KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



373 



PHKENOLOGY FOB, THE MILLION. 



"He who opposes his own judgment against the con- 

 sent of the times, ought to be backed with unanswerable 

 Truths; and he who has Truth on his side is a fool 

 as well as a Coward, if he is afraid to own it because of 

 the currency or multitude of other men's opinions." — 

 Defoe. 



No. XII.— DR. GALL'S OWN PREFACE. 



[Having given all due consideration to the 

 Life op Dr. Gall in our first Eleven Chapters, 

 we propose, before introducing his great work, 

 the Physiology of the Brain, to submit his 

 own Preface. It will not occupy more than two 

 chapters, and should on no account be passed 

 over without a most careful perusal.] 



When any discovery or new doctrine is an- 

 nounced, the question is usually asked, how the 

 author conceived the first idea? 



Although the same experiments may not lead 

 different individuals to the same meditations, yet 

 when these same experiments are collected and 

 presented in order, they give rise to ideas in the 

 mind of the reader so analogous to those of the 

 author, and the discovery often appears to him 

 so natural an event, that he is ready to exclaim, 

 " Why had I not made it long since ? " 



This is precisely what has happened with 

 respect to my doctrine, the origin of which rests 

 on very ordinary facts. Most of those who have 

 heard my lectures have said to themselves, and 

 I doubt not that most of my readers will say 

 likewise, " How is it possible, that these truths 

 have been so long overlooked? " 



From my earliest youth, I lived in the bosom 

 of my family, composed of several brothers and 

 sisters, and in the midst of a great number of 

 companions and schoolmates. Each of these 

 individuals had some peculiarity, talent, pro- 

 pensity, or faculty, which distinguished him 

 from the others. This diversity determined our 

 indifference, or our mutual affection and aver- 

 sion, as well as our contempt, our emulation, and 

 our connections. In childhood, we are rarely 

 liable to be led astray by prejudice; we take 

 things as they are. Among our number, we soon 

 formed a judgment, who was virtuous or in- 

 clined to vice; modest or arrogant; frank or 

 deceitful; a truth-teller or a liar; peaceable or 

 quarrelsome; benevolent, good or bad, &c. 

 Some were distinguished by the beauty of their 

 writing, some by their facility in calculation, 

 others by their aptitude to acquire history, phi- 

 losophy, or languages. One shone in composi- 

 tion by the elegance of his periods ; another had 

 always a dry, harsh style; another reasoned 

 closely and expressed himself with force. A 

 large number manifested a talent or a taste for 

 subjects not within our assigned course. Some 

 carved and drew well ; some devoted their leisure 

 to painting, or to the cultivation of a small 

 garden, while their comrades were engaged in 

 noisy sports ; others enjoyed roaming the woods, 

 hunting, seeking birds' nests, collecting flowers, 

 insects, or shells. Thus, each of us distinguished 

 himself by his proper characteristic ; and I never 

 knew an instance, where one who had been a 

 cheating and faithless companion one year, 

 became a true and faithful friend the next. 



The schoolmates most formidable to me, were 

 those who learned by heart with such facility 

 that, when our recitations came, they took from 

 me the honors which I had gained by my com- 

 positions. 



Some years afterwards I changed my abode, 

 and I had the misfortune still to meet individuals 

 endowed with a surprising facility for learning 

 by heart. It was then that I remarked, that all 

 these resembled my former rivals in their largo 

 prominent eyes. 



Two years afterward I went to a university; 

 my attention first fixed itself on those of my 

 new fellow-students who had large prominent 

 eyes projecting from the head. Such generally 

 boasted of their excellent memories, and though 

 in many respects by no means the first, all of 

 them had the advantage of me, when the object 

 was to learn promptly by heart, and to recite 

 long passages with correctness. 



This same observation having been confirmed 

 to me by the students of other classes, I natu- 

 rally expected to find a great facility of learning 

 by heart in all those in whom I should remark 

 the prominency of the eyes. I could not believe, 

 that the union of the two circumstances which 

 had struck me on these different occasions, was 

 solely the result of accident. Having still more 

 assured myself of this, I began to suspect that 

 there must exist a connection between this con- 

 formation of the eyes, and the facility of learning 

 by heart. 



Proceeding from reflection to reflection, and 

 from observation to observation, it occurred to 

 me that, if memory were made evident by ex- 

 ternal signs, it might be so likewise with other 

 talents or intellectual faculties. From this time 

 all the individuals who were distinguished by 

 any quality or faculty, became the object of my 

 special attention, and of systematic study as to 

 the form of the head. By degrees, I thought I 

 could flatter myself with having found other 

 external characters, which were constantly met 

 with in great painters, musicians, mechanics, 

 and which consequently denoted a decided pro- 

 pensity to painting, music, the mechanical 

 arte, &c. 



I had in the interval commenced the study of 

 medicine. We had much said to us about the 

 functions of the muscles, the viscera, &c, but 

 nothing respecting the functions of the brain 

 and its various parts. I recalled my early obser- 

 vations, and immediately suspected, what I was 

 not long in reducing to certainty, that the dif- 

 ference in the form of heads is occasioned by the 

 difference in the form of the brains. But, I 

 never went so far as to imagine that the cause 

 of the moral qualities or the intellectual faculties 

 resided in such or such a place in the bones of 

 the cranium. 



Was it not then very natural to expect, that 

 in discovering and demonstrating, in men en- 

 dowed with remarkable propensities or talents, 

 the existence of some external signs of their 

 qualities, this discovery would lead me to a 

 knowledge of the functions of the brain, and of 

 its parts ? The hope of having it in my power to 

 determine, one day, the relation of the moral 

 and intellectual forces with the organisation, 

 the hope of founding a physiology of the brain, 



