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This work of Ogburn's is one of the most stimulating studies of human behavior that it has been the fortune of the reviewer recently to read. The psychiatrist and the psychoanalyst will have their attention immediately arrested by these two statements in the preface: first, “It is thought that the most effective check against error is an examination of the sources of one's own prejudices,” and second, “No one indeed ever honestly knows the origin of his ideas,” and will at once admit that the author certainly appears to start out upon his quest with an attitude of mind which promises much of interest.
The book as a whole may be said to be occupied essentially with the problem of whether that complex of factors which have resulted in what we are pleased to call civilization is essentially dependent upon man's nature as such, that is, his constitution, his hereditary qualities, or whether on the other hand it is the result of the accumulation at a constantly increasing rate of discoveries and inventions. The author's conclusion is almost uncompromisingly that the second state of affairs expresses the facts or at least he would say that if there have been any fundamental and far reaching changes in man's nature since the beginning of that series of events which has resulted in civilization, there is no sufficient evidence of such changes, while on the other hand the evidences of the increasing complexity of society as the result of discoveries and inventions is very considerable. The argument is followed through very convincingly, and the conclusion is at least suggestively helpful for all those interested in human betterment, for if mankind is to all intents and purposes unchangeable, his cultural environment certainly does permit of more or less modification.
The results of nature on the one hand and nurture on the other, as they are wont to be called, have been a source of argument for many a day and the results of the two have been consistently and continuously confu