THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 423 



gaeater. b According to the smallness of the anterior and anterior- 

 superior portions of the brain, will individual mental superiority 

 to the brute creation be small. Human idiotism may arise from 

 faultiness of texture, or want of power 6 , but most congenital cases 

 depend upon deficiency of anterior development ; and such idiots, 

 as well as the whole brute creation, may be regarded as examples 

 of cerebral mutilations, made by nature, illustrating the use of the 

 cerebral parts. Attempts to mutilate artificially are not calculated 

 to afford much information. Brutes can generally give no oppor- 

 tunity of minutely observing what mental change has been pro- 

 duced by the removal. For instance, when a writer says that the 

 removal of the cerebellum causes no other effect than sluggishness 

 in the animal, how does he know that sexual desire is not ex- 

 tinguished? When various portions of brain are removed, how 

 can any inference be drawn, during the short existence of the 

 poor animal, as to the state of its various faculties and inclin- 

 ations ? And when another asserts that, after the removal of the 

 hemispheres and cerebellum, we may make observations whether 

 the animal will copulate or not, how can he ascribe the disin- 

 clination that may occur to the removal, when any circumstances 

 of suffering, a wound, confinement, or want of food, will make 

 it very difficult to induce an animal to indulge itself with sexual 

 intercourse ? d It is, besides, difficult, if not generally impossible, 



5 In the words of the 94th Number (already quoted above at p. 329.) of the 

 Edinburgh Review, now retracting its assertions : " In the nervous system alone 

 we can trace a gradual progress in the provision for the subordination of one 

 animal to another, and of all to man ; and are enabled to associate every faculty 

 which gives superiority with some addition to the nervous mass, even from the small- 

 est indication of sensation and will up to the highest degree of sensibility, judg- 

 ment, and expression. The brain is observed to be progressively improved in its 

 structure, and, with reference to the spinal marrow and nerves, augmented in 

 volume more and more, until we reach the human brain, each addition being 

 marked by some addition to, or amplification of, the powers of the animal, until 

 in man we behold it possessing some parts of which animals are destitute, and 

 wanting none which they possess." 



c Gall, 8vo. t. ii. p. 377. 



d See Gall, 1. c. 8vo. t. vi. p. 210. From page 178. to 288. are excellent re- 

 marks upon the unsatisfactory nature of such experiments as have been made by 

 Fleurens, Rolando, &c. &c. See also 4to. vol. iii. p. 56., and 8vo. t.iii. p. 379. sqq. 

 The first three quarters of the sixth volume should be read by all who are ac- 

 quainted with the writings of these experimenters, or of Tiedemann, Rudolphi, 

 Serres, &c. upon the brain. They will find those writers less meritorious than 

 they imagined. 



