Obituary JVotice of Dr. Gaspar Spurzheim. 361 



" Dr. Spurzheim procured one letter of introduction for that city, 

 and but one ; that was to the reputed author of the vituperating 

 essay. He visited him, and obtained permission to dissect a brain in 

 his presence. He succeeded in convincing some of his hearers of 

 the truth of the results of his researches. A second day vs^as named. 

 The room was crowded to overflowing. There, with the Edinburgh 

 Review in one hand, and a brain in the other, he opposed fact to 

 assertion. The writer of the article still believed the Edinburgh Re- 

 view, but the public believed the anatomist. Dr. Spurzheim now 

 opened a course of lectures on the anatomy and the functions of the 

 brain, and its connexion with the mind. He used to say to the Scotch, 

 ' You are slow, but you are sure. I must remain some time with 

 you, and then I will leave the fruit of my labors to ripen in your 

 hands. This is the spot from which, as from a centre, the doctrine 

 of phrenology shall spread over Britain.' 



" Edinburgh, the city from which the great anathema had issued 

 against phrenology, actually became the principal seat of it. There, 

 in 1820, a phrenological society was formed, at the head of which 

 stands Mr. G. Combe, extensively known by his interesting works ; 

 and there a phrenological journal continues to be published. 



" After a residence of seven months at Edinburgh, Dr. Spurzheim 

 returned, in 1817, to London, where his doctrine had meanwhile 

 made many converts, and where he was made Licentiate of the 

 Royal College of Physicians. During the three years of his resi- 

 dence in England, he published several works on Phrenology, par- 

 ticularly one under the title, The Physiognomical System, of which 

 he afterwards published an abstract (Outlines of the Physiognomical 

 System.) He also wrote in defence of his principles, his Examina- 

 tion of the Objections made in Great Britain against Phrenology. 



" Dr. Spurzheim returned to Paris in 1817, where he gave lec- 

 tures on the anatomy, physiology and pathology of the brain. He 

 also devoted himself to the practice of medicine, and visited, in this 

 capacity, several American families then residing in Paris. Still the 

 medical profession did not seem to be his favorite occupation. At 

 the same time he published some new works in French, and became 

 Doctor of Medicine at the University of Paris, in 1821.* 



*He published a work, Sur la Folie ; another, Sur la Phrenologie ; another, 

 Essai philosophique sur la nature morale et intellectuelle de Vhomme; besides his 

 medical dissertation, Du cerveau sous les rapports anatomiques. 



Vol. XXIIl.— No. 2. 46 



