the attention of mankind, and almost equally necessary in the sciences of morals and of medicine."* Another set of philosophers, in avoiding Scylla, have thought it necessary to dash into Charybdis, and, teaching that the mind is nought but a combination of matter, have endeavoured to explain its functions by supposed mechanical motions in its parts: but, as we shall hereafter see, this course of proceeding is equally erroneous with the other. In surveying the phenomena of mind, we are struck by the variety of faculties with which it appears to be endowed. Philosophers and the vulgar equally admit it to be possessed of different powers. Thus it is by one faculty that it reasons, by another that it fears, and by a third that it discriminates between right and wrong. If, however, we inquire what progress has hitherto been made by metaphysicians in ascertaining the primitive mental powers, and in rendering the philosophy of man interesting and practically useful to persons of ordinary understanding, we shall find a deficiency that is truly deplorable. From the days of Aristotle to the present time, the most powerful intellects have been directed, with the most persevering industry, to this department of science; and system after system has flourished, fallen, and been forgotten, in rapid and melancholy succession. To confine our attention to modern times: Dr. Reid overturned the philosophy of Locke and Hume; Mr. Stewart, while he illustrated Reid, yet differed from him in many important particulars; and, recently, Dr. Thomas Brown has attacked, with powerful eloquence and philosophical profundity, the fabric of Stewart, which already totters to its fall. The very existence of the most common and familiar faculties of the mind is debated among these philosophers. Mr. Stewart maintains Attention to be a faculty, but this is denied by Dr. Brown. Others, again, state Imagination to be a primitive power of the mind, while Mr. Stewart informs us, that "what we call the power of Imagination is not the gift of nature, but the result of acquired habits, aided by favourable circumstances." Common observation informs us, that a taste for music and a genius for poetry and painting are gifts of nature, bestowed only on a few; but Mr. Stewart, by dint of his philosophy, has discovered that these powers, and also a genius for mathematics," are gradually formed by particular habits of study or of business." On the other hand, he treats of Perception, Conception, and Memory as original powers; while Dr. Thomas Brown denies their title to that appellation. Reid, Stewart, and Brown admit the existence of moral emotions; but Hobbes, Mandeville, Paley, and many others, resolve the sentiment of right and wrong into a regard to our own good, perceptions of utility, and obedience to the laws or to the Divine command. Thus, after the lapse and labour of more than two thousand years, philosophers are not yet agreed concerning the existence of many of the most important principles of action, and intellectual powers of man. While the philosophy of mind shall remain in this uncertain condition, it will be impossible to give to morals and natural religion a scientific foundation; and, until these shall assume the stableness and precision of scienceseducation, political economy, and legislation must continue defective in their principles and application. If, therefore, Phrenology could introduce into the philosophy of mind even a portion of the certainty and precision which attend physical investigations, it would confer no small benefit on this interesting department of science; and that it is fully competent to do so, shall be made apparent after we have attended to a few preliminary points requiring consideration. In the next place, supposing the number and nature of the primitive faculties to be ascertained, it is to be remarked, that, in actual life, they are successively developed. The infant feels anger, fear, attachment, before it is alive to the sublime or the beautiful; and it observes occurrences long before it reasons. A correct theory of mind ought to unfold principles to which these facts also may be referred. Farther-even after the full maturity of age is attained, how different the degrees in which we are endowed with the various mental powers! Admitting each individual to possess all the faculties which constitute the human mind, in what a variety of degrees of relative strength do they appear in different persons! In one, the love of glory is the feeling which surpasses all; another is deaf to the voice of censure, and callous to the accents of applause. The soul of one melts with softest pity at a tale of wo; while the eye of another never shed a sympathetic tear. One individual spends his life in an ardent chase of wealth, which he stops not to enjoy; another scatters in wasteful prodigality the substance of his tires, and perishes in want from a mere incapacity to retain. One vast intellect, like Newton's, fathoms the profundities of science; while the mind of another can scarcely grope its way through the daily occurrences of life. The towering imagination of a Shakspeare or a Milton soars beyond the boundaries of sublunary space; while the sterile fancy of a clown sees no glory in the heavens and no loveliness on earth. A system of mental philosophy, therefore, pretending to be true, ought not only to unfold the simple elements of thought and of feeling, but to enable us to discover in what proportions they are combined in different individuals. In chemical science, one combination of elementary ingredients produces a medicine of sovereign virtue in removing pain; another combination of the same materials, but differing in their relative proportions, brings forth a mortal poison. In human nature, also, one combination of faculties may produce the midnight murderer and thief—another a Franklin, a Howard, or a Fry, glowing with charity to man. If, however. we search the works of those philosophers who have hitherto written on the mind, for rules by which to discriminate the effects produced upon the character and conduct of individuals by different combinations of the mental powers, what information do we receive? Instead of light upon this interesting subject, we find only disputes whether such differences exist in nature, or are the result of education and other adventitious circumstances; many maintaining the one opinion, while some few advocate the other. This department of the philosophy of man, in short, is a perfect waste. Mr. Stewart was aware equally of its importance and of its forlorn condition. The varieties of intellectual character among men, says he, present another very interesting object of study, which, "considering its practical utility, has not yet excited, so much as might have been expected, the curiosity of our countrymen."