Much more might be remarked in refutation of Professor Müller's thesis, but I have probably already tired the reader's patience. I hope enough has been said to show that this learned author has not even brought out a clear and consistent statement of his own position, much less to have effected any "revolution in philosophy," I have not discussed his theory of the formation of roots in language, for such a discussion seems unnecessary after the examination thus far made into the nature of thought. Nor do I stop to consider his lament over the neglect of Kant among later English thinkers. I can see no evidence that Kant has been neglected or failed to receive the attention that is his due; but all this is quite irrelevant to Professor Müller's argument. As for the latter it is self-contradicted in his own book, and any thorough analysis of mental operations would, as seems to me, independently demonstrate its fallaciousness. Altogether, the impression made upon the reader of "The Science of Thought" is that of a work written by a man, who, possessed by his favorite science, endeavors to use it for the explanation of all other sciences without much reference to the results which an unbiased and dispassionate study of those sciences would yield.
Professor Müller informs us that his book was written for himself and for a few friends, with whom he has been traveling for many years on the same road. We are grateful for the permission to join this band of peripatetics for the while, and, if pressing duties elsewhere oblige us to part from them, we can cordially thank Professor Müller for a charming entertainment, reserving, of course, to ourselves that liberty, which all good society allows, of afterward abusing the company.
| THE METALS OF ANCIENT CHALDEA. |
By M. P. E. BERTHELOT.
IN the pursuit of my studies of the origins of alchemy and the metals of antiquity, I have had occasion to examine substances recovered from the Palace of Sargon at Khorsabad, and from the excavations made by M. de Sarzec at Tello, as they are preserved in the Museum of the Louvre. I intend to describe the results of my analyses, and then to examine a number of new or little-known documents relative to the origin of the tin used by the ancients in the manufacture of bronze.
In the course of his excavations, in 1854, M. Place discovered, under one of the angular stones of the Palace of Sargon, at Khorsabad, a stone chest containing votive tablets, covered with very clear cuneiform inscriptions commemorating the foundation of the building, b. c. 706. According to M. Place, there were five of these tablets; but the form of the inscriptions indicates that there were seven of
