“I have already read a large part of the book, and I have been delighted, instructed, and morally animated. It gives rich, delicate, and robust expression to a various knowledge, as well as to fine, devout and far-reaching thought. I have not for long taken up a book which has interested me so immediately, or refreshed me so abundantly.”—Rev. R. S. Storrs, D.D., Brooklyn, N. Y.
“An admirable treatment of a widely related theme. The book is none the less profound for being so pungent, and its sharp raciness of style is quite befitting its keen discrimination of thought.”—Pres. Julius H. Seelye, LL.D., Amherst College.
“I appreciate it highly. The incisive but graceful style is worthy the pure and elevating sentiments and conceptions which it inculcates. I feel a singular sympathy with its way of thinking, and shall embrace every proper opportunity to call attention to a book so brilliant and so noble in its aims.”—Prof. Alexander Winchell, LL.D., Michigan University.
“I know Prof. Parker chiefly by the articles he gave me for the North American Review. These gave me the highest regard for him as an original, sound and deep thinker. I have repeatedly characterized his article on the natural theology of art as the best paper that passed under my hands during the ten or eleven years of my editorship. My belief is that Mr. Parker’s æsthetic capacity and culture are unsurpassed among us.”—Prof. A. P. Peabody, D.D., of Harvard University.
“Prof. Parker, like the late President Hitchcock, was continually laying in rich stores of facts and principles in the several departments of natural history. At the same time he was contributing to the North American Review articles in natural and ethical philosophy unexcelled for richness and beauty by any contemporaneous productions of American periodical literature.”—Prof. W. S. Tyler, LL.D., of Amherst College.
“By personal knowledge of the manuscript I know that Prof. Parker has investigated the subjects of Animal Intelligence and Animal Æsthetics in a new and fresh way, as never has been done before, in defence of a spiritual philosophy. It is a work that was greatly needed, and is thoroughly done by Dr. Parker, as only an accomplished naturalist, a skilful literateur and a clear reasoner could do it.”—Ex-President G. F. Magoun, D.D., of Iowa College.
“The title is a gem in itself, and I have named my wife after it. I have had a copy presented to the Philosophical Society of Great Britain, and have urgently recommended the author for honorary membership, and am assured of success. These deeds are better encomiums than words like the following:—that I deem it one of the best displays of the connection between science and religion I have ever met with. A grand book.”—Ephraim Cutter, M.D., LL.D., Hon. F. S. Sc. (London), Mem. Victoria Inst., etc.
“The author is a naturalist and in quite familiar with the facts and views of Darwin, Spencer and Haeckel; and, whatever restrictions he may make upon them, he has made as a man who has studied the subject from the inside. The observation of facts in the organic and inorganic worlds is good.”—Science.
“In Prof. Henry W. Parker’s volume we have just one of those protests against the recent schools of philosophical sensationalism which are sure to be raised, sooner or later, in the name of esthetics. We welcome everything that will bring intelligent people to see that it is not dogmatic orthodoxy alone or the limited and perhaps narrow interests of sectarian religion which are assailed by this philosophy, but the whole spiritual theory of man, the basis of his esthetic ideas and of art in all its higher relations. This is the value of Professor Parker’s book. It is attractive in style and indicates an abundant familiarity with the subject, both as a naturalist and a student of esthetics. The chapter on the Divine in Art can hardly be surpassed in the literature of the subject.”—N. Y. Independent.
“The Spirit of Beauty, by Prof. Parker, is a fresh find in John B. Alden’s literary gold mine. It is a series of essays, æsthetic and scientific, inspired by a reverent passion for purity and beauty, and clothed in the language of a ripe and finished scholar. The essays are all overflowing with beauty, melody and fragrance, as well as charged with learning and profound thought.”—Southern Criterion, Atlanta, Ga.