* The reason appears sufficiently obvious: the common modes of studying man afforded no clew to the discovery desired. In thus surveying the philosophy of man, as at present exhibited to us in the writings of philosophers, we perceive, first, That no account is given of the influence of the material organs on the mental powers; and that the progress of the mind from youth to age, and the phenomena of sleep, dreaming, idiocy, and insanity, are left unexplained or unaccounted for by any principles admitted in their systems: secondly, That the existence and functions of some of the most important primitive faculties are still in dispute: and, thirdly, That no light whatever has been thrown on the nature and effects of combinations of the primitive powers, in different degrees of relative proportion. It is with great truth, therefore, that Monsieur De Bonald, quoted by Mr. Stewart, observes, that " diversity of * Dissertation, Supp. Encyc. Brit., Part. ii., p. 198. doctrine has increased from age to age, with the number of masters, and with the progress of knowledge; and Europe, which at present possesses libraries filled with philosophical works, and which reckons up almost as many philosophers as writers; poor in the midst of so much riches, and uncertain, with the aid of all its guides, which road it should follow; Europe, the centre and focus of all the lights of the world, has yet its philosophy only in expectation." While philosophers have been thus unsuccessfully engaged in the study of mental science, human nature has been investigated by another set of observers-moralists, poets, and divines. These have looked upon the page of life merely to observe the characters there exhibited, with the view of tracing them anew in their own compositions; and certainly they have executed their design with great felicity and truth. In the pages of Shakspeare, Addison, Johnson, Tillotson, and Scott, we have the lineaments of mind traced with a perfect tact, and exhibited with matchless beauty and effect. But these authors had no systematic object in view, and aimed not at founding their observations on principles which might render them subservient to the practical purposes of life. Hence, although in their compositions we find ample and admirable materials for the elucidation of a true system of the philosophy of man, yet, without other aids than those which they supply, we cannot arrive at fundamental principles sufficient to guide us in our intercourse with the world. The charge against their representations of human nature is, not that they are incorrect, but that they are too general to be useful. They draw striking pictures of good men and of bad men, but do not enable us to discover, previously to experience, whether any particular individual with whom we may wish to connect our fortunes, belongs to the one class or to the other-a matter of extreme importance, because, in the course of gaining experience, we encounter the risk of suffering the greatest calamities. In short, poets and novelists describe men as they do the weather: in their pages they make the storm to rage with terrific energy, or the sun to shine with the softest radiance, but do not enable us to discover whether, to-morrow, the elements will war, or the zephyrs play; and, without this power, we cannot put to sea with the certainty of favouring gales, nor stay in port without the risk of losing winds that would have wafted us to the wished-for shore. Phrenology, therefore, if a true system of human nature, ought not only to present to the popular reader a key of philosophy which shall enable him to unlock the stores of intellectual wealth contained in the volumes of our most gifted authors, but likewise to render their representations of human character practically useful, by enabling him to discover the natural qualities of living individuals previously to experience of their conduct, and thus to appreciate their tendencies before becoming the victim of their incapacity or passions. The causes of the failure of the metaphysician are easily recognised. He studied the mind chiefly by reflecting on his own consciousness; he turned his attention inward, observed the phenomena of his own faculties, and recorded these as metaphysical science. But the mind is not conscious of organs at all; we are not informed by it of the existence of muscles, nerves of motion, nerves of taste, nerves of smell, an auditory apparatus, optic nerves, nor any mental organs whatever. All that consciousness reveals is, that the mind inhabits the head; but it does not inform us what material substances the head contains: hence it was impossible for the metaphysician to discover the organs of the mind by his method of philosophizing, and no metaphysical philosopher pretends to have discovered them. The imperfection of this mode of investigation accounts for the contradictory representation of the human mind given by different metaphysicians. Suppose an individual with a brain like that of a New Hollander, to turn philosopher; he would never, by reflecting on his own consciousness, find an instinctive sentiment of justice, and, therefore, he would exclude it from his system. On the other hand, another philosopher, constituted like Dr. Spurzheim, would feel it strongly, and give it a prominent place. When we turn our attention to the works of physiologists, we discover the most ceaseless, but fruitless, endeavours to ascertain and determine the parts of the body with which the several mental powers are most closely connected. Some of them have dissected the brain, in the hope of discovering in its texture an indication of the functions which it performs in relation to the mind; but success has not hitherto crowned their efforts. When we examine, with the most scrupulous minuteness, the form, colour, and texture of the brain, no sentiment can be perceived slumbering in its fibres, nor half-formed ideas starting from its folds. It appears to the eye only as a mass of curiously convoluted matter; and the understanding declares its incapacity to penetrate the purposes of its parts. In fact, we cannot, by merely dissecting any organ of the body whatever, discover its functions. Anatomists for many centuries dissected the nerves of motion and feeling, and saw nothing in their structure that indicated the difference of their functions; and, at this moment, if the nerves of taste and of hearing were presented together on the table, we might look at them for ages without discovering traces of separate functions in their structure. Simple dissection of the brain, therefore, could not lead to the discovery of the functions of its different parts.