Dr. Spurzkeim's demonstrative Course of Lectures. 305 



be made, or any of those windows or doors be forced open, the 

 consequent explosion of the fulminating po'vder must se.ve at 

 once to alarm the robliers, and awaken tl:>e 'inmates to a sense 

 of their danger. Were it once generally known that all houses 

 are supplied with these instruments of alarm, very few or no 

 robbers would venture on breaking into tiicm by the doors or 

 windows. Nor would thsre be the smaHest danger in such ex- 

 plosions ; for, however properly the magistrates acted in pro- 

 hibiting the misuse of falminati.ig balls, &c. it is certain that, if 

 properly prepared, neither paper tior wood could h--^ iguted by 

 their explosion. The ingenious Mr. Af cum, cf Compton Street, 

 has prepared fulminating silver, and ma'ie it up in various safe 

 forms, which could he used for the purpose here proposed ; and 

 it would well become the magistrates to show as much ^eal in this 

 useful application of a chemical discovery, as they did hi pre- 

 venting its abuse. But , whatc, er may be llie opinions of magi- 

 strates, it is certain that every prudent housekeeper will adopt 

 some plan of protecting his property from the nocturnal depreda- 

 tions of trained bands of robbers, and gladly avail himself of at 

 least a cheap means of alarm, if not of defence against danger. 



Yours, &c. 



Chemicus. 



LI. Dr. Spurzheim's dem.onstralive Course of lectures on 

 Drs. Gall and Spurzheim's Fhysiognomonical System. 



X HE introductory lecture gave a clear and comprehensive view 

 of the subject proposed to be explained in the course ; and Dr. 

 Spurzheim stated that he had called his lectures demonstrative, 

 because he intended to show by sensible characters on real skulls 

 the basis on which his physiognomical system is founded. He 

 defended the science of physiognnmy, after Lavater, by observ- 

 ing that all men are physiognomists, and that they only want 

 the knowledge of reducing their observations to a system, to 

 give them permanency and greater accuracy. To methodize 

 those observations is the ])rincipal object of his plan. The fa- 

 culties, he observed, never depend on the temperaments, which 

 are merely physical ; but the manifestations of the mind are 

 known only by tlie organization of the body : we cannot perceive 

 mind, but only its eifccts en the bodyj and from these effects we 

 judge of its exi=!tence and it? powers. When the same effects are 

 uniformly attended with the same characters of mind^ we de- 

 duce our knowledge of the latter from the former ; although, m 

 fact, it may be that the phvsical effects are only the visible con- 

 Vol.44.N«. 198. Oc^. 1814. U sequence* 



