Read Ebook: Appletons' Popular Science Monthly August 1899 Volume LV by Various Youmans William Jay Editor

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A bright woman sojourning for a winter in a small town found that there were two hotels or taverns where liquor was sold, two churches where only occasional services were held, a single school-house kept open during the winter months, no hall except the ballrooms of the hotels , no library, and no entertainments of a literary order. This woman organized a club or debating society, and after a few months of careful guidance she allowed the members to select their own topic for the last meeting of the season; to her great surprise, a debate was announced on the subject, "Whether it is better for a young man upon coming of age to have one thousand dollars or a good education." The majority decided that it would be better to have the money, because he could then speculate and gain a fortune!

What better missionary work could be done in behalf of education than to establish a "thought center" in every farming region or small town? The system of traveling libraries, a recent and encouraging movement, makes it possible to place the best books and current literature in the homes of the farmers and of the inhabitants of the smallest towns. The books can be obtained, made use of, and exchanged for others, so that the interest may be perpetuated; the conditions are not difficult, and the fact that a room or rooms must be provided for the safe keeping and the circulation of the library is important. A traveling library once secured, a "thought center" is established. Lectures, clubs, and classes will follow; they are a natural sequence. In addition to literary topics, talks on personal purity, physical culture , and on home ideals may be given. Good men and women, fitted to speak well on these subjects, will be ready to give their services. Where enthusiasm is once aroused, seed can be sown by such nonsectarian gatherings which fails to take root in the churches.

We are taught that the highest authority within man is the conscience. Rosenkranz, in his Philosophy of Education, gives this fine definition of conscience: "Conscience is the criticism which the ideal self makes on the realized self." To discover and quicken the ideal self wherever possible is one of the noblest aims of practical philanthropy.

EMPLOYMENT.--A recent report of the United States Labor Commissioner, Hon. Carroll D. Wright, states that the number of women laborers is increasing, but that women are more generally taking the places of children than of men; that the encroachment of women upon the occupations held by men is so far very slight, and only in conditions where women are better adapted for the particular work in which they are employed.

"Women," he says, "are considered by many employers to be more reliable, more easily controlled, neater, more rapid, industrious, polite and careful, and less liable to strike than men. Wyoming and Utah are cited as the only States which have laws according to men and women equal wages for equal work. There is still much economic injustice as to compensation for women's work, although some progress has been made within the last few years."

The agitation of the question of "equal pay for equal work," if it has not as yet accomplished much for the woman wage-earner, has at least revealed the fact that women as a class are not as well trained for the work they attempt as men. The number of unskilled women in all branches of trade presents a problem which may well engage the attention of the philanthropist. The necessity of earning to "keep the wolf from the door," the pleasure resulting from financial independence, and a desire to add to "pin money" have all tended to increase the number of girls and women who are seeking employment outside the home. The fever has extended to the smaller towns, and even to the farmers' wives and daughters, until the supply greatly exceeds the demand in many localities, and the women really in need are often crowded to the wall in this inadequate race. In the passing of old ideas as to the proper status of woman much good has been evolved; it is no longer considered degrading to earn one's living, and the woman worker in every field is winning her way to the respect and recognition which she deserves.

What can be done to raise the standard of woman's work, to give more thorough training in vocations for which women are best fitted, to dignify important occupations which suffer from the lack of skilled service and which are not overcrowded because of mistaken ideas, and, above all, to make women ashamed to receive compensation which they do not fully earn?

The employment bureaus connected with the various organizations of women are endeavoring to answer these questions. Their object, as outlined, is to advise and adopt such methods as shall best assist women in their chosen vocations; to also provide a bureau of registration where applications can be received and information given.

To discover latent ability, to stimulate the desire to excel, to explain the rights of the employer and employee, and the moral obligations of both, is a part of the privilege of the women who give time and thought to the employment problem.