* Thus, the obstacles which have hitherto opposed the attainment of this information have been numerous and formidable. The imagination, however, has been called in, to afford the knowledge which philosophy withheld, and theories have been invented to supply the place of principles founded on facts and legitimate induction. Some physiologists, while they locate the understanding in the brain, derive the affections and passions from various abdominal and thoracic viscera, ganglia, and nerves. But the fallacy of this notion is apparent from a variety of circumstances. In the first place, there is a presumption against it in the fact, that the heart, liver, and intestines have well-known functions entirely different from those so ascribed to them; and it is contrary to the established principles of physiology to suppose that a muscular organ like the heart is at once a machine for propelling the blood and the organ of courage or love-or that the liver, which secretes bile, and the bowels, which are organs of nutrition, are at the same time respectively the organs of anger and compassion. These emotions being mental phenomena, it is presumable that they ought to be referred, like the analogous phenomena of intellect, to the nervous system. Secondly, no relation is found to subsist between the size of these viscera and the mental qualities ascribed to them: cowardly men have not small hearts, nor do we find the liver more ample in angry men than in mild and pacific. Thirdly, disease of the brain influences the affective faculties not less than the intellectual; while the abdominal and thoracic viscera, on the other hand, may be in a morbid state without any corresponding change of the faculties ascribed to them. Fourthly, why do not children, in whom these viscera are well developed even at birth, manifest all the passions in their earliest years? Fifthly, many idiots, almost or wholly *The proposition that the structure of an organ does not reveal its function is to be understood with reference, not to mechanical functions, but only to vital. Harvey was led to discover the function of the heart and blood vessels, by observing in them certain valves capable of permitting the blood to flow in one direction, but not in the opposite. So true it is, however, that vital functions are not revealed by dissection, that physiologists have not even yet been able to determine the purpose of the spleen. destitute of some of the affections, have nevertheless a complete developement of the thoracic and abdominal viscera. Sixthly, it is very improbable that animals of different species, having the viscera alike, should manifest opposite affections-that the heart, for example, should be the organ of fear in the sheep and of courage in the dog. Lastly, and above all, observation proves that the affective faculties are stronger or weaker, according as certain parts of the brain are more or less developed; a fact which will be demonstrated when we come to treat of them in detail. Those who argue that, because fear and anger cause palpitation of the heart, the latter must be the organ of these passions, do in reality (according to the remark of Dr. Mason Good, quoted above, p. 12) mistake an effect for its cause. By means of the nerves the thoracic and abdominal viscera are intimately connected with the brain, and a very close sympathy exists between them. Excitement and disease of the brain, therefore, often produce marked effects upon the viscera; and in like manner diseases of the stomach and liver have a very obvious influence on the brain. Excitement even of the intellectual faculties is not unfrequently found to affect the viscera: thus it is recorded of Malebranche, that he was seized with lively palpitations of the heart when reading the Treatise on Man of Descartes; and Tissot, in his work on the Diseases of Literary and Sedentary Persons, refers to many cases where overexertion of the intellect occasioned the same diseases of the viscera as those produced by too great violence of the passions. So, also, vomiting is sometimes occasioned by wounds of the brain; but the brain is not, therefore, the seat of vomiting. On the other hand, nervous affections, equally with those of the viscera, result from great activity of the passions, in the various forms of palsy, convulsions, madness, and epilepsy. Grief, as every one is aware, makes us shed tears; fear produces a sensation of cold in the skin, and causes the legs to totter; and indigestion frequently occasions toothache: but are we thence to infer that the lachrymal glands are the organs of grief, the teeth the seat of indigestion, and the skin or legs the organs of fear? In short, to use the words of Adelon, who has adopted all the arguments of Gall, "les objections se présentent en foule contre toute cette doctrine." Even Dr. Prichard, who has no other seat for the passions, abandons the claim of the thoracic and abdominal viscera as utterly hopeless-on the ground, among others, "that the same emotion will display its effect on different organs in different individuals. Fear or terror will occasion in one person fainting or palpitation of the heart; in another, it affects the liver or intestinal canal; but the particular effect would probably be uniform and unvaried if the mental emotion were dependent on some particular ganglion of the great sympathetic nerve (which was the idea of Bichât.) The vagueness of popular language on this subject is sufficient to prove that the physical effects of the emotions are very various. The Greeks referred most of the passions to the liver, spleen, and diaphragm; the Hebrews, to the bowels and reins; the moderns refer them almost solely to the heart. The diversity of these phenomena, which vary according to the peculiarities of constitution, proves that they are secondary effects produced by the emotions through sympathy on the functions of the viscera, those organs being most affected which in each individual have the greatest irritability or susceptibility of impressions."‡ * Gall, ii., 93–97.-I do not reckon the sixth argument as of much value; for an organ apparently the same may have different functions in different species of animals. See this subject adverted to in the Phrenological Jour. nal, ix., 514. + Adelon, Physiologie de l'Homme, 2d. edit., i., 160. Prichard's Review of the Doctrine of a Vital Principle, &c., p. 179. In a |