineering and accepted the position of sub-

* See Note B.

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 5 1 1

editor of the Economist. It was issued, under the title of
Social Statics, at the close of 1850. In this work various
developments of the ideas contained in the pamphlet above
named are noticeable. It will be seen that the conception
that there is an adaptation going on between human nature
and the social state has become dominant. There is the
idea that all social evils result from the want of this adap-
tation, and are in process of disappearance as the adapta-
tion progresses. There is the notion that all morality con-
sists in conformity to such principles of conduct as allow of
the life of each individual being fulfilled, to the uttermost,
consistently with the fulfilment of the lives of other indi-
viduals ; and that the vital activities of the social human
being are gradually being moulded into such form that
they may be realized to the uttermost without mutual hin-
drance. Social progress is in fact viewed as a natural
evolution, in which human beings are moulded into fitness
for the social state, and society adjusted into fitness for
the natures of men — the units and the aggregate perpet-
ually acting and reacting, until equilibrium is reached.
There is recognized not only the process of continual
direct adaptation of men to their circumstances by the in-
herited modifications of habit ; but there is also recognized
the process of the dying out of the unfit and the survival
of the fit. And these changes are regarded as parts of a
process of general evolution, tacitly affirmed as running
through all animate Nature, tending ever to produce a
more complete and self-sufficing individuality, and ending
in the highest type of man as the most complete individual.
After finishing Social Statics Mr. Spencer's thoughts
were more strongly attracted in the directions of biology
and psychology — sciences which he saw were most inti-
mately related with the progress of social questions ; and
one result reached at this time was significant. As he
states in the essay on the Laws of Organic Form, published

512 Edward Livingston Youmans.

in 1859 in the Medico-Chirurgical Review, it was in the
autumn of 1851, during a country ramble with Mr. George
Henry Lewes, that the germinal idea of that essay was
reached. This idea, that the forms of organisms, in re-
spect of the different kinds of their symmetry and asym-
metry, are caused by their different relations to surround-
ing incident forces, implies a general recognition of the
doctrine of Evolution, a further extension of the doctrine
of adaptation, and a foreshadowing of the theory of life
as a correspondence between inner and outer actions.

In 1852 Mr. Spencer published in the Westminster
Review the Theory of Population deduced from the Gen-
eral Law of Animal Fertility, setting forth an important
principle which he says that he had entertained as far back
as 1847. Here also the general belief in Evolution was
tacitly expressed ; the theory being that, in proportion
as the power of maintaining individual life is small, the
power of multiplication is great ; that along with increased
evolution of the individual there goes decreased power of
reproduction ; that the one change is the cause of the
other ; that in man, as in all other creatures, the advance
toward a higher type will be accompanied by a decrease of
fertility ; and that there will be eventually reached an ap-
proximate equilibrium between the rate of mortality and
the rate of multiplication. Toward the close of this argu-
ment there is a clear recognition of the important fact that
excessive multiplication and the consequent struggle for
existence cause this advance to a higher type. It is there
argued that " only those who do advance under it even-
tually survive" and that these " must be the select of their
generation." That which, as he subsequently stated in the
Principles of Biology, Mr. Spencer failed to recognize at
this time (1852) was the effect of these influences in pro-
ducing the diwrsities of living forms ; that is, he did not then
perceive the co-operation of these actions of the struggle

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 5 1 3

for existence and the survival of the fittest, with the tend-
ency to variation which organisms exhibit. He saw only
the power of these processes to produce a higher form of
the same type, and did not recognize how they may give
rise to divergencies and consequent differentiations of
species, and eventually of genera, orders, and classes.

Early in 1852 Mr. Spencer also printed a brief essay
in the Leader, on The Development Hypothesis, in which
some of the new current reasons for believing in the
gradual evolution of all organisms, including man, are in-
dicated. To this paper Mr. Darwin refers in the intro-
ductory sketch of the previous course of research on the
subject of development, which he prefixed to the Origin of
Species. In this essay, however, direct adaptation to the
conditions of existence is the only process recognized.

In October of the same year (1852) Mr. Spencer pub-
lished an essay in the Westminster Review, on the Phi-
losophy of Style, in which, though the subject appears so
remote, there are traceable some of the cardinal ideas now
indicated, and others that were afterward developed. The
subject was treated from a dynamical point of view, and, as
Mr. Lewes remarks in his essays on The Principles of Suc-
cess in Literature, it offers the only scientific exposition of
the problem of style that we have. The general theory set
forth is, that effectiveness of style depends on a choice of
words and forms of sentence offering the least resistance
to thought in the mind of the reader or hearer — a fore-
shadowing of the general law of the " line of least resist-
ance " as applied to the interpretation of psychological
phenomena, as well as phenomena in general. Moreover,
at the close of the essay there is a reference to the law of
Evolution in its application to speech — there is a recogni-
tion of the fact that " increasing heterogeneity " has been
the characteristic of advance in this as in other things, and
that a highly evolved style will " answer to the descrip-

514 Edward Livingston Youmans.

tion of all highly organized products, both of man and of
Nature ; it will be, not a series of like parts simply placed
in juxtaposition, but one whole made up of unlike parts
that are mutally dependent." Here, as early as 1852, there
is recognized in one of the highest spheres both the process
of differentiation and the process of integration — the two
radical conceptions of Evolution.

In July of the next year (1853) Mr. Spencer's continued
interest in the question of the functions of the state led
him to write the essay on Over-Legislation in the West-
minster Review ; and here, as in Social Statics, the con-
ception of society as a growth, under the operation of
natural laws, is predominant.

The critical perusal of Mr. Spencer's works shows that
this was a very important period in the development of his
views. The reading of Mr. Mill's Logic along with some
other philosophical works had led him to the elaboration
of certain opinions at variance with those of Mr. Mill on
the question of our ultimate beliefs, and those he published
in the Westminster Review, under the title of The Univer-
sal Postulate (1853). The inquiries thus commenced, to-
gether with those respecting the nature of the moral feel-
ings, and those concerning life and development, bodily
and mental, into which he had been led both by Social
Statics and the Theory of Population, prepared the way
for the Principles of Psychology. Some of the funda-
mental conceptions contained in this remarkable work
now began to take shape in his mind. Other ideas con-
nected with the subject began also to form in his mind, an
example of which is furnished by the essay on Manners and
Fashion, published in the Westminster Review (April, 1854).
Various traits of the general doctrine of Evolution are
here clearly marked out in their relations to social
progress. It is shown that the various forms of restraint
exercised over men in society — political, ecclesiastical, and

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 5 1 5

ceremonial — are all divergent unfoldings of one original
form, and that the development of social structure, in these
as in other directions, takes place by gradual and continu-
ous differentiations, " in conformity with the laws of Evolu-
tion of all organized bodies."

Mr. Spencer was at the same time engaged in working
out his view in a different sphere ; the essay on the Gen-
esis of Science being contributed to the British Quarterly
Review in July, 1854. This was primarily called forth by
Miss Martineau's Abridgment of Comte, then just issued,
and was in part devoted to the refutation of the French
philosopher's views respecting the classification of the
sciences. But it became the occasion for a further de-
velopment of the doctrine of Evolution in its relation to
intellectual progress. The whole genesis of science is
there traced out historically under the aspect of a body of
truths, which, while they became differentiated into dif-
ferent sciences, became at the same time more and more
integrated, or mutually dependent, so as eventually to
form " an organism of the sciences." There is besides a
recognition of the gradual increase in defmiteness that
accompanies this increase in heterogeneity and in co-
herence.

It was at this time that Mr. Spencer's views on psy-
chology began to assume the character of a system — the
conception of intellectual progress now reached being com-
bined with the ideas of life previously arrived at, in the de-
velopment of a psychological theory. The essay on the
Art of Education,* published in the North British Review
(May, 1854), assisted in the further development of these
ideas. In that essay the conception of the progress of the
mind during education is treated in harmony with the con-

* Republished in his little work on Education, under the title of Intel-
lectual Education.

516 Edward Livingston Youmans.

ception of mental Evolution at large. Methods are con-
sidered in relation to the law of development of the fac-
ulties as it takes place naturally. Education is regarded
as rightly carried on only when it aids the process of self-
development ; and it is urged that the course in all cases
followed should be from the simple to the complex, from
the indefinite to the definite, from the concrete to the ab-
stract, and from the empirical to the rational.

Having reached this stage in the unfolding of his ideas,
Mr. Spencer began the writing of the Principles of Psy-
chology in August, 1854. This is a work of great origi-
nality, and is important as marking the advance of Mr.
Spencer's philosophical views at the time of its preparation.
The whole subject of mind is dealt with from the Evolu-
tion point of view. The idea which runs through Social
Statics, that there is ever going on an adaptation between
living beings and their circumstances, now took on a pro-
founder significance. The relation between the organism
and its environing conditions was found to be involved in
the very nature of life ; and the idea of adaptation was de-
veloped into the conception that life itself " is the definite
combination of heterogeneous changes both simultaneous
and successive in correspondence with internal coexistences
and sequences." It is argued that the degree of life varies
with the degree of correspondence, and that all mental
phenomena ought to be interpreted in terms of this corre-
spondence. Commencing with the lowest types of life, Mr.
Spencer, in successive chapters, traces up this relation of
correspondence as extending in space and time, as increasing
in specialty, in generality, and in complexity. It is also
shown that the correspondence progresses from a more
homogeneous to a more heterogeneous form, and that it be-
comes gradually more integrated — the terms here em-
ployed in respect to the Evolution of mind being the terms
subsequently used in treating of Evolution in general. In

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 5 1 7

the fourth part of the work, under the title of Special Syn-
thesis, the Evolution is traced out under its concrete form
from reflex action up through instinct, memory, reason,
feelings, and the will. Mr. Spencer here distinctly avowed
his belief that " life in its multitudinous and infinitely
varied embodiments has arisen out of the lowest and sim-
plest beginnings, by steps as gradual as those which evolve
a homogeneous microscopic germ into a complex organism "
— dissent being at the same time expressed from that
version of the doctrine put forth by the author of the Ves-
tiges of the Natural History of Creation. It was, more-
over, shown by subjective analysis how intelligence may
be resolved, step by step, from its most complex into its
simplest elements, and it was also proved that there is
"unity of composition " throughout, and that thus mental
structure, contemplated internally, harmonizes with the
doctrine of Evolution.

It was at this time (1854), as I have been informed by
Mr. Spencer, when he had been at work upon the Princi-
ples of Psychology not more than two months, that the
general conception of Evolution in its causes and extent,
as well as its processes, was arrived at. He had somewhat
earlier conceived of it as universally a transformation from
the homogeneous into the heterogeneous. This kind of
change, which Von Baer had shown to take place in every
individual organism, as it develops, Mr. Spencer had already
traced out as taking place in the progress of social arrange-
ments, in the development of the sciences, and now in the
Evolution of mind in general from the lower forms to the
higher. And the generalization soon extended itself so as
to embrace the transformations undergone by all things
inanimate as well as animate. This universal extension of
the idea led rapidly to the conception of a universal cause
necessitating it. In the autumn of 1854, Mr. Spencer pro-
posed to the editor of the Westminster Review to write

518 Edward Livingston Youmans.

an article upon the subject under the title of The Cause of
all Progress, which was objected to as being too assuming.
The article was, however, at that time agreed upon, with
the understanding that it should be written as soon as the
Principles of Psychology was finished. The agreement
was doomed to be defeated, however, so far as the date
was concerned, for, along with the completion of the Psy-
chology, in July, 1855, there came a nervous breakdown,
which incapacitated Mr. Spencer for labour during a period
of eighteen months — the whole work having been written
in less than a year.

We may here note Mr. Spencer's advanced position in
dealing with this subject. While yet the notion of Evolu-
tion as a process of Nature was as vague and speculative
as it had been in the time of Anaximander and Democritus,
he had grasped the problem in its universality and its
causes, and had successfully applied it to one of the most
difficult and important of the sciences. He had traced the
operation of the law in the sphere of mind, and placed that
study upon a new basis. The conviction is now enter-
tained by many that the Principles of Psychology, by Spen-
cer, in 1855, is one of the most original and masterly scien-
tific treatises of the present century ; if, indeed, it be not
the most fruitful contribution to scientific thought that has
appeared since the Principia of Newton.* For thousands

* This association of the name of Spencer with Newton, let it be re-
membered, does not rest upon the authority of the present writer ; recent
discussions of the subject in the highest quarters are full of it. The .Sat-
urday Review says : " Since Newton there has not in England been a phi-
losopher of more remarkable speculative and systematizing talent than
(spite of some errors and some narrowness) Mr. Herbert Spencer." An
able writer in the Quarterly Review, in treating of Mr. Spencer's remark-
able power of binding together different and distant subjects of thought
by the principle of Evolution, remarks : " The two deepest scientific prin-
ciples now known of all those relating to material things are the Law of
Gravitation and the Law of Evolution." The eminent Professor of Logic in

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 519

of years, from Plato to Hamilton, the world's ablest
thinkers had been engaged in the effort to elucidate the
phenomena of mind ; Herbert Spencer took up the ques-
tion by a method first rendered possible by modern sci-
ence, and made a new epoch in its progress. From this
time forward, mental philosophy, so called, could not con-
fine itself simply to introspection of the adult human con-
sciousness. The philosophy of mind must deal with the
whole range of psychical phenomena, must deal with them
as manifestations of organic life, must deal with them
genetically, and show how mind is constituted in connec-
tion with the experience of the past. In short, as it now
begins to be widely recognized, Mr. Spencer has placed the
science of mind firmly upon the ground of Evolution.
Like all productions that are at the same time new and
profound, and go athwart the course of long tradition,
there were but few that appreciated his book, a single small
edition more than sufficing to meet the wants of the public
for a dozen years.* But it began at once to tell upon ad-
vanced thinkers, and its influence was soon widely dis-
cerned in the best literature of the subject. The man who
stood, perhaps, highest in England as a Psychologist, Mr.
John Stuart Mill, remarked in one of his books, that it is
" one of the finest examples we possess of the psychological
method in its full power " ; and, as I am aware, after care-
fully rereading it some years later, he declared that his al-
ready high opinion of the work had been raised still more —
which he recognized as due to the progress of his own mind.f

Owen's College, Manchester, Mr. W. Stanley Jevons, in his recent treatise
entitled The Principles of Science : A Treatise on Logic and Scientific
Method, says : " I question whether any scientific works which have ap-
peared since the Principia of Newton are comparable in importance
with those of Darwin and Spencer, revolutionizing as they do all our
views of the origin of bodily, mental, moral, and social phenomena."
* See Note C. f See Note D.

520 Edward Livingston Youmans.

The article Progress, its Law and Cause, projected, as
we have seen, in 1854, was written early in 1857. In the
first half of it the transformation of the homogeneous into
the heterogeneous is traced throughout all orders of phe-
nomena ; in the second half the principle of transformation
is deduced from the law of the multiplication of effects.
In this essay, moreover, there is indicated the application
of the general law of Evolution to the production of
species. It is shown that there " would not be a substitu-
tion of a thousand more or less modified species, for the
thousand original species ; but, in place of the thousand
modified species, there would arise several thousand species
or varieties or changed forms " ; and that " each original
race of organisms would become the root from which
diverged several races differing more or less from it and
from each other." It is further argued that the new rela-
tions in which animals would be placed toward one another
would initiate further differences of habit and consequent
modifications, and that " there must arise, not simply a tend-
ency toward the differentiations of each race of organisms
into several races, but also a tendency to the occasional
production of a somewhat higher organism." The case of
the divergent varieties of man, some of them higher than
others, caused in this same manner, is given in illustration.
Throughout the argument there is a tacit implication that,
as a consequence of the cause of Evolution, the production
of species will go on, not in ascending linear series but by
perpetual divergence and redivergence — branching and
again branching. The general conception, however, differs
from that of Mr. Darwin in this ; that adaptation and re-
adaptation to continually changing conditions is the only
process recognized — there is no recognition of " sponta-
neous variations," and the natural selection of those that
are favourable.

During the summer of 1857 Mr. Spencer wrote the

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 521

Origin and Function of Music, published in Eraser's Maga-
zine for October. Like nearly all of his other writings,
this interesting article is dominated by the idea of Evolu-
tion. The general law of nervo-motor action in all animals
is shown to furnish an explanation of the tones and ca-
dences of emotional speech ; and it is pointed out that from
these music is evolved by simple exaltation of all the dis-
tinctive traits, and carrying them out into ideal combina-
tion. A further step was taken, the same year, in the de-
velopment of the doctrine of Evolution, which is indicated
in the article entitled Transcendental Physiology. It was
there explained that the multiplication of effects was not
the only cause of the universal change from homogeneity
to heterogeneity, but that there was an antecedent principle
to be recognized, viz., the Instability of the Homogeneous.
The physiological illustrations of the law are mainly dwelt
upon, though its other applications are indicated.

In October of the same year, the essay on Representa-
tive Government : What is it good for ? appeared in the
Westminster Review. The law of progress is here applied
to the interpretation of state functions, and it is stated
that the specialization of offices, " as exhibited in the Evo-
lution of living creatures, and as exhibited in the Evolu-
tion of societies," holds throughout ; that " the govern-
mental part of the body politic exemplifies this truth
equally with its other parts." In January, 1858, the essay
on State Tamperings with Money and Banks appeared in
the same periodical. The general doctrine of the limita-
tions of state functions is there reaffirmed, with further
illustration of the mischiefs that arise from traversing the
normal laws of life ; and it is contended that " the ultimate
result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill
the world with fools " — an indirect way of asserting the
beneficial effects of the survival of the fittest.

In April, 1858, Mr. Spencer published an essay on
23

522 Edward Livingston Youmans,

Moral Education, in the British Quarterly Review, and
throughout the argument every thing is again regarded
from the Evolution point of view. The general truth in-
sisted upon is, that the natural rewards and restraints of
conduct are those which are most appropriate and effectual
in modifying character. The principle contended for is,
that the moral education of every child should be regarded
as an adaptation of its nature to the circumstances of life ;
and that to become adapted to these circumstances it must
be allowed to come in contact with them ; must be allowed
to suffer the pains and obtain the pleasures which do in the
order of Nature follow certain kinds of action. There is
here, in fact, applied to actual life the general conception
of the nature of life previously inculcated in the Prin-
ciples of Psychology — a correspondence between the inner
and the outer actions that becomes great in proportion
as the converse with outer actions through experience be-
comes extended.