The Boston Women's Educational and Industrial Union has been able to render excellent service by the distribution of circulars cautioning women against advertisements which offer large returns for work done at home. Its list of fraudulent firms, obtained by thorough investigation, has been sent to other associations, and has already proved of inestimable value to many women who would otherwise have been tempted to send money, allured by the attractive advertisements.

The list compiled gives the names of one hundred firms which are a "delusion and a snare," and which, on account of some trifling technicality, the law seems unable to touch.

To exalt the home and raise the standard of domestic service is another important object--perhaps the most important of all. From the ordinary intelligence office to the employment bureau under the guidance of educated women is a long step for progress.

In all humane effort, the more scientific the methods employed the better will be the results. According to Charles Kingsley, "scientific method needs no definition--it is simply the exercise of common sense."

HERBERT SPENCER AT SEVENTY-NINE.

The portrait of Herbert Spencer, which forms the frontispiece to this number of the Monthly, is from a photograph taken soon after he reached the age of seventy-eight. Though of late years his health has been unusually feeble, this is scarcely reflected in the face, which still retains in a marked degree the expression of intellectual strength that was so characteristic of his prime.

About the time Mr. Spencer completed the Synthetic Philosophy, or, as it is better known, the Philosophy of Evolution, with the publication of the third volume of the Principles of Sociology, we gave an account of The Man and his Work, from the pen of Prof. William H. Hudson, who had for a number of years acted as his secretary, and was so familiar with his thought that he afterward published an Introduction to the Philosophy, which Mr. Spencer himself has cordially commended. It was naturally supposed by his many friends that having practically carried out his original plan as laid down in his prospectus thirty-six years before, Mr. Spencer would throw off the cares and vexations of authorship, to enjoy the rest and relaxation that his arduous and long-continued labors had earned. But this, it seems, he was not inclined to do. Apparently as active intellectually as ever, he has kept at work to the full extent of his physical ability, devoting himself mainly to such additions and modifications of his published writings as new knowledge and the advance of thought have made necessary. This persistent industry, unusual, to say the least, in one so far advanced in life, the presentation of his latest portrait, and the interest which the world takes in the doings of a man who has so profoundly influenced the thought of his time, make this a fitting opportunity to refer to some of the later incidents in his career.

Though never inclined to plume himself on the importance or the grandeur of his great undertaking, wondering now that he ever had the "audacity" to begin it, and regarding its completion as more an "emancipation" than a triumph, Mr. Spencer is nevertheless entitled to the satisfaction which comes from the contemplation in the evening of a long life of the fulfillment of the purpose to which that life has been devoted. Although he speaks of the series of works comprising the Synthetic Philosophy as "complete yet incomplete," because more things might have been put into it, Mr. Spencer has the unquestionable right to look upon his "system" as finished in all the essentials of a symmetrical and self-sustaining structure; and more than this, he finds it generally accepted as a masterpiece, embodying, if not all the truth, yet a fundamental truth manifested in the growth and order of the universe of matter and mind.

When we regard the comprehensiveness of Mr. Spencer's system, embracing everything there is, and the multitude of the details that had to be considered in the course of its preparation, we wonder at the magnitude of the aggregation that may be formed by the repetition of small daily tasks. The portions of time he was able to give to work were at most very brief, and would be regarded by the majority of workers as insufficient for any great accomplishment; and when the frequent and sometimes long interruptions that occurred are considered, seem absolutely insignificant. Yet in these small fragments of two or three hours a day with many lost days in the year, and several lost years, one of the greatest works in the history of the human mind was carried to its end. The old figure of the dropping of the water on the stone and the fable of the tortoise and the hare are newly illustrated.

