itself to a practical people like the Americans. Competition has its advantages; but if we are to have free competition, men must at least be prepared for the struggle. Education cannot be left to haphazard. There may be much to be said for what Lowell calls "the old Amerikin idee, To make a man a man and let him be"; but, if so, the first clause is certainly as important as the second. On the other hand, too much regulation is not desirable; and a freedom-loving people like the Americans is not likely to tolerate it. Legislation, as compared with individual enterprise, has played but a small part in the development of modern society; and it is unreasonable to suppose that it will play the chief part in the Voluntary co-operation, and especially such a scheme as that of Industrial Partnership, seems to offer a much more hopeful form of solution for the social problem than any attempt to bring about a compulsory form of collective organization. The social problem, indeed, is a moral rather than an economic problem; and it is chiefly by moral rather than by legislative methods that its solution must be attempted. At the same time there are many directions in which legislative action may be extended, and even some departments of industry that may suitably be taken over by the state. The wisest policy is one neither of individualism nor of socialism, but rather one of opportunism; and it is in this direction that the Anglo-Saxon race, at any rate, has so far tended to move. "What the American social spirit has done for two centuries, it will continue to do. It will give equal rights before the law to every man, an equal education in the public schools to every child, and a refuge to the infirm and incapable. It will clothe the naked and feed the hungry who cannot provide for themselves, and will enlarge the opportunities of work for those who can work. It will hold back the State from no field which the State can cultivate better than private persons, singly or in companies, because of any theory of individualism. It will close no career to lawful enterprise and private talent because of any theory of socialism. It will be content to be opportunist and serve its own time, as it can live only in the present." All this is sensible enough, and yet one cannot but feel somewhat dissatisfied with it. A wise opportunism is never altogether without guiding principles; and these one rather misses in Mr. Gilman's treatment.* I am doubtful whether he fully appreciates the extent of the industrial problem and the difficulty of its solution by mere individual effort or by occasional tinkering on the part of the State. He is optimistic, and does not appear to furnish quite adequate grounds for his optimism. This, however, may be a matter of individual opinion. Of the general sobriety and good sense of the whole treatment there can be no doubt. On a few special points some criticism may be passed. In some of the earlier pages of his work Mr. Gilman rightly enough protests against the identification of Individualism with selfishness or of Socialism with public spirit; but in doing so I think he rather obscures the fact that Individualism has generally been associated with a belief in the predominance of self-interest as a human motive, while Socialism has been commonly connected with a more generous view. No doubt, however, it is right enough to insist that there is no necessary connection between these things, and that they are frequently found dissociated from one another. Again, is it correct to say that Anarchism is "the complete antithesis of State Socialism"? It is tempting to regard it in this way; but it should be remembered that the antithesis extends only to the view taken of the action of the State. With respect to industrial organization, the views of Anarchists and Socialists are to a large extent similar. In this sphere at least it is certainly misleading to class Anarchists with Individualists. 66 When Mr. Gilman says, with reference to economic science (p. 250), that its undeniable province is the facts and laws of human nature that concern the pursuit and expenditure of wealth," he seems to ignore the hypothetical character of a large part of economic reasoning, and to forget the modifiability of human char acter. In his treatment of Profit Sharing, one is surprised not to find *It is perhaps unfair to make a criticism of this kind without suggesting an improvement. Mr. Gilman has himself indicated one general principle of State interference, viz., that education must be provided by the State. This is a farreaching principle; for it is hard to say where education ends. Could not another principle be introduced by distinguishing between the mechanical and the more purely personal aspects of life? The connection between Socialism and Machinery has never been sufficiently worked out. Some valuable hints on this subject were given by Prof. H. C. Adams in a very admirable paper published by him in this JOURNAL some time ago ("An Interpretation of the Social Movements of Our Time"); but the subject awaits further study. any reference to the recent criticisms of Mrs. Webb (Miss Beatrice Potter). One other point. While it is largely true, as Mr. Gilman says on p. 347, that in general "socialism lays little stress upon morals," and that "the emphasis of its advocates is on the material side of life"; while it is perfectly right to stigmatize this as a blunder, and to regard as an "absurdity" the new doctrine "that the want of money is the root of all evil," it is yet most misleading to quote against socialists the statement (from Mr. W. D. Morrison's "Crime and its Causes") that "a mere increase of material prosperity generates as many evils as it destroys." No socialist advocates a mere increase of material prosperity: some would even be willing to dispense with a considerable amount of material prosperity. These passages, and a few others, seem to me to be serious blemishes in a good book. On the other hand, it would be much easier to quote passages with which one can entirely agree, and which are in the highest degree instructive and stimulating. On the whole, the book is one which every student of social questions ought to read. It is always clear and interesting, often vigorous, and nearly always judicious. OWENS COLLEGE, Manchester. J. S. MACKENZIE. NOTES ON THE NICOMACHEAN ETHICS OF ARISTOTLE. By J. A. Stewart, M.A., Student and Tutor of Christ Church, Oxford. In Two Volumes. