him, for the family bookcase the library of the Mechanics' contained only a handful of Institute. During the whole such works as Bunyan, The Pictorial Bible, and Ebenezer Erskine. From the last of these Bain remembered having declaimed pages at the age of four, but he naïvely admits that the highly anthropomorphic designs in the Pictorial Bible left a ludicrous impression that endured through life. But of these very early recollections by far the most suggestive and interesting in the light of his after work is his account of the very early development of an unusual critical faculty, "to take all statements of fact in their literal meaning, and to compare them with one another, and with the facts in their actual occurrence. From my earliest consciousness, I had this peculiarity in a degree beyond what I could observe in those about me. It operated in many ways, and showed itself particularly in religion and conduct." When his schooldays ended at the age of eleven, Bain had acquired an excellent grounding in mathematics and some knowledge of Latin-no large equipment, but quite sufficient, as it proved, for a basis to a long-continued effort at selfimprovement. After a short experience as an auctioneer's clerk, Bain, for the next five years, joined his father at the loom, preferring manual labour to the drudgery of a desk. These years were the formative period of his life. After a day at the loom, he would spend three hours at an evening school, thereafter reading till midnight from of this period, his interests were entirely scientific and mathematical, and by the time he was sixteen he was studying the differential calculus, and reading Newton and Herschel. But the strongest stimulus to further study he found in the formal debates and reading of papers on the most ambitious subjects at the Mechanics' Institute. His method of work was undoubtedly the very best he could have chosen for his special requirements: it was his way, in preparing papers for societies, "to choose a difficult subject I did not understand at the moment, but got cleared up, under the strain of being committed to bring it before an audience." One day in 1835 came the tide in his affairs which led to fame. A clergyman, struck by the youth's conversation in the shop of a bookseller, was prompted to offer to coach him for the university. This kindly help was seconded by James Melvin, who, with characteristic generosity, admitted Bain to the Grammar School free of charge for three months' coaching in the then indispensable art of Latin prose composition. Bain made valiant efforts to do in three months what his rivals had been studying for as many years. Though he did not succeed in gaining a bursary, he was fourteenth on the list, and his effort was quickly and justly rewarded by a small presentation scholarship, which enabled him to proceed to the univer The Autobiography' traces these early years with what many will consider disproportionate length. Bain's answer to this may readily be conjectured. The Autobiography is really an elaborate preface to his works. The special business of this book is to paint the philosopher in the making; for his achievement he refers us to our library. It is certainly the earlier part of the book that is the more interesting, and it affords many curious glimpses of the Scottish universities of an older day. What would an undergraduate "tenderfoot" of to-day think of a competition for a mathematical scholarship which lasted for two days from ten in the morning till midnight sity. His success as a student tending' a course of lectures would have been remarkable for the professor of surgery. under the most adventitious circumstances. In classics he acquitted himself among the best; in Mathematics and Natural Philosophy he excelled all his contemporaries, being "complimented in very unusual terms for my essays"; and at the end of the curriculum he was bracketed as the most distinguished student of his year. During all his years in the university his vacations were spent in working at the loom, in private tuition, in voracious reading from the university library, and in preparing papers for various "mutual improvement" societies. It was not till his fourth year at the university that Bain's interests definitely shifted from mathematical to philosophical studies. Before he was twenty he believed that he had made original contributions to what he calls "The Philosophy of Discovery," and so consuming was his passion for the discovery of general principles that he had even "formulated a theory of conversation"! Again, a prize competition for an essay on "Cruelty to Animals" was the occasion of an analysis of sympathy thorough and complete, "even as compared with my finished handling in The Emotions and the Will.' Will.'" It is typical of Bain's passion for knowledge that in addition to the necessary classes he attended courses in Botany, Chemistry, and Anatomy, and one of his vacations was spent in ex On and only three problems set each day? Or what would he think of having to win his M.A. degree by having to tackle the seven necessary subjects in seven consecutive days-Sunday excluded? his professors and his contemporaries Bain has many observations of interest. "The Latin teaching under Melvin," he shrewdly remarks, "had no rhetorical efficacy. He felt the poetry himself, but could not impart it to his pupils." Thomas Clark, the professor of chemistry, was a man of extraordinary mental activity. He made deep research into the provinces of grammar and Biblical criticism, and Bain records, with quite unusual emphasis, that "from no other single man did I obtain the same amount of assistance in regard to Eng lish style and composition." So much for the professor, Writing of his contemporaries, but what of his students? At he says, "Still more stimulat- his first dame's school, Bain ing was the companionship of displayed a dexterity due to David Masson. He was already original sin by ringing the a deep thinker in matters of changes on two psalms instead philosophy, literature, and theo- of repeating a new one every logy; and while I poured out morning to the pious dame my cogitations to him, he gave afflicted with a short memory. an encouraging attention, which Many years later, when supwas what I needed and profited posed to be taking notes of Dr by." But for the best account Glennie's prehistoric discourses, of a Scottish University class- Bain was "analysing in writroom of a bygone generation ing the succession of my own we may quote Bain's descrip- thoughts, with a view to gention of the Moral Philosophy eralising the laws of associaclass in Aberdeen in 1839:- tion." Two years before this he had been deeply impressed by Hartley. "The professor, Dr Glennie, was old and feeble. He had a young clergyman as his assistant, who did the work of the six hours weekly, while he himself took the remaining nine. His mode of teaching was a survival from the old University system, of which he was probably the last example. The morning