Outside of his work in the composition of the Philosophy, Mr. Spencer has always taken a vital interest in leading public questions, making them the subjects of frequent communications to the press, and seeking the co-operation of others when opportunity offered either in combating some needless innovation or aiding some important reform. True to the teaching of his philosophy, it will be observed that in any attempts of the kind his reliance has always been on the power of gradual development, rather than abrupt changes by acts of Parliament or otherwise, to bring about desired conditions. Before his visit to the United States, in 1882, he interested himself in forming an Anti-Aggression League, for the purpose of opposing schemes for extending the lines of British dominion in various parts of the world. Among his associates in this effort were Mr. John Morley, Mr. Frederic Harrison, and the Rev. Llewellyn Davis and Canon Fremantle, now Dean of Ripon, liberal-minded clergymen of the Church of England. The movement found little public sympathy, and no adequate support. Mr. Spencer, severely taxing his strength in promoting it, suffered another breakdown , in consequence of which the next number of his Philosophy--Part VI of the Principles of Sociology: Ecclesiastical Institutions--did not appear till the close of 1855. It is worthy of remark in connection with this incident that it seems to have been left for non-Christians almost alone in a professedly Christian community to take the advance in inculcating and disseminating one of the central ideas of the Christian religion; as now, in the United States, with the orthodox church people almost unanimous in supporting war and the wildest schemes of aggression, it has been left for a few New England Unitarians first to dare to speak in protest against an iniquitous and perilous crusade for foreign dominion. Mr. Spencer has never neglected an opportunity to express in unmistakable terms his aversion to militancy, and has been at great pains to demonstrate, as in his Sociology, that the true road to all higher development of society is through encouraging the growth of its industrial factors.

From the spring of 1886 till 1889, when conditions of health compelled entire suspension of the work on the Philosophy, and it was even doubtful whether it could ever be continued, Mr. Spencer dictated the larger part of his autobiography. This has since been completed and put in print, but will not be published during his lifetime. It will comprise two considerable volumes.

Not finding life in a boarding house in all respects suited to his wishes, Mr. Spencer for many years entertained the idea of establishing himself in a home of his own in the suburbs of London, but had been deterred from so doing by the prospective troubles of housekeeping. In the summer of 1889, however, after making such arrangements as promised to relieve him in great measure of these cares, he finally carried out the idea by taking a house in the neighborhood of Regent's Park. But though for some years the bachelor household was a success, we understand it eventually ceased to be so, though it was continued until Mr. Spencer changed his residence to Brighton two years ago. There was wanting in those who had immediate charge of details that feeling of identity of interests and that disposition to co-operate which belong to the ordinary family, and as a consequence differences grew up that could not be permanently composed, and that on the whole did not conduce to domestic tranquillity.

The ethical part of the Philosophy as contemplated by Mr. Spencer having been completed, only two divisions remained to be worked out--Professional Institutions and Industrial Institutions, parts of the Principles of Sociology--to fill out the whole plan. A subsidiary discussion of considerable importance for the integrity of the theory of evolution now intervened to be disposed of before these parts of the work could be proceeded with. Prof. August Weismann had published a book in which he denied the transmission of acquired characters; or, as Mr. Spencer would word it, the transmission of functionally-wrought modifications--a very vital point in all Mr. Spencer's philosophy. Mr. Spencer took the matter up at once, and published several incisive essays refuting Professor Weismann's positions. He opened his argument against the neo-Darwinian position with essays on the Inadequacy of Natural Selection, and on Professor Weismann's Theories, and followed them, at intervals of a few months, with the additional articles, A Rejoinder to Professor Weismann, and Weismannism Once More. Anxious that the question should be brought to the notice of every biologist, Mr. Spencer had reprints of these essays distributed among the teachers of the science all over Europe and America.

The work on the final stage of Mr. Spencer's great undertaking was begun about the middle of 1894. The reading of an editorial in the Popular Science Monthly having suggested to him that it would be desirable to do so, he published the chapters on Professional Institutions--serially in this periodical and in the Contemporary Review. The chapters on Industrial Institutions did not appear till the third volume of the Sociology was issued in November, 1896--the volume which was the culmination of the work so persistently prosecuted in the face of the most formidable and even seemingly hopeless difficulties. In these departments of the system, the argument was pursued, consistent with that which prevails in all the other departments, that in the professions and the industries the principle of evolution operates just as surely and completely as in the derivation of an animal species from its ancestral form.