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1892. Pp. ix, 539 ; 475. THE NICOMACHEAN ETHICS OF ARISTOTLE. Translated with an Analysis and Critical Notes. By J. E. C. Welldon, M.A. Head London and New York: Macmillan, Master of Harrow School. 1892. Pp. lxvii, 352. Such space as can be given here to a notice of the first of the two works named above is quite inadequate to do it justice. Mr. Stewart has brought to his task, besides a trained judgment, an extensive knowledge of Aristotle's writings as a whole and of the literature relative to them, which can be appreciated best by those who know the difficulty of learning even a small portion of them. His work is executed on a different plan from Sir A. Grant's edition, in which the bulk of the commentary is thrown into the form of introductions, a preferable plan, it would seem, for obtaining a clear synopsis of the whole. The notes are of a complete and elaborate character, consisting in some cases of long and able disquisitions designed to interpret Aristotle's philosophy. The student will find here, even when he may not always agree with Mr. Stewart's judgment, ample means for forming a judgment of his own. Younger students will doubtless need the help of a teacher in selecting the more important notes. In particular, some of the longer notes in Book i. may with advantage be left to a second reading. Two valuable features are the following: the notes on each chapter are preceded by a full and careful statement of the argument, and, secondly, references to other works of Aristotle or to commentators are quoted in full. Mr. Stewart is sanguine enough to think that young students will read these quotations, but at any rate they would not look out the references for themselves, and to the older reader, who is also human, such full quotations are of the greatest value. The success of a collection of notes like this cannot be judged except after continued trial in the work of teaching. Only a few brief remarks are possible here, and none at all on Mr. Stewart's treatment of textual difficulties, such, for instance, as the vexed questions of the text in the intermediate Books v.-vii., of doubtful authorship. Mr. Stewart seems to me happiest when he is explaining Aristotle's philosophical language in the Ethics by reference to other parts of his writings; so, for instance, the learned and interesting note on Nature (Book iii. ch. iii.), the careful explanation of the psychology of the will by help of the De Anima, or of the various intellectual functions described in Book vi. In interpreting the thought of various passages he is in general terse and distinct; so, for instance, in pointing out the primary ethical significance of Aristotle's doctrine of pleasure, or to take a shorter instance, in the note on involuntary actions in Book iii. Naturally no commentator will please everybody. For instance, I do not find the account of commercial justice in Book v., full as it is, stated very clearly. Mr. Stewart regards it as a species of distributive justice, and the connection is unmistakable and is justified by earlier authority (see a note in the April number of the Classical Review). But the connection is not so much contained in Aristotle's own statement as an inference of the reader. There is a real difference between a distribution of government grants, or of taxation, and the distribution which is effected by the play of private interests. In another place (vol. i. p. 418) this justice is treated as corrective, in so far as it keeps exchange fair; but where is corrective justice described as putting things in fair relations? Is it not rather the restoration of fair relations which have been violated? Perhaps a few words might have been introduced to indicate that in all these kinds of particular justice the object (as illustrated by the mathematical analysis) is to leave the parties in the same relative position after the act of justice as they were before. As to Mr. Stewart's treatment of the main ethical ideas, one turns naturally to the notes on Eudæmonia, on the Will, on the Mean, as Theoria, and the like, in which he endeavors to bring out the full philosophical significance of these conception. In doing so he is bearing in the mind the needs of those who, like most students of philosophy at Oxford, practically use the Ethics as a text-book of moral philosophy. Hence, as I suppose, arises what will strike most persons as a defect, or at least an element of danger, the habit of reading freely into Aristotle ideas, mainly biological ideas, of contemporary philosophy. From the educational point of view this is extremely instructive and fruitful, but it may lead to misconceptions as to Aristotle's historical position. What must be said in defence is that if you are to try and bring home Aristotle's ethics to the mind as a solution of our own problems, then it is these biological ideas which best express to us his way of thinking. Still, these ideas are such as can be thought out of Aristotle, rather than actually stated in his doctrine. In fact, that doctrine resembles the evolutionist doctrine so much, because Aristotle is philosophizing a merely customary system of morals, in which moral observances fit into their places like the parts of an organism. It should at least be pointed out how far Aristotle falls short of the meaning we attach to these ideas; by omitting to do so Mr. Stewart sometimes makes Aristotle's doctrine less simple than it really is. So the idea of the mean leads on inevitably to that of propor tion between an act and the social environment of a person, but what it says is that an act gratifies a passion in a mean extent between excess and defect, approved by custom and determined by reason. Again, in dealing with the will and responsibility, Mr. Stewart seems to give Aristotle credit for too much. Thus on p. 228, vol. i., he writes, "Biologically considered, bodily functions differ from moral pážets in depending upon structural adaptations of older standing." This is admirably said. But is it Aristotelian? Again, Mr. Stewart's remarks on responsibility seem to me excellent in themselves, but the difficulties discussed by Aristotle |