produced is in all respects satisfactory. But it is the work of one who writes with full knowledge of what philosophy is, as well as with an enthusiasm for his subject, and the result is a very interesting sketch. If the distinction be allowable, the book (whatever may have been the author's intention) is less of a handbook for students than an outline which will be read with appreciation and profit by those who turn to philosophy disinterestedly on its own account. The fact that nearly half of the book is devoted to "Kant and the Post-Kantians," and "Recent and Current Philosophy"-a proportion which would be out of place in a textbook-must enhance the interest of the sketch. to such readers, and they will find Mr. Bax a bright and well-informed guide over these regions. Professor Zeller's "Outlines of the History of Greek Philosophy "* is a model, in the fulness and compactness of its information, of what a student's handbook should be; but, unless supplemented by other reading or teaching, it will be found, it is to be feared, rather dry and lifeless. It is essentially a summary and book of reference, and could not be recommended to the general reader. The author's primary object was, he says, "to provide students with a help for academical lectures which would facilitate preparation, and save the time wasted in writing down facts, without interfering with the lecturer's work or imposing any fetters upon it." It will fulfil this purpose admirably in the hands of a judicious teacher. Students of Greek philosophy will learn with regret that Miss Alleyne, to whom they are indebted for the English version of so much of Zeller's History, died in 1884 while she was engaged on this translation. It is to be hoped that some one will be found to carry out her intention of translating the last volume of Dr. Zeller's larger work, as well as the volume on Aristotle once announced as in preparation, but never carried into execution. Several other translations call for notice. The second volume of Rosmini's "Psychology"† has been published by his faithful editors. It is to be feared that the exceedingly unmodern and scholastic look of the exposition will act as a deterrent to the majority of readers; but, as remarked in connection with the first volume, there is a considerable amount of sound and suggestive metaphysics underlying it.— Mr. Hastie has translated Hegel's Introduction to his lectures on Aristotle and Michelet's summary of Hegel's "Philosophy of Art." They make an interesting little book.-The handsome English edition of Schopenhauer's chief work § is now complete. Messrs. Haldane and Kemp are to be congratulated on the successful accomplishment of a very arduous task. An abstract of Schopenhauer's early "Essay on the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason " forms a useful appendix for the philosophical reader. But the volumes are so full of general interest that they will have many readers beyond professed students of philosophy. ANDREW SETH. * "Outlines of the History of Greek Philosophy." By Dr. Eduard Zeller. Translated by Sarah Frances Alleyne and Evelyn Abbott. London: Longinans, Green & Co. 1886. "Psychology." By Antonio Rosmini Serbati. Vol. II. Trench & Co. 1885. "The Philosophy of Art: an Introduction to the Scientific by Hegel and C. L. Michelet." Translated by W. Hastie, B.D. Boyd. 1886. The World as Will and Idea." Haldane, M.A., and J. Kemp, M.A. By Arthur Schopenhauer. London: Kegan Paul, Study of Esthetics, Translated by R. B. III.-GENERAL LITERATURE. THE press is still teeming with works on Ireland. Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet, "The Irish Question," is written in self-defence. He will not have it said that he either conceived the intention of Home Rule precipitately or concealed it unduly, and he certainly produces evidence to prove, if not that he ever showed any special love for Home Rule, yet what can be said by few other Liberals-that he had repeatedly spoken of it without aversion, if due safeguards were established. He admits that his action on the subject after the election of 1885 was taken suddenly in consequence of an incident of a vital character, which neither he nor any one else had foreseen-viz., that the Irish Nationalist members should at the opening of Parliament have preferred so moderate and reasonable a demand; but then this, he says, is promptitude, not precipitancy. So far his defence must seem complete enough: the question was ripening outside, and naturally the statesman's relation to it changed somewhat at every stage of the process, and especially at the very decisive turn given it by the election of 1885.-An admirable discussion and defence of Mr. Gladstone's Irish Bill will be found in Mr. David Mabelan's "Home Rule and Imperial Unity."