380 SIR WILLIAM Hamilton's philosophy. 



African brain, when compared with the European, are still supported 

 by recent inquirers ;* and, not to go further into detail, the discoveries 

 which he claims to have made, regarding the development of the 

 cerebellum in proportion to the cerebrum, must be acknowledged to 

 be of value in determining the function of the cerebellum as well as 

 in other respects. But it might be admitted that he had succeeded 

 in overturning every doctrine of importance in the organology of the 

 phrenologists ; and yet we should be far from his conclusion that the 

 study of the nervous system cannot supersede reflection in the science 

 of mind, still farther from the position, that that science cannot even 

 be aided by such a study. For the general theory, which makes 

 mental science altogether dependent on the physiology of the nervous 

 system, is not involved in the truth or falsity of particular theories 

 on the special functions of different parts of that system. It is there- 

 fore incumbent on the psychologist to adduce some grounds, apart 

 from any properly physiological doctrines, to prove that consciousness, 

 if not the only competent informer, is certainly an independent source 

 of reliable information, with regard to mental phenomena. Yet this 

 is exactly what Sir William Hamilton has failed to do. As far as his 

 arguments against phrenology are concerned, the general principle 

 of that doctrine is unassailed and might therefore be reproduced with 

 a revised theory of cerebral organs. 



It is the more remarkable that Hamilton should have missed the 

 exact point of this argument, because the basis of psychology, as opposed 

 to any exclusive organology, is so obvious. It is possible to conceive, 

 as a department of physiology, a science which seeks to discover the 

 cerebral organs of different mental powers, which yet would not inter- 

 fere with the investigation of these as they are revealed in our con- 

 sciousness of their exercise. But Hamilton contemplated and attacked 

 an intolerant doctrine like that of Comte, which refuses to recognise 

 in consciousness any trustworthiness as a revealer of mental pheno^ 

 mena. Now, in opposing such a doctrine it is wholly Unnecessary to 

 consider the special functions which it may ascribe to the several 

 parts of the brain. It is unnecessary even to rest content with the 

 statement of Mr. Mill, that " all real knowledge of the successions 

 of mental phenomena must continue, for a long time at least, if not 

 for ever to be sought in the direct study of the successions them- 



* See the Quarterly Journal of Science for January, 1866, p. 46. 



