The author of this book, though not yet 40 years of age, has made for himself a high place among contemporary writers. His first volume, on the French Revolution in San Domingo, appeared in 1914, and was followed by three others} relating to the Great War. In 1920 he issued "The Rising Tide of Colour against White World-Supremacy."" In the next year came "The New World of Islam." Re views of each of these volumes appeared in the "North-China Daily News" at the time.
It is not to be wondered at that the publishers cite the remark of the late Lord Northcliffe during his circumnavigution of the globe:
"Two far-seeing books (the abovementioned), by the same American author, should be in the library of every One who wants to know something of the world of 1950." To "The Rising Tide of Colour' President Harding referred when he spoke in Birmingham, Alabama, on America's race problem: Whoever will take the time to read and ponder it (this book) must realize that our race problems here in the United States are only a phase of a race issue which the whole world confronts." Thus it is evident that the author's extensive studies and wide reading have prepared him to branch out into a line somewhat different from his previous ones, but of equal importance.
In the opening chapter on "The Burden of Civilization" (a tern which, however, he does not define), the author. sets forth the seamy side. of human progress. He says that during the entire historic period, at any rate, there is abundant, evidence proving that mankind has-made no racial progress in either physical power or brain capacity. The skeletal remains of the an-dents show them to have possessed brains and bodies fully aqua] to our own and these anatomical observations are confirmed by the teachings of history. ''Can we show greater philosophers than Plate or Aristotle, greater scientists than Archimedes or Ptolemy, greater generals than Cwsar or Flossers greater poets. than HomeFfor Hesiod, greater spiritual guides than Buddha or Jesus?" It is interesting to recall that Mrs. John Martin, an American author, published in 1910 a curious book entitled: "Is Mankind Advancing?' giving elaborate lists of the great men of all the centuries with a view to proving, in Chinese phrase, that "the present is nob equal to the past;" thus reaching by an empirical process the same conclusions as Dr. Stodard's induetions from biology.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.