The essay on the Nebular Hypothesis was published in
the Westminster Review for July, 1858. The opinion was
then almost universally held that the nebular hypothesis
had been exploded, and the obvious bearing of the ques-
tion upon the theory of Evolution induced Mr. Spencer to
take it up. The conclusions that had been drawn from
observations with Lord Rosse's telescope, that the nebular
hypothesis had been invalidated, were shown to be erro-
neous; and the position taken that the nebulae could not
be (as they were then supposed to be) remote sidereal
systems, has been since verified. Spectrum analysis has,
in fact, proved what Mr. Spencer then maintained, that
there are many nebulae composed of gaseous matter. To
the various indications of the nebular origin of our own
solar system commonly given, others were added which
had not been previously recognized, while the view that
Mr. Spencer took of the constitution of the solar

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 523

atmosphere has since been also verified by spectrum analy-
sis.

In October, 1858, he published in the Medico-Chirur-
gical Review a criticism on Prof. Owen's Archetype and
Homologies of the Vertebrate Skeleton, which was written
in furtherance of the doctrine of Evolution, and to show
that the structural peculiarities which are not accounted
for on the theory of an archetypal vertebra are accounted
for on the hypothesis of development. In January of the
next year there appeared in the same review a paper on
The Laws of Organic form, already referred to (the germ
of which dated back to 1851), and which was a further elu-
cidation of the doctrine of Evolution, by showing the direct
action of incident forces in modifying the forms of organ-
isms and their parts. In April, 1859, appeared in the Brit-
ish Quarterly Review an article on Physical Education, in
which the bearing of biological principles upon the man-
agement of children in respect to their bodily development
is considered. It insists upon the normal course of unfold-
ing, versus those hindrances to it which ordinary school regu-
lations impose; it asserts the worth of the bodily appetites
and impulses in children, which are commonly so much
thwarted; and contends that during this earlier portion of
life, in which the main thing to be done is to grow and de-
velop, our educational system is too exacting — " it makes
the juvenile life far more like the adult life than it should
be." The essay What Knowledge is of most Worth was
printed in the Westminster Review for July, 1859. This
argument is familiar to the public, as it has been many
times republished ; but what is here most worthy of note
is that, in criticising the current study of history, it defines
with great distinctness the plan of the Descriptive Sociology
(the first divisions of which are now just published), and
which will give the comprehensive and systematic data
upon which the Principles of Sociology are to be based.

524 Edward Livingston Youmans.

An argument on Illogical Geology was contributed in
July, 1859, to the Universal Review, which, although nom-
inally a criticism of Hugh Miller, was really an attack upon
the prevalent geological doctrine which asserted simultane-
ity in the systems of strata in different parts of the earth.
His view, which was at that time heresy, is now coming
into general recognition. In the Medico-Chirurgical Review
for January, 1860, Mr. Spencer published a criticism on
Prof. Bain's Work, The Emotions and the Will, designed to
show that the emotions cannot be properly understood and
classified without studying them from the point of view of
Evolution, and tracing them up through their increasing
complications from lower types of animals to higher. The
essay on the Social Organism appeared at the same time
in the Westminster Review, in which it was maintained that
society, consisting of an organized aggregate, follows the
same course of Evolution with all other organized aggre-
gates— increasing in mass and showing a higher integra-
tion not only in this respect but also in its growing solidar-
ity ; becoming more and more heterogeneous in all its
structures, and more and more definite in all its differentia-
tions. The Physiology of Laughter, which appeared the
same year in Macmillan's Magazine, was a contribution to
nervous dynamics from the point of view that had been
taken in the Principles of Psychology. Even in Mr. Spen-
cer's discussion of Parliamentary Reforms, their Dangers
and Safeguards (Westminster Review, 1860), the question
is dealt with on scientific grounds ultimately referring to
the doctrine of Evolution. It was its general purpose to
show that the basis of political power can be safely extended
only in proportion as political function is more and more
restricted. It was maintained in an earlier essay that rep-
resentative government is the best possible for that which
is the essential office of a government — the maintenance of
those social conditions under which every citizen can carry

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 525

on securely and without hindrance the pursuits of life; and
that it is the worst possible for other purposes. And in
continuation of this argument it was here contended that
further extension of popular power should be accompanied
by a further restriction of state duty — a further specializa-
tion of state function. In the essay on Prison Ethics, con-
tributed to the British Quarterly Review in July, 1860, a
special question is very ably dealt with in the light of those
biological, psychological, and sociological principles which
belong to the Evolution philosophy. The principle of
moral Evolution is asserted, and the concomitant unfolding
of higher and better modes of dealing with criminals.

»

We have now passed in rapid review the intellectual
work of Mr. Spencer for nearly twenty years, and have
shown that, though apparently miscellaneous, it was, in
reality, of a highly methodical character. Though treating
of many subjects, he was steadily engaged with an exten-
sive problem which was resolved, step by step, through the
successive discovery of those processes and principles of
Nature which constitute the general law of Evolution.
Beginning in 1842 with the vague conception of a social
progress, he subjected this idea to systematic scientific
analysis, gave it gradually a more definite and comprehen-
sive form, propounded the principles of heredity and adap-
tation in their social applications, recognized the working
of the principle of selection in the case of human beings,
and affiliated the conception of social progress upon the
more general principle of Evolution governing all animate
Nature. Seizing the idea of increasing heterogeneity in
organic growth, he gradually extended it in various direc-
tions. When the great conception thus pursued had grown
into a clear, coherent, and well-defined doctrine, he took
up the subject of psychology, and, combining the principle
of differentiation with that of integration, he placed the

526 Edward Livingston Youmans.

interpretation of mental phenomena upon the basis of Evo-
lution. We have seen that two years after the publica-
tion of the Psychology, or in 1857, Mr. Spencer had ar-
rived at the law of Evolution as a universal principle of
Nature, and worked it out both inductively as a process of
increasing heterogeneity, and deductively from the princi-
ples of the instability of the homogeneous and the multi-
plication of effects. How far Mr. Spencer was here in ad-
vance of all other workers in this field, will appear when
we consider that the doctrine of Evolution, as it now
stands, was thus, in its universality, and in its chief out-
lines, announced by him two years before the appearance of
Mr. Darwin's Origin of Species. ,

A principle of natural changes more universal than any
other known, applicable to all orders of phenomena, and so
deep as to involve the very origin of things, having thus
been established, the final step remained to be taken, which
was to give it the same ruling place in the world of thought
and of knowledge that it has in the world of fact and of
Nature. A principle running through all spheres of phe-
nomena must have the highest value for determining scien-
tific relations ; and a genetic law of natural things must
necessarily form the deepest root of the philosophy of nat-
ural things. It was in 1858, as Mr. Spencer informs me,
while writing the article on the Nebular Hypothesis, that
the doctrine of Evolution presented itself as the basis of a
general system under which all orders of concrete phenom-
ena should be generalized. Already the conception had
been traced out in its applications to astronomy, geology,
biology, psychology, as well as all the various superor-
ganic products of social activity ; and it began to appear
both possible and necessary that all these various concrete
sciences should be dealt with in detail from the Evolution
point of view. By such treatment, and by that only, did
it appear practicable to bring them into relation so as to

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 527

form a coherent body of scientific truth — a System of
Philosophy.

It is proper to state in this place that, in contemplating
the execution of so comprehensive a work, the first diffi-
culty that arose was a pecuniary one. Mr. Spencer had
frittered away the greater part of what little he possessed
in writing and publishing books that did not pay their ex-
penses, and a period of eighteen months of ill health and
enforced idleness consequent on the writing of one of
them had further diminished his resources. His state of
health was still such that he could work, at the outside,
but three hours a day, and very frequently not that, so
that what little he could do in the shape of writing for peri-
odicals, even though tolerably paid for it, did not suffice
to meet the expenses of a very economical bachelor life.
How, then, could he reasonably hope to prosecute a scheme
elaborating the doctrine of Evolution throughout all its de-
partments in the way contemplated — a scheme that would
involve an enormous amount of thought, labour, and inquiry,
and which seemed very unlikely to bring any pecuniary re-
turn, even if it paid its expenses ? Unable to see any so-
lution of the difficulty, Mr. Spencer wrote, in July, 1858,
to Mr. John Stuart Mill, explaining his project, and asking
whether he thought that in the administration for India, in
which Mr. Mill held office, there was likely to be any post,
rather of trust than of much work, which would leave him
leisure enough for the execution of his scheme. Mr. Mill
replied sympathetically, but nothing turned out to be
available. In despair of any other possibility, Mr. Spencer
afterward extended his application to the Government,
being re-enforced by the influence of various leading scien-
tific men, who expressed themselves strongly respecting
the importance of giving him the opportunity he wished.*

* See Note E.

528 Edward Livingston Youmans.

A peculiar difficulty, however, here arose. Mr. Spencer is
a very impracticable man — that is, he undertakes to con-
form his conduct to right principles, and his decided views
as to the proper functions of government put an interdict
upon the far greater number of posts that might otherwise
be fit. Among the few that he could accept, the greater
part were not available because they did not offer the
requisite leisure. One position became vacant which he
might have accepted, that of Inspector of Prisons, I think ;
but, though effort in his behalf was made by Lord Stanley
(now Lord Derby, who was familiar with Mr. Spencer's
works and entertained the matter kindly), the claims of
party were too strong, and no arrangement was made.

Other plans failing, Mr. Spencer decided to adopt that
of subscription, and to issue his System of Philosophy in a
serial form. A prospectus of that system was issued in
March, 1860, which outlined the contents of the successive
parts. The first installment of the work was issued in
October, 1860, and the commencing volume, First Princi-
ples, was published in June, 1862.

In this work the general doctrine of Evolution is pre-
sented in a greatly developed form ; and the author's for-
mer views are not only combined but extended. The law
of Von Baer, which formulates organic development as a
transformation of the homogeneous into the heterogeneous,
Mr. Spencer had previously shown to hold of all aggre-
gates whatever — of the universe as a whole, and of all its
component parts. But, in First Principles, it was shown
that this universal transformation is a change from in-
definite homogeneity to definite heterogeneity ; and it is
pointed out that only when the increasing multiformity is
joined with increasing definiteness, does it constitute Evo-
lution as distinguished from other changes that are like it
in respect of increasing heterogeneity. There is, however,
a much more important development of the principle.

Herbert Spencer and tJie Doctrine of Evolution. 529

This change from the indefinite to the definite is shown to
be the accompaniment of a more essential change from the
incoherent to the coherent. Throughout all aggregates of
all orders it is proved that there goes on a process of inte-
gration. This process is shown to hold alike in the growth
and consolidation of each aggregate as well as in the growth
and consolidation of its differentiated parts. The law of
the instability of the homogeneous is also more elaborately
traced out. Under the head of \.\\t principle of segregation
it is, moreover, shown that the universal process by which,
in aggregates of mixed units, the units of like kinds tend
to gather together, and the units of unlike kinds to sepa-
rate, everywhere co-operates in aiding Evolution. Yet a
further universal law is recognized and developed — the
law of equilibration. The question is asked, " Can these
changes which constitute Evolution continue without
limit?" and the answer given is that they cannot; but
that they universally tend in each aggregate toward a final
state of quiescence, in which all the forces at work have
reached a state of balance. Like the other universal pro-
cess, that of equilibration is traced out in all divisions of
phenomena. But the most important development given
to the doctrine of Evolution in this volume was its affilia-
tion upon the ultimate principle underlying all science —
the persistence of force. It was shown that from this ulti-
mate law there result certain universal derivative laws,
which are dealt with in chapters on The Correlation and
Equivalence of Forces, The Direction of Motion, and The
Rhythm of Motion, and it was demonstrated that these
derivative laws hold throughout all changes, from the as-
tronomical to the psychical and social. It is then shown
that the Instability of the Homogeneous, The Multiplica-
tion of Effects, Segregation and Equilibration, are also de-
ducible from this ultimate principle of the persistence of
force. So that Evolution, having been first established

530 Edward Livingston Youmans.

inductively as universal, is further shown to be universal
by establishing it deductively as a result of the deepest of
all knowable truths.

The first edition of First Principles was published, but
another important step in elucidating the philosophy of
Evolution required to be taken. In dealing with the classi-
fication of the sciences, from the point of view to which
his philosophy has brought him, Mr. Spencer had occasion
to seek for that aspect of all physical phenomena which
forms the most general division of physical science. He
found that what he sought must be some general fact re-
specting the redistribution of matter and motion. The
law was soon arrived at, that integration of matter results
from decrease of the contained motion, while disintegra-
tion of matter results from increase of the contained
motion. It is at once manifest that the law thus reached
was deeper than the principle of Evolution, for it is con-
formed to by mineral bodies, which do not exhibit the
phenomena of Evolution as Mr. Spencer had interpreted
them. In short, it became clear that a law had been
reached, holding of all material things whatever, whether
they are those which do or those which do not increase in
heterogeneity. It was now first possible to judge of the
relative value and importance of the several factors of the
evolutionary process. In Von Baer's conception of organic
development, it is made to consist essentially and solely
in the change of increasing heterogeneity in the evolving
body. But Mr. Spencer had shown that evolution is a
double process — a tendency to unity as well as to diversity,
an integration as well as a differentiation. It was now
found that the process of integration, as it applies to all
things, whether evolving or not, is a deeper principle, and
is, in fact, the primary process in evolution, while the in-
crease of heterogeneity is the secondary process. At the
same time, this new view of the matter made it obvious

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 531

that Dissolution is everywhere the correlative of Evolu-
tion, and that, before the generalization is complete, Dis-
solution must be recognized as universally tending to undo
what Evolution does.

In a new edition of First Principles this idea was em-
bodied, and the work recast in conformity with it. The
doctrine of Evolution thus attained a higher development.
The fundamental antagonism between Evolution and Dis-
solution comes into the foreground as the cardinal concep-
tion. It is shown that every aggregate, simple or com-
pound, is, from the beginning to the end of its existence,
subject to these opposing processes of change ; that, ac-
cording as its quantity of contained motion is becoming
greater or less, it is tending to integrate or disintegrate,
evolve or dissolve; that from moment to moment through-
out its whole existence it is simultaneously exposed to both
these processes, and that the average transformation it is
undergoing expresses the predominance of the one process
over the other. This being the universal law to which all
material things at all times are subject, there come to be
recognized certain derivative laws that are not universal
although highly general. Evolution is distinguished into
simple and compound : simple Evolution being that in
which the character of the matter and the rate of its inte-
gration are such that this primary process of change from a
diffused state to a concentrated state is uncomplicated by
secondary changes — compound Evolution being that in
which, along with the general integrations, there go on
more or less marked differentiations and local integrations.
Thus the changes which were originally conceived to con-
stitute Evolution itself came to be recognized as, in order
of time and importance, subordinate; integration may go
on without differentiation, as in crystals ; but differentia-
tion is made possible only by antecedent integration.

The doctrine of Evolution, as a theory of the genesis

532 Edward Livingston Youmans.

and dissolution of things in the onward course of Nature,
was elaborately presented in First. Principles, and might
have been there left to take its place and its chance
among philosophical theories. But it had not been ex-
ploited by Mr. Spencer in the way of mental gymnastics, as
a piece of novel and ingenious speculation. He believed
it to embody a living and applicable principle of the great-
est moment. If the law of Evolution be true, it is a truth
of transcendent import, no less in the sphere of practical
life than in the world of thought, and it was important that
it should be carried out in the various fields of its applica-
tion. Moreover, Mr. Spencer had been drawn to the inves-
tigation by his interest in the study of human affairs, and
his task was but fairly begun with the establishment of the
principle by which they are to be interpreted. In the strict
logical order the next step would have been to trace the
operation of the law in the inorganic or pre-organic world, but
the vastness of the subject forbade this, and Mr. Spencer
found it necessary to enter at once upon the organic divi-
sion of his scheme. In the Principles of Biology the sub-
ject of life was accordingly comprehensively dealt with
from the Evolution point of view. He then passed to the
phenomena of mind, and recast and amplified the Principles
of Psychology in accordance with his more matured opin-
ions, placing it upon the ampler basis afforded by First
Principles and the Principles of Biology. These three
works, forming five volumes of the System of Philosophy,
are now published, and they carry him half through the
undertaking — the Principles of Sociology, in three volumes,
and the Principles of Morality, in two volumes, remaining
yet to be written. Mr. Spencer allowed twenty years for
the whole enterprise; ill health and unforeseen interrup-
tions have occasioned considerable delay, and it was half
accomplished in twelve years.

A further illustration of the comprehensive and thor-

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 533

oughly systematic character of Mr. Spencer's work is
afforded by his preparation for the treatment of the sub-
ject of Sociology. In dealing with Biology and Psychology,
the data for reasoning were readily accessible ; but in en-
tering upon the scientific study of so vast and varied a sub-
ject as human society a most formidable difficulty appeared
at the threshold of the inquiry, in the absence of facts to
form the broad basis of sociological reasoning. So defi-
cient and scattered and contradictory were such data that
the possibility of any valid social science has been gener-
ally regarded with distrust, or unhesitatingly denied. But
the phenomena of society are not chaotic; they coexist
and succeed each other in an orderly way. The natural
laws of the social state are undoubtedly determinable, but
such determination is primarily a question of the collection
of materials suitable for wide and safe inductions. Mr.
Spencer foresaw this several years ago, and began the col-
lection and methodical arrangement of all those numerous
classes of facts pertaining to the various forms and states
of society which are needed to work out the Principles of
Sociology. This alone was an immense undertaking. The
races of mankind were divided into three groups, illustrat-
ing existing civilizations, extinct or decayed civilizations,
arid the savage state. Three corresponding series of works
were projected, a tabular method for the classification and
arrangement of facts was devised, and three gentlemen
were employed to carry out the work of collection and di-
gestion of materials under Mr. Spencer's supervision. The
first installments of each of these divisions are now com-
pleted, and published. This important work, which is sub-
sidiary to his main enterprise, is the first of the kind ever
attempted, and when finished and issued will form a com-
plete Cyclopaedia of the multifarious data necessary for the
scientific investigation of social questions. Its continued
publication will depend upon public support; but the col-

534 Edward Livingston Youmans.

lection has been made by Mr. Spencer for his own use, and
it will form the groundwork of the Principles of Sociology
upon which he has now entered, and the first part of which
is issued.

