tion. All attempts to bring it under the law of the correlation and conservation of forces have thus far failed. That it is to remain an exception to this fundamental principle, no physicist, in view of the progress of the last few years, would be willing to admit. But, on the contrary, it is confidently believed that future investigation will reveal its true character and assign it its proper place in the family of correlated forces. There is no reason to doubt that, when the nature of polarity, or the condition of matter which gives rise to attraction and repulsion, is fully comprehended-and this difficulty is not now regarded as insuperable--it will be possible to explain all the wonderful phenomena of Universal Gravitation on the theory of ethereal undulations, and thus establish the complete identity of all the forms of physical force.

We may now see how great a step the adoption of this dynamical theory of heat, with all its practical and speculative results, has been toward the sublime end to which all philosophical thought and scientific investigation now seem to be tending. To demonstrate the grand unity and harmony of the forces producing all the endless variety of the phenomena of nature, is the great work which modern science has now presented to it. And, when we consider the earnestness and energy with which it has addressed itself to its work, we may hopefully look for results still more astonishing and far-reaching in their consequences than any yet obtained. For what has already been accomplished, wonderful and even startling as it may seem compared with our past knowledge, is really but indicative of the tendency of the great current of scientific thought, and prophetic of higher and wider triumphs yet to

come.

ART. IV.-PHILANTHROPY IN WAR TIME.

Collected

The Philanthropic Results of the War in America. from Official and other Authentic Sources by an American Citizen. New York: Sheldon & Co. 1864.

If we look back to the records of history we shall find-it may seem strange to say that philanthropy, in its broadest sense, has always found the widest sphere of activity in war time. In the times of the Crusades, Christian maidens established along all the route of the army of the Crusaders hospitals for the sick and wounded soldiers, and ministered to their healing with such skill as they possessed; while at home, high-born matrons and maids gave from their own stores the food and clothing needed by the families of the men-at-arms who had followed their lords to the contest against the Paynim host.

In the civil war in England, which resulted in the dethronement and execution of Charles the First, not only were the sweet charities of domestic life called forth for the succor of the wounded, but education received a new and higher impulse; and from that period dates the foundation of some of the best institutions of learning in the land.

Not less productive of deeds of charity, though among a greatly impoverished people, was our own war of the Revolution. The sacrifices of the women of that period for the sake of the army, and the abundant contributions, even in the midst. of the most grinding poverty, of all classes, mitigated greatly, though they could not wholly prevent, the sufferings of the soldiery. It was amid this fearful strife, too, that the foundations of some of our best colleges were laid; and though the times seemed unfavorable for the promotion of education, yet our fathers, strong in their faith of the glorious future, determined to secure for their children the opportunities of instruction.

It is not, then, so utterly without precedent as our impulsive reader has assumed, that philanthropy should find ample field for exercise in time of war; though never has it attained to such extraordinary proportions as in the struggle in which we are now engaged, as indeed in no contest of modern times has there been so much occasion for its ministration.

Various and multiform have been its manifestations. State legislatures, acting for the nonce in accordance with the will of their constituents, voted almost unanimously sums greatly beyond any previous expenditure of the state, for arming and equipping or giving bounties and extra pay to their own citizens who volunteered. Counties, cities, towns, and corporatious appropriated large sums, in some instances millions, for bounties and the relief of soldiers' families. Individuals possessing wealth undertook the cost of fitting out whole regiments, or paid large bounties to stimulate men to enlist, pledging themselves at the same time to the support of their families; while others, though themselves exempt by age or ill health from personal service in the army, desiring to be represented there, sent a stalwart soldier to fill their place. In this form of patriotic service many ladies of wealth participated. One citizen presented to the government a steamship of unsurpassed beauty and speed; a gift estimated at eight hundred thousand dollars. Another having performed some great service for the government, paid into the United States treasury his entire commission, amounting to twenty-five thousand dollars. The same spirit actuated all classes of loyal citizens; those who had not large sums to give gave what they could, but all felt that they must contribute something. Nor has this desire to contribute to the maintenance and increase of the army yet ceased. Villages which before the commencement of the war could not have raised for any public purpose whatever five thousand dollars, have contributed, year after year, their subscriptions of from ten to fifteen thousand dollars to increase the bounties of volunteers, in addition to taxes of equal or larger amount for the same purpose; and cities and larger towns have given in like proportion, and each new call is responded to as cheerfully as those which preceded it.

