IX. 



THE DEVELOPMENTAL SIGNIFICANCE OF HUMAN 



PHYSIOGNOMY.* 



The ability to read character in the form of the human face 

 and figure is a gift possessed by comparatively few persons, al- 

 though most people interpret, more or less correctly, the salient 

 points of human expression. The transient appearances of the 

 face reveal temporary phases of feeling which are common to all 

 men ; but the constant qualities of the mind should be expressed, 

 if at all, in the permanent forms of the executive instrument of 

 the mind, the body. To detect the peculiarities of the mind by 

 external marks has been the aim of the physiognomist of all 

 times ; but it is only in the light of modern evolutionary science 

 that much progress in this direction can be made. The mind, as 

 a function of part of the body, partakes of its perfections and its 

 defects, and exhibits parallel types of development. Every pecu- 

 liarity of the body has probably some corresponding significance in 

 the mind, and the causes of the former are the remoter causes of 

 the latter. Hence, before a true physiognomy can be attempted, 

 the origin of the features of the face and general form must be 

 known. Not that a perfect physiognomy will ever be possible. A 

 mental constitution so complex as that of man can not be expected 

 to exhibit more than its leading features in the body ; but these 

 include, after all, most of what it is important for us to be able to 

 read from a practical point of view. 



The present essay will consider the probable origin of the 

 structural points which constitute the permanent expression. 

 These may be divided into three heads, viz. : (1) Those of the 

 general form or figure ; (2) those of the surface or integument of 

 the body with its appendages ; and (3) those of the forms of the 



* Abstract of a lecture delivered before the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, 

 January 20, 1881, in exposition of principles laid down in "The Hypothesis of Evo- 

 lution," New Haven, 1870, p. 31. 