Let us now recapitulate his labours in the order of their
accomplishment, so as to bring them into one view :

Letters on the Proper Sphere of Government, ..... 1842
(Occupied several years as a Railroad Engineer.)

Planned Social Statics, 1846

Social Statics published, . 1850

Theory of Population, \

The Development Hypothesis, I 1852

Philosophy of Style, )

Over-Legislation, ^

The Universal Postulate, )

Manners and Fashion,

The Genesis of Science,

The Art of Education,

Evolution first conceived as Universal,

Principles of Psychology, 1855

(Breakdown of eighteen months.)

Progress, its Law and Cause,
Origin and Function of Music,
Transcendental Physiology,
Representative Government,

State Tamperings with Money and Banks,

Moral Education,-

The Nebular Hypothesis, }- . 1858

Archetype and Homologies of the Vertebrate Skeleton,

Evolution first conceived as the basis of a system of Philosophy,

The Laws of Organic Form, "^

Physical Education,

What Knowledge is of most Worth, |* . . . 1859

Illogical Geology,

Prospectus of the System of Philosophy drawn up,

i860

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 535

The Emotions and the Will,

The Social Organism,

The Physiology of Laughter,

Parliamentary Reform,

Prison Ethics,

Prospectus of the Philosophical System published,

First Principles, 1862

Classification of the Sciences, 1864

Principles of Biology, 1867

Principles of Psychology, 1872

The Study of Sociology, ) o

Descriptive Sociology, j

Principles of Sociology, Part I., 1874

The facts now presented, I submit, entirely sustain the
view with which we set out, in regard to the character of
Mr. Spencer's work, and his position in the world of
thought. It has been shown that he took up the idea of
Progress while it was only a vague speculation, and had
not yet become a subject of serious scientific study. We
have seen that he verified its reality by gradually tracing
its operation step by step, in widely different fields of phe-
nomena ; that he analyzed its conditions and causes, and
at length formulated it as a universal principle, to which
the course of all things conforms. That view of the uni-
verse which the science of the world now accepts, it has
been shown that Mr. Spencer adopted a generation ago,
and entered upon its elucidation as a systematic life-work.
We have traced the course of its unfolding, and I appeal
to the record of labours here delineated as furnishing an ex-
ample of original, continuous, and concentrated thinking,
which it will be difficult to parallel in the history of intel-
lectual achievement. In newness of conception, unity of
purpose, subtilty of analyses, comprehensive grasp, thor-
oughness of method, and sustained force of execution, this

536 Edivard Livingston Youmans.

series of labours, I believe, may challenge comparison with
the highest mental work of any age.

As to the character of the system of thought which
Mr. Spencer has elaborated, we have shown that it is such
as to form an important epoch in the advance of knowl-
edge. He took up an idea not yet investigated nor enter-
tained by his predecessors or contemporaries, and has made
it the corner stone of a philosophy. If by philosophy we
understand the deepest explanation of things that is pos-
sible to the human mind, the principle of genesis or Evolu-
tion certainly answers pre-eminently to this character ; for
what explanation can go deeper than that which accounts
for the origin, continuance, and disappearance of the
changing objects around us ? It is the newest solution
of the oldest problem ; a solution based alike upon the
most extended knowledge, and upon a reverent recognition
that all human investigation, however extensive, must
have its inexorable bounds. The philosophy of Evolution
is truly a philosophy of creation, carried as far as the
human mind can penetrate. If man is finite, the infinite is
beyond him; if finite, he is limited, and his knowledge, and
all the philosophy that rests upon knowledge, must be also
limited. Philosophy is a system of truth pertaining to the
order of Nature, and coextensive with it ; and, as the vari-
ous sciences are but the knowledge of the different parts of
Nature, Mr. Spencer bases philosophy upon science, and
makes it what may be called a science of the sciences.
Resting, moreover, upon a universal law, which governs
the course and changes of all phenomena, this philosophy
becomes powerful to unify and harmonize the hitherto
separate and fragmentary systems of truth ; and, as this
is the predominant trait of Mr. Spencer's system of
thought, he very properly denominates it the Synthetic
Philosophy.

In estimating the character of Mr. Spencer's Philosoph-

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 537

ical System it is needful to remember that it differs in vari-
ous fundamental respects from any that has before been
offered to the world. It is more logically complete than
any other system, because its truths are first derived from
facts and phenomena by the method of induction, and then
systematically verified by deduction from principles already
established. It is more practical than any other, because
it bears immediately upon common experience, takes hold
of the living questions of the time, throws light upon the
course of human affairs, and gives knowledge that may
serve both for public and individual guidance. Viewed as
an intellectual achievement, his undertaking is neither to
be measured by the time consumed in its execution nor by
the amount of labour involved, but by the nature and quality
of the work itself. It was original throughout, was based
upon the most comprehensive results of modern science,
and was elaborated under the inexorable conditions of
logical method. The development of a system of philoso-
phy now is a very different thing from what it was in the
earlier times. Plato spun a system of thought before specu-
lation was yet curbed by the knowledge of Nature ; Spen-
cer has constructed a philosophy out of the inflexible mate-
rials furnished in all the fields of modern investigation. His
system is not a digest, but an organon ; not merely an
analytic dissection, but a grand synthetic construction ;
not a science, but a co-ordination of the sciences; not a
metaphysical elaboration, but a positive body of doctrine
conforming to verifiable facts, and based upon the most
comprehensive principle of Nature yet arrived at by fhe
human mind.

But no recognition of the greatness of Mr. Spencer's in-
tellectual work will do him justice. There is a moral sub-
limity in his self-sacrificing career which is not to be neg-
lected in making up the estimate of his character. As
remarked by M. Laugel : " If Mr. Spencer, with his talents,

538 Edward Livingston Youmans.

his fertility of genius, and the almost encyclopaedic variety
of knowledge, of which his writings furnish the proof, had
chosen to follow the beaten path, nothing would have been
more easy than for him to secure all those honours of which
English Society is so prodigal to those who serve her as she
wishes to be served. He preferred, however, with a noble
and touching self-denial, to put up with poverty, and, what
is still more difficult, with obscurity." In advance of his
generation and working against the powerful current of its
prejudices, with broken health, without pecuniary resources,
and depending upon promises of support that were but
very partially redeemed, with an intrepidity that was not
wanting in heroism he entered upon the most formidable
intellectual project that was ever undertaken by any single
mind. One would think that it should have commanded
the sympathy of the generous and the cordial approval if
not the kindly co-operation of all who appreciate courage-
ous and noble endeavour; but, unhappily, a discriminating
appreciation of genuine work is not overabundant in these
times; and, in the accomplishment of a task which I be-
lieve future generations will regard as the most memorable
achievement of this fruitful age, Mr. Spencer has had but
stinted encouragement and a very shabby support. In an-
swer to the question, why his contemporaries have been so
unappreciative, much might be said, but I will here confine
myself to one or two suggestions.

In the first place, Mr. Spencer's work has been done
under circumstances peculiarly unfavourable to the recog-
nition of his rights as an original and independent thinker.
Of the twenty-five articles prepared in the most active
period of his life, and published between 1852 and 1860,
which, as I have shown, are important contributions toward
the development of the doctrine of Evolution in its various
phases, most, if not all, appeared anonymously. They were
printed in the different leading reviews, and many of them

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 539

attracted marked attention at the time ; but their author
was unknown, and, of course, lost the advantage of having
his ideas accredited to him. Up to the time when he had
matured his system of thought, and was ready to enter
upon its formal publication, he had been giving it out in
fragments, as its several aspects had taken shape in his
own mind. His articles, many of which were republished
in this country, thus went far toward familiarizing the pub-
lic mind with the general conception of Evolution, so that
he was actually preparing his readers to discredit his subse-
quent claims to his own views, which, being reproduced and
further diffused by others, were regarded as belonging to the
common stock of current ideas. So far did this go that
he was ultimately exposed to the imputation of plagiarism
for the restatement of opinions that he had first put forth,
but which other men had appropriated, and sent out as
their own. Nor was the case much helped when he be-
gan to publish his system of philosophy to subscribers, for
so limited was its distribution that it might almost have
been said that it was " printed for private circulation."
Moreover, being the owner of his own works, the interests
of publishers were not enlisted in their diffusion ; while the
assaults of the press were so malignant, and their repre-
sentations so false, that for years he was constrained to
withhold his series from the periodicals. All this was fa-
vourable to misconception, and left Mr. Spencer much at
the mercy of dishonest authorship and unscrupulous criti-
cism.

Again, it must be recognized that there were difficulties
in appreciating his work which arose from its nature and
extent. While a scientific discovery, or a single definite
doctrine, is readily apprehended because the impression it
makes is narrow and sharp, an extensive system of prin-
ciples, which it requires power to grasp and time to master,
can only be imperfectly received by the general mind. The

54O Edward Livingston Youmans.

very greatness of Mr. Spencer's work was thus an impedi-
ment to its recognition, and this, too, it must be acknowl-
edged, on the part even of men of science. In the scien-
tific world the accumulation of facts has outstripped the
work of valid generalization. For, while men of moderate
ability can observe, experiment, and multiply details in
special departments, it requires men of breadth to arrange
them into groups, to educe principles and arrive at com-
prehensive laws. The great mass of scientific specialists,
confined to their 'departments, and little trained to the
work of generalization, are apt to regard lightly the logical
processes of science, and to decry mere theorizing and
speculation. They forget that facts of themselves are not
science, and only become so by being placed in true rela-
tions, and that the function of the thinker is therefore su-
preme ; while the work of organizing facts and establishing
general truths is, after all, just as much a specialty as that
of observation or experiment in any branches of inquiry.
The prevalence of these narrow views has been unfavour-
able to the recognition of Mr. Spencer's work by a large
class of the cultivators of science ; and the more so, as he
has been mainly occupied in the highest spheres of general-
ization. For this reason it is only by the comparatively
small number of scientific men who possess marked philo-
sophic power that his labours have been justly appreciated.
But, while considerations of this kind are not to be
overlooked in assigning the responsibilities of criticism,
neither are they to be construed into excuses for preju-
diced opinions, or crude and hasty judgments. It is the
business of critics to inform themselves on important mat-
ters of which they speak, or to hold their peace. And,
where there is peculiar difficulty or liability to error, they
are all the more bound to caution, and to refrain from
injurious interpretations. Reverting now to the criti-
cisms cited at the outset of this discussion as typical of a

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 541

class, we are prepared to rate them at what they are
worth.

From what has been stated, I think it will be sufficiently
evident that Mr. Spencer is no follower of Comte, Dar-
win, or any other man, and that he has pursued his own
independent course in his own way. As to M. Taine's state-
ment that " Mr. Spencer has the merit of extending to the
phenomena of Nature and of mind " Mr. Darwin's principle
of Natural Selection, the facts given show how mistaken
was his view of the case. Strange to say, M. Taine, who
claims to be a psychologist, puts forth this idea in a review
of Mr. Spencer's Principles of Psychology, a work which
treated the subject of mind throughout, and for the first
time from the point of view of Evolution, and this years
before Mr. Darwin had published a word upon the subject.

As this error of M. Taine is frequently repeated,* and
indicates a total misapprehension of the facts, it is de-
sirable to add a word or two regarding Mr. Darwin's re-
lation to the question. While this illustrious naturalist
has contributed immensely toward the extension and es-
tablishment of a theory of organic development, he has
made no attempt to elucidate the general law of Evolu-
tion. His works do not treat of this broad problem ; and
nothing has tended more to the popular confusion of the
subject than the notion that " Darwinism " and Evolution
are the same thing. Mr. Darwin's fame rests chiefly upon
the skill and perseverance with which he has worked out a
single principle in its bearing upon the progressive diver-
sity of organic life. The competitions of Nature leading to
a struggle for existence, and that consequent winnowing

* The Saturday Review, for example, in commenting upon Prof. Tyn-
dall's late address, remarks : " What Darwin has done for physiology,
Spencer would do for psychology by applying to the nervous system par-
ticularly the principles which his teacher (!) has already enunciated for
the physical system generally."

542 Edward Livingston Youmans.

which Mr. Darwin calls " Natural Selection, and Mr. Spen-
cer calls " Survival of the Fittest," were recognized before
Mr. Darwin's time : what he did, as I have already ex-
plained, was to show how this principle may aid in giving
rise to new species from pre-existing species. The princi-
ple is a part of the great theory of Evolution, and has a
philosophic importance exactly in proportion to the valid-
ity of that larger system of doctrine to which it is tribu-
tary as an element. Not only has Mr. Darwin never
taken up the general question of Evolution, but it was not
his aim to explain even the evolution of species in terms of
ultimate principles — that is, in terms of the redistribution
of matter and motion. Yet it is in this way that all proxi-
mate principles, including Natural Selection, have to be
expressed before the final interpretation is reached. This
mode of dealing with the subject — the analysis of it into
those primary principles from which all the proximate
principles are derived, and the reduction of the various
phases of transformation to a single law, which is the only
thoroughly scientific method of its treatment, belongs to
Mr. Spencer alone. As to his following Mr. Darwin, we
have already seen that, long before the Origin of Species
was published, Mr. Spencer had reached the proof of Evo-
lution as a universal law ; had traced its dependence upon
the principle of the persistence of force ; had resolved it
into its ultimate dynamical factors ; had worked out many
of its important applications ; had made it the basis of a
system of Philosophy ; and had shown that it furnishes a
new starting-point for the scientific interpretation of hu-
man affairs. And for this vast constructive work Mr.
Spencer was indebted solely to his own genius. Referring
to the subject of Evolution, in a lecture before the Royal
Institution, Prof. Huxley said : " The only complete and
systematic statement of the doctrine with which I am ac-
quainted is that contained in Mr. Herbert Spencer's System

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 543

of Philosophy ; " of this doctrine, I have given the proof
that Mr. Spencer is the chief originator, as well as the
only expositor. The same ethical canons of research, I
therefore maintain, which gave to Copernicus the glory of
the heliocentric astronomy ; to Newton that of the law of
gravitation ; to Harvey that of the circulation of the
blood ; to Priestley that of the discovery of oxygen ; to
Dr. Young that of the undulatory theory of light ; and to
Darwin that of natural selection — will also give to Herbert
Spencer the honour of having first elucidated and estab-
lished the law of Universal Evolution.

Colonel Higginson imputes to Mr. Spencer, as a weak-
ness, the propensity to write on a great number of sub-
jects ; I have shown, on the contrary, that he has been
compelled to write upon many subjects from logical neces-
sity, and has done so in unswerving devotion to the de-
velopment of one class of ideas. It will be seen that he is
now upon the same identical track of thought which he
opened in his youth, to which he has consecrated his life,
and which he has made his own. Thirty-two years ago
he began to study the social condition and relations of
men from the scientific point of view, and to treat of hu-
man society as a sphere of natural law. After eight years
he published a treatise upon the question, which, although
in advance of the times, only served to convince its author
that the investigation was barely begun, and that, before
any adequate social science was possible, the whole subject
required to be more deeply grounded in the knowledge of
Nature. Upon that deeper study of Nature he then en-
tered, and, after twenty-four years of steady and system-
atic preparation, the problems of Social Statics are re-
sumed in the Principles of Sociology. If so prolonged
and inflexible a course of original inquiry, yielding results
which are felt in the highest spheres of thought, are sug-
gestive of "a weakness," we should be glad to be furnished

544 Edward Livingston Youmans.

with the examples which embody Colonel Higginson's con-
ception of strength in mental character. As to the decla-
ration that it seems absurd to attribute to Mr. Spencer any
vast enlargement or further generalization of the modern
doctrine of Evolution, we leave its author to reconcile his
opinion with the fact that the System of Psychology,
which first extended the principle of Evolution to the
sphere of mind, had been nine years before the world, the
conception of universal Evolution had been formulated
and promulgated four years, and First Principles had
been for some time published, when this statement was
made.

Mr. Emerson's criticism of Spencer is summary and de-
cisive, as becomes a man who has gone to the bottom of a
§ubject. Reticent and mystical no longer, he plumps out
his opinion, when interviewed, with all the confidence of
one who knows what he is talking about. Into the pan-
theon of immortals, arranged for the reporter of Frank
Leslie's newspaper, none may enter but star-writers, and
Mr. Spencer is only a "stock-writer." We may, however,
presume that Mr. Emerson has here followed his trans-
cendental lights, as there are many who will insist that he
is not for a moment to be suspected of having ever read
Mr. Spencer's books — though it will still remain a mystery
how he has so skilfully contrived to make his statement
as exactly wrong as it could be made. It will, probably,
matter little to Mr. Spencer what Mr. Emerson thinks of
his position, as it may matter nothing to Mr. Emerson
what we think of his judgment ; but it should matter a
good deal to him that he do not lend the influence of his
eminent name to the perpetration of injustice. Speaking
in the light of the facts here sketched, we say that Mr.
Emerson will search the annals of authorship in vain to
find an instance in which his epithet would be more grossly
misapplied. And we will do him the justice to say that in

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 545

other days he has taught us a more generous lesson in re-
gard to what is due from the manly and liberal-minded to
the heroic endeavours of noble and unrecognized men.
Many of his admirers will recall with pleasure the follow-
ing admirable passage : " What is the scholar, what is the
man/0r, but for hospitality to every new thought of his
time ? Have you leisure, power, property, friends ? you
shall be the asylum of every new thought, every unproved
opinion, every untried project, which proceeds out of good-
will and honest seeking. All the newspapers, all the
tongues of to-day, will, of course, at first defame what is
noble; but you, who hold not of to-day, not of the times,
but of the everlasting, are to stand for it ; and the highest
compliment man ever receives from Heaven is the sending
to him its disguised and discredited angels." This is a
grand exhortation, and has no doubt thrilled many a reader
with enthusiasm for the rising thoughts of his time. But
the difficulty still remains, how to identify the celestial
messengers! Such are the eccentricities of human judg-
ment, that the sympathy which Mr. Emerson invokes is as
likely to be given to the worthless as to the worthy. And
what shall we say about the duty of common mortals re-
specting the " disguised and discredited angels," when the
Seer himself snubs the author of First Principles as a
"stock-writer," and says to the author of that unclean im-
posture, Leaves of Grass, " I greet you at the beginning of
a great career " ?