The little work whose title we have placed at the beginning of our article computes the amount thus contributed to January last, by states, counties, towns, corporations, and individuals for the equipment, bounties, and extra pay of volunteers, and the relief of their families, together with other purposes of national defense, at a little more than one hundred and eighty-seven millions of dollars. A somewhat careful inquiry into the contributions of the northern and northwestern states during the past summer

convinces us that the estimate is below the truth, and that, with the addition of the bounties, etc., offered under the two calls of the present year, it cannot be less than two hundred and twenty millions. This vast sum, it is to be remembered, is entirely independent of all that has been appropriated in the shape of equipment, pay, or bounties by the United States government, that being regarded in the light of a business expenditure.

But the expenditure of this sum, large and liberal as it was, only contemplated the placing the soldier in the field and the care of his family at home. It had no reference to his possible sickness or wounding, to the sanitary condition of his camp, and the prevention of disease by suitable precautions of clothing, food, exercise, and location, and made no provision for his intellectual or moral improvement.

The care of the soldier, in some of these particulars, appertained properly to the medical department of the army; but that department, though admirably adapted to an army of twenty-five thousand men, for which it was originally designed, expanded slowly and with great difficulty to the care of a million, and mean time there was need of a more flexible voluntary organization to supplement its deficiencies and make up for its lack of service. Provision for the intellectual and moral wants of the soldiers was for the most part beyond the scope of the governmental authority.

The physical necessities of the soldier had excited the sympathies of the great mass of the people from the beginning of the war. As soon as the troops began to move toward Washington in April and May, 1861, supplies of comforts and delicacies of all kinds were forwarded to them by express in such abundance, that before the first of June the principal express companies broke down under an accumulation of goods beyond their utmost power of delivery. Everywhere the women were at work for the soldiers; clothing of every description, havelocks, and articles of food to vary the dull monotony of the ration, were prepared and forwarded in quantities far beyond the immediate wants of the army. At first there was little system or order, and as a consequence great waste. But with the talent for organization so characteristic of the American mind, this chaos of philanthropy soon took form and shape,

and there emerged from it institutions of practical and permanent value to the army. Prominent among these was the SANITARY COMMISSION, having its origin in the joint efforts of three associations formed in New York city for the purpose of aiding the government in the care of the soldier. These associations were, the "Women's Central Association of Relief," which had undertaken the furnishing of hospital supplies and the training of nurses; the "Advisory Committee of the Board of Physicians and Surgeons of the Hospitals of New York," which had given much thought to the present and prospective sanitary condition of the army; and the "New York Medical Association for furnishing Hospital Supplies in Aid of the Army," whose officers, though purely medical, are sufficiently described by its title. Each of these associations appointed members of a joint committee, to visit Washington and ascertain from the War Department in what way the aid which all felt would soon be needed could best be rendered to the government, in the improvement of the sanitary condition of the army, and the prevention and successful treatment of the diseases which would undoubtedly visit the camps. The men composing this committee were Rev. Dr. Bellows, and Doctors W. H. Van Buren, Elisha Harris, and Jacob Harsen; all men. known throughout the country for their professional ability and their previous labors in the cause of sanitary science. They found matters in great confusion at Washington. The medical bureau was not only physically inadequate to the vast volume of labor unexpectedly thrown upon it, but many of its members were so wedded to routine that they could not be made to comprehend the new and enlarged duties thrown upon them by the emergency, and were attempting with feeble persistence to manage the hygienic affairs of an army rapidly approaching a half million of men with the machinery intended for a force of twenty or twenty-five thousand. They could give the committee no information, declined all proffers of assistance, regarding themselves as abundantly competent to supply all the medical wants of the army, and turned a cold shoulder upon their proposals.

It happened that Dr. Van Buren, one of the members of this New York committee, had himself been an army surgeon, and fully understood the capacities of the medical bureau, and