BOOK REVIEWS 46t that constitute the material units of physics.” Such a fundamental science would cause physics to become derivative and would not leave psychology as singular and isolated among sciences. Kolnai, Aurel. PsycuoaNatyse unp Soztotocim. Zur PsycHou- OGIE VON Masse unp Gesertscuarr. [Internationaler Psycho- analytischer Verlag, Leipzig, Vienna, Ziirich.] This study of psychoanalysis in its relation to sociology presents many suggestive thoughts. While the author has stated his own ideas concisely and as clearly considered conclusions, he has left them also as points of view from which to consider many practical problems. One need not agree with his analyses of conditions in every instance, yet one is challenged to give thoughtful consideration. For situations are too easily accepted, as he suggests, with only blind tationalizations of emotional desires rather than with clear fundamental analysis of conditions. Kolnai begins by pointing out the actual relation of psycho- analysis to sociology. As a special form of psychological research devoted to the understanding and adaptation of lives, it must itself be distinct from sociology, and yet its work is always in practical relation to the latter. It belongs with a social science which seeks truly to understand society in its psychological meaning. To such a sociology it is a distinct aid for the fuller understanding of historical social development, of the significance of present movements and conditions, and in the practical formative tasks of sociology. The writer reviews psychoanalytic interpretation, its principles and dis- coveries. He then turns the light of these upon the great social agitations of the present day, chiefly communism and anarchy in their relation to other phases of social condition, His analysis of these movements as particular forms of the underlying individual complexes, resistance to the father, supplanting of the father author- ity by the brother clan, reaching back to the mother, are suggestive thoughts for further examination in relation to these large sociolog- ical problems. It also further illuminates the understanding of the individual whose conflicts go to make up the great social struggles. [B.] Child, Charles Manning. Tur Oricix axp DeveLopMENT oF THE Nervous System From A Pxystonoarcar. Virwrornt. [The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1921.] Child’s presentation of the idea of the physiological axial gradient as explaining differentiation in protoplasmic growth activity is fruitful for the understanding of the development of the nervous system, He has expressed his thought clearly, leading it step by step through the report of various experimental investigations which confirm and illuminate the theory. He seeks to prove that the nervous system cannot be a peculiar structure injected at some time into a developing organism, Instead, it is only a specially developed part of such an organism following the principles of the organismic development.