+ The objections that have been made to the Bill are answered with great acuteness and mastery of constitutional principles. Sir C. Gavan Duffy's "League of North and South" is a very interesting and well-written history of the tenant-right movement of 1850-54. The Tenant League was established to promote the precise scheme of tenant-right which the Parnellites have been able to see carried; it anticipated the Parnellites also in adopting the parliamentary tactics of an independent opposition, and it excelled them in being able to unite the North and the South of Ireland in the common cause. And Sir Gavan Duffy, who was one of its originators, naturally enough complains-and we believe justly that the present Irish party, instead of recognizing as they ought the labours of their predecessors, are prone to depreciate them, and have even called them "the party of Sadleir and Keogh," though Sadleir and Keogh never belonged to the League at all. Sir Gavan accordingly performs a much-needed task in describing the earlier tenant-right movement, and he has performed it with great literary skill. Mr. J. A. Partridge's "The Making of the Irish Nation" § is a somewhat heated but stimulating and readable account of Irish politics since the Union, written under a strong enthusiasm for Irish autonomy, and the idea of beneficial federation. Mr. C. P. Deane's "Short History of Ireland," || on the other hand, is markedly calm and judicious. It is a summary of Irish history, making no pretensions to being anything more than a compilation; but it is very good work of its kind: a plain, straightforward, well-balanced narrative, from which one can without any difficulty obtain a clear and good idea of the history of Ireland. -Under the head of "Struggles for Life" ¶ a large number of * London: John Murray. London: Isbister & Co. London: Chapman & Hall. § London Fisher Unwin. || London: Elliot Stock. Struggles for Life." By William Knighton, LL.D.; London and Edinburgh: Williams & Norgate. historical facts are brought together without any very immediate connection or systematic order. Evolution, politics, persecution, plague, fashion, war, constitute a few of the divisions under which the author discusses the various natural, social, and religious obstructions against which men have had to contend; and as his illustrations are drawn from almost every period and nationality, there is practically no limit to the theme. It is perhaps natural, therefore, to find a certain casual rapidity of arrangement, and some crudeness in the matter of details. But a subject so wide of course admits of very much that is exceedingly interesting, and the author's style is bright and vivid. His account of the heroic struggle of the Suliotes is given very graphically; and there is much good sense in his chapters on "Social Struggles" and on the "Destiny of England," in which the influence of English women upon the lower classes is, in the author's opinion, to play a high part. A great deal of the book is rather revolting in its matter, and the writer seems to give more care to the description of brutalities than is absolutely necessary for purposes of reformation.— The extensive literature of Seismology has received an important addition in the shape of a volume contributed by Mr. Milne to the International Scientific Series. The book is not a collection of past records and observations, but the materials have been drawn largely from personal experiments made during a residence of eight years in Japan, where the author has had the happiness of recording one earthquake a week. Besides being of great scientific interest, as giving the latest results of observation regarding the amplitude, direction, and period of motions, the book should be of practical value for the instruction it offers on the subject of measures to be adopted in the choice of building-sites and the construction of houses in districts subject to earthquakes. Not so much help can be afforded by definite rule for the prediction of shocks, owing to the fact that merely endogenous phenomena have far the greatest effect in producing earthquakes. Cicero's words, however, in the "De Divinatione," "Non Deus prævidet tantum, sed et divini ingenii viri," are accepted by the author as meaning that "God has not predicted so much as the divine ntelligence of man ;" which, in whatever way regarded, is a sufficiently bold rendering.-"A History of Music" is able, interesting, and well on line with the latest findings of philosophy and science. It liscusses, on the Darwin and Spencer platform of evolution, the origin ind progress of music through prehistoric times, and through the older ivilizations of the Egyptians, Assyrians, Hebrews, and Chinese. There s no unscientific use made of the theory of development; its real urpose as a guiding line through the labyrinths of the past being oundly appreciated. The writer's doctrine is, that the drum stage is nan's earliest attempt to elicit the rhythm which is in Nature; that he practice of the pipe is next, both these stages being sensuous and losely akin to the various physical impulses of dancing; and that the yre, with its representative the piano, is the crown of achievement, as epresenting the relative subordination of the sensuous to the thoughtful. lis discussion of races in this light has as much ethnological as musical "Earthquakes." By John