RELATION OF THE BRAIN TO THE BODY. 77 



here a force is provided which carries them back, of their nature, 

 when the channels are provided, to the altitude whence they came, 

 or to the feet of the soul : that the life of man may not be wasted 

 underground among his viscera, but may circulate from his head to 

 his head, without a drop being spilt from the high nervousness of 

 the body. 



It is not surprising in this eminent region, that physiologists, 

 loyal to their heads, have assigned to the brain the perpetual govern- 

 ment of the body, or have regarded every function and every struc- 

 ture, as but a procedure or emanation from these commanding parts. 

 Indeed, on the spiritual or nocturnal side, such a view becomes just, 

 for the brain absorbs all the light and power of the system, and is 

 the only noticeable part, or the body of the body. So when the 

 sun ceases to shine, our domestic and motherly ground disappears, 

 and contemplation, facing the vault, sees no longer the opaque 

 earth, but only the ignited planets and the suns of systems, as it 

 were the galaxies of the starry brain. And so with the body also : 

 when its grosser senses cease to overwhelm us, and thought kindles 

 in the teeming night, the body drops away, and organ after organ 

 ceases to show, until we are left in the presence of a man, standing 

 with luminous feet upon the darkness, and we see the ghostly human 

 form, all nerve, feeling and volition; the brain as head and eye, 

 body and limbs, founded not upon matter, but like the organic stars 

 on its own sufficient form. We awaken, however, from these alti- 

 tudes, and find that the planet too, and the material body, are things 

 in themselves, nay, are our mothers, and deserve our best considera- 

 tion in the homely way. 



But the organic relation of the brain to the body generally, has 

 not yet been well made out. It is clear, that the brain is the en- 

 gine of the mind, and that the other viscera make up the body, 

 which seems to be nourished on its own account. This, however, 

 does not explain the immersion of the one within the other, or the 

 subjection of each to the necessities of each. But surely, if the 

 body gives the brain substance, the brain gives the body what it has 

 to give, namely, brains. In this case, all the processes of nutrition, 

 circulation, secretion, &c, must be controllable by the brain accord- 

 ing to its perfection; and that this is the case, we know from the 