NOTE A. — Page 506.

PULPIT exposition, in this case, is to be taken as representing the force
of tradition, the persistence of habit, and the adherence to stereotyped
ideas and forms of expression, which have been so long used in sacred
relations that they have become sacred — rather than the actual and living
belief. There has come to be a great discrepancy in this matter between
pulpit presentations and the private opinions of clergymen. An example
24

546 Edward Livingston Youmans.

of this occurred when Prof. Huxley was invited to address the clerical
body of Sion College, and took up, as the subject of his discourse, " The
Antiquity of the Earth, of Man, and of Civilization." His address was
followed by discussion, in accordance with custom, when several clergy-
men took occasion to express their surprise that Prof. Huxley should have
chosen such a subject for such an audience ; that his facts were very ele-
mentary, and his views long established and quite commonplace, and that
the speaker greatly underrated the intelligence of clergymen if he supposed
they needed primary lessons on that subject. To this Prof. Huxley re-
plied : " Why, then, do you not teach these things to your congregations?"
But there are plenty of clergymen still who inculcate the old views by no
means as a matter of routine. They maintain them with vigour, and still
denounce the modern doctrines with fiery vehemence. An illustration of
this is afforded by a sermon lately preached in New York by Rev. George
B. Cheever, on Evolution, of which the following passages are samples
from the Tribune report. Mr. Darwin having referred to the notion of the
special creation of man as a miserable hypothesis, Dr. Cheever remarks :
" Observe this language, the miserable assumption of a special creation,
spoken or written in the full knowledge that, instead of being an assump-
tion at all, it is the very first truth taught in the Bible, as clearly as the
being of a God, and no more to be disputed by a Christian than that, but
plainly revealed as the foundation of all the obligations and duties of
religion, and the corner stone on which the whole scheme of Christianity
rests. . . .

" If you demand positive and actual chronology for these postulated,
illimitable ages, the archaeological and geological scientists have an alma-
nac of Greek scientific terminologies, under the cloak of which both ab-
sence and assumption of knowledge without facts they may hide them-
selves— Eocene, Miocene, Pliocene, and Pleistocene — ingenious compounds
of two Greek words ; the dawn of recent time, the less recent, the more
recent, the most recent. The use of these forms of scientific learning being
established, when you ask the age of any given development or stratum,
you are answered, it was Pliocene, or Post-Pliocene, or Eocene, or Miocene.
You must be content, for these are but parts of the grammar of endless
genealogies, which you must accept for certainties, and any further ques-
tioning can only show your ignorance of what be the very first principles
of the knowledge of earth and time in the processes of evolution. The
first postulate of this philosophy is that of countless millions of years to
work in, with no creator, and no authority that can bring it to book. Such
being the basis of scientific evolution, what can be the God, or the natural
principle, at work for such results through illimitable ages ? Is it any gain
to such a system, or does it obviate, or soften, or neutralize its irreligion,

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 547

its atheistic tendency, its monstrosity and cruelty, to suppose a God, or
what is called God, hiding himself behind all these millions of ages, and
setting all this in motion by inexorable law that evolves its products by
natural selection, but gives neither idea, nor knowledge, nor revelation
of God, but, on the contrary, makes it impossible that God should be a
father or should ever interpose for the guidance or benefit of his creatures,
or indeed should ever have acted with personal will and purpose, benevo-
lence, and power, as their Creator? ....

'• By their scheme, there never was, and never could have been, a deity
interposing to instruct Adam, to educate Abraham, to inspire Joseph, to
put down oppressing Pharaoh, to change the rod of Moses into a serpent,
to create an additional frog, louse, or mosquito, in Egypt ; to call for the
waters of a deluge, to spread abroad a rainbow, to speak to the rain to fall
on one piece of ground and not on another ; to commission a famine, or a
pestilence, or a flash of lightning ; every drop of rain, and every shower,
and every ray of light, and every blade of grass, having been so unalterably
woven out of the original supply of force in the web of order, continuous
and unbroken forever, as not to admit of a possibility of interference or
alteration."

NOTE B. — Page 510.

IN regard to Mr. Spencer's education, a few words may be added. As
a child he had a delicate constitution, and his father, feeling the danger
of exposing him to the usual course of education, kept him from school,
and attended to his early instruction himself. In this respect his case
was like that of Mr. Mill, but the plan pursued was very different. For,
while young Mill's mind was forced out by a stern coercive discipline,
that of Spencer was led out by awakening an interest in knowledge, and
guiding and encouraging the spontaneous tendencies of his mind. His
father was a professed mathematical teacher, and the son's mathematical
studies began early, and were continued systematically with a view to his
prospective vocation as a civil engineer. This course was chosen because
Herbei't early exhibited a marked aptitude for mechanics, mathematics,
and scientific studies, and because the occupation of engineering would
combine useful employment with outdoor activity, which was favourable
to health, and was demanded by his slender constitution. Mr. Mill's
early education was purely one of books, and in his autobiography he
expresses regret that he never had the discipline of trying experiments in
science, or even the advantage of seeing them. Young Spencer, on the
other hand, went early into the practical work of science. He cultivated
natural history, collected an herbarium, and experimented in physics and

548 Edward Livingston Youmans.

chemistry. The bent of his mind, moreover, early attracted him to origi-
nal investigation, and it is known that, before the age of seventeen, he
had discovered and worked out the electrotype process independently.
He had also solved certain difficult original problems relating to his chosen
profession, and devised a new and ingenious theorem in descriptive
geometry, which were afterward published in The Civil Engineer and
Architect's Journal. He compleied his mathematical studies with his
uncle, the Rev. Thomas Spencer, a cultivated scholar, who graduated with
honours at Cambridge. He was also a man of great liberality, advanced
in his political views, and the first clergyman of the Established Church
to take a public and prominent part in the movement for the repeal of the
Corn Laws, having written and published extensively upon the subject.
At seventeen young Spencer commenced life as a civil engineer, being
first engaged under Mr. Charles Fox, afterward Sir Charles Fox, who had
been a pupil of his father, and afterward built the great Exhibition build-
ing of 1850. Some eight years were spent in this profession, when the
reaction from the railway mania of 1845 led to such a depression in the
engineering business that he abandoned it, and gave himself up to sys-
tematic study and a career of authorship.

NOTE C. — Page 519.

THE following passage is from an able article republished in The
Popular Science Monthly, from the Westminster Review, on the De-
velopment of Psychology :

" If Mr. Herbert Spencer had no other title to fame, he would still be
the greatest of psychologists. The vast construction of his First Prin-
ciples will ever be a monument of his extraordinary powers of general-
ization. His designed organization of the Social Science opens up the
prospect of intellectual acquisitions in the future, to which the past may
furnish few parallels. But the Principles of Psychology will still remain,
in its symmetrical completeness and perfect adequacy to the subject, at
once the most remarkable of his achievements and the most scientific
treatise on the Mind which has yet seen the light. Its publication in 1855
did not make a sensation. The persistent efforts of Mill had not yet suc-
ceeded in stemming the muddy tide of the prevailing scholasticism. The
bastard Kantism of Hamilton did duty for Metaphysics, and the Common-
Sense Philosophy of Reid, with the common sense left out, usurped the
place of experimental psychology. Experimental Psychology was as usual
busy with analysis, and had no eye for an imposing synthetical effort. Mr.
Spencer's work had, accordingly, a chill reception. Greeted by the aristo-
cratic metaphysicians with only a few words of courtly compliment, but

Herbert Spencer and tJie Doctrine of Evolution. 549

treated practically with supercilious disregard, it was received by psycholo-
gists of the Association school with hardly more favour than the snarling
approval with which a constitutional Whig views the entry into the cabinet
of a Birmingham Radical. Mr. Spencer was ahead of his generation, and
paid the penalty of his prescience in twenty years of neglect. But now
the wheel is coming round. The bovine British public, constitutionally
disposed, indeed, to apathy, but drugged into a leaden slumber by its
medicine men, is at last awakening to the fact that the peer of Bacon and
Newton is here. Writers of all schools are hastening to define their po-
sition with reference to the Synthetic Philosophy. . . . Whatever part of
this philosophy may be transitory, Mr. Spencer's present influence is in-
disputable ; and, since the lamented death of Mill, no one can now con-
test his claims to the philosophic supremacy in these islands. That su-
premacy rests mainly on his Psychology. . . . Mr. Spencer's numerous
psychological advances may be grouped in two divisions : the application
to mind of the theory of development, and the connection of psychological
evolution with evolution in general. The last edition of his work also
incorporates Mr. Darwin's law of natural selection in the explanation of
the emotions, but this may be regarded as simply an extension of the de-
velopment theory. In the working out of both principles, Mr. Spencer
has followed the lead of the physical sciences. . . . With a prescient in-
sight into the future of science which has probably few parallels, Mr. Spen-
cer founded his Psychology on the hypothesis of development. To all but
a few deep-thinking observers there can have seemed few signs in 1855
that that hotly disputed theory was ever likely to be in the ascendant.
The exposition of none of the organic sciences, that we know of, had yet
been based on it, and its application to mind was undreamt of. But, with
a confidence in the intuitions of reason, which is one of the clearest
attributes of speculative genius, and which may have its analogue in the
statesman, in the nerve to take the vessel of the state over a bar, Mr. Spen-
cer assumed the provisional truth of the theory, and it might be difficult to
exaggerate the extent to which his exhibition of it in Psychology has con-
tributed to its establishment."

NOTE D. — Page 519,

HIGH as was Mr. Mill's estimate of the Principles of Psychology, we
believe he never grew to a full appreciation of it. He was an ardent par-
tisan of the experiential psychology as opposed to the intuitional, and his
bias prevented him from discerning the immense step that Mr. Spencer
had taken in harmonizing the fundamental disagreements of the two
schools. His position, as defined in the Autobiography, is that " there is

550 Edward Livingston Youmans.

not any idea, feeling, or power in the human mind, which, in order to
account for it, requires that its origin should be referred to any other
source than experience," and by this he means the experience of the in-
dividual. How strong his feeling was against the a priori view is illus-
trated by a further passage in the Autobiography. He says : " Whatever
may be the practical value of a true philosophy of these matters, it is
hardly possible to exaggerate the mischiefs of a false one. The notion
that truths external to the mind may be known by intuition or conscious-
ness, independently of observation and experience, is, I am persuaded, in
these times the great intellectual support of false doctrines and bad insti-
tutions. By the aid of this theory, every inveterate belief and every in-
tense feeling, of which the origin is not remembered, is enabled to dis-
pense with the obligation of justifying itself by reason, and is erected into
its own all-sufficient voucher and justification. There never was such an
instrument devised for consecrating all deep-seated prejudices." Mr. Spen-
cer, on the contrary, held that the intuitionalists are right in this, that the
ideas, feelings, and powers of the mind cannot be explained as originating
in the experience of the individual, but that there are intuitions or capaci-
ties of knowing born with us. But, instead of merely assuming these with
the intuitionalists as ultimate principles beyond explication, he maintains
that they originate in the experiences of the race which have been accu-
mulated and transmitted to the individual in his organization. Intuitions
are thus affirmed, but their basis is laid in hereditary life, and the law of
evolution thus becomes the key to the deepest interpretation of mental
phenomena.

In his recent able work, entitled Principles of Mental Physiology, Dr.
Carpenter remarks: " No physiologist can deem it improbable that the
intuitions which we recognize in our own mental constitution have been
acquired by a process of gradual development in the race corresponding to
that which we trace by observation in the individual. . . . The doctrine
that the intellectual and moral intuitions of any one generation are the
embodiments in its mental constitution of the experiences of the race was
first explicitly put forth by Mr. Herbert Spencer, in whose philosophical
treatises it will be found most ably developed." Dr. Carpenter further-
more says that " the great master of the experiential school, Mr. J. S. Mill,
was latterly tending toward the acceptance of this view," the evidence of
which is given in the following quotation from a letter of Mr. Mill upon
the subject to Dr. Carpenter: "There is also considerable evidence that
such acquired facilities of passing into certain modes of cerebral action
can in many cases be transmitted, more or less completely, by inheritance.
The limits of this transmission, and the conditions on which it depends,
are a subject now fairly before the scientific world ; and we shall, doubt-

Herbert Spencer and the Doctrine of Evolution. 551

less, in time know much more about them than we do now. But, so far as
my imperfect knowledge of the subject extends, I take much the same
view of it that you do, at least in principle." We thus see how profoundly
the foremost psychologist of his time was ultimately influenced in his most
radical philosophical views by the doctrines of Mr. Spencer ; and, when
we remember how completely Mr. Spencer had already reconstructed the
new psychology upon the basis of the principle thus lately and partially
recognized by Mr. Mill, we are enabled to see how far he was in advance
of his age in dealing with this great subject.

NOTE E. — Page 527.

INTERESTED in all that relates to the history of Mr. Spencer's enter-
prise, and the conditions under which it was launched, when I learned
about his being sustained by eminent men in his application to Govern-
ment, I sought to know what kind of action they took, and found that
their influence was given in the shape of letters to Mr. Spencer, to be
used with the Government authorities. They were written by Mr. J. S.
Mill, George Grote, and Profs. Huxley, Fraser, Hooker, Tyndall, and
Latham, in 1859, fifteen years ago, and were, of course, responsible esti-
mates of Mr. Spencer as a thinker by some of the most distinguished of
his contemporaries. At my request, Mr. Spencer favoured me with the
reading of these letters, and the effect of their perusal was to produce
a feeling of profound regret that they had never been given to the pub-
lic ; for this would certainly have made an important difference in the re-
ception accorded to his philosophical project. The writers recognized
that Mr. Spencer was eminently the man to do a great and special work
for the advancement and organization of knowledge in this age — a work
which the British Government would honour itself by promoting ; and they
predicted the utmost that time has fulfilled in regard to the undertaking.
But Mr. Spencer regarded the letters as written for a special purpose, and
therefore not to be appropriated to any other. They, however, belonged
to the initial stage of his enterprise, were designed to aid it, and should,
I think, have been used for that object. I refer to this circumstance be-
cause it is an interesting fact ; and I have the less concern in speaking
about it, as the author of one of the letters assured me that the writers
designed them for publication.

VI.

THE CHARGES AGAINST THE POPULAR
SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE publishers of this magazine, having declined any
longer to issue the North American Review because of its
recent articles from the pen of Colonel Ingersoll, have been
charged with inconsistency on the ground that, in respect
to the matter objected to, the periodical they retain is as
bad as the one they have dismissed. A writer in the Even-
ing Post says: "I would like to know how and where
Messrs. Appleton & Co. draw the line which makes the
same opinions detestable in the North American Re-
view, which are endured in The Popular Science Monthly.
The editorial views of the latter publication are certainly
as pronounced in their atheistical tendencies as anything
Colonel Ingersoll ever uttered, and for a long period of
years this journal has published everything of interest
written by pronounced atheists, and excluded everything
which has appeared of merit on the other side. The papers
of Herbert Spencer, and others of his class, have been pre-
sented, but such writers as the Duke of Argyll have never
been permitted to offer their views."

This accusation against The Popular Science Monthly,
that it is a teacher of atheism, has been made before, and
met before ; but, as the present circumstances give it point
and revive its interest, we propose now to reconsider it,
and again see what it amounts to. We shall thereby be
enabled to judge whether the two magazines really teach

(552)

The Charges Against the Popular Science Monthly. 553

the "same opinions" upon this subject, as the writer in
the Post affirms.

The paragraph just quoted would have been more sat-
isfactory if it had been more explicit ; for here, if any-
where, clear distinctions are demanded. What does the
writer mean by " pronounced atheistical tendencies " and
" pronounced atheists " ? Does he mean that their atheism
is avowed, or imputed ; that they pronounce themselves
atheists, or are so pronounced by others ? These are not
only different things, but the distinction is here very ma-
terial ; so that it becomes necessary, before we can find out
who are truly atheists, to have the test by which they are
known. Because a man is called an atheist, are we to hold
that he is therefore, in fact, an atheist ? We were once
accosted by an inquisitive Irishman thus: "D'ye b'lieve in
the mother o' God ? " " No." " Be gorry, ye're an athe-
ist ! I wouldn't be in yer boots for twenty pound." Was
that a satisfactory basis of classification ? Prof. Huxley
had a cook who got on a drunken spree, and made such a
row in the house that the police were called. As she was
hustled through the yard, she sent back a blast, of which all
that could be understood was an emphatic " damn athish ! "
Is Prof. Huxley, therefore, to be ranked as a "pronounced
atheist " ? But, if a drunken cook is not an authority on this
point, is a sober bigot any better ? It is the common and
very foolish trick of religious partisans to stigmatize those
who differ from them in their views of Deity as atheists.
Each one identifies God with his own scheme of belief, and,
if that scheme is objected to, the objector is denounced as
a denier of God. Particularly where the conception of
God is low, gross, and materialistic, is every higher view
charged with atheism. There is, however, no honest diffi-
culty here. We have exactly the same means of knowing
atheists that we have of knowing Baptists or Buddhists —
that is, by what they profess and teach. We should call

554 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Bradlaugh a " pronounced atheist," because we have
heard him say that he is the only man who ever ran for
Parliament distinctly as an atheist. He has, besides, a
large following in open agreement with him, and who may,
therefore, be properly called atheists. A "pronounced
atheist " in short, must simply be one who pronounces him-
self an atheist.

And now, having found that atheists are those who
avow a certain belief, it is desirable to note distinctly what
that belief is. " Atheism," says Webster, " is the denial of
the existence of a God." But the term God has many sig-
nifications, and is variously defined. We take the highest
definition given by Webster, "the Supreme Being; the
Eternal and Infinite Spirit." A pronounced atheist, there-
fore, is one who professes to deny the existence of "the
Supreme Being; the Eternal and Infinite Spirit."