Milne. London: Kegan Paul, Trench & Co. "A History of Music." By John Frederick Rowbotham. In three volumes. ondon: Trübner & Co. 1885. value, and in particular may be mentioned extraordinary insight into the social condition of Egypt's helpless millions as victims, after the present London manner, to a high civilization, while he has the clearest criticism of the religious virtues and artistic failings of the Hebrews. It is rare to meet with a volume of such fresh, honest, and enlightened thought."A History of Greek Literature," by J. B. Jevons, M.A., forms a counterpart to Mr. Cruttwell's well-known "History of Roman Literature." A special feature of the book is the examination of the different causes, political and social, which determined the development of Greek literature-causes the operation of which is more easily traced in Greek literature than in any other, owing to the absence of external influence, and the factors of the problem being simpler and less obscured. Mr. Jevons brings his sketch to an end with the death of Demosthenes. With the loss of freedom, he considers, classical Greek literature ceased to exist. Aristotle, therefore, Theocritus, Menander, the Stoics, the Epicureans, and the Alexandrian School find no place in his book. We cannot but think this a mistake; Greek literature, when it became cosmopolitan, was none the less Greek; the consciousness of a broad humanity, which it then developed, goes hand in hand with the conquests of Alexander and the spread of Greek civilization in the East; neither the triumphs of Aristotle's genius, nor those of his illustrious pupil's sword, can with justice be excluded from Greek history. For the rest, Mr. Jevons' work-especially the critical work is carefully done: it is up to date, even to such a detail as the spelling of Clytemnestra's name, and the book supplies a real want. -The marks of labour in the bulky work, "Good Queen Anne," are abundant. Though it has not really risen above the point of being a compilation, there is much in it that is readable, more especially with respect to the drama and literature of the so-called Augustan age of England. Some curious information is also given of the musicians of Queen Anne's reign; but the chapters on her soldiers and sailors are wooden and fragmentary, because of the confined space which the plan of the book allows. The second volume, which is taken up with the authors of the period, has many bright pages, and does not suffer from too much condensation. Repetitions could not be totally avoided on the biographical system followed, but it must be said that they appear so often and so unnecessarily as to damage the author's reputation for anything like finish of even a good working style. To those who value substance rather than form, there is a considerable feast of facts spread in the volumes of Mr. Davenport Adams. The epoch of Pope, Swift, Addison, Marlborough, Defoe, and many another notable, is run over in an interesting though disjointed way, rather than digested into permanent literature. * London: Charles Griffin & Co. +"Good Queen Anne; or, Men and Manners, Life and Letters, in England's Augus tan Age." By W. H. Davenport Adams. In two volumes. London: Remington & Co. THE SITUATION IN THE EAST. WH HO cau foretell what will result from a situation so complicated and so grave as that which we see in the Balkan Peninsula ? It is always perilous to play the part of prophet in matters of foreign policy, especially when the final decision must proceed from an autocrat who lives apart from the world, and who can with a single word set in motion at his own will a million of soldiers. Apropos of the impossibility of foreseeing events, Prince Bismarck, in one of those long evenings at Versailles during the siege of Paris, told a story which Herr Busch has reported for us in his curious book, " Bismarck und seine Leute." At the moment when the quarrel between Prussia and Switzerland about Neuchâtel seemed likely to lead to war, Bismarck, who was then Prussian representative at the Diet at Frankfort, called on Rothschild and instructed him to sell some stock which he thought would fall if the war broke out. "They are good securities," said Rothschild; " it is a mistake to sell them." "I know what I know," answered Bismarck: "sell." As we know, the Emperor Napoleon intervened, and the question was amicably settled; Bismarck, who thought himself so well informed, sold his stock, and lost on the bargain. "It is the only financial speculation I ever made," he added; "I was a diplomatist, not more stupid than other diplomatists; I thought I was admirably informed, and yet my forecast was entirely contradicted by the event." So I will not try to predict what the near future may have in store for us. The only task that can be attempted is to disentangle the interests of the different States which are involved in this Eastern imbroglio. First, let us take the Bulgarians. I think I may assert that the good things which I said of them in my book on the Balkan Peninsula have been entirely justified by their conduct |