AND ORANlOGlSOM'if. 



50o 



"who derives a pleasure of a peculiar nature from the eye, as in the case 

 of colours ; or the musician, who derives a pleasure of a pecuhar nature 

 from the ear, as in the case of sounds, have an express chamber in the 

 brain, by which such peculiar pleasure is alone excited, and on which it 

 alone depends, so ought the glutton, who derives a pleasure of a peculiar 

 nature from the stomach. While, if there be no such cerebral region or 

 chamber in the brain, and, consequently, no external developement or 

 manifestation of gluttony, or any of the other feelings or sentiments ^ 

 have just glanced at, the system itself, even admitting its generaltruth, 

 must be so far imperfect and unavailing : it must dwindle into a half 

 science, and be more liable to lead us astray than aright. 



There is also another powerful objection, which I will beg leave to state, 

 as I .stated it at the same time to the learned lecturer I have just alluded 

 to, though, so far as appeared to myself, without a successful solution. It 

 is this. The strictly obvious or natural divisions of the brain are but three ; 

 for we meet with three, and only three distinct masses, — the cerebrum or 

 brain properly so called, the cerebel or little brain, and the oblongated 

 marrow. The first, as we have forn*ierly observed, constitutes the largest 

 and uppermost part ; the second lies below and behind ; the third level 

 with the second, and in front of it; it appears to be a projection issuing 

 equally from the two other parts, and gives birth to the spinal marrow, 

 which is thus proved to be a continuation of the brain extended through 

 tlie whole chain of the spine or back-bone. 



Now as the brain consists naturally of three, and only three distinct: 

 parts, it may be allowable and pertinent to suppose that each of these parts 

 is allotted to some distinct purpose ; as, for example, that of forming the 

 seat of thinking, or of the soul ; the seat of the local senses of sight, sound, 

 taste, and smell ; and the seat of that general feeling which is diffused all 

 over the body ; but as the nice hand of the anatomist has confounded even 

 so rational a speculation as this, by proving that many of the nerves pro- 

 ductive of different functions originate in the same division of th6 brain, 

 while others, limited to a single function, originate in different divisions of 

 it ;* as it has hereby shown that we know nothing of the reason of this 

 palpable conformation, nor the respective share which each of these grand 

 divisions takes in producing the general effect, — how fanciful and pre^ 

 sumptuous must it be to partition each or any one of these divisions into 

 a number of imaginary regions, and to guess, for after all, it comes to no- 

 thing more, at the respective duties allotted to these boundaries of our 

 own conceit ! 



But the most serious, or perhaps I should rather say the most ludicrous. 

 and as it appears to me the most fatal objection to this hypothesis, is the 

 extraordinary fact that the different professors of it cannot agree in dividing 

 the brain, or in mapping the scull-bone ; some of tiicm telling us that a 

 bump or protuberance in a given situation imports one faculty, and others, 

 that it imports another faculty ; while one or two of them have, at different 

 times, assigned different faculties or manifestations to the same bui!np. 

 The organ which Dr. Gall at first called that of courage, he afterwards 

 denominated that of quarrelsomeness, and still later that of self-defence. 

 Now the qualities of self-defence and of quarrelsomeness are as opposite 

 as those of light and darkness ; while that of courage is distinct from both' 

 of them. So the organ of the theatrical talent he afterwards detected to 



* See Stud, of Med. vol. iv. p. 6. STdedlt. 

 64 