The writer in the Post declares that the Popular Sci-
ence Monthly " has published everything of interest written
by 'pronounced atheists,' and excluded everything that
appeared of merit on the other side." The other side of
what ? Why, the advocacy of atheism, of course ! That
is, " for a long period of years " this magazine has been
given over to the work of teaching the doctrine of the
non-existence of " the Eternal and Infinite Spirit." This
statement is not true ; it has not a vestige of truth in it ;
it is wholly and absolutely false. This is one of the
charges that calls for proof, and happily the writer has
given his proof. It is this, and nothing else — that "the
papers of Herbert Spencer and others of his class " have
appeared in The Popular Science Monthly. That any
such papers really have the character charged, there is not
the slightest attempt at proof.

But Herbert Spencer is not an atheist, and never has
been. He has never declared his belief in atheism, and he
is a man who expresses his opinions very freely and with

The Charges Against the Popular Science Monthly. 555

but little regard for their popularity. He has been called
an atheist, but that, as we have seen, will not do. If we
had space we could fill pages with admissions on the part
of all his ablest theological critics that he is not an atheist.
We challenge the Post writer to produce a single passage
in all his writings, in the Monthly or out, either avowing or
defending atheism. On the contrary, he has laboured with
all the power of his genius to prove that atheism as a
theory of the universe (which it professes to be) is baseless
and indefensible. And more than this, no man of the pres-
ent age has reasoned out the foundations of man's belief
in the existence of the " Infinite and Eternal Spirit " with
such a depth of analysis and logical force as Herbert Spen-
cer. He has sought to show that the " Infinite and Eternal
Spirit," of which all the phenomena of the universe are but
the manifestations, is the most absolute of all realities.

And still more than this is true. Mr. Spencer has gone
beyond the theologians in their own line, and has rescued
them from the consequences of their own logic. Every in-
telligent person knows that there has been a great progress
in the religious ideas of mankind ; and in nothing has that
progress been so clearly evinced as in the gradual elevation
of man's conceptions of the character of the deity he wor-
ships. During all the primitive ages religion was idolatry,
and still is so, almost all over the world. But with
growing intelligence there slowly arises a higher idea of
the Divine nature. Polytheism passes into monotheism,
and the gross, limited, anthropomorphic idea of God gives
place to the loftier ideal of an " Infinite and Eternal Spirit."
In this clearing away of limitations how far was the work
to go, and what to be finally left ? The theologians had
been driving destructive criticism to its last extreme,
with but little apparent care for the consequences. There
grew up a vigorous ecclesiastical agnosticism, asserted
even by the fathers of the Church. Clemens Alexandrinus

556 Edward Livingston Yonmans.

(A. D. 200) says of God, " We know not what he is, but only
what he is not." Cyril of Jerusalem (A. D. 350) affirms,
" To know God is beyond man's power." St. Augustine
(A. D. 400) observes, " Rare is the mind that in speaking of
God knows what it means." John of Damascus (A. D. 800)
declares, "What is the substance of God, or how he exists
in all things, we are agnostics, and cannot say a word."
Duns Scotus (A. D. 1300) remarks: "Is God accessible to
our reason ? I hold that he is not." This tendency to re-
move the Divine nature beyond the grasp of reason, and
to hold that "a God understood is no God at all," has
grown in strength in modern times, and reached its full
expression in the theological philosophy of Hamilton and
Mansell, which landed inquiry upon this subject in blank
negation. Finding that the " Infinite and Eternal Spirit "
transcended and baffled all reason^ they assumed that rea-
son brings us to an infinite nothing, so that we have no
alternative but to give up the idea of an Infinite Power,
or fall back upon faith. Mr. Spencer strenuously resisted
this conclusion. He maintained that the most inexorable
logic brings us not to an Infinite Nothing, but to an Infi-
nite Something; and, although this " Eternal Spirit " tran-
scends the reach of reason, and is " past finding out," yet
that its existence is the profoundest of all verities. Where
the case broke down in the hands of the theological ana-
lysts, he insists that it is demonstrably the strongest.
Whether he proves his case is not here the question ; we
only declare that such is his position, which is in dead an-
tagonism to atheism. But it is proper to say that many of
his able opponents acknowledge that Mr. Spencer has con-
tributed new and powerful arguments for the existence of
an " Infinite and Eternal Spirit." In the presence of these
facts, well known to all who care to know, what shall we
say of the veracity, the honour, or even the decency of
those who flippantly reiterate this groundless charge ?

The Charges Against the Popular Science Monthly. 557

And it is important here still further to observe that
Mr. Spencer is not a denier or antagonist of religion. He
holds it to be a reality, a great truth ; in short, nothing less
than an essential and indestructible element of human na-
ture. The religious institutions of the world, he maintains,
represent a genuine and universal feeling in the race just
as really as any other institutions. With the accessory
superstitions which in all ages of ignorance have overgrown
and perverted the religious sentiment, he is, of course, not
in agreement ; and he maintains that the confounding of
these with the religious sentiment itself is a mischievous
mistake of religionists and anti-religionists alike. And he
furthermore holds *that science, in clearing away these su-
perstitions, is bringing us ever nearer to the underlying
truth, and is therefore doing the highest religious work.
And, besides, in all his discussions of religious subjects,
though bold, he is reverent, respectful to sincerity, tolerant
of honest prejudice, and never wantonly irritating in the
treatment of what he regards as religious errors.

A line is to be here drawn, clear and sharp, separating
this mode of regarding religion from that which proclaims
it to be a sham, an imposture, and a mere invention of
priestcraft to cheat credulous people. Between him who
believes that religion is a great and sacred reality, and him
who denounces it root and branch as a delusion originating
in fraud and knavery, there can be no common ground.
These are not the " same opinions," but diametrically op-
posite opinions. A criticism of religious errors, however
trenchant it may be, if it gives the subject sincere and re-
spectful consideration, is as different as any two things can
be, from a spiteful, ruthless, and exasperating assault upon
th£ religious sentiment of the community. And when
these opinions are published for no other reason than to
startle and shock the public by their audacity, and for no
other than a sordid purpose, the case is still further aggra-

558 Edward Livingston Youmans.

vated. The Popular Science Monthly has left others to
make what they might out of this policy.

The writer in the Post complains that we have not pub-
lished the views of such men as the Duke of Argyll, to
which we reply : i. That we should have been glad to pub-
lish the Duke of Argyll's articles, but had no room for
them. 2. That we started a supplement to make more
room, and did publish the views of the Duke of Argyll. 3.
That the papers of his Grace have been very widely re-
printed in other channels, so that the public has ex-
perienced no inconvenience from the want of them. The
Monthly, we must remember, was established not for the
display of polemical pugilism, but for the serious purpose
of placing before American readers the most important re-
sults of scientific thought as presented by its ablest ex-
positors. So far, indeed, has it been from seeking sensa-
tional papers, that its main purpose was to publish a class
of valuable scientific articles, which, because they are too
heavy or will not pay, or conflict with public prejudices,
were systematically excluded from our current magazines.
While striving to make our pages as varied and attractive
as possible, we have not sacrificed the character of the
magazine to promote its pecuniary success. We have
maintained a steady course, our last issue is strictly in the
line of the first, and all the wide approbation that has
been accorded us from the beginning is as applicable now
as it ever was.

The New York Observer, in commenting upon this sub-
ject, agrees with the writer in the Post that the Monthly is
as bad as the Review, if not worse, and it very plainly
says : " We with thousands hope sincerely that the com-
mendable course taken by the eminent publishers, in kic£-
ing the Review out of their premises, will be followed in
regard to the Monthly. Or, what would be better still, let
us hope the Monthly will omit its atheistic teachings, and

The Charges Against the Popular Science Monthly. 559

become such an organ of science as the great body of in-
telligent people will admit with confidence into their
homes."

We have exploded the charge of the Post writer, here
repeated, because he gave us his evidence, and we had
something tangible to deal with. But the Observer scents
atheism in everything scientific, and, if we began to ex-
purgate in accordance with its notions, we should have to
expunge the whole Monthly. For does not the Observer
hold evolution to be atheistic ? And what would The Pop-
ular Science Monthly be, minus evolution ? It is the new
dispensation of scientific thought, cropping out every-
where, antiquating old views, affording new explanations,
reorganizing knowledge, and guiding the researches of
scientific men in every field of investigation. Those who
do business on old opinions are- in a great state of pertur-
bation and distress about it. Some are for " giving in,"
some are for patching up compromises, and some for
" fighting it out." Meanwhile the tide is carrying every-
thing before it, and the confusion of the unready waxes
grotesque. The foreign periodicals arrive monthly loaded
with evolutionary discussions ; and in the last Contempo-
rary Review Calderwood, of Edinburgh, announces that
even Hegelianism is but " dialectical evolution."

The Observer suggests that we make such a periodical
" as the great body of intelligent people will admit with
confidence to their homes." This sounds well, but what is
it in a little plainer English ? " Divest your Monthly of
every feature that can be objectionable to those who care
a good deal more for theological than for scientific teach-
ings, and who have a horror of all science as tending to in-
fidelity." We should not be permitted to say a word of
the progress of scientific thought, because hardly a step is
taken anywhere that somebody with a dogma in that di-
rection does not cry, " Halt, you destroyer of religion ! "

560 Edward Livingston Youmans.

We indulge in no exaggeration. The Observer is au-
thority here, and right above the article in which it recom-
mends that the Monthly be kicked off the premises, we
read, " SCIENCE FORGES WEAPONS CONSTANTLY TO DESTROY
THE FAITH." What kind of a scientific magazine would
that be which should be suited to the state of mind of the
dismal creatures who take such a view of science as this ?
We should rather take the Observer's alternative, and be
kicked into the street, than to edit such a periodical.

The Observer accuses science of " forging weapons to
destroy the faith " ; but need we remind it that science de-
stroys nothing but ignorance and error ? Only where faith
is the enemy of truth can science be the enemy of faith.
Science is the best friend of faith, for only when it has de-
stroyed all it may, can faith have any "abiding founda-
tion." We are afraid that, when the Observer invokes the
publishers' boot as a censor of science, it betrays some
want of confidence in its own foundation. What shall we
say of the security of a religious edifice built upon the
basis of literal Old Testament history ? But in the very
next column to the article we are noticing, it is laid down :

"A DENIAL OF THE LITERAL VERITY OF THE OLD TESTA-
MENT HISTORY IS THE FIRST STEP IN MODERN INFIDELITY."

No more complete or more mischievous mistake can be
committed than to impute to the scientific writers of this age
any hostility to religion as the motive of their labours. That
the course of inquiry often conflicts with cherished tenets
is undoubtedly true, and it is a painful fact; but to charge
scientific men with any intention of inflicting this pain, or
to make them responsible for it, is wholly unjust. The
world has never seen in all its history a class of men more
noble in purpose, more fair-minded, more candid, tolerant,
or considerate, than the class of men who, in all countries,
though with a common spirit, have devoted themselves to
the truth — as it is in science. They have done their work

The Charges Against the Popular Science Monthly. 561

with a single-mindedness, a freedom from partisan and sec-
tarian passion, and an openness and uprightness of pur-
pose, that find no parallel in any other great group of men
engaged in the advancement of a common interest. These
men are entitled to stand first in the respect and confidence
of the community ; and to accuse them of being animated
in their study of nature by a desire to destroy religion, or
to wound the feelings of religious people, is thoroughly
unjustifiable.

The Popular Science Monthly is a record of the scien-
tific activity of the age for the last ten years, and it reflects
the breadth, the independence, and the catholicity of
thought that distinguish the scientific men of our time.
There may have been things said in it which people with a
formulated faith find objectionable ; but they are the re-
sults of honest and earnest thought and the incidents of
legitimate discussion, and must, therefore, be tolerated.
Science cannot work under the dictation of those inter-
ested to restrain it. Are men who make the supreme pur-
pose of their lives the understanding of Nature, to stop re-
search into the laws of life, the genesis of species, the an-
tiquity of man, the functions of the brain, the laws of social
growth, or the natural history of superstitions, because
there are many who, without ever studying these subjects,
have views in relation to them which they do not wish
disturbed ? It is impossible. The great modern movement
of the human mind which we call science is a part of evolv-
ing Nature, and we have no liberty to do anything but rep-
resent it as faithfully as we are able.

VII.
CONCERNING THE SUPPRESSED BOOK.

IT will be no news to the readers of this Monthly that
the volume entitled The Nature and Reality of Religion ; A
Controversy between Herbert Spencer and Frederic Harri-
son, published by D. Appleton & Co. last March, has been
suppressed by order of Mr. Spencer. This catastrophe was
the result of a public correspondence carried on between
these gentlemen in the columns of the London Times.
Fragments of the letters were cabled to this country as they
appeared, and were widely disseminated by the newspapers,
producing some suspense, and giving a confused impression
of the affair. At length came the announcement that the
disagreeable difference was happily composed ; but with it
came also a despatch ordering the destruction of the book
— copies, plates, and all — the damage to be charged to Mr.
Spencer. This seemed a curious way of bringing an un-
pleasant difference between two authors to a harmonious
termination ; but without waiting for explanations, the
mandate was obeyed and the book suppressed. The letters
themselves are now before us, and as they have not all been
previously published in this country, they are herewith sub-
mitted to the reader in full :

THE SPENCER-HARRISON CORRESPONDENCE.

[London Times, May 29,

A NEW FORM OF LITERARY PIRACY.

Mr. Frederic Harrison has forwarded to us for publication the
inclosed letter, which he has addressed to Mr. Herbert Spencer :

(562)

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 563

"May 48, 1885.

" DEAR MR. SPENCER : I cannot admit that there is anything
to justify you in being a party to the American reprint of articles of
mine, without my knowledge or consent. I learn accidentally that a
volume has appeared in New York, which consists of three recent ar-
ticles of yours in the Nineteenth Century, printed alternately with
three recent articles of mine, with an introduction, notes, and appen-
dix. This reissue of my articles was made without the knowledge
of myself, or of the proprietor of the Nineteenth Century, and he tells
me that it is a case of piracy.

" You now avow (in your letter to me of yesterday) that the vol-
ume was issued by your American publishers, and was edited by
your friend Prof. Youmans, after consultation with you, with your
consent and assistance. You also avow that you furnished the
editor with controversial comments on my articles, and requested
him to append them in his own way — that is to say, you have
abetted a clandestine reprint of three articles of mine, interpo-
lated with notes supplied by yourself. I regard this not only as
an act of literary piracy, but as a new and most unworthy form of
literary piracy. May I ask if it is proposed to hand you the profits of
a book of which I am (in part) the author, or are these to be retained
by your American publishers and friend ?

" To justify this act you now write that you expected republica-
tion in America by my friends. This expectation rests, I can assure
you, on a pure invention. No friend of mine, nor any person what-
ever in America or in England, has ever suggested to me the repub-
lication of my articles, nor have I ever heard or thought of such a
project. You quote to me, as your authority, a letter from Prof.
Youmans, who simply says there is danger of its being done by
others, and he adds that I am coming to lecture in America. Again,
this is a pure invention. I have never thought of lecturing in Amer-
ica, or of going there, nor has any one on either side of the Atlantic
suggested to me to do so. Those who ' convey ' my writings will as
readily invent my intentions. Inquiry would have shown that neither
I nor my friends had any intention of reprinting any articles — much
less yours. And I fail to see how an unverified report that they
might be reprinted, coupled with an unverified report that I was go-
ing to lecture in America, could justify you in promoting and assist-
ing in the unauthorized issue and sale of writings of mine.

564 Edward Livingston Youmans.

" This is not a simple case of clandestine reprint. Those of us
who do not take elaborate precautions are exposed to have what they
write appearing in unauthorized American editions. But it does
surprise me that an English writer should connive at this treatment
of another English writer with whom he had been carrying on an
honourable discussion. It is, I think, something new, even in Ameri-
can piracy, to reissue an author's writings behind his back, and sell
them interlarded with hostile comment. Reprints, even while they
plunder us, spare us the sight of our sentences broken on the same
page with such amenities as 'he complacently assumes,' 'loose and
misleading statements/ etc. You avow, in your letter of yesterday,
that you supplied these comments to my articles ; and if internal
evidence did not show them to be yours, by your offer to me to re-
publish them now in England, you treat them as yours. I know no
instance of such a practice. It is as if I were piratically to reprint
your Data of Ethics, freely interspersed with a running commentary
on your practice of ethics, and were to justify my act on the ground
that I had had a controversy with you, and that I had heard your
friends were about to reprint it.

" There is one minor point which serves to show the kind of pub-
lication in which you have chosen to take part. My articles in this
volume are followed by a cutting from a newspaper account of what
the editor calls ' The Little Bethel of the Comtists.' As the volume
bears as its subtitle the words, ' A Controversy between Frederic
Harrison and Herbert Spencer,' that newspaper paragraph would
only be relevant if it referred to practices in which I had some part,
or which I approved. It is well known that I have nothing to do
with anything of the kind, and never countenanced it. Nothing ol the
sort has ever been heard in Newton-hall, where for years past I have
presented Positivism as I understand it. The matter is a small bit of
polemical mischief; those who are engaged in plunder are not likely
to be fair. But I think it is quite unworthy of a place in a volume for
which you are responsible, and which you have authorized and adopt.

" You now propose to me to republish this volume in England,
where you admit it could not appear without the consent of all con-
cerned. After what you have done I must decline to act with you.
I leave your conduct to the judgment of men of sense and of honour.

" I am faithfully yours,
" MR. HERBERT SPENCER. FREDERIC HARRISON."

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 565

[ Times, Jtme sst.~\
MR. FREDERIC HARRISON'S CHARGE.

To the Editor of the Times.

SIR : Will you oblige me by publishing the following letter, which
is a copy of one to Mr. Harrison, referred to by him in his letter con-
tained in The Times of Friday :

QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, W., May 27, 1885.

" DEAR SIR : Here are my replies to the questions put in your
note of yesterday.

" Just before the middle of January I received from my American
friend, Prof. Youmans, a letter dated January 2, containing, among
others, the following paragraphs :

" ' And now we have something of a new embarrassment upon
which I must consult you. There is a pretty sharp demand for the
publication of your controversy with Harrison in a separate form,
and the publishers favour it. The question is not simply whether
it is desirable, for we cannot control it. There is danger that it will
be done by others, and if that should occur it would be construed as
a triumph of the Harrison party — the Spencerians having declined to
go into it.

