Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Mottoes
- Contents
- Letter. 1 Inquiry for a Basis
- Letter. 2 Proposal of a Basis
- Letter. 3 Preparation of the Ground
- Letter. 4 What is the Brain?
- Letter. 5 Inquiry about its Structure
- Letter. 6 Early days of Phrenology
- Letter. 7 Inquiry for New Discoveries
- Letter. 8 Methods of New Discovery. Organic Arrangement of the Brain
- Letter. 9 Illustrative Cases
- Letter. 10 Organic Arrangement of the Cerebrum
- Letter. 11 Dr. Howe's Report on Idiocy
- Letter. 12 The Senses and Nervous System
- Letter. 13 Illustrative Comment
- Letter. 14 Facts about the Senses under various conditions
- Letter. 15 Raising questions
- Letter. 16 Bacon, on Matter and Causation. Inferences and Dreams. Association of Ideas
- Letter. 17 Nothing
- Letter. 18 Knowledge and Notions. Results of each
- Letter. 19 Release from Notions. Entrance upon Knowledge
- Letter. 20 Natural History of Superstition
- Letter. 21 Theology and Science
- Letter. 22 Central Law and Pervasive Unity. Light. Sense of Identity. Ghost-seeing. Unrevealed Human Relations
- Letter. 23 Position and Privilege of Truth-seekers
- Letter. 24 Position and Privilege of Truth-speakers
- Appendix
Letter. 7 - Inquiry for New Discoveries
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 August 2010
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Mottoes
- Contents
- Letter. 1 Inquiry for a Basis
- Letter. 2 Proposal of a Basis
- Letter. 3 Preparation of the Ground
- Letter. 4 What is the Brain?
- Letter. 5 Inquiry about its Structure
- Letter. 6 Early days of Phrenology
- Letter. 7 Inquiry for New Discoveries
- Letter. 8 Methods of New Discovery. Organic Arrangement of the Brain
- Letter. 9 Illustrative Cases
- Letter. 10 Organic Arrangement of the Cerebrum
- Letter. 11 Dr. Howe's Report on Idiocy
- Letter. 12 The Senses and Nervous System
- Letter. 13 Illustrative Comment
- Letter. 14 Facts about the Senses under various conditions
- Letter. 15 Raising questions
- Letter. 16 Bacon, on Matter and Causation. Inferences and Dreams. Association of Ideas
- Letter. 17 Nothing
- Letter. 18 Knowledge and Notions. Results of each
- Letter. 19 Release from Notions. Entrance upon Knowledge
- Letter. 20 Natural History of Superstition
- Letter. 21 Theology and Science
- Letter. 22 Central Law and Pervasive Unity. Light. Sense of Identity. Ghost-seeing. Unrevealed Human Relations
- Letter. 23 Position and Privilege of Truth-seekers
- Letter. 24 Position and Privilege of Truth-speakers
- Appendix
Summary
H. M. to H. G. A.
This last letter of yours is extremely interesting. Let me say, in the first place, that there is no danger of my thinking that you exaggerate the value of the discoveries you have made as to the functions of some portions of the brain. I do not see how it is possible to overrate them,—supposing them proved, of which I have no doubt.
Let us just look at the course of the affair.—First, I suppose, all movement, all operation of one thing upon another, was concluded, before science existed, to imply spirit. The winds, the waters, the waving and sprouting trees, the flickering fire, were all animated by spirits; and so were the movements of man,—the rolling eye and jerking limbs of the new-born infant, as well as the far-reaching thought of the philosopher. How very lately were still-born children supposed to be damned because they had not been baptized! Then, almost every organ seems to have been honoured and glorified before the brain; and especially the heart. How long will the word Heart stand in our parlance for soul, affections, sensibility, conscience? Then, by slow degrees, the brain seems to have risen into a sort of vague consideration as an indispensable, noble, but most mysterious part of our frame. All along, while any attention at all was paid to the brain, there seems to have been some kind of general impression that its size and mode of development indicated character.
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- Letters on the Laws of Man's Nature and Development , pp. 41 - 46Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009First published in: 1851