Phrenology, or the doctrine of the mind : and of the relations between its manifestations and the body.
- Johann Spurzheim
- Date:
- 1825
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Phrenology, or the doctrine of the mind : and of the relations between its manifestations and the body. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![some motion in the viscera, and that it is therefore natural to su})])ose these affections resident in the bowels. It may, how¬ ever, be answered generally, that from sensations experi¬ enced, or other phenomena exhibited by different parts of the body, it is impossible to infer that the primitive causes are inherent there. Every part is in communication with, and ex¬ ercises an influence upon, every other. In this way, the great sympathetic or nerve of the abdomen and thorax, is con¬ nected with the spinal marrow, with the nerves of the external senses, and with the brain. Without this connection, animal life w^ould be confined to the brain, and this organ could not excite the instruments of motion. The activity of one part commonly produces different phenomena in others; and as the existence of pain and pleasure does not demonstrate conscious¬ ness of these impressions resident at the place where they are felt, so peculiar sensations experienced in the thorax and ab¬ domen do not demonstrate that the affections have their seat in the included viscera of these cavities. Sorrow makes the tears flow, anger makes the knees tremble and the lips quiver; but wdio asserts that sorrow resides in the lachrymal gland, or anger in the knees and lips? Wounds of the brain excite vomiting: the primitive cause of this phenomenon is in the brain; but no one will place the vomiting there. Indigestible ali¬ ments occasion headache; and intestinal worms, narcotics, and other poisonous substances, sometimes produce madness,blind¬ ness, S)'c.; but who from this will maintain that headache, madness, blindness, ^c., have their seat in the alimentary canal? The remembrance of an injury received acts upon the heart, and increases the strength and frequency of its beats; but is the brain, therefore, the organ of circulation ? From these and similar considerations, it follows that the sensations produced in different parts by affections and passions do not entitle us to infer that these are their respective orc;ans. All that has been said to prove that the abdominal and tho- lacic viscera are not the organs of tlic moral sentiments, ap-](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2929597x_0044.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
