My wish is to be brief. There is, however, one great secret in the art of being brief: it is to be clear. I frequently quote Descartes: I even go further; for I dedicate my work to his memory. I am writing in opposition to a bad philosophy, while I am endeavouring to recall a sound one. CONTENTS. I. Of Gall.—Of his doctrine in general 17 II. Of Gall.—Of the faculties 47 III. Of Gall.—The organs 59 IV. Of Spurzheim 96 V. Of Broussais 115 VI. Broussais’s Psycology 121 VII. Broussais’s Physiology 125 VIII. Of Gall 127 Note I. Anatomical relations supposed by Gall to exist between the organs of the external senses and the organs of the intellectual faculties 131 II. Difference between instinct and understanding 133 III. Gall as an observer 137 IV. The animal spirits 139 V. Exaggeration of Broussais, even in phrenology 140 VI. Contractility of Broussais 142 VII. Real labours of Gall as to the brain 143 I. OF GALL. OF HIS DOCTRINE IN GENERAL. The great work in which Gall sets forth his doctrine is well known.[1] That work shall serve as the groundwork of my examination. I shall examine in succession each of the questions studied by the author; merely introducing some slight changes in the order in which they are arranged. The entire doctrine of Gall is contained in two fundamental propositions, of which the first is, that understanding resides exclusively in the brain, and the second, that each particular faculty of the understanding is provided in the brain with an organ proper to itself. Now, of these two propositions, there is certainly nothing new in the first one, and perhaps nothing true in the second one. Let us commence our examination with the first proposition. I say that in the first proposition, namely, that the brain is the exclusive seat of the understanding, there is nothing new. Gall himself admits this to be the case. “For a long time,” says he, “both philosophers and physiologists, as well as physicians, have contended that the brain is the organ of the soul.”[2] The opinion that the brain, (as a whole, or such and such parts of the brain considered separately,) is the seat of the soul, is, in fact, as old as learning itself. Descartes placed the soul in the _pineal gland_, Willis in the _corpora striata_, Lapeyronie in the _corpus callosum_, &c. &c.