p. 13 | BOOK NOTICES

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Aug 20, 1912

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 39, No. 32.

BOOK NOTICES

"The Critical Period of American History, 1783-1789." By John Fiske. Cloth. $2.00. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston and New York.

This book is the substance of a course of lectures given in the Old South Meeting-house in Boston in 1884. It is really a sketch of the political history of the United States from the end of the Revolutionary War to the adoption of the Federal Constitution. It does not treat upon the Revolution itself as the critical period of American history, but upon the times which immediately followed that period, the formative state of the nation and government, the turning-point in the development of political society in the western hemisphere. To that period and to that crisis, more than to any other in the history of America, the author attributes the molding influences which shaped America into the mighty nation and tremendous world force she has been. He who wishes to become conversant with the formation of the great republic of the West, who would learn of the secret springs which helped to form the mighty rivers, certainly needs to read "The Critical Period of American History."

"Christ Among the Cattle." By Frederick Rowland Marvin. Cloth. 12 mo. 60c net. By mail 65c. Sherman, French & Co., publishers, Boston.

This little book is written with an object in view, and that is the rights of animals at the hands of men. The author believes that it justifies their production. A few years ago it was believed that animals had no rights that men are morally bound to respect, and cruelty was everywhere manifest, altho frequently rebuked. A great change has taken place, and the popular conscience has been quickened, and the author hopes that this little book against cruelty and vivisection will help to strengthen the sentiment which has been created. The basis of the book is taken from our Lord's

birth in a manger, surrounded by the lowly cattle, and he feels that our Saviour's advent associated with beasts of the stall should teach us lessons of respect for and kindness toward the animal world. Other passages of Scripture are quoted to the same end. Even the promises of the new heavens and the new earth show that God has regard for the animal kingdom. The little volume is a tremendous arraignment of cruelty to animals; of the fashions which murder thousands of birds simply for their plumage, regardless of the effect of the slaughter; of the breeding and fattening of animals; of the bull fighting and the bear baiting and the cockpit, the stag-hunt and the fox-hunt, and vivisection.