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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![upon a priori argument, and for a while prevailed. But the seed had been sown, which in good time was to grow to the rich harvest that our generation is girding itself to reap. Thirty years ago Dr. Arthur Ladbrooke Wigan, a Physician of considerable eminence, whose practice had given him an extensive acquaintance with cases of Insanity, had the moral courage boldly to reassert the doctrine Gall had taught and, in defiance of the hostility of his Profession and of the Metaphysicans, whose prejudices he directly defied, to proclaim the “ the Duality of the Mind.” Not merely did he adopt the doctrine that the brain is the organ of the mind; that the brain is a duplex organ; that the brain does not work as one whole for each mental operation but that distinct parts of the brain have distinct functions—but he advanced a step beyond Gall and asserted that the two hemispheres of the brain are not only two parts of one mind, as Gall had taught, but that they are two distinct and perfect organs as of two minds. Reflecting on this fact of the complete duplicity of the brain, he instituted a most patient investigation into the phenomena exhibited by brain action in its various phases, and especially in its abnormal conditions, and thus he was brought to the conclusion, that as the brain is so is the mind. He proved by anatomical examination that each brain hemisphere is a perfect brain—that we have in fact two brains, as we have two eyes and two ears, and he deduced from this the conclusion that as the brain is the organ of the Mind, and we have two brains, we have two Minds. Careful examination of the Phenomena of Mind satisfied him that so it was, and, with a moral courage that cannot be too highly commended, ho published a volume entitled “ The Duality of the Mind,” in which he detailed the experiments and observations by which he had been conducted to the conclusion that as we have two brains so we have two Minds. [74]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2244385x_0006.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
