General Books

CHAPTER I. . . . The justification of all persons who have freed themselves from toil is now founded on experimental, positive science.  The scientific theory is as follows:— “For the study of the laws of life of human societies, there exists but one indubitable method,—the positive, experimental, critical method “Only sociology, founded on biology, founded on all the positive sciences, can... more...

PREFACE A collection of about 2000 questions asked by children forms the foundation on which this book is built. Rather than decide what it is that children ought to know, or what knowledge could best be fitted into some educational theory, an attempt was made to find out what children want to know. The obvious way to discover this was to let them ask questions. The questions collected were asked by... more...

INTRODUCTION The Great War has caused a vast destruction of the sounder portion of the belligerent peoples and it is certain that in the next generation the progeny of their weaker members will constitute a much larger proportion of the whole than would have been the case if the War had not occurred. Owing to this immeasurable calamity that has befallen the white race, the question of eugenics has... more...

THE DEVELOPMENT HYPOTHESIS. [Originally published in The Leader, for March 20, 1852. Brief though it is, I place this essay before the rest, partly because with the exception of a similarly-brief essay on "Use and Beauty", it came first in order of time, but chiefly because it came first in order of thought, and struck the keynote of all that was to follow.] In a debate upon the development... more...

On the 30th November, 1858, Jagadis Chunder was born, in a respectable Hindu family, which hails from village Rarikhal, situated in the Vikrampur Pargana of the Dacca District, in Bengal. He passed his boyhood at Faridpur, where his father, the late Babu Bhugwan Chunder Bose, a member of the then Subordinate Executive Service was the Sub-Divisional Officer; and it was there that he derived "the... more...

THE CAT. PART 1.walk´-ingthoughtknewsheathswatchedstrokedsmoothwon´-dergroundfore´-pawsyawnmis-take´shak´-ingtoesstretchedclaw1. Pussy came walking along the garden-path. Harry watched her, and saw that she did not like the damp ground. 2. She jumped over the pools, and then began to run, shaking her paws as she got to the house. 3. 'Now, a dog does not mind wet feet,' Harry thought;... more...

PREFACE Tins volume contains twelve essays written at various timesduring recent years. Many of them are studies contributed toScientific Reviews or delivered as popular lectures. Some areexpositions of views the scientific basis of which may beregarded as established. Others—the greater number—may bedescribed as attempting the solution of problems which cannot beapproached by direct observation.... more...

That application of the sciences of biology and geology, which is commonly known as palaeontology, took its origin in the mind of the first person who, finding something like a shell, or a bone, naturally imbedded in gravel or rock, indulged in speculations upon the nature of this thing which he had dug out—this "fossil"—and upon the causes which had brought it into such a position. In this... more...

Our fabulist warns "those who in quarrels interpose" of the fate which is probably in store for them; and, in venturing to place myself between so powerful a controversialist as Mr. Gladstone and the eminent divine whom he assaults with such vigour in the last number of this Review, I am fully aware that I run great danger of verifying Gay's prediction. Moreover, it is quite possible that... more...

Gallick Reports: Or, A Collection of Criminal Cases adjudg'd in the Courts of Judicature in France. In which is Comprized, An Account of Arnold du Tilh, an Impostor, who deceived a Man's Wife and Relations, and puzzled, for a long Time, the Parliament of France. Memoirs of the famous Madam de Brinvilliers, who poisoned her Father, and two Brothers, and attempted the Life of her Sister,... more...