J 60 Fhyslognomrf. [Chap. XI* 



s}*stem. And he often displays the refined accu- 

 racy of a very delicate observer, together with the 

 enlightened views of a real philosopher*. 



Tlie method of illustrating physiognomical dis- 

 cussions by Engravings was first adopted by Bap- 

 tista Porta t, one of the earliest writers on the 

 subject after the revival of letters. The en- 

 gravings of M. Lavater are more numerous, bet- 

 ter executed, and, consequently, far more instruc- 

 tive than his. Since the labours of this amiable, 

 pious, and ingenious divine^ nothing has been 

 done in the science of physiognomy worthy of be- 

 ing recorded as new. All, therefore, relating to 

 this subject, that can be considered as peculiar to 

 the eighteenth century, is the revival of attention 

 to it; ths detaching it from the disgraceful con- 

 tiection in which it had previously stood ; and the 

 exhibition of its principles in a more popular and 

 splendid manner. But sanguine calculators ima- 

 gine that a foundation has been recently laid for 

 incomparably greater progress. They look for- 

 ward to the time when the students of this science 

 shall carry it to a degree of perfection of which 

 faint ideas only can now be formed; when its 

 principles shall be so clearly defined, our know- 

 ledge of its laws so greatly extended, and depart- 

 ments, at present unknown, so fully laid open to 

 tlie prying eye of philosophy as to render it one of 



* See his Essays on Fhysiognomij. Some account of his mode 

 •f thinking and reasoning on the subject may also be found in 

 tlie Encydoputdiay from which many of the facts above stated are 

 collected. 



t A philosopher of Kapks, who flourished about the middle of 

 the sixteentli centur}\ 



