Statistics of phrenology : being a sketch of the progress and present state of that science in the British Islands.

  • Hewett Watson
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

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

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

    27/262 page 12
    from some of their seniors ; ai.d religious biokcrings — one of the irreatest curses of social intercourse in Ediu- burgh—joined with other circumstances, soon darkened the flourishing prospects, and within ten years from its first institution, the Society ceased to master more than ten persons at its ordinary meetings, and sometimes barely lialf that number were visible in a hall capable of contain- ing hundreds. Tlie enemies of phrenology chuckled over the declining <trength of the Phrenological Society ; believing, or pre- tpnding to believe, that Phrenology itself would share the >ame fate, and that both science and Society would speedily become extinct. If any of them really believed this, time has since shown them to have been egregiously mistaken. The Phrenological Society materially tended to advance and diffuse phrenological doctrines ; and its valuable mu- seum vet continues to prove a most powerful auxiliary to the persevering labours of the true phrenologists of Edin- burgh. Meanwhile the science was continuing to advance in public favour every where outside the walls of the Phreno- logical Society's Hall ; and was fast recovering from the check given to its early career by hostile reviewers. It is stated by Mr. Combe in the Phrenological Jounial, that the sale of Spurzheim's works completely stopped after the appearance of the 49th number of the Edinburgh ♦' Review, and did not revive till 1S19, after which it ♦• went on rapidly, and it still jiroeeeds (1826).* • One of the first natural jihilosoiilurs of the age, M. Araco, roj»d a biographical notice of the late Dr. Thomas Young, to tlie .1cnd<-inie di-s Scicnci-s, in 1832. In this notice ho givos a reinarkalile instance of the injuries inflicted on scientc niul Kciontific discoverers by iitijusi ahuse Jind denials in reviews. The two following sentences are ex- tracted from Ara^o's notice, as it apinnrs in the Edinhur;;h Nvw Phi- ;oso])l;icalJ<iurnal, April, 1^3(7; N'lr. xi..,p. 'JSP.;— The scientific journals, when tliey are cunducied \>y men of known merit, thus acquire, in certain matters, an iiittuente whidi often becomes highly injurious. It is thus, I tJiink, we must (jualify that wliich the Kd:n-
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3