Joseph Cook and his Boston lectures are too well known to need comment. All who are interested in following the “advanced thought” of this remarkable man will require his “Occident.”[I] This valuable book contains Mr. Cook’s lectures on “advanced thought” in England, Germany, Italy and Greece; his remarkable expositions of Professor Zöllner’s views of spiritualism, and the views of his opponents; the discussion on probation after death, and many talks on current topics of the time. It contains decidedly the most interesting collection of lectures published this season.
A work on physiology and hygiene, eminently practical, and showing the most approved methods of the school room, has just been published by A. Lovell & Co.[J] For primary and intermediate grades it is decidedly the best work we have seen. The object lessons, given or suggested, will be valuable aids to teachers, and for all young readers the principal facts are well expressed, and amply illustrated. Though a book for children it is not childish, and any one may gather from it lessons of great value. The chapters on alcohol and narcotics furnish the basis of lessons that should be taught plainly in all our schools.
“Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene”[K] is a work evidently prepared by one having a thorough knowledge of the subject. Though scientific and scholarly, it is popular in style, and not burdened with useless technicalities. It is well illustrated. The great advance made in physiological and hygienic knowledge in the last decade is noted with no ordinary satisfaction. The millions who now know so much of themselves, their needs and resources, liabilities and safeguards, are congratulated. Such knowledge and obedience to nature’s laws connect closely with the progress of society, and all that is most valuable in human achievement.
A little volume of poems by Andrew Lang bears the title, “Ballades and Verses Vain.”[L] The poems are classified into five different groups. There are ballads on all sorts of subjects and charming society verses, a handful of sonnets and a collection of bright translations, beside a few songs, “Post Homerica.” Austin Dobson has written these pretty verses of introduction for Mr. Lang’s “Laughter and Song:”
“Laughter and song the poet brings,
And lends them form and gives them wings;