Buchanan's Journal of Man, October 1887: Volume 1, Number 9
Philosophy
Buchanan's Journal of Man, October 1887: Volume 1, Number 9
Medicine -- Periodicals; Phrenology -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
FIRMNESS, RELIGION (Veneration or Theosophy), and BENEVOLENCE are so
well located and described by both Gall and Spurzheim as to need but
little comment at present. The four superior organs on the median
line, and the organ of CONSCIENTIOUSNESS were more correctly located
and described than any other large portion of the brain.
HOPE is not adjacent to Conscientiousness, but parallel to Religion.
MARVELLOUSNESS has a preposterously large space assigned it, being
really a small organ at the summit of Ideality, which exercises a more
intellectual and less superstitious function than has been given it.
Marvellousness, Hope, Conscientiousness, Time, Order, Weight, Size,
and Individuality are the eight organs discovered and added by
Spurzheim, not having been recognized by Gall. The exterior portion of
Spurzheim's Marvellousness occupies the space devoted by Gall to
Poetry.
POETRY, recognized by Gall, is brought lower by Spurzheim and called
IDEALITY. Both locations are substantially correct. The location of
Gall is the seat of Marvellousness, Imagination, and Spirituality;
that of Spurzheim is well expressed by the term Ideality, and the
description given, but the word Poetry is rather too limited as the
definition of Gall's organ. It gives brilliance to prose and to
oratory, or even conversation, as well as to poetry.
IMITATION, adjacent to Benevolence, is somewhat better located by Gall
than by Spurzheim, who gives it too much breadth anteriorly.
WIT or MIRTHFULNESS is a confused and erroneous statement. The two
faculties are distinct, Wit being intellectual and occupying a small
space adjacent to Causality or Reason, while Mirthfulness, or the
sentiment of the ludicrous, is just above it, and should properly be
called Humor. The mirthful or playful faculty is in the posterior
region adjacent to Approbativeness, and may be quite conspicuous when
there is neither wit nor humor in the mirth. Imitation, Mirth or
Humor, and Wit follow each other in a line. The so-called organ of Wit
(Gall) or Mirthfulness (Spurzheim) is the seat of the most profound
reasoning faculty, while the CAUSALITY of Spurzheim, the METAPHYSICAL
DEPTH of thought of Gall, though it gives a clear analytical
intelligence has really less profundity and ability in reasoning than
the organ which they have misnamed Wit and Mirthfulness, which is
pre-eminently the organ of profound reasoning.
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