German Hellenism

THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY hear them. As distinct from this, what is required is a positive' description of the occurrence and of the conditions which affect it_. Dr. Rhine merely touched upon this when he investigated the effect of drugs upon the cqrrectness of the subjects' judgments. Even if we grant that these investigations have demonstrated the existence of extra~sensory perception and telepathy, the findings still fail to be of any particular significance. The results, obtained as they were from numerous subjects and after seven years of research, show that such powers provide a very uncertain ,basis for even such an insignificant performance as guessing cards. The guesses of even the best subjects are neither sufficiently correct nor consistent enough to provide an adequ"ate guide for any course of action. Even when we are playing cards, a sound knowledge of the principles of the game (or, if one prefers, dexterity in the manipulation of the cards when shuffling and dealing) would still constitute a "much sounder basis for winning than aU the extrasensory perception or telepathy that may have been demonstrated by these investigations. Further, there is no, indication that these powers develop with practice. If anything, the opposite appears to be the case with some subjects. This,practically eliminates the last claim of the findings to any psychological significance. True, further investigations may conceivably reveal something of significance , hut as yet there is no indication that this will be the case. There will always be those for whom the mysterious and the vague have a special attraction. For, such, Dr. Rhine's book is heartily recommended: they will enjoy it. For those who prefer well-founded and significant information, no such recommendation is offered.' ' . GERMAN HELLENISM'" H. STEINHAUER It is a tribute to British scholarship that it realized very-early the immense influence which Greek civilization has exercised on modern German life " and thought, more especially on German literature of the last two centuries. In 1923 appeared- Marshall "'The Tyranny of Greece ooer Germany, by E. M. Butler, Cambridge University Press (Macmillans in Canada) I 1935. ' 268 REVIEWS Montgomery's book 6n Friedrich Holderlin and the German NeoHellenic Moveme'(lt-a rather pedantic and poorly written work, but important nevertheless in digging out a large store of valuable information. The next ' year Professor J. G. Robertson delivered and published his Taylorian lecture on The Gods of Greece in'German Poetry-an 'extremely able survey of a vast field of research, but necessarily sketchy. Ten years later Mr. Humphrey Trevelyan published a short study, TIle Populm' Backgroundto Goethe's Hellenism , in which he retraced in greater detail some of the ground ' already covered by Montgomery. Robertson's brief paper could not, Montgomery's and Trevelyan's volumes did not, do any sort ofJustice to this fascinating and vital intellectual current in modern German non-aca.demic thought. It was left for Miss E. M. Butler to give the English-speaking world the first really significant monograph on the subject. The title of Miss' Butler's book-The Tyranny of Greece over Germany-indicates clearly her opinion of the Graecomania which has held the greatest German thinkers and writers enslaved for the last two centuries. Why the Germans, more than any other people, have succumbed to this blind adoration of the Greeks is a problem for the social psychologist. Miss Butler offers one suggestive explanation: , the traditional incapacity of the German to resist the allurement of abstract ideas and ideals. But her main concern is to study the phenomenon as it revealed itself in the life and thought of individual men, and her fascinating book consists of a series of essays on the high priests of this religious cult, Winckelmann its founder, Lessing and Herder its interpreters) Goethe its great creative spirit, Schiller its ,antagonist, Holderlin its martyr) Heine its rebellious subject, and on four recent victims of its powerful spelJ-Schliemann, a Winckelmann redivivus, Nietzsche the Dionysian, Spitteler the mythologist, and Stefan George the mystagogue. Her book, Miss Butler frankly admits, is no exhaustive treatment of the subject; she 'has left large tracts of her vast theme unexplored. She has paid scant attention to the problem of...