590 EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE ON THE SKULL. 



variety of causes, such as misery, want, or an oppressed social state. It 

 is, however, on all hands admitted that nothing so quickly disturbs the 

 brain in its action as functional disturbance of the liver. If, through a 

 partial failure in the operation of that great gland, the products which it 

 should normally secrete begin to accumulate in the blood, or have to 

 seek new channels for their escape, the vigor of the intellect is at once 

 impaired. It is with the brain as it is with any other organ, a decline 

 in its activity is soon followed by a deterioration or diminution of its 

 structure, and we must not forget that it is not the brain which accom- 

 modates itself to the capacity of the skull, but the skull which accommo- 

 dates itself to the shape and size of the brain. Whatever the causes may 

 be, and of course they are very numerous, which tend to lessen the en- 

 tire cerebral mass, or by inequality in their effect produce the develop- 

 ment of one part with the contemporaneous diminution of another, they 

 will inevitably give rise to a modification in the figure of the skull ; 

 and observation, as well as phrenological considerations, would cause us 

 to anticipate that, if the effect takes place in such a way as to involve the 

 higher powers of intellection, the skull, answering in its change thereto, 

 will assume the prognathous cast. 



From what I have said respecting the relationship of different nations 

 Hereditar of men, it will be gathered that the peculiarities on which we 

 transmission have been dwelling, the complexion and form of the skull, as 

 of variations. Dependent upon hepatic action, are capable of hereditary trans- 

 mission ; for such a modified glandular action, in whatever manner it 

 may have been occasioned, can be propagated in that way. 



In these remarks it will be perceived that I have mainly had in view 

 Base form of that degradation from the more perfect standard of man which 

 from low Tern- * s encount ered in hot climates, and which finds its expression 

 peraturc. in a blackness of the skin and a base form of the skull. But 

 there is likewise a white degraded form. It is that which we meet in 

 the highest latitudes, and it is therefore dependent upon climate, that is 

 to say, temperature. Here no such tax is thrown upon the skin as is 

 the case in the torrid zone, but here the intellectual powers are greatly 

 enfeebled, if for no other reason, at least because of the hardships under 

 which life must be maintained. It is not, therefore, in very high or very 

 low latitudes that we should expect to find man in his best estate, and 

 this is corroborated by the history of all races. It is true that, by the 

 artificial control which we have obtained over temperature by the aid of 

 clothing and improved modes of shelter, we have, in some degree, with- 

 drawn ourselves from the absolute dominion of climate; but, putting 

 these disturbances of civilization aside, and looking only to our natural 

 state, we shall be constrained to admit that the man of maximum intel- 

 lectual capacity is of a faint brown hue. Nor was it through any acci- 



