66 Facial Expression. 



mental enquiry, so here has it been found that the further 

 knowledge advances, the more scope does there seem to be for 

 yet further useful enquiry. 



The investigation of the subject is of necessity an analytical 

 process,— one involving a close study of the anatomical struc- 

 tures concerned in expression ; and a clear apprehension of 

 their action under the influence of nerve force ; to which at 

 the same time must be added a general classification of human 

 passions by which the various qualities of nerve force are called 

 into activity. To some minds this study will be distasteful. 

 " What ! " such an one might reasonably exclaim, " are we not 

 to be satisfied with far-reaching enquiries into the subtly-woven 

 structure of the body ? Must the soul also yield herself to the 

 processes of dissection, and must the warp and woof of her 

 gauzy tissues be separated thread by thread ? " Of such an 

 opinion would doubtless have been the last and sweetest singer 

 of the German school of romantic poetry : who, in describing 

 a certain physiognomy, says, " it was not a face that one saw, 

 but a soul." With the poet's rapid insight he saw only the 

 intense spirituality that expressed itself in the material ; he was 

 sublimely unconscious of the mechanism by which that reve- 

 lation came within the reach of his senses. If we wish to 

 discuss with adequate exactitude so delicate a topic as the 

 expression of human emotion, we must ourselves be in a calm 

 and unemontional frame of mind. We, must for the nonce, 

 dismiss the poetical, and adopt, if not a prosaic, at least an 

 intensely practical way of thinking ; for an enquiry so subtle 

 can only be conducted by a steady unbiassed judgment, just as 

 the delicate experiment of the physicist can only be performed 

 by trained untrembling fingers and its results recorded by 

 instruments of mathematical precision. 



Now it is important to enquire at the outset what we actually 

 understand by the term Facial Expression. I shall venture 

 to answer the question by defining it as those associated qualities 

 of permanent form and of postural potentiality in the face that 

 convey to the beholder an impression of the general tenor and 

 immediate purpose of a human mind. You will observe that 



