“Sollt es wahr Sein.... Dasz die Menschengestalt, von allen sichtlichen Dingen Ganz allein uns lügt, dasz wir, was edel und albern, Was beschränkt und grosz, im Angesicht zu suchen, Eitele Thoren sind, betrogne, betrügende Thoren.” GÖTHE. COUNTENANCE INDEX OF MIND. Talleyrand was wont to say, that speech was given to man for the purpose of concealing his thoughts. Among mankind in general the countenance may, with equal force, be said to represent a series of hieroglyphics by which the internal emotions of the mind may be readily deciphered. Observe a child thrown for the first time among a number of strangers. To some it will immediately, and as it were instinctively, attach itself, while to others it will manifest the greatest repugnance and dislike. Such first impressions are not the result of reasoning, they spring from the quickness of perception peculiar to childhood; and the choice is in general not the less happy, although the reason may have had no effect in determining it. With a rapid glance a mere infant will seize the prevailing expression of the physiognomy, and detect at once the mental constitution of those by whom it is surrounded; for pride and impatience, and kindness and benevolence, are written on the plastic countenance in broad legible characters, though the many, with their blunted perceptions, may, to a certain extent, have lost the key to their solution. Contrast the expression of the physiognomy of some of the more celebrated among the ancients, as exemplified in the collection of antique busts preserved in the museum of the Capitol at Rome. Compare the broad open brow and finely-chiselled features of Trajan, or the beauty, majesty, and grace expressed in the countenance of either of the Antonines, with the coarse, heavy, animal face of Vitellius, or the dull, morose expression of Caligula or of Commodus,— ——“Without a ray Of mind, that makes each feature play Like sparkling waves on a sunny day.”