Psychology: an elementary text-book

AN ELEMENTARY TEXT-BOOK BY HERMANN EBBINGHAUS PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF HALLE; AUTHOR OF “ÜBER DAS GEDÄCHTNIS,” “GRUNDZÜGE DER PSYCHOLOGIE,” ETC.; EDITOR OF THE “ZEITSCHRIFT FÜR PSYCHOLOGIE” TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY MAX MEYER PROFESSOR OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI BOSTON, U.S.A. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 1908 Copyright, 1908, By D. C. Heath & Co.

The present book is a free translation of Ebbinghaus’s “Abriss der Psychologie” (Veit & Co., Leipzig, 1908). It is intended primarily to serve as a text-book for college students, but it should appeal also to the general reader. It will commend itself through its brevity and the excellent proportions of the material selected. The translator became interested in this book because of the fact that the author has succeeded in keeping entirely free of all fads, and has presented only that which is generally accepted by psychological science; on the other hand, he has given to the highest constructive processes of the human mind, religion, art, and morality, the attention which they deserve because of their tremendous importance for human life.
In some places the original text has been somewhat condensed, particularly in the description of the anatomy of the nervous system in section 2. Section 4 of the original has been omitted, since its contents seemed to be sufficiently emphasized in the other sections of the book. The numbers of the following sections differ, therefore, from those of the German text. The translator regards this as insignificant, since his intention is not to aid his brother-psychologists in making themselves acquainted with Ebbinghaus’s views,—for this end they are referred to the German original,—but to furnish an elementary text-book for the English-speaking student. Wherever there was any doubt as to the comprehensibility to the American student of any application or illustration of the laws discussed by the author, the translator has unhesitatingly sacrificed the interest of the professional psychologist to that of the beginner-student. In a few places he has made slight additions to the original; for instance, figures 7, 8, and 9 are his own property. But he has decided to abstain from enumerating all changes, since this would be of interest only to the professional psychologist. In no case are his additions opposed to the author’s views.