" • If I thought no one else would print the correspondence (i. e.,
the Nineteenth Century articles), I should be in favour of our not do-
ing it. In the first place, for general effect, rhetoric against reason
counts as about ten to one. The Comtists are reviving — Harrison is
coming over to lecture in this country, and much will be made of his
brilliant conduct of the controversy. In the next place, he has this
advantage of you : your main work bearing upon the issue is to be
sought elsewhere, while Harrison had accumulated all the materials
of his assault and gives his whole case, so that the popular effect
could not fail to be much in his favour. To the narrower circle of
readers who can really appreciate the discussion, the republication
would undoubtedly be an excellent thing, and I suppose, after all, it is
only these that we should much care for. On the whole it may be
politic to reprint. What do you think about it ? '

" There was thus raised a quite unexpected problem. I had sup-
posed that the matter had ended with your letter to the Pall Mall
Gazette ; and having expressed (in the Nineteenth Century) my in-

566 Edward Livingston Youmans.

tention not to continue the controversy, I hoped it would drop.
Here, however, came the prospect of a revival in another shape ; and
I had to choose between republication by my American friends or
republication by your friends, with the implication that I was averse
to it. Though I should have preferred passivity, yet, under the cir-
cumstances stated, I thought it best to assent to republication. One
objection, however, became manifest. While in my replies to you I
had pointed out sundry of your many misrepresentations, I passed
over others — one reason being that I could not trespass too much on
the space of the Nineteenth Century and the attention of its readers.
Now, however, when it was proposed that the statements contained
in your articles should be rediffused, and take a permanent form in-
stead of a temporary form, I felt that I could not leave unnoticed
these other misrepresentations. Appearing in a volume issued by
my American publishers, and edited by my American friend, the
implication would have been that statements made by you to
which no objection was raised were correct statements. If words
in quotation marks tacitly ascribed by you to me had not been
disowned by me (p. 112), it would, of course, have been assumed
that I had used them, and that I stood convicted of the absurdity
which you allege on the assumption that I had used them. If it
had not been shown that an opinion you debit me with (p. 129) is
wholly at variance with opinions which I have expressed in three
different places, it would naturally have been concluded that I held
the opinion. Hence it was clear that unless I was to authorize
the stereotyping of these and other errors I must take measures
to dissipate them. I therefore pointed out to Prof. Youmans the
statements which required notice, indicated the needful rectifica-
tions, and requested him to append these rectifications in his own
way. At the same time I forwarded him a copy of the letter which
you published in the Pall Mall Gazette, saying that ' if this reprint
of the articles is published without this letter, he (you) will inevitably
say that his final reply has been omitted. It is needful, therefore,
that it should be included.' And along with your letter I sent indi-
cations of the points in it which should be noticed.

" Do you think I was not justified in this course ? Do you think
I ought to have withheld my consent to the republication by my
friends, leaving your friends to republish ? Do you think that, having
assented to jepublication, I ought to have let pass without correction

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 567

your misstatements previously uncorrected ? If you think either of
these things, I imagine that few will agree with you. There is, how-
ever, an easy way of bringing the question to issue. All the articles
are copyright in England, and cannot be republished here without
the consent of all concerned. I do not suppose that Mr. Knowles
will raise any difficulty; and if you agree to the reissue of them
here, I am quite willing that they should be reissued. If you think
that anything said in refutation of your statements should not have
been said, we can easily include an appendix in which you can point
out this ; and then, if you wish it, copies of the volume can be sent
round to the press.

" Of course I preserve a copy of this letter with a view to possible
future use. Faithfully yours,

" HERBERT SPENCER.

" FREDERIC HARRISON, Esq."

I will add but two comments. Mr. Harrison had this letter be-
fore him when he wrote his statement. Does the reader find that
his statement produced an impression anything like that which my
letter produces ? The other comment is this. Asking whether I
have any share in the profits, Mr. Harrison not only by this, but by
his title, " A New Form of Literary Piracy," tacitly suggests that
I have. Merely stating that the affair is purely the affair of the
Messrs. Appleton, and that not even a thought about money ever
entered my head concerning it, I draw attention to the readiness
with which Mr. Harrison, without a particle of evidence, makes grave
insinuations. And I do this because it will enable the reader to judge
what need there probably was for taking the measures I did to pre-
vent the wider and more permanent diffusion of Mr. Harrison's mis-
representations.

Concerning the newspaper extract describing a Comtist service I
know nothing, and greatly regret that it was appended. I will at
once ask to have it withdrawn. If three gentlemen, appointed in
the usual way, decide that under the circumstances, as stated to
me by Prof. Youmans, I was not justified in the course I took, I
will, if Mr. Harrison wishes it, request Messrs. Appleton to suppress
the book and destroy the stereotype plates, and I will make good
their loss to them. I am, faithfully yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

May 29.

568 Edward Livingston Youmans.

[ Times ; June 2d.~\
MR. SPENCER AND MR. HARRISON.

To the Editor of the Times.

SIR : I will not pursue this matter further, nor will I insist on Mr.
Spencer's fair offer to submit it to arbitration. It satisfies me if he
will not claim any absolute and moral right to copyright in America
my writings with rectifications of his own. I am accustomed to un-
authorized reprints of what I write ; and as I hear there is a brisk
sale for these essays (quorum pars minima fui) I will only con-
gratulate the Yankee editor on his 'cuteness. As Mr. Spencer, by
his offer, now admits it to be possible that he made a mistake, I am
ready to regard his share of it as an inadvertence. I know too well
his great generosity in money matters to suppose that any question
of profit crossed his mind. But it certainly crossed some one's mind ;
and I referred to it only to convince him that eager partisans had led
him into a mistake. It is not easy at any time to get him to see this,
and to open his eyes I used for once plain words. Conscious that
I had conducted a philosophical debate with an old friend with all
the deference and admiration that I really feel for his genius, it did
pain me to find myself treated as the proverbial dog whom any stick
is good enough to beat. The only arbitration I now desire is that of
some common friend who may convince him that I wish nothing
more than a return to the position of philosophic friends who agree
to differ about their respective systems.

I am, &c.,

FREDERIC HARRISON.

June i.

[ Times, June jv/.]
MR. SPENCER AND MR. HARRISON.

To the Editor of the Times.

SIR : Rather than have any further question with Mr. Harrison,
and rather than have it supposed that I intentionally ignored his
copyright claim, I have telegraphed to Messrs. Appleton to stop the
sale, destroy the stock and plates, and debit me with their loss.
I am, faithfully yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.
CLOVELLY, June 2.

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 569

[ Times, June /j.th^\
MR. SPENCER AND MR. HARRISON.

To the Editor of the Times.

SIR : Allow me to supplement my letter telegraphed yesterday,
partly to explain how the thing arose, and partly to correct an im-
pression made by your leader of to-day. I was wrong in assenting
to the republication by Messrs. Appleton. I ought to have borne
passively the threatened evils of republication by other publishers,
and, as my friend has been connected with publishing in New York
for thirty years, I supposed his impression that these were coming
was correct. But my decision was made in a hurry, without due
thought. Believing there was no time to lose, I telegraphed reply,
and by the next post indicated corrections to be made in the state-
ments of my views. And here I wish to point out that the notes I
indicated were not criticism of Mr. Harrison's opinions, but corrected
versions of my own. Any others, if there are any, are Prof. You-
mans's. I go on to explain that my mind was so engrossed with the
due presentation of the controversy that the question of copyright
never occurred to me ; and the thought that Mr. Harrison might not
like his articles republished was excluded by the impression given-
me that others would republish them if the Appletons did not.
Hence my error. But my error does not, I think, excuse Mr. Harri-
son's insult. By cancelling the rest of the edition and the plates I
have done all that remains possible to rectify the effects of my mis-
take. I am, faithfully yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.
ILFRACOMBE, June 3.

[ Times, June 6th .]
MR. HARRISON AND MR. SPENCER.

To the Editor of the Times.

SIR : May I once more trespass on your space by asking you to
publish the following letter from Mr. Harrison ?

I am, faithfully yours, HERBERT SPENCER.

"38 WESTBOURNE TERRACE, W., June 4, 1885.

"DEAR MR. SPENCER : As.you still appear to think (in spite of
my public disclaimer) that I have brought against you a charge of
25

570 Edward Livingston Youmans.

desiring money profit out of this American reprint, I beg to say that
I did not intend to make any such charge, and I do not believe that
I have. I regret the use of any words which produced that impres-
sion on you. I am, yours faithfully,

"FREDERIC HARRISON.

" P. S. — You can use this letter as you think fit.
" HERBERT SPENCER, Esq."

[Standard, June
MR. SPENCER AND MR. HARRISON.

To the Editor of the Standard.

SIR: The fact that the information to which it refers came
through The Standard must be my excuse for asking you to publish
the following letter, a copy of which I have inclosed to Mr. Harrison,
requesting him to post it after reading it.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant, HERBERT SPENCER.

"38 QUEEN'S GARDENS, BAYSWATER, LONDON, W., Juneq.

" MY DEAR YOUMANS : I returned home last night, and only
this morning learned that in The Standard of Saturday last there was,
in a telegram from New York, a statement to the effect that Messrs.
Appleton decline to destroy the stock and plates of the reprinted con-
troversy (as I had telegraphed them to do), on the score that
the book would be reprinted by some other publisher. In this ex-
pectation they are probably right. But a reprint would necessarily
be without the notes ; since these, as implied in your preface, are
your copyright in America. Now, though these notes — or, at
least those which I pointed out as needful — are corrections of erro-
neous statements of my views, yet, rather than have it supposed that I
wished to take any advantage of Mr. Harrison in making such cor-
rections, I will submit to the evil of reissue by another publisher
without them ; and I therefore repeat the request that the stock and
stereoplates may be destroyed, and the loss debited to me.

" One word respecting the proposal of the Appletons to share the
author's profits between Mr. Harrison and myself. If any have at
present accrued, or if, in consequence of refusal to do as I have
above requested, any should hereafter accrue, then I wish to say

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 571

that having been, and being now, absolutely indifferent to profit in
the matter, I shall decline to accept any portion of the returns.
" Ever sincerely yours,

"HERBERT SPENCER."

Several points in this correspondence, especially in its
opening letter, require some notice in this place ; but, before
making the critical corrections that seem to be required, I
desire to say a few words on the peculiar circumstances of
American publication which have an important bearing
on the present case.

Mr. Frederic Harrison took offence at the American re-
print in a book of some review articles of his, and pro-
nounces it " a case of piracy." The organs of English
opinion, in commenting upon these letters, take the same
view. The London Times, after referring to the grace-
ful and honourable termination of the disagreeable dif-
ference between Mr. Harrison and Mr. Spencer, devotes
a leading editorial to the discussion of American piracy
on the basis of the fresh and striking illustration of it
here afforded. Speaking of the effect of the "tolerably
rigid copyright law " of England, the Times says : " But so
far as America is concerned it is different. To the English
author that country seems to answer very much to Hobbes's
idea of a state of nature. Foreign aulhors are fair prey ;
for them there is or need be no selling or buying of copy-
rights, and a good book is to be dealt with as a part of the
common elements of Nature. If any laws govern the mat-
ter, it is only those which regulate the capture and reduc-
tion into possession of wild animals." The case is cer-
tainly bad enough, but this is an exaggeration.

At the outset I admit that on the question of interna-
tional copyright, or the claims of foreign authors to prop-
erty in their books, the English are right and the Ameri-
cans wrong — so flagrantly wrong as to justify much of the

572 Edward Livingston Youmans.

denunciation we receive. The position of our Government
upon the subject I regard as wholly indefensible. Its
policy is an outrage upon a class of men who are public
benefactors, a disgrace to the country, and a scandal to
civilization. Grover Cleveland's republic does not recog-
nize that Frederic Harrison and Herbert Spencer have any
right of property in the products of their brainwork. Their
productions when brought to the United States belong
neither to them nor to anybody else. They are not pro-
tected by law, and may be appropriated by anybody with-
out violation of law. There are many in this country who
realize the vice of this policy quite as vividly as the for-
eign victims of it and who are labouring hard to put an end
to it. But, without offering a word of apology for it, there is
still something to be said in behalf of those who are com-
pelled to act under a bad state of things which they reprobate
but are for the time powerless to remedy. It is certainly
unjust to involve these in the indiscriminate condemnation
of the vicious system. It is a good deal easier to denounce
it at a distance than to fight it on the spot. Nor is it pos-
sible for authors, living under a government which so
stringently protects them that they acquire the habit of re-
garding literary property as something peculiarly sacred,
to fully appreciate the difficulties of publication and the
course which business must take under entirely opposite
circumstances, where literary property is without any legal
protection. With no international copyright it is certainly
impossible to act as if we had one. That the Government
does not protect him, and that if protected at all it must be
done by himself, is the first and vital fact that has to be
taken into account when any publisher makes the venture
of reissuing a foreign book in this country. The Govern-
ment is, in fact, his enemy, and virtually calls upon every-
body to make war upon him. However disposed he may
be to treat a foreign author well, to bring out his work in

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 573

respectable shape, and pay him for it fairly, he meets this
ugly circumstance at the threshold of the transaction, that
the money he puts into it may be sunk because anybody
can reprint the work in cheaper form and without paying
the author anything. Nor is this all ; the more honourable
he is, the worse it is for him. Any sense of liberality he
may indulge works directly against him. If he publishes
the book in good form, pays a decent royalty, and makes
it properly known by advertising, all this is a temptation
to other parties to take advantage of his outlay, and the
reputation the book acquires by means of it, to fill the
market with mean editions that kill the honest publication.
The American publisher is therefore compelled to adopt a
policy very different from that in England, where books
are vigilantly and effectively protected by law. He has to
conform to the necessities of a lawless state of things, and
must be left to make the best he can of it.

But the indiscriminate charges of the London Times are
not true; all American publishers are not freebooters and
pirates. Although it is not possible for them to treat for-
eign authors with full justice in the absence of international
copyright, yet it is false that these authors are preyed upon
in the unqualified way asserted by the Times. There are,
of course, American publishers, and plenty of them, who
are thoroughly unscrupulous; but there are others, and
they are not a few, who do the best they can under the
present demoralizing system to compensate foreign authors
for their work. They pay them by voluntary arrangement,
not the rates that they are accustomed to at home, and not
always perhaps as much as they might, but often, as I hap-
pen to know, to their own loss, when books are reprinted
by others and the market supplied by degraded editions on
which the author receives nothing. In the absence of an
international copyright law, this voluntary action of Ameri-
can publishers is the only thing practicable or possible to

574 Edward Livingston Youmans.

mitigate the barbarism of the situation. Imperfect as it
may be, it is an honest procedure in behalf of the foreign
author; and it is now practised to an extent that should
materially qualify those wholesale charges of piracy. The
present case is to be regarded in the light of these consid-
erations ; and I think it will be found that the lesson to be
drawn from it is quite different from that which has been
drawn by the English press.

So far as the above correspondence is concerned, the
motives that impelled me to take the share I had in bring-
ing out the suppressed book are to be gathered only
from a scrap in a hurried private letter to Mr. Spencer;
but, as my act is now branded as piratical, I must be ex-
cused for stating more fully the reasons by which I was
actually influenced in the course taken.

Mr. Harrison had an important controversy with Her-
bert Spencer on a grave subject, which was published in
the Nineteenth Century. In printing their papers I have
the right to assume their purpose to be that they should
be read as widely as possible. There was much interest
in this country to follow this discussion, and we accord-
ingly printed the articles in The Popular Science Monthly.

But, when the controversy was finished, there was a call
for its republication in a separate form, more convenient,
accessible, and cheaper than in the pages of a magazine.
The demand was reasonable, and I was anxious to comply
with it, that the discussion might be disseminated as widely
as possible. I, moreover, desired the republication for the
same reason that I had urged Mr. Spencer to go on with the
controversy with Mr. Harrison. Although knowing the
low state of his working power, and how important it was
that he should not be interrupted by such side issues in
the prosecution of the great philosophical work upon which
he has been engaged for many years, it seemed to me of

Concerning the Suppressed Book.

greater importance that he should seize the opportunity
offered by Mr. Harrison's attack to develop more fully his
fundamental religious opinions. He had published but
little upon that subject for a long time, his views had been
much controverted and much misunderstood, and I knew
there was a strong desire on the part of many to read
everything he might say in further interpretation and elu-
cidation of them. His distinctive doctrines were now vig-
orously and formally attacked by a sagacious adversary,
long prepared by his special studies to put them to the
severest test. For the same reason that I encouraged Mr.
Spencer to give time to the discussion, I desired that his
readers in this country should be put in ready possession
of it when done. I may add that in this I was impelled by
the same general motives that had prompted me for many
years to do what I could to bring Mr. Spencer's ideas be-
fore the American people.

But there were special reasons which made me wish
that the publication should be issued by D. Appleton &
Co. This house had printed all of Spencer's works; and
as a present statement of his religious views would be an
important addition to them, and would naturally be called
for in connection with them, it seemed important that his
controversy with Harrison should be brought out in a rep-
utable and permanent shape to take its place with his other
books. Besides, there was a high degree of certainty that
the discussion would be published by somebody. The
names of the eminent contestants, and the interest felt by
a large number of people in the subject, were evinced by a
strong demand for the publication. The discussion in its
separate form was called for by the friends of Mr. Harrison
and by the friends of Mr. Spencer, and by others who were
friends of neither. It was open to anybody to print it, and
there was every probability that it would be picked up
and issued in a cheap, catchpenny edition, which is now so

576 Edward Livingston Youmans.

common with publications of every kind. I desired, there-
fore, that the Appletons should bring it out in a respectable
shape and at a moderate price, that the book might be had
at any time in a form suitable for preservation.