Appreciation of the value of Mr. Spencer's work had been growing for many years, and its influence was gradually making itself felt in movements of various kinds in the active world. Whatever he wrote or said received attention at once, was discussed, or influenced action. The completion of his Philosophy was deemed worthy of formal notice and a proper subject for felicitation wherever science was known, and in England was regarded as a suitable object for a national memorial. An address of congratulation was prepared for presentation to him, and with it went a request that he would have his portrait painted to be presented to the nation. It has always been his principle to decline offers of testimonials, on the ground that the custom had become an abuse, and persons invited to participate in presentations were often put under a kind of moral obligation to comply, to which he would not be, even incidentally, a party. Consistently with this attitude and not realizing the real nature of the movement in favor of a testimonial and how really spontaneous it was, he wrote to its promoters repeating his objections and asking that it be not pressed. But when the address was presented and he saw the list of illustrious names attached to it, including those of men who had been his antagonists, he yielded to what was evidently a spontaneous feeling of the representative men among his countrymen, and sat for his portrait as soon as circumstances permitted, or about a year afterward, to Mr. Hubert Herkomer. The following is the letter of congratulation and the request for his portrait, with the names of the distinguished signers, and Mr. Spencer's reply:

DEAR SIR: We, the undersigned, offer you our cordial congratulations upon the completion of your System of Synthetic Philosophy.

Not all of us agreeing in equal measure with its conclusions, we are all at one in our estimate of the great intellectual powers it exhibits and of the immense effect it has produced in the history of thought; nor are we less impressed by the high moral qualities which have enabled you to concentrate those powers for so many years upon a purpose worthy of them, and, in spite of all obstacles, to carry out so vast a design.

To the many who, like us, have learned to honor the man while profiting by his writings, it would be a satisfaction to possess an authentic personal likeness of the author. It has therefore occurred to us that the occasion might be appropriately marked by requesting you to permit us to employ some eminent artist to take your portrait, with a view, to its being deposited in one of our national collections for the benefit of ourselves and of those who come after us.

We hope that your health may be benefited by the leisure which you have earned so well, and that you may long continue to enjoy the consciousness of having completed your work.

W. DE W. ABNEY, R. E., C. B., D. C. L., F. R. S., Pres. Physical Society.

ROBERT ADAMSON, M. A., LL. D., Prof, of Logic, Glasgow University.

GRANT ALLEN, B. A.

ALEXANDER BAIN, M. A., LL. D., Professor of Logic, Aberdeen University.

SIR GEORGE S. BADEN-POWELL, K. C. M. G., M. A., M. P.

RIGHT HON. ARTHUR JAMES BALFOUR, P. C., D. C. L., F. R. S., M. P.

SIR ROBERT STAWELL BALL, LL. D., F. R. S., Lowndean Prof. Ast., Camb.

H. CHARLTON BASTIAN, M. A., M. D., F. R. S., Prof. Medicine, Univ. Coll., London.

FRANK E. BEDDARD, M. A., F. R. S., Prosector Zo?logical Society.

JOHN BEDDOE, M. D., F. R. S.

SIR WALTER BESANT, M. A.

E. W. BRABROOK, Pres. Anthropological Institute.

BERNARD BOSANQUET, M. A.

T. LAUDER BRUNTON, M. D., D. Sc., F. R. S.

EDWARD CLODD.

F. HOWARD COLLINS.

SIR J. CRICHTON-BROWNE, M. D., LL. D., F. R. S.

W. H. DALLINGER, LL. D., D. Sc., F. R. S.

FRANCIS DARWIN, M. A., M. B., F. R. S.

GEORGE H. DARWIN, M. A., LL. D., F. R. S., Plumian Prof. Ast. and Exp. Physics, Cambridge.

W. E. DARWIN, B. A.

JAMES DONALDSON, M. A., LL. D., Principal University St. Andrews.

SIR JOHN EVANS, K. C. B., D. C. L., LL. D., D. Sc., Treas. R. S.

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