Phrenology Examined

Part 1

PHRENOLOGY EXAMINED.

PHRENOLOGY EXAMINED.

BY P. FLOURENS, MEMBER OF THE FRENCH ACADEMY, PERPETUAL SECRETARY OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES (INSTITUTE OF FRANCE), MEMBER OF THE ROYAL SOCIETIES OF LONDON AND EDINBURG, OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF STOCKHOLM, OF MUNICH, AND OF TURIN, ETC. ETC. PROFESSOR OF COMPARATIVE PHYSIOLOGY AT THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM AT PARIS.

“J’ai un sentiment clair de ma liberté.”

BOSSUET, TRAITÉ DU LIBRE ARBITRE.

Translated from the Second Edition of 1845, by CHARLES DE LUCENA MEIGS, M.D. MEMB. AMER. PHIL. SOC. ETC. ETC.

PHILADELPHIA: HOGAN & THOMPSON. 1846.

ENTERED ACCORDING TO ACT OF CONGRESS, IN THE YEAR 1845, BY CHARLES D. MEIGS, M. D. IN THE CLERK’S OFFICE OF THE DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA.

TO DR. JAMES JACKSON, OF BOSTON.

MY DEAR SIR:

Perhaps I have taken too great a liberty in sending to you in this public manner, and in praying you to accept a copy of M. Flourens’ ingenious work. I have a very sincere desire that you should read the Inquiry; for I feel sure, that if you approve of it, the studious portion of our countrymen who may peruse it, will concur in the opinion of a gentleman so justly distinguished as yourself in every good word and work, and so capable of judging as to the salutary or evil tendency of the productions of our teeming press.

Inasmuch as many of our countrymen have heretofore felt, and many do now feel, desirous to know the truth as to the question of the multiple nature of the human mind, I have here translated the Examination, in order that they might have an opportunity to learn what is thought of Gall’s doctrines by one of the best and most precise thinkers in Europe.

Professor Flourens, by his writings on the brain and nervous system, by his courses of lectures at the Jardin des Plantes, by numerous writings on various scientific subjects, by his position in the Institute, has acquired a place among the literary and scientific celebrities of the present age. The amiable and elegant manners, and the fine disposition of this distinguished character, coincide with his acknowledged learning, and exactness, and zeal, to accumulate upon him the public respect and esteem. It is therefore with great confidence that I present to you this copy of his criticism upon Phrenology, since I suppose that every writing of so good a man might prove acceptable to you, and to the studious portion of our countrymen generally.

I invoke your approbation of what I cannot but deem a masterly criticism of the doctrines of Gall. So highly have I appreciated it, that I cannot readily suppose it possible to rise from its perusal, without being convinced that Gall was wholly mistaken in his views of the human mind; and of course, that all the cranioscopists, mesmerizers, and diviners, who have followed his track, or risen up on the basis of his opinions, are equally in error.

In order to have a just view of human responsibility, it is indispensable to entertain the justest notions of the nature of the human mind. If Phrenology be an unsubstantial hypothesis, no phrenologist is fit to be a juror, a judge, or a legislator: for since all human law—the whole social compact—and indeed all divine law, as relative to human propensities and actions—is founded on some real nature of the soul and mind, there is risk that manifestly erroneous conceptions of the freewill, of the conscience, of the judgment, and the perceptive powers, &c. may mislead the juror, the judge, and the legislator, in their vote, their opinion, and their notion of rights and wrongs.

If I am correct in entertaining these apprehensions as to the influence of false metaphysics on the public characters I have enumerated, there is abundant cause to rejoice when a blow is struck, like that pulverizing blow which is given in this work, to so considerable an error. There are thousands among the young and ardent and curious of our countrymen and countrywomen, whose minds may be likewise led astray from the truth; but if it be mischievous for the judge and the juror and the legislator to entertain erroneous views upon the nature of the understanding, the mind, or the soul, it is equally to be deprecated where the error is sown broadcast in the land.

Tares, if not in themselves poisonous, serve at best to choke up the useful or beautiful plants that ought to be cultivated in the fields of science or morals; but you will find that M. Flourens regards them as poisons.