I protest that these considerations were not vitiated by
any covetous desire or purpose whatever. Mr. Harrison
says it is a case of " piracy " ; but, so far as this involves
the taking of his property without compensation, there was
no thought of it. In his opening letter he virtually accused
Mr. Spencer of collusion in the piracy of his articles, from
a sordid intention. Judged by this extraordinary letter,
Mr. Harrison's religion of humanity consists chiefly in im-
puting vile motives to his fellow-men. He said, " May I
ask if it is proposed to hand you the profits of a book of
which I am (in part) the author, or are these to be retained
by your American publishers and friend?" Evidently the
pecuniary consideration was uppermost in his own mind.
But he had here gone too far. Everybody recognized the
outrage. The reader will note the striking difference in
tone, amounting to a collapse, between his first and his
second letters. He withdrew the offensive insinuation so
far as Mr. Spencer was concerned, saying, " I know too
well his great generosity in money matters to suppose that
any question of profit crossed his mind." But he knew this
no better when he wrote his second letter than when he
wrote the first. He sent Mr. Spencer a private note asking
explanations about the book, and this Mr. Spencer an-
swered, but said nothing respecting the copyright ; this
did not enter his mind, probably for the reason that the
house which issued it had published his books for twenty-
five years, paying him regularly on all of them from the
first, and he had no care about it, knowing that the equita-
ble thing would of course be done to all concerned. But
the inadvertence gave Harrison his opportunity.

But while Mr. Harrison exonerates Mr. Spencer from

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 577

all thought of making profit out of him, he adds, " But it
certainly crossed some one's mind," referring, of course, to
Mr. Spencer's " American publishers and friend." Yet
there was not the slightest wish or design on the part of
the publishers of the book to withhold from Mr. Harrison
his proper share in its copyright proceeds. They have
published the scientific and philosophical works of many
English authors, on which they have paid the customary
compensation allowed to American authors, and if Mr. Har-
rison doubts it he can satisfy himself by inquiring of his
neighbours, Tyndall, Lecky, Huxley, Bain, Sully, or the
Darwins, and there is surely no reason why they should not
have compensated Mr. Harrison in the same way ; and this
was certainly their intention.

But perhaps the party who desired to plunder Mr.
Harrison (he uses the significant word twice in his first let-
ter) was Mr. Spencer's American friend, and that he sup-
posed this "friend" capable of sharp practice is inferable
from his remark, " I will only congratulate the Yankee edi-
tor on his 'cuteness." Yet the 'cute Yankee editor in this
case was the only party to get nothing. Among the sev-
eral stools occupied by authors and publishers, it was his
fate to sit on the ground. Neither by stipulation nor ex-
pectation was he to have a cent for his labour in editing the
volume, or his efforts in promoting its circulation. The
reasons which actuated him have been already stated. But
as the question is here raised of venal motives in the treat-
ment of foreign authors, and as this transaction has been
extensively paraded as a flagitious example of American
piracy, the editor of the suppressed book is entitled to say
that he has done his full share in a practical way toward
promoting international equity in the payment of authors
for their books. He gave nearly a year's labour to the or-
ganization of the International Scientific Series for the
avowed purpose of securing more satisfactory compensa-

578 Edward Livingston Youmans.

tion to scientific writers. The project was based upon the
condition of the payment of copyright to each of the con-
tributors from all the countries in which the books were
issued. Nothing of the kind had ever been done or at-
tempted before ; and, in regard to its result, Dr. John W.
Draper remarked, " Although there are international
copyright regulations in Europe, and my various works
have been translated into many foreign languages, I have
never received anything from them except upon the vol-
ume I wrote for the International Series, and on that I have
been paid regularly by the English, French, German, and
Italian, as well as by the American publishers." Fifty vol-
umes have now appeared in that series, and the American
publishers have voluntarily paid all the foreign contribu-
tors the same as if they had been citizens of the United
States. And this they have done in spite of the fact that
this honourable arrangement has been disregarded, and
various of the volumes have been reprinted in shabby
twenty-cent editions, on which, of course, the authors have
received nothing.

This, then, is the way in which Mr. Harrison has been
outraged. He had his articles brought out in good shape
for such of his friends as desired to possess them in a sepa-
rate form. He has been " plundered " by being protected
against plunder on the part of those who might have issued
a trivial and fugitive edition of his controversy, and allowed
him nothing for it. He has been " pirated " by having
voluntarily secured for him the substantial benefits of an
international copyright law.

But Mr. Harrison's articles were used without his con-
sent, and that is what the charge of " piracy " here amounts
to. His consent was not asked because it would have im-
plied control of that over which he had no control. If he
had refused, that would not have stopped the publication,
but would have simply defeated the purposes of those who

Concerning tJie Suppressed Book. 579

knew better than Mr. Harrison did what required to be
done. He was not consulted for the simple reason, now
obvious enough, that he would be unlikely to make allow-
ance for a state of things utterly different from that to
which he has been accustomed. He was not asked, because,
while his assent would have done no good, his dissent
would have done injury to himself, to Mr. Spencer, and to
the public. And that Mr. Harrison would have withheld
his consent is far from improbable. That the book was
wanted here by many readers was nothing to him, as is
shown by the fact that, when a word would have saved it
from destruction, he declined to utter it. Something is of
course due to courtesy, but I was not at all certain that
courtesy would be met in the same spirit. The feeling of
high-toned British authors toward American " pirates " is
not usually vented in gracious expression. American ex-
perience with such authors is apt to engender diffidence in
approaching them. Those gentlemanly and honourable
publishers, the Messrs. Putnam, having special reasons re-
cently to make overtures to Mr. Ruskin for the use of one of
his articles (to be paid for, of course), were deterred from
doing so because that author " absolutely declined to come
into any relation with an American publisher." Mr. Har-
rison is understood to be a particular and punctilious
man, and that he can, upon occasion, pretermit the re-
quirements of amiable civility, and take to " plain words,"
is amply attested by his letter of May 29th to Herbert
Spencer.

But, in the matter of " piracy," it is Mr. Spencer who
comes in for Harrison's hottest indignation. He accuses
him of having invented a new form of it, and aggravated
the offence by its clandestine perpetration. Now, let us see
what it was that Spencer did. After finishing the controversy
in the Nineteenth Century, Mr. Harrison transferred it to
the Pall Mall Gazette, in which he printed an additional

580 Edward Livingston Youmans.

article, addressed to a new audience, and filled with very ob-
jectionable misstatements. It would not do, in editing the
volume which was intended to be a full presentation of the
discussion, to leave this article out. But to print it with-
out corrections would be unjust to Spencer, and to the
readers of the book, who wanted and were entitled to the
completest statement of the case. There was no call for
anything more from Mr. Harrison, who had had his last
word, and declared that he should pursue the controversy
no further ; but there was a need that corrections by Spen-
cer should be supplied. He accordingly sent me the sub-
stance of some additions to be appended as notes, and
which I inserted in their appropriate places. I deny the
wrongfulness of this act, and the ado that has been made
over it seems to me perfectly absurd. Mr. Spencer did
what it was desirable and entirely proper that he should
do. He had not only the right but it was his duty to de-
fend himself against the erroneous representations of Mr.
Harrison ; and I insist that, if any apology was due either
way, it was from Mr. Harrison to Spencer for making the
misstatements, rather than from Spencer to Harrison for
correcting them.

Mr. Spencer, as will be seen, prints two paragraphs
from a private letter of mine giving reasons which induced
him to favour the American reprint, and Mr. Harrison char-
acterizes them as chiefly " inventions." I had said, " Har-
rison is coming over to lecture in this country/' and Mr.
Harrison says he never thought of it. I wrote carelessly ;
but my meaning was, that he is expected to come, and in
this there was no "invention." It had been talked about,
and there was nothing unlikely in it. The coming of emi-
nent Englishmen to this country to lecture is certainly no
unusual thing. Mr. Harrison is a lecturer, a man of ideas
which he is interested in propagating, and is reputed to
have means and leisure. He has many admirers in the

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 581

United States, and a reputation which would be certain to
secure him good audiences. As it turns out, " the wish
was father to the thought," but the rumour was not im-
probable. I should have referred to it as a contingency,
and I simply meant that it might be worth taking into
account, with reference to the publication of the contro-
versy.

Mr. Harrison says the idea that there was any danger
of republication in this country by his friends rested also
upon pure " invention." But I did not say this. I wrote
to Spencer, " There is danger that it will be done by others,
and if that should occur it would be construed as a triumph
of the Harrison party." Mr. Spencer's interpretation of it
was, " 1 had to choose between republication by my Ameri-
can friends or republication by your friends, with the im-
plication that 1 was averse to it." And Mr. Spencer was
here substantially right. Although there may have been no
apprehension that Mr. Harrison's avowed friends would
move in reprinting the book, yet if it had been done by any-
body but the Appletons, the inevitable inference would have
been that their author had been so badly handled that they
declined to back him. The book was looked for from Mr.
Spencer's publishers, they had printed it in their magazine,
they issued all his works, there was a demand for the vol-
ume which was certain to make it a safe business venture,
and it represented two sides or schools of thought : if, un-
der all these circumstances, D. Appleton & Co. had left the
work for others to publish, the certain construction would
have been that the book was abandoned to the party op-
posed to Mr. Spencer. This is the aspect of the case which
he had to meet, and it is not at all affected by Mr. Harri-
son's statement that his friends had no idea of printing the
controversy.

Another explanation seems here called for. Those who
will refer to the second paragraph of my letter, quoted by

582 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Mr. Spencer, will observe both an indecision and a confu-
sion in the statement. This was due not only to hasty
writing but to some perplexity in my own mind. I said,
" If I thought no one else would print the correspondence "
(controversy), " I should be in favour of our not doing it " ;
and I then go on to give reasons for this conclusion, end-
ing with the remark, " On the whole, it may be politic to
reprint." Apparently this indifference to publication is
inconsistent with the various reasons I have given for
strongly desiring it. But there was a consideration not
mentioned in the letter which weighed much with me at the
time. I was in very bad health, and was urged by physicians
and friends to go South without delay. It seemed therefore
to be impracticable, if not impossible, for me to give that
attention to the editing and publication of the volume
which were prompted by my interest in it. But it will be
noticed that, under this conflict of inclinations, though I
gave some trivial reasons for non-publication, the conclusion
favours reprinting. This shows the predominant feeling,
even in a time of depression ; and I must say, as a matter
of fact, that, though referring the matter as I did in a hur-
ried note to Mr. Spencer, I had not for a moment really
relinquished the purpose of bringing out the book. This
explanation is necessary, that the responsibility may rest
where it properly belongs. Mr. Harrison lays stress upon
Spencer's agency in " promoting and assisting " in the pro-
duction of " a volume for which you are responsible, and
which you have authorized and adopt." But though Mr.
Spencer chose to take the responsibility because he had
assented to it, and furnished some notes for it, yet it was
neither by his suggestion, procurement, nor desire that the
book was issued ; and truth requires me here to say that, if
he had discouraged or even opposed it, the book would
probably have been reprinted by D. Appleton & Co. all the
same. Mr. Spencer had, in reality, very little to do with

Concerning the Suppressed Book. 583

the edition. For the Introduction, the bad taste with
which the notes were embellished, and the newspaper quo-
tation describing the doings in a branch of the positivist
church in London which Mr. Harrison does not like, he is
not to be held to account.

For his offence in correcting some injurious misrepre-
sentations in a controversial volume published for the use
of a people three thousand miles away, the London Times
declares that Mr. Spencer has made the amende honorable
by destroying the book : and this is the general English
view. The equally general American view is, that this ex-
treme'proceeding was ridiculous, that it benefited nobody,
and gratuitously deprived many readers in this country of
a valuable work on an important subject. It is, at any
rate, desirable that the responsibility for this result should
be fixed where it justly belongs. Mr. Spencer made two
proposals to Harrison looking to the preservation of the
work, both of which were absolutely fair, but neither of
which was accepted. Mr. Spencer would have been justi-
fied in making a stand upon either of these propositions,
and refusing further concessions ; but Mr. Harrison's re-
jection of his overtures left the matter in so unsatisfactory
a shape that nothing remained for Mr. Spencer but to cut
the knot by ordering the book to be suppressed.

APPENDIX A.

ANCESTRY.

SAMUEL YOUMANS, the great-great-grandfather of E. L.
Youmans, was of English descent, and was born on Long
Island about 1700. He was a wheelwright. He moved
from Long Island to Fishkill-on-the-Hudson, in Dutchess
County, about 1720. He had two sons, John and Anthony,
who were farmers, living in Dutchess County till their father
was an old man. When, about i77o-*75, the cheap land on
the west side of the Hudson below Albany was opened to
emigrants, these men migrated with their growing families,
taking with them their aged father, and settled at Coey-
mans upon "lease land." The land along the Hudson
was mostly owned by a few Dutchmen, who held it by
letters patent from the King of Holland. Only in this
region did feudalism ever get a foothold in our country,
and the last vestige of it disappeared half a century ago in
a civil conflict known as the anti-rent war. Each of these
Dutch landlords made his own terms with settlers inde-
pendently of the others, and the business shrewdness of a
man was shown as much in the choosing of his landlord as
in the choosing of his land. John Youmans took up two
hundred acres of heavily timbered land, for which he
agreed to pay what in the end proved a ruinous rent; but
five years were given free of rent for clearing the land and
getting ready for cropping.

(585)

586 Edward Livingston Youmans.

Jeremiah, the second son of John Youmans, in the year
1791, at the age of twenty-three, married Margaret Vincent,
the fifth child of Levi Vincent, a resident of Coeymans, and
the young couple began their married life upon a portion
of the paternal two hundred acres, to which more were
added from adjacent new land belonging to the same land-
lord. Here Vincent Youmans, their second son and the
father of E. L. Youmans, was born in 1794. Here his
mother, Margaret Vincent Youmans, died in 1801, leaving
six little children ; here Samuel Youmans died at a great
age in 1797, and John Youmans a few years later. Vin-
cent Youmans distinctly remembered his great-grandfather,
whom he saw daily in the early years of his life. At the
death of his mother, when he was seven years old, Vincent
went to live with his mother's parents — was chosen from
the little flock, no doubt, because of his name. He always
spoke of their place as " home," but it was only a mile
away from his father's house, where he was a daily visitor.

Nothing certain is known of the origin of Samuel You-
mans, but it is not improbable that his father or grand-
father were among the early colonists of New England.
There were Yeamans, Yeomans, and Youmans in and about
Boston, Ipswich, and New Haven in i633-'39~'5o, and
emigration to Long Island from Massachusetts and Con-
necticut colonies began before 1650. The various spellings
of the name are, of course, not the slightest bar to the sup-
position that they all descended from the same stock, for
everywhere before the nineteenth century there was extreme
carelessness about the spelling of names, as, indeed, about
spelling in general. The same name will be found spelled
in one way in the body of an old local history and will be
referred to by another spelling in the index. But, whether
four or six generations of Americanization be allowed,
Samuel Youmans and his descendants seem to have been
perfectly assimilated to the American type of character.

Appendix A. 587

They were tough, athletic men, of tireless industry, self-
reliant, self-asserting, apt to be on the aggressive and un-
popular side of public questions both in religion and poli-
tics, ultra-democratic, despising people who boasted of their
ancestry or claimed distinction on any ground but that of
personal merit. To explain the great hardiness of Vincent
Youmans, his fervour of conviction, the honour he paid to
labour, his contempt of frivolities, and the gloomy severity
of his religious experience, seven generations of hard-
working pioneer Puritan ancestors are none too many.

The maternal great-grandfather of Vincent Youmans
was Leonard Vincent. There is on record at White Plains,
Westchester County, a deed of twenty-six acres of land
given to Leonard Vincent in 1713 by Charles Vincent
" with the consent of his parents." This land is now with-
in the limits of New York city. Leonard Vincent married
a Dutch girl of the neighbourhood and had four sons —
John, Levi, Leonard, and Samuel. Levi, the second son,
married into a family of Dutchess County Quakers named
Hoxie. His wife was the daughter of Zebulon Hoxie, a
blacksmith, and one of the first settlers of that county,
coming from Stonington and settling in the town of Beek-
man, where some of his descendants are still living.

Levi Vincent lived for several years after his marriage
in Dutchess County, and migrated from there to Coeymans
at nearly the same time as the Youmanses. He had a large
family, was a skilful blacksmith, and also managed his
own farm. He was careful in business, and his family was
reared in more comfort than was usual to the time and
place. He was a man of sound judgment, much respected
by his neighbours, and often chosen by them to settle their
disputes and difficulties. He had a cheerful temper and
friendly manners, was humorous, and fond of a laugh. It
was said by Edward's father and uncles that in character
and disposition as well as in certain physical traits he re-

588 Edward Livingston Youmans.

sembled this ancestor. As Vincent Youmans was reared
in his family, we have from him more details of Vincent
than of Youmans history. Levi Vincent wore the garb,
attended the meetings, and held to the principles of the
Quaker society, of which his wife was a member, but he
never joined them nor used their form of speech. He had
six sons, tall, finely developed men. The Vincents were
usually large men, standing six feet in their stockings, and
in this respect the Hoxies were like them. There was a
double marriage between Zebulon Hoxie's family and that
of Leonard Vincent. The Vincents were Tories. And
here authentic early history of these Vincent and Hoxie
families ends.

But there is a field of conjecture that seems plausible.
Vincents and Hoxies are both Cape Cod families. The
Hoxies were first heard of in this country at Sandwich
about the time the Quakers appeared there, and were
themselves Quakers. Their relations with the Vincents in
town concerns is matter of history, as follows: There was
a family of Vincents living at Plymouth in 1639, and that
very year John Vincent was one of a committee of ten men
sent from Plymouth to found the town of Sandwich in
Cape Cod. He was also one of the two first representa-
tives of the town of Sandwich in 1639 at the Colonial As-
sembly in New Plymouth. Later he was placed on a com-
mittee appointed to lay out the true boundaries of lands in
Sandwich, and Ludovic and Edward Hoxie were among
the owners whose lands the committee adjusted. It seems
fair to infer from this that John Vincent was a resident of
Sandwich; that these Vincents and Hoxies knew each
other and were neighbours. The Vincents were freemen
and of the dominant faith. Both the families of Vincents
and Hoxies that we know of in later times opposed our
revolutionary war with England— the Hoxies on religious
grounds, and the Vincents from loyalty to the Crown.

