PHYSIOGNOMY. 



denote a heart ill at ease. Those who 

 think profoundly, and those equally pru- 

 dent and firm in their conduct, never 

 have high and weak eye-brows ; in some 

 measure equally dividing the forehead, 

 they rather betray debility and apathy, 

 and though men of an opposite character 

 may be found with them, they invariably 

 signify a diminution of the powers of the 

 mind. Thick angular eye-brows, inter- 

 rupted in their lengths, signify spirit and 

 activity ; and when they approach the 

 eyes closely, the more firm, vigorous, and 

 decided, is the character ; the reverse 

 shews a volatile and less enterprizing 

 disposition ; when the extremes are re- 

 mote from each other, the sensations of 

 the possessor are sudden and violent. 

 White eye-brows are demonstrative of 

 weakness, in the same degree that the 

 dark-brown are of firmness. 



The good Lavater considered the nose 

 as the abutment, or buttress, of the fore- 

 head, the seat of the brain, without which 

 the whole face would present a misera- 

 ble appearance ; indeed an ugly or dis- 

 agreeable set of features is never accom- 

 panied by a handsome nose : but there 

 are thousands of fine and expressive eyes 

 where a perfectly formed nose is want- 

 ing; he describes this portion of the face 

 as requiring the following peculiarities : 

 " Its length should equal the length of the 

 forehead ; at the top should be a gentle 

 indenting; viewed in front, the back 

 should be broad, and nearly parallel, yet 

 above the centre something broader ; the 

 bottom, or end of the nose, must be nei- 

 ther hard nor fleshy, and its under out- 

 line must be remarkably definite, well 

 delineated, neither pointed nor very 

 brqad ; the sides, seen in front, must be 

 well defined, and the descending nostrils 

 gently shortened ; viewed in profile, the 

 bottom of the nose should not have more 

 -than one third of its length ; the nostrils 

 above must be pointed below, round, and 

 have in general a gentle curve, and be 

 divided into equal parts by the profile of 

 the upper lip; the side, or arch of the 

 Jiose, must be a kind of oval ; above, it 

 must close well with the arch of the eye- 

 bone, and near the eye must be at least 

 half an inch in breadth. Such a nose is 

 of more worth than a kingdom." Num- 

 bers of great and excellent men have 

 flourished in all ages of the world, whose 

 noses would suffer essentially by a com- 

 parison with Lavater's description of a 

 nose, more valuable to the possessor than 

 extensive empire ; indeed, he is compel- 

 led to acknowledge this indisputable fact, 



and observes that he has seen persons en- 

 dowed with purity of mind, noble in 

 their conceptions, and capable of exer- 

 tion, whose noses were small, and the 

 arches of their profiles inverted ; and yet, 

 true to his first principles, 4fe discover- 

 ed, or imagined he discovered, their 

 worth to consist chiefly in the elegant ef- 

 fusions of their imaginations, their learn- 

 ing, or fortitude in suffering, and this is 

 accompanied with a proviso, that the re- 

 mainder of their form must be correctly 

 organized. 



Noses arched near the forehead be- 

 long to those who possess the energy to 

 command, are capable of ruling, acting, 

 overcoming, and destroying ; others, rec- 

 tilinear, are the medium between the ex- 

 tremes above noticed, and are appropri- 

 ated by nature to persons who act and suf- 

 fer with equal power and patience. Socra- 

 tes, Lairasse, and Boerhaave, were great 

 men, and had ill-shaped noses, and were 

 distinguished for meekness and gentle- 

 ness. Were it possible to attribute a ge- 

 neral prevalence of disposition to a gene- 

 ral form of the nose, individuals of every 

 nation would be found to resemble the 

 Tartars, who have flat indented noses, the 

 Negroes, who have broad, and the Jews, 

 who have high arched noses, in their pro- 

 pensities, and it must follow that what- 

 ever qualities the physiognomist may ap- 

 ply to those individuals, must also belong 

 to the whole people whose noses bear a 

 resemblance to them ; were this particu- 

 lar accurately examined into ? it would 

 tend, in a great measure, to confirm the 

 correctness or incorrectness of the sci- 

 ence, as it has hitherto been practised. 



The admirers of this study attribute 

 great powers to the mouth, in expressing 

 the emotions of the mind ; and Lavater 

 expatiates on it with enthusiastic fervour 

 indeed : " Whoever," he exclaims, " in- 

 ternally feels the worth of this member, 

 so different from every other member, 

 so inseparable, so not to be defined, so 

 simple, yet so various ; whoever, I say, 

 knows and feels this worth, will speak and 

 act with divine wisdom." He then pro- 

 ceeds to call it " the chief seat of wisdom 

 and folly, power and debility, virtue and 

 vice, beauty and deformity, of the human 

 mind ; the seat of all love, all hatred, all 

 sincerity, all falsehood, all humility, all 

 pride, all dissimulation, and all truth." 

 Granting the benevolent pastor full as- 

 sent to these observations on the mouth, 

 it becomes the indispensable duty of 

 all men to notice the physiognomy, or 

 indications of that organ ; in making those 



