Statistics of phrenology: being a sketch of the progress and present state of that science in the British Islands / By Hewett C. Watson.

  • Hewett Watson
Date:
1836
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Statistics of phrenology: being a sketch of the progress and present state of that science in the British Islands / By Hewett C. Watson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the next volume, by a review of the controversy between Spurzheim and Dr. Gordon, in which the conduct of the latter was denounced as “ most illiberal,’ and the anato- mical discoveries of Gall and Spurzheim were fully ad- mitted as established truths in science. At this time the reviewer still withheld his assent from the physiological portion of the discoveries, “ not from any want of respect “to Drs. Gall and Spurzheim’s talents. or veracity as ob- “servers of nature, but until inductions are multiplied ‘* by others, so as to produce greater probability, if indeed “ this can ever be the case.” This early countenance of a philosopher, then so cruelly persecuted by leaders in the medical profession, was a noble act on the part of re- viewers depending on the patronage of the medical proftes- sion for their continuance as journalists. Medical phreno- logists owe a debt of gratitude to them for this independent proceeding. It is pleasurable to add that their efforts did not rest here, but have been repeated at various times since ; and that the same journal now decidedly supports phrenology in all, or almost all, its leading principles and details. This Review, taking rank with the first medical journals in the world, its cordial support is of more worth than that of all the merely literary reviews and magazines put together, when the subject is a science mvolving ana- tomy, physiology, and moral philosophy, in close and in- separable connexion. In 1819 appeared the “ Essays on Phrenology” by Mr. George Combe, since so distinguished as a phrenologist ; and to whose hands the sceptre of Spurzheim has descended undisputed, — Phrenologorum facile princeps,” if we may so apply, to the leader of an immensely superior science, the botanical compliment from Humboldt to our country- man, Dr. Robert Browne. In 1820 we find Sir George Mackenzie again in the field, with his “Illustrations of Phrenology,” and Dr. Elliotson giving the sanction of his name and the aid of his pen to the support and diffusion BO
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