Social Elements, Institutions, Character, Progress. By Charles Richmond Henderson. New York : Charles Scribner's Sons. Pp. vi + 405.
This book is divided into several parts, each part being, in some sense, introductory to the next following part :
Part I, " Basis of Society in Nature."
Part II, "The Social Person."
Part III, " Social Institutions."
Part IV, " Social Psychology, Order, and Progress." An appendix gives directions for local studies, maps, and topics for discussion.
Those who had read carefully the works previously published by Dr. Henderson were prepared, when the present volume was announced, to expect a book of great interest and value. In this expectation they will not be disappointed, even though they should be constrained occa- sionally to place an interrogation point after some statement of the author, for the purpose of giving it further consideration. The work, as the writer says, has been prepared both for ordinary readers, many of whom care for little more than a surface knowledge of a subject, and also for students, including teachers, who are, as a rule, seeking to get at the real truth. The adoption of the book by the Indiana Teachers' Reading Circle indicates that it is intended to meet the wants of teachers of common schools, a class of persons who, more than any others, excepting possibly parents, have occasion to make use, in their daily labors, of practical facts such as are discussed in this treatise. The book will, consequently, be especially valued on account of its adapta- tion to educational purposes. The introduction states very clearly the field of study and the means of learning the facts to which attention is to be directed. The order and arrangement of the matter conform admirably to the principles of pedagogy and the general laws of teach- ing. Any intelligent instructor will be able to follow readily the steps and progress of the discussion. The purpose of this article is chiefly to notice the happy application of some of these principles.
It is agreed by all experienced students of pedagogy that the child, and indeed the more advanced learner, must begin, in the investigation of any complex subject, with the near-at-hand and with the concrete. If the world is to be studied, one should commence with his own home, his neighborhood, his immediate surroundings. If a principle is to be easily and thoroughly comprehended, it must be seen embodied in some institution or some mode of living. Dr. Henderson well says :
