The duality of the mind : read at the meeting of the Psychological Society of Great Britain, May 12, 1875 / by Mr. Serjeant Cox.
- Edward William Cox
- Date:
- [1875]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The duality of the mind : read at the meeting of the Psychological Society of Great Britain, May 12, 1875 / by Mr. Serjeant Cox. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![but which, carried to their consequences, will work a revolution in Psychological and Mental Science. (a) The first proposition to be submitted is : 1. That each of our two brains can and does work as one whole and complete Mind. This follows as the necessary result of the brain structure. If the brain be the mental machine, and if that brain be double, and if each part of that double brain be a complete organ, there must be a double action of the mental machinery. But of that double action there is but one consciousness. How can this be. The mechanism of the organ of vision shows us how it can be. We have two eyes. Two distinct pictures of the one object of sight are depicted upon those eyes. But we are conscious of one picture only. Why ? Because the two branches of the optic nerve which carries the impres- sions upon the retina to the brain, to be there communicated to the Conscious Self, are so admirably adjusted that the two pictures painted upon the two retinas blend and present one picture to the recipient brain, as is proved by the stereoscope. The two brains are adjusted in like manner. By reason of their having a common centre at which all impressions are received from without, and to which all internal action is conveyed from within, and at which centre the Conscious Self exercises over the brain above and the nerves below the controlling power of the Will, the same (a) I propose to follow very nearly the division of the subject adopted by Dr. A. Wigan, to whose admirable treatise I must express my obligation for some of the cases I shall have occasion to cite. But it is also fair to state that 1 had never seen his book until the present paper had been commenced. The conception of the Duality of the Mind suggested in the little treatise on “ What am I?” was deduced entirely from the teaching of Dr. Gall that the brain is duplex. Brown- Sequard had not then affirmed the fact, which was vehemently denied by the Physiologists and Mental Philosophers who held themselves to be authorities. [82]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2244385x_0014.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
