Part 10

Charles Villers has preserved some of his souvenirs, touching the first impressions produced by the doctrine. “If,” writes Gall at the period in question, “the exterminating angel was under my orders, wo to Kæstner, to Kant, to Wieland, and others like them.... Why is it, that no one has ever preserved for our times, the skulls of Homer, Virgil, Cicero, &c.?”

“At one time,” says Charles Villers, “every body in Vienna was trembling for his head, and fearing that after his death it would be put in requisition to enrich Dr. Gall’s cabinet. He announced his impatience as to the skulls of extraordinary persons—such as were distinguished by certain great qualities or by great talents—which was still greater cause for the general terror. Too many people were led to suppose themselves the objects of the doctor’s regards, and imagined their heads to be especially longed for by him, as a specimen of the utmost importance to the success of his experiments. Some very curious stories are told on this point. Old M. Denis, the Emperor’s librarian, inserted a special clause in his will, intended to save his cranium from M. Gall’s scalpel.”

Gall and Spurzheim differ from each other upon several points: upon the offices of the external senses; upon the names of the faculties of the soul; upon their number; and upon the classification of the faculties, &c. Let us examine a few of the points more particularly.

1. Offices of the external senses. “M. Gall is disposed,” says Spurzheim, “to attribute to the external senses, as well as to each and every internal faculty, not only perception, but also memory, reminiscence, and judgment.... It seems to me that such facts (the facts cited by Gall) do not prove the conclusion. In the first place, memory, being nothing more than the repetition of knowledge, must have its seat in the point where perception takes place. The impressions of the nerves that give rise to the sensation of hunger, &c. are indisputably perceived in the head, which likewise has the reminiscence of hunger.... I do not believe we can conclude that the eyes or the ears are the seats of reminiscence.”

Spurzheim is right, as we have sufficiently seen; perception is not in the organ of the sense.

But the error that Spurzheim combats is not the whole of Gall’s error; it is only a particular and secondary error: the error that he does not perceive, the error that he follows, is a general and capital one. From the independence of the external senses, Gall concludes the independence of the faculties of the soul: he reasons upon an apparent analogy, which conceals a profound dissimilitude; and Spurzheim reasons just as Gall does.

“In the nervous system,” says he, “we find the five external senses separate and independent of each other.” “The faculties of the external senses are attached to different organs; they may exist separately. The same holds true of the internal senses.” “We assert that there is a particular organ for each species of sentiment or thought, as there is for each species of exterior sensation.”

Like Gall, Spurzheim denominates the faculties of the soul internal senses; in the same spirit he says: “The sense of colour, the sense of number, sense of language, sense of comparison, sense of causality,” &c. &c.

Both authors begin by calling the faculties of the soul internal senses; and then, misled by the word, they conclude from the independence of the external senses, to the independence of their internal senses; that is to say, the independence of the faculties of the soul.

2. Names of the faculties. Spurzheim accuses Gall of having given denominations only to actions, and not to the principles of those actions.

“Finding,” says he, “a relation betwixt the development of a cerebral part and a sort of action, M. Gall denominated the cerebral part from the action; thus, he spoke of the organs of music, poetry, &c.” “The nomenclature,” says he further, “ought to be conformed to the faculties, without regard to any action whatever.... When we attribute to an organ cunning, management, hypocrisy, intrigue, &c. we do not make known the primary faculty which contributes to all these modified actions.”

Gall replies: “M. Spurzheim cannot have forgotten how often we reasoned without end, with a view to determine the primitive destination of an organ.... I confess, that there are several organs, with whose primary faculties I am not yet acquainted; and I continue to denominate them from the degree of activity that led me to the discovery of them. M. Spurzheim thinks himself more fortunate: his metaphysical temperament has led him to the discovery of the fundamental or primitive faculty of every one of the organs. Let us put it to the proof.”

Indeed, Spurzheim’s expedient for rendering himself master of the primary faculties is very simple. He creates a word: he calls the instinct of propagation amativity, the propensity to steal, convoitivity; courage is combativity, &c. &c.

Gall and Spurzheim talk a great deal about nomenclature; but they do not perceive, that as to nomenclature, the first difficulty, and indeed the only one, is to get at simple facts. Whoever has come to simple facts, is very nigh to a good nomenclature.

Descartes says: “Had some one clearly explained the simple ideas that exist in the imagination of men, and which constitute all that they think, I should venture to hope for a language that it would be very easy to learn, ... and, which is the principal matter, that would assist the judgment, representing to it things so distinctly that it would be almost impossible for it to be deceived; whereas, on the contrary, the words we now have possess, so to speak, only confused significations, to which the human mind has been so long accustomed, that it therefore understands scarcely any thing perfectly well.”

3. Number of the faculties. Spurzheim adds eight faculties to those established by Gall, and Gall is vexed by it. One does not see why.

What! Shall Gall endow twenty-seven faculties, and Spurzheim not have the same privilege for seven or eight? Shall Gall have a faculty for space, one for number, &c. and Spurzheim be refused one for time, one for extent, &c.? Is not Spurzheim half right, when he says:

“One does not readily perceive why M. Gall should desire to suggest to his readers that his method of treating the doctrine of the brain is the only admissible one, and that there are no other organs than those he has recognised; that the organs do nothing but what he attributes to them; ... that all he says and all he does (and that only) bears the stamp of perfection; and that his decision constitutes the supreme law.”

4. Classification and attributes of the faculties. Gall, by giving the same attributes to all the faculties, and to each faculty all the attributes of the understanding, in fact forms out of the faculties only two groups: the group of faculties that he supposes common to man and the animals, and the group of faculties that he supposes to be proper to man alone. Spurzheim divides and subdivides them.

None of the formulas required for the classification agreed upon are omitted.

In the first place, there are two orders of faculties: the affective and the intellectual faculties; then each of these orders is divided into genera. The first order has two genera: the affective faculties common to man and animals, and the affective faculties peculiar to man alone. The second has three genera: the faculties or internal senses which make external objects known; the faculties or internal senses which make known the relations of objects in general; and the faculties or internal senses that reflect.

What an apparatus for saying very simple things; for saying that there are propensities, sentiments, and intellectual faculties! What singular personification of all these faculties: faculties that know; faculties that reflect! Spurzheim elsewhere speaks of happy faculties. Indeed, what arbitrariness in the distribution of facts! And Gall, too, is he not half right?

“By what right,” says he, “does M. Spurzheim exclude from the intellectual faculties imitation, wit, ideality or poetry, circumspection, secretivity, constructivity? How are perseverance, circumspection, imitation; how are they sentiments? What reason have we for counting among the propensities constructivity rather than melody, benevolence, or imitation?”

Gall, by endowing each faculty with all the attributes of an understanding, makes as many understandings as faculties. Spurzheim makes several kinds of understandings: understandings that know, understandings that reflect, &c. He restores the sensitive and rational souls.

In fine, Gall and Spurzheim rarely agree as to their faculties. In hope Gall sees nothing more than an attribute; Spurzheim beholds it as a primary faculty. In conscience Gall sees nothing but an effect of benevolence; Spurzheim looks upon it as a peculiar faculty. Gall resolves that there is only one organ of religion, and Spurzheim insists upon three—the organ of causality, that of supernaturality, and that of veneration, &c. &c.

We should never end, were we to follow them throughout their debates. I have said enough to show the case, and I now pass on to Broussais.

OF BROUSSAIS.

Broussais appears to have been born solely for the purpose of imagining or propagating systems.