NATURAL SCIENCE.

Elements of Physics.

A Text-book for High Schools and Academies. By Alfred P. Gage, A.M., Instructor in Physics in the English High School, Boston. 12mo. 424 pages. Mailing Price, $1.25; Introduction, $1.12; Allowance for old book, 35 cents.

This treatise is based upon the doctrine of the conservation of energy, which is made prominent throughout the work. But the leading feature of the book—one that distinguishes it from all others—is, that it is strictly experiment-teaching in its method; i.e., it leads the pupil to “read nature in the language of experiment.” So far as practicable, the following plan is adopted: The pupil is expected to accept as fact only that which he has seen or learned by personal investigation. He himself performs the larger portion of the experiments with simple and inexpensive apparatus, such as, in a majority of cases, is in his power to construct with the aid of directions given in the book. The experiments given are rather of the nature of questions than of illustrations, and precede the statements of principles and laws. Definitions and laws are not given until the pupil has acquired a knowledge of his subject sufficient to enable him to construct them for himself. The aim of the book is to lead the pupil to observe and to think.

C. F. Emerson, Prof. of Physics, Dartmouth College: It takes up the subject on the right plan, and presents it in a clear, yet scientific, way.

Wm. Noetling, Prof. of Rhetoric, Theory and Practice of Teaching, State Normal School, Bloomsburg, Pa.: Every page of the book shows that the author is a real teacher and that he knows how to make pupils think. I know of no other work on the subject of which this treats that I can so unreservedly recommend to all wide-awake teachers as this.

B. F. Wright, Supt. of Public Schools, St. Paul, Minn.: I like it better than any text-book on physics I have seen.

O. H. Roberts, Prin. of High School, San Jose, Cal.: Gage’s Physics is giving great satisfaction.