Appendix A. 589

Now, the first Ludovic Hoxie mentioned above had six
sons ; four of them bore the names respectively of Joseph,
Peleg, Abram, and Ludovic. And the great-grandfather of
Vincent Youmans — the Dutchess County Quaker and black-
smith from Stonington — Zebulon Hoxie, had four sons —
Joseph, Abram, Peleg, and Ludovic, repetitions of the Cape
Cod Hoxie family names. This hardly seems accidental.
Zebulon Hoxie might easily have been a grandson of the
first Ludovic Hoxie, and Stonington in those days of travel
by water was on the route of migration from Cape Cod to
Dutchess County. Besides, the double marriage that oc-
curred between the two families from which E. L. Youmans
descended, when they were separated many miles by bad
roads and primeval forests, indicates family intimacies in
earlier times. There are other grounds for this conjecture,
but it scarcely seems worth while to present them here.
All that is known of the maternal ancestry of Catherine
Scofield Youmans is given on page 5. Her father, Gideon
Scofield, was born in Connecticut. His mother was a Hoyt,
and the Hoyts and Scofields from which he was descended
were among the oldest and staunchest families of that fa-
mous stronghold of tempered Puritanism.

APPENDIX B.

LIST OF WRITINGS.

A CLASS-BOOK OF CHEMISTRY. In which the principles
of the science are familiarly explained and applied to the
arts, agriculture, physiology, dietetics, ventilation, and the
most important phenomena of Nature. Designed for the
use of academies and schools and for popular reading, by
Edward L. Youmans, author of A New Chart of Chemistry.

" To know that which before us lies in daily life is the
prime wisdom." — Milton.

New York: D. Appleton & Co., 200 Broadway, 1851.
A new edition, entirely rewritten, with over three hundred
illustrations, in 1863. Rewritten and revised, with many
new illustrations, in 1875.

ALCOHOL AND THE CONSTITUTION OF MAN. Being a
popular scientific account of the chemical properties of
alcohol and its leading effects upon the healthy human
constitution. Illustrated by a beautifully colored chart.
D. Appleton & Co., 200 Broadway, 1854. Fowler & Wells,
131 Nassau Street, 1854.

CHEMICAL ATLAS; or, The Chemistry of Familiar Ob-
jects. Exhibiting the general principles of the science in
a series of beautifully colored diagrams, and accompanied
by explanatory essays, embracing the latest views of the
subjects illustrated. Designed for the use of students and
pupils in all schools where chemistry is taught. By

(590)

Appendix B. 591

Edward L. Youmans. D. Appleton & Co., 346 and 348
Broadway, 1856.

THE HANDBOOK OF HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE. A popular
account of heat, light, air, aliment, and cleansing, in their
scientific principles and domestic applications. With numer-
ous illustrative diagrams. Adapted for academies, semina-
ries, and schools. By Edward L. Youmans. D. Appleton
& Co., 346 and 348 Broadway, 1857.

THE CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES. A
series of expositions by Prof. Grove, Prof. Helmholtz, Dr.
Mayer, Dr. Faraday, Prof. Liebig, and Dr. Carpenter.
With an introduction and brief biographical notices of the
chief promoters of the new views. By Edward L. You-
mans. D. Appleton & Co., 90, 92, and 94 Grand Street,
1864.

THE CULTURE DEMANDED BY MODERN LIFE. A series
of addresses and arguments on the claims of scientific
education. By Profs. Tyndall, Henfrey, Huxley, Paget,
Whewell, Faraday, Liebig, Draper, De Morgan ; Drs.
Barnard, Hodgson, Carpenter, Hooker, Acland, Forbes;
Herbert Spencer, Sir John Herschel, Sir Charles Lyell, Dr.
Seguin, Mr. Mill, etc. With an introduction on Mental
Discipline in Education, by E. L. Youmans. D. Appleton
& Co., 549 and 551 Broadway, 1867.

INDEX.

AGASSIZ, Prof., 57.

Agricultural chemistry, 41, 93-94.

Alcohol, writes upon, 92.

Alger, Rev. W. R., 163.

Ancient Philosophy and Modern Sci-
ence lectures, 73.

Antioch College, 211.

Antisell, Dr., 61.

Antislavery, 30, 51.

Appletons, 59, 66, 68, in, 154 ; Mr.
W. H. Appleton, 113, 141, 154,
184, 276.

Appletons' Journal, 255, 258-259,
267.

Arithmetical text-book, 63-64.

Beecher, H. W., 201, 321, 377, 379.
Biological science, study of, 429 ;

as discipline, 432.
Blindness, 40-72.
Brain as organ of mind, 411-414,

455, 462-469 ; contempt for, 478.
Burdsall, J. R., 62.

Cambridge, visit to, 137.
Carpenter, Dr., 550.
Charges against P. S. M., 552.
Chemical Atlas, 93.
Chemical Chart, 62.
Chemical studies, beginning of, 25 ;
interest in agricultural chemistry,
26

41, 50, 54 ; experiments in, 55 ; at-
tends Draper's lectures, 64.

Chemical text-book, 63-70.

Class-Book of Chemistry, 63-70 ;
new edition sale of, 145.

Comte, 152, 166, 173, 182, 233, 235,

290, 337, 515.

Concerning the suppressed book,
562.

Conflict between thought and insti-
tutions, 399.

Cook, Mr. Ransom, 41 ; Mrs., 45, 49.

Copyright, 281, 366, 374, 375 ; inter-
national, 571.

Correlation of Forces, publication of,

147-

Cosmic philosophy, 290-291.
Culture, aims of, 418 ; waste and

economy in, 420 ; incentives to,

445-
Culture demanded by Modern Life,

publication of, 221 ; introduction

to, 399.
Cyclopaedia of Household Science,

322.

Darwin, Charles, 276 ; relation of, to

Spencer, 104, 378, 541.
Darwins, the, 276.
Dawson, Dr., 498.
Delafield, Dr., 42.

(593)

594

Edward Livingston Youmans.

Discipline, mental, 399 ; of memory,
403 ; of judgment, 404 ; of gram-
mar study, 404-407 ; of mathe-
matics, 407-409 ; meaning of, 410 ;
vicarious, 417 ; of science studies,
423 ; of language studies, 441.

District school, the, 21-26.

Education Spencer's essays on, pub-
lishers of, no.

Eliot, George, 127, 340, 366.

Elliott, Dr., 44.

Essays, Spencer's, 114, 115, 148, 154-
157, 160, 168, 176, 512-525.

Evolution, teacher of, 74-76 ; doc-
trine of, 104 ; labours for, 148 ; re-
ligious aspects of, 496, 497 ; rise
of the idea of, 512-517.

Eye Infirmary, experience of, 43.

First Principles, 528-533.

Fiske, John, 164, 166, 363, 365,

378.

Flanders, Benjamin, 46.
Free Religious Association, address

to, 321.

Good, Uncle, 22.
Grammar, the study of, 404-407.
Greeley, Horace, 45, 300.
Gundy, Joe, 15.

Habit, physiological, meaning of,
459-

Handbook of Household Science,
94.

Handwriting, 50, 91.

Hawkins, Waterhouse, 251.

Harrison, Frederic, 387, 562.

Health, 345, 367-369, 383.

History of progress in arts and in-
vention begun, 58.

Holmes, O. W., letters of, 146, 315.
Huxley, T. H., 129 ; visits America,

333 ; lectures here, 335, 546.
Human Nature, Scientific Study of,

lecture, 223-227, 451.

Illogical Geology, essay on, 524.
Insane, treatment of, 471.
Instructor, the function of, 482.
International Scientific Series, 266-

293, 577-
Inventional Geometry, 332.

Judgment, discipline of, 404.
Ketcham, James, 49, 52.

Language, study of, 440.

Lecturing, 72.

Letters of H. S. to E. L. Y., first,
108 ; his view of our national
prospects in 1863, 151 ; on
article in New Englander, 152 ;
about his new volume of essays,
172 ; Comte and positivism, 173 ;
classification of the sciences, 175 ;
further explanations of, and of
Social Statics, 180 ; reply to Min-
turn, 216 ; on title of Philosophy,
233 ; dedication to his American
friends, 261 ; retrospect and pros-
pects, 304 ; advice to E. L. Y.
concerning Monthly, 314 ; con-
cerning economy of effort, 324;
on address of E. L. Y. to Liberal
Club, 325 ; growth of the idea of
evolution in his own mind, 327 ;
on work-drunkenness, 331 ; in-
vites E. L. Y. to go to Riviera,
347 ; speaks of coming to Ameri-
ca, 370 ; more about it, 373 ; on
international copyright, 375.

Index.

595

Letters of E. L. Y. while lecturing,
81-91, 243-248 ; first one to Spen-
cer, 106 ; about publication of Edu-
cation, 112; of the Spencers at
Derby, 117 ; first impressions of
London, 119; visit to Glasgow,
121 ; Lewes, Mrs., 127, 340, 366 ;
dines at Gloster Square, meets
J. D. Morell, 130 ; of Kew Gar-
dens, 136 ; of Cambridge, 137 ; on
state of book business in 1863,
142 ; on draft riots, 143-145 ; on
state of country, 148 ; on publica-
tion of Essays and other matters,
154 ; account of N. E. trip, 162 ;
more about essays, 168 ; issue of,
on Progress, 175 ; letters to family
in 1865, 186-198 ; to Fiske, 202 ;
of Ripley and the Tribune, 206 ;
from Antioch College, 211 ; visit
to Wales, 218 ; of lecture at Col-
lege of Preceptors, 224 ; to S. on
state of business, 228 ; Mill's St. An-
drew's address, 236 ; about books,
266 ; to his mother on his fiftieth
birthday, 269 ; letters of 1871, 271-
292 ; from Paris, 285 ; from Berlin,
286-289 J to a contributor to P. S.
M., 310 ; from a contributor to
P. S. M., 311 ; letters of 1877,
337-340 ; to a niece just settled,
341 ; on the state of business in
January, 1878, 342-344 ; decides
to go to Riviera with H. S., 348 ;
reaching London, 350-351 ; from
Riviera, 351-360; of health, 367-
369 ; articles on political institu-
tions, 373, 373 ; fractures his wrist,
382 ; health, 383 ; last letter of,

391-

Liberty, Mill's, 150.
Lecturer, as a, 78-81.

Man studied by the scientific meth-
od, 452, 454 ; by the method of
tradition, 453.

Manning, Mr. R. H., 94, 105, 114,
260.

Marriage, 116.

Masquerade of the Elements, a lec-
ture, 73.

Mathematics in education, 407-409,

431-

McCosh, Dr., 496.

Meeting of British Sci. Ass., 138.

Memory, 403, 459, 468 ; discipline
of, 403 ; meaning of discipline of,
410.

Mental Gymnastics, 417.

Mental limitations, 474.

Mental states due to states of blood,
465 ; to nervous system, 466.

Mill, John Stuart, 132, 204 ; inaugu-
ral address, 236-238, 425-429,
432-435, 439, 450, 547-550-

Minturn, R. B., letter of, 215.

Morell, Dr. J. D., 130.

Moulton's attack on Spencer, 329.

Nature, meaning of, 488.

Philosophical Series, Spencer's, 105-
no, 113-115, 156, 199, 261-265,
290, 528-537-

Physiology, evolution of, 455-458.

Popular Science Monthly, 295 ; start-
ing of, 296-301 ; success of, 302 ;
after a year and a half, 313 ; aim
of, 306-310 ; charges against, 552.

Popularization of science, works for,
101.

Psychology, Spencer's, 105, 516.

Reflex action, 457.
Repetition, value of, 414-416.

59<5

Edward Livingston Youmans.

Rest, importance of, 476.
Ripley, George, 153, 207.

Science, meaning of, 486, 492 ; in-
centives it gives, 445 ; its bracing
quality, 447 ; religious work of,
491-494.

Science primers, 332.

Science studies, 423 ; order of, 424 ;
as information, 425 ; of human na-
ture, 451.

Scientific lecturing, 72.

Sister reads for him, 42, 50, 54 ; joins
him in N. Y., 56 ; chemical stud-
ies, 61.

Social Statics, republication of, 1 14,
141, 176.

Sociology, study of, 295.

Specimen of handwriting, 92.

Spencer, Herbert, visit to America,
376; and the doctrine of evolution,
502, 511 ; works of, 504 ; health,
527 ; rights as a thinker, 538 ; re-
ligious teachings, 554, 557 ; appli-
cation to government, 551 ; con-
troversy with Harrison, 562.

Staten Island, life at, 45.

Suppi'essed book, concerning, 562.

Synthetic philosophy, 233, 290, 291.

Taine, 503, 505.

Teachers' office, 483.

Tenney, E. P., Appletons' reader,
judges of manuscript of Class-
Book, 66.

Theology the adversary of science,
494, 500.

Tyndall, Prof., visit to this country,
317 ; letters of, 317, 319, 320,
366.

Unconscious mental action, 460.

Vestiges of Creation, 42, 57.
Vicarious discipline, 417.
Voluntary activity, limits of, 488.

War times, 116, 135, 141-145, 178,

185.

Wheeler, J. M., letter, 35-40.
Wheelers, the, 14-17.
Whitman, Walt, 46.

Youmans, Catherine Scofield, 4-6.

Youmans, Earle, 61, 323.

Youmans, E. L., popular sympathies
of, 4 ; birth, 4-6 ; childhood, 9-13 ;
religious experience, 9, 29-33 ;
freethinkers, 18 ; leaves Greenfield,
19 ; generosity, 26 ; circulating li-
brary, 27 ; inflammation of the
eyes, 28 ; powers of persuasion,
33 ; handiness, 34 ; goes to Gal-
way Academy, 35-40; treatment
by Ballston oculist, 40 ; blindness,
40 ; reading, 41, 42, 50 ; relapses,
42, 45, 59 J goes to N. Y. Eye In-
firmary, 42 ; treated by Dr. Elli-
ott, 44 ; life at Mrs. Cook's, 44-

45 ; removes to Mrs. Chipman's,

46 ; Mr. Flanders, 46, 47 ; expo-
sures, 48 ; the Ketchams, 49 ; self-
supporting, 50 ; handwriting, 50 ;
literary work, 51 ; conversation,
52 ; power of exposition, 52 ;
studies mnemonics, 53 ; sister joins
him in N. Y., 56 ; attends Agas-
siz's lectures, 57 ; historical work
undertaken, 58 ; call at Apple-
tons', 59 ; history forestalled, 59 ;
deep discouragement, 60 ; Chemi-
cal Chart, 62 ; text-book of arith-
metic, 63 ; Class-Book of Chem-
istry, 63-70 ; forestalled, 64 ; be-
gins lecturing, 72 ; as a lecturer,

Index.

597

78-81 ; letters written when lec-
turing, 81-92 ; studies the physio-
logical action of alcohol, 92 ; first
acquaintance with Herbert Spen-
cer, 105 ; writes to him, 106 ; re-
lations with Appletons, in ; they
publish Spencer's Education, and
other works, in; E. L. Y.'s la-
bours for their dissemination, 115 ;
marriage, 116 ; voyage in Great
Eastern, 116 ; visits Derby, 117 ;
meets H. S., 121 ; visits Cam-
bridge, 137; rewrites Chemistry,
143 ; publishes Correlation of
Forces, 147 ; labours for the diffu-
sion of modern views, 148 ; meets
Fiske, 164 ; second visit to Eng-
land, 185 ; accepts professorship

at Antioch, 199 ; threatened failure
of Spencer's serial publication —
labours to prevent, 199 ; Antioch
College, 211 ; third visit to Eng-
land, 221 ; fourth visit to England,
255 ; fifth visit to England, 267 ;
International Scientific Series, 267,
273-281, 284, 293 ; as an editor,
302 ; health, 321, 322, 367 ; lec-
ture before Liberal Club, 322 ;
rewrites Class-Book of Chemistry,
333 ; visits the Riviera, 345-349 ;
goes to Thomasville, 385 ; trouble
with Harrison, 387 ; last days,
395-

Youmans, Vincent, 4-6, 9-13.

Youmans, William Jay, 93, 192 ; goes
to England, 188.

THE END.

D. APPLETON & 00, 'S PUBLICATIONS,

Professor E. L. YOUMANS'S WORKS.

THE HAND-BOOK OF HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE. A

Popular Account of Heat, Light, Air, Aliment, and Cleansing, in
their Scientific Principles and Domestic Applications. 12mo. Illus-
trated. Cloth, $1.75.

THE CULTURE DEMANDED BY MODERN LIFE.

A Series of Addresses and Arguments on the Claims of Scientific
Education. Edited, with an Introduction on Mental Discipline in
Education. 1 vol., 12mo. Cloth, $2.00.

CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES.

A Series of Expositions by Scientific Men. Edited, with an Intro-
duction and Brief Biographical Notices of the Chief Promoters of
the New Views, by EDWARD L. YOUMANS, M. D. 12mo. Cloth,
$2.00.

CONTENTS.

I. By Professor W. R. GROVE. The Correlation of Physical Forces.
II. By Professor HELMHOLTZ. The Interaction of Natural Forces.

III. By Dr. J. R. MAYER. 1. Remarks on the Forces of Inorganic Nature.

2. On Celestial Dynamics.

3. On the Mechanical Equivalent of Heat.

IV. By Dr. FARADAY. Some Thoughts on the Conservation of Forces.
V. By Professor LIEBIG. The Connection and Equivalence of Forces.

VI. By Dr. CARPEXTER. The Correlation of the Physical and Vital
Forces.

" This work is a very welcome addition to our scientific literature, and
will be particularly acceptable to those who wish to obtain a popular but
at the same time "precise and clear view of what Faraday justly calls the
highest law in physical science, the principle of the conservation of force.
Sufficient attention has not been paid to the publication of collected mono-
graphs or memoirs upon special subjects. Dr. Youmans's work exhibits
the value of such collections in a very striking manner, and we earnestly
hope his excellent example may be followed in other branches of science."
American Journal of Science.

New York: D. APPLETON & CO., 1, 3, & 5 Bond Street.

D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS,

JOHN TYNDALL'S WORKS.

ESSAYS ON THE FLOATING MATTER OF THE AIR,

in Relation to Putrefaction and Infection. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.

ON FORMS OF WATER, in Clouds, Rivers, Ice, and Glaciers.
With 35 Illustrations. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.

HEAT AS A MODE OF MOTION. New edition. 12mo.
Cloth, $2.50.

ON SOUND : A Course of Eight Lectures delivered at the Royal
Institution of Great Britain. Illustrated. 12mo. New edition.
Cloth, $2.00.

FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE FOR UNSCIENTIFIC PEO-
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