hours, when the assistant officiated, were devoted to dictation, called by the old Scotch phrase 'diting.' It consisted in slowly dictating a summary of the course in consecutive composition. The substance had long been fixed, so that the student had to take down, To the friendship of a fellowtownsman Bain owed his introduction to Mill and his circle. John Robertson for a few years acted as assistant-editor to Mill in the management of 'The London and Westminster Review,' and on his visits to Aberdeen he had much to tell to the group of young students interested in philosophy of the charmed circle to which he had right of entry. The result was that Bain became an ardent admirer of the Westminster,' in which "Mill's political and other articles had a wonderful fascination for me," though his hero-worship did not prevent him from discovering that Mill's literary criticism was based on no guiding principles, but was merely a sustained ipse dixit. Venturing to write to Mill, he received a very encouraging reply, and in 1840 he made his first appearance as a writer with an article in the Westminster' on the daguerreotype and electrotype processes. Two years later, when he was now assistant to the professor of Moral Philosophy, Bain spent a memorable summer in London, receiving a warm welcome from Mill, and meeting men like Grote, Arnott, Lewes, Chadwick, and Carlyle. In his monograph on Mill he recorded his recollections of their first meeting. "The day after arriving, I walked down to the India House with Robertson, and realised my dream of meeting Mill in person. I am not likely to forget the impression he made upon me, as he stood by his desk, with his face turned to the door as we entered. His tall slim figure, his youthful face and bald head, fair hair and ruddy complexion, and the twitching of his eyebrow when he' spoke, first arrested the attention : then the vivacity of his manner, his thin voice approaching to sharpness, but with nothing shrill or painful about it, his comely features and sweet expression would have all remained in my memory though I had never seen him again. To complete the picture, I should add his dress, which was constant-a black dress-suit with silk neck-tie." During all the five months of his visit to town, Bain went twice a week to the India House in Leadenhall Street and escorted Mill on his way to Kensington Square. The intimacy quickly ripened, and so it came about that the 'Logic,' which was at last in the press after being rejected by Mr Murray, was submitted to Bain for revision. At first, Bain tells us, the general impression overpowered his critical faculties, but he speedily revived and began to pick holes. The most valuable help he was able to afford was the furnishing of examples illustrative of the Experimental Methods; and here Bain turned to to good account his knowledge of natural and applied science. In the 'Westminster' for May 1843 Bain reviewed the 'Logic,' displeasing its author by his eulogy. This vacation was in many ways the great turning-point in Bain's life. He had now influence behind him, and only the occasion was to seek for a successful entry into academic teaching. With Carlyle he established a friendly footing, and on his first visit had the pleasure of hearing Jupiter thundering. "I have tried many recipes," quoth the sage, "Wordsworth and the rest, and, but for the French Revolution and German literature, I see very little hope for this old earth of ours. "" It was this same year that Bain was offered the editorship of the Aberdeen 'Banner,' a post which he declined, and which was taken by his old friend David Masson. On his way to London, Bain to London, Bain attended a lecture of Christopher North's, and his comment has the incisive sarcasm which in later years many a student had cause to remember. "His subject seemed to be the criteria of moral virtue or merit; and the lecture concluded with a highflown panegyric on our own King Alfred." A few years later 'Maga' avenged her champion by turning a cold ear to the voice of his sarcastic auditor. Bain had the temerity to submit an article to 'Maga' on Leigh Hunt's 'Wit and Humour,' and received the inevitable reply that "the subject as connected with Leigh Hunt was not to the editor's taste." Until 1845 Bain remained in Aberdeen, acting as assistant to the professor of Moral Philosophy-with whom he had a quarrel for trying to impart some vitality to the fossil lectures which he was supposed to dictate-and, for one session, as substitute for William Knight, the able and eccentric professor of Natural Philosophy. (Knight's favourite rebuke to a rowdy student was the stern prophecy, "You'll die in a ditch.") On various occasions Bain offered himself as a candidate for Scottish philosophical chairs, but time and again he was defeated by the organisations of orthodoxy. Sometimes this had lamentable results for the chairs concerned. Professor (afterwards Principal) Pirie and Bain were the favoured candidates for the chair of Moral Philosophy. Neither candidate would have grudged the honour to the other, and either would have adorned the post. But a compromise was instituted, with the result that for close on half a century the teaching of Ethics in the University of Aberdeen was intrusted to two estimable gentlemen, who won the friendship of their pupils, but reduced philosophy to a farce. It is probable that in the matter of its professorial appointments this country might advantageously study American methods. A single appointment due to nepotism or jobbery has again and again sufficed to cripple a whole de partment of university study. Of this the case in point is an admirable illustration. That only a very few of the pupils of Bain and his successor, Minto, attained to any philosophical distinction is mainly attributable to the incapacity of their colleagues in that department of study. Bain's disappointment was in this case consoled by his appointment to the so-called Chair of Natural Philosophy in the Andersonian Institution of Glasgow. One session of the work there, however, was sufficient to convince him that the post led to nothing, and, full of confidence in his own ability, Bain resigned the post, and boldly embarked on a career of authorship. At the present day such a step would savour of madness. Bain was a ready, but never a graceful, writer. He had a splendid equipment of knowledge, and a magnificent capacity for the logical arrangement and the lucid exposition of facts. The bricks he built with were not dissimilar to those Huxley used, but Bain had never any command of the straws of style. But, fortunately for him, the spirit of that age was a very grave and serious spirit. The day of "bright and chatty literature had not yet dawned. A serious people clamoured for information at any price, and, as by a miracle, Messrs Chambers supplied the felt want. They provided 'Information for the People' and 'Papers for the People' on every conceivable subject from agriculture to astrology, and on every |