Selections from Previous Works: With Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals, and a Psalm of Montreal

Samuel Butler was never one to let a comfortable orthodoxy go unchallenged, and this collection gathers his sharpest polemics in one furious volume. The centerpiece is his devastating critique of G. J. Romanes' theories on animal intelligence and inherited memory a direct attack on the Darwinian establishment that Butler believed had grown complacent and unaccountable. But the collection also extracts the most potent passages from Erewhon, Butler's brilliant satirical masterpiece, where he imagines a society that has inverted all moral values: illness is treated as a crime, while crime is healed as an ailment. This is not mere whimsy Butler uses the conceit to expose how arbitrarily we have constructed our notions of justice, health, and wrongdoing. Rounding out the volume is 'A Psalm of Montreal,' a biting satirical poem that extends his project of dismantling sacred cows. The result is a portrait of a writer who trusted nothing, questioned everything, and delighted in making the powerful uncomfortable. For readers who loved Erewhon's irreverence, this collection reveals the mind behind the satire at its most pointed and provocative.