Has not M. Flourens clearly refuted the phrenologists? and has he not, in doing so, performed a useful and an acceptable service?

I pray you to believe that I am, with the most grateful respect and the sincerest esteem,

Your obliged and faithful servant,

CHARLES D. MEIGS.

PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 10, 1845.

TO THE MEMORY OF DESCARTES.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE.

Having been a witness to the progress of phrenology, I was led to the composition of the following treatise.

Each succeeding age has a philosophy of its own.

The seventeenth century recovered from the philosophy of Descartes; the eighteenth recovered from that of Locke and Condillac: is the nineteenth to recover from that of Gall?

This is a really important question.

Part 2

I propose, in this work, to examine phrenology as it appears in the writings of Gall, of Spurzheim, and of Broussais.

My wish is to be brief. There is, however, one great secret in the art of being brief: it is to be clear.

I frequently quote Descartes: I even go further; for I dedicate my work to his memory. I am writing in opposition to a bad philosophy, while I am endeavouring to recall a sound one.

CONTENTS.

I. Of Gall.—Of his doctrine in general 17

II. Of Gall.—Of the faculties 47

III. Of Gall.—The organs 59

IV. Of Spurzheim 96

V. Of Broussais 115

VI. Broussais’s Psycology 121

VII. Broussais’s Physiology 125

VIII. Of Gall 127

Note I. Anatomical relations supposed by Gall to exist between the organs of the external senses and the organs of the intellectual faculties 131

II. Difference between instinct and understanding 133

III. Gall as an observer 137

IV. The animal spirits 139

V. Exaggeration of Broussais, even in phrenology 140

VI. Contractility of Broussais 142

VII. Real labours of Gall as to the brain 143

OF GALL.

OF HIS DOCTRINE IN GENERAL.

The great work in which Gall sets forth his doctrine is well known. That work shall serve as the groundwork of my examination. I shall examine in succession each of the questions studied by the author; merely introducing some slight changes in the order in which they are arranged.

The entire doctrine of Gall is contained in two fundamental propositions, of which the first is, that understanding resides exclusively in the brain, and the second, that each particular faculty of the understanding is provided in the brain with an organ proper to itself.

Now, of these two propositions, there is certainly nothing new in the first one, and perhaps nothing true in the second one.

Let us commence our examination with the first proposition.

I say that in the first proposition, namely, that the brain is the exclusive seat of the understanding, there is nothing new. Gall himself admits this to be the case.

“For a long time,” says he, “both philosophers and physiologists, as well as physicians, have contended that the brain is the organ of the soul.” The opinion that the brain, (as a whole, or such and such parts of the brain considered separately,) is the seat of the soul, is, in fact, as old as learning itself. Descartes placed the soul in the pineal gland, Willis in the corpora striata, Lapeyronie in the corpus callosum, &c. &c.

As to the more recent authorities, Gall quotes Sœmmerring, who says precisely that, “the brain is the exclusive instrument of all sensation, all thought, and all will,” &c. He quotes Haller, who proves (proves is the very expression made use of by Gall himself,) that “sensation does not take place at the point where the object touches the nerve, the point where the impression is made, but in the brain.” He might have quoted many other authorities to the same effect.

Part 3

Were not Cabanis’s writings anterior to the time of Gall? and did not he say, “In order to obtain a just idea of those operations whose result is thought, the brain must be considered as a peculiar organ designed to produce it, just as the stomach and the bowels are designed to produce digestion, the liver to secrete the bile,” &c.? a proposition so extravagant as to become almost ridiculous, but which is in truth the very proposition of Gall himself, except as to some exaggeration in the terms employed.

Antecedently to the time of Gall, both Sœmmerring and Cuvier, in the comparative anatomy of the various classes of animals, had investigated the ratio existing between the development of the encephalon and that of the intellectual power. The following remarkable phrase is from the pen of Cuvier: “The proportion of the brain to the medulla oblongata, a proportion which is greater in man than in all other animals, is a very good index of the perfection of the creature’s intelligence, because it is the best index of the preeminence of the organs of reflection above the organs of the external senses.” And this other still more remarkable phrase: “In animals the intelligence appears to be greater in proportion as the volume of the hemispheres is greater.”

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