The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-02-02 00:00:00

MR. RUMBALL'S FOURTH LECTURE ON
PHRENOLOGY.

On Tuesday evening Mr. timball delivered his fourth lec-
ture on phrenology at the Medical Institution, Mount-pleasaut.
In comuiencing his lecture, he said he had given wnat were
called the propensities and sentiments; -sonic s common to man
.and auitnals, and sonic peculiar -to man alone. He-had-not
classified them as vet, and he almost regretted to classify them
at all, because classification assumed, a priori, what remained to
be proved in any science, and that, all about .that science was
perfectly known and established. As in chemistry, names had
been obliged to be altered, because they had been given in as-
,sumption of facts, which had afterwards been proved to be false-
hoods;so it was in anatomy and physiology, and every science
where men had assumed what they could not prove.- He-would
show how the.intel.ectual.faculties-were classified and how.clas-
sificationein the present state of science ought to be avoided.
Man had feelings given to him to detend him from harm,
to lead to. his individual security,. his. individual pleasures,
and also to lead to the qualificetion of ,his wants and luxuries
incidental to him as one of many. These feelings could only be
raised by perception efesbjects calculated.to raise them; Averse.
fore man had perceptive faculties. They had plenty of proofs
that all perceptions were carried into the brain before they
could be made perceptions; that the senses were the mere in-
struments which the brain made use of to collect its information;
and carry forward its mandates. Throtighene,medium of these
senses, man came to the.knowledge ef.surroundingebjects. It
was necessary:that he should be able to tinderstapd their form,
size, weight, colour, noruber, and the, order in ,whleh they were
,placed, the space they, occupied, and then that he should he able
,p form them into an image ; because_ every, individual body
.had these properties : these were properties of matter, It was
necessary that man should. forme these thingeinto an image;
:and theu it was necessary,,if they, wished to elevate him above
the lowest,brute, that he should ascertain bow these things were;
and. why these thinge were, that he might then dertve,gratifica•
tion by the application of: his intellectual faculties tor his ext.e,rs
nal seusietions. Man,hadall these powers, .He could perceive
,eforme but some men could perceive, it with very much greater
nicety than others. It was .a primitive .facutty. Bewivk, the
.celebrated wood-engraver, hail a wonderful perception of form.
Sir. Walter Scott and Mrs. Radcliff, each betrayed in their -wri-
tings a.w.oriderful perceptien of form, so, much sosthat you could
sit down and draw from their. descriptions • but pots° Byron:
,he gave the expression, the soul, the mad, but said nothirig
about form; and so it was with ail their works. ,Lord Byron's
eyes were almost a deformity, . they were placed eanear toge-
ther. Bewick's eyes were declared to be the widest apart that
were ever seen. The.organ of form was situated immediately
above the root of tlie'nose, and enlarged the part exactly. above
the nose, though the nose itself need not be wide. But he
should not be surprised if, some day, this were .not found to be
a faculty, either from wanteof experience or judgment. There
were two or three which required to be subetantiated. It was
not, only necessary, that man ,should see the form. of a thing, but
its size because two ehings,of the same form might be of a very
differeet size. He knew a lady who would tell the, height of
the column of 'abe'ehurch within two or three feet, whilst many
could, not at all tell you, the ..dimensions,- There was a faculty
for size. He was sorry to doubt, but they had space again. as
he should show, which they would suispose was included in size.
They would findsome sportsmen who could tell exactly when a
bird was within range, and others who could- not tell whether
it was or not. Size was supposed to enlarge the eyebrow for=
wards and downwards, exactly
.opposite the organ of , form.
Then came weight. Some men had no conception of the weight
of a thing if they did not see it. This, faculty was said to make
a good billiard player. He had found that all good billiard
players. had weight exceedingly well developed. This faculty
was situated next to size in the centre of the eyebrows. -But they-
must each take a marked bust. before they could make them-
selves acquainted with all about phrenology. Everything in
nature had a colour that had light upon it. was, therefore,
necessary that man should. have
.the faculty of perception of
colour, There were some painters who could never discrimi-
nate colours in the .same way as Reubens and Titian.. Mr.
Rumball here related an anecdote of a young man who was
dismissed from his situation in a draper's shop owing to the
strange mistakes he made from a want of the faculty of
colour. He once sold a person some scarlet
.plush to match
some green unmentionables; and having one time left his
top-coat at an inn, and, on going to inquire fur it, told the wai-
ter it was either a snuff-brown or an olive-green. He had visited
tbe.Blind Asylum in this town, and had found that all persons
born blind, or. who had become blind before they were four
yeare old, had the organ of colour exceedingly small indeed.
'This was a striking fact. Colour was placed in the middle of
the eye. undere he eyebrow. The next was the organ of number.
Sums savages could not remember to any extent, The negroes
men had been said not to be able to number beyond 5.. Newton
possessed this faculty largely. It was shown in a swelling out
of. the eyebrow at the outside. George Biddy, at the age of 7
years or under, could• multiply three- lines of ten figures each,
amounting to ten billions, in his:head sooner than any one could
do it on a state. Some could not multiply. at all : he would
answer for it there-were some in that lecture eoom,who could
not go through their multiplication table. Wherever a man
was gifted with this faculty very largely the. external angle of
the eyebrow, nearly on a level with the pupil, of the eye, would
be very much enlarged. They had a special faculty, which
collected together all these perceptions, and formed them into
an image which the mind could store up, and call back at. any
future period. This was. individuality. If this faculty was very
larg,9ly developed in any person, it looked at images without
looking at any anything else. It sees everything, but never
thinks of the relation ef one thing with another. .Ladies -with
this faculty would notice every article of, dress in.a ball room,
but the why or wherefore they could not tell. These• were a
eia.se of people ever ready to form images, and the faculty was
developed above the nose. It was also necessary that.we should
compute time. Men were not always stored with watches and
clocks, but were obliged to ,have recourse to their own percep-
tion§ of the way in which time passed. They would find a
great difference in people in this faculty. Many people had
not any difficttlty in the mechanical part of music, or in the mo-
dulation of tone, but had the,greatest difficulty ju keeping time.
But in some people this was a perfect faculty. He knew some
people Who could compute distance of time to •a few minutes,
froth, the sun, and would complete a journey to within five
minutes of the time they would fix for it. ()tilers had no com-
putation of time at all, and were never punctual. This faculty
was placed over colours. By a singular coincidence it was
fermed by the anterior part of the convolution which manifested
The next faculty was, order. It was a primitive faculty.
Some peopleweee extremely orderly, some as disorderly as could
be. Some pereodecould never keep things in order,.and others
were ahsolutely pained when things were not in order. This
orgati was placed betvreennumher and colour.. In those amongst
whom it was uncommonly manifested,, it tended to throw up the
eyebrow. Some men had eyebrows arched natnrally towards
the outward side. Men who, were satirical or witty hadehat
arch. What was it that enabled. pigeons to fly thousands.of
miles over tracts of water, and country they had never seen ?
It was said to be the faculty of location of things ,in space.
Gall fopridehat when a bey 'he never could find a bird's nest
again; but he bad a ecboolfellow who never missed to take him
to.t he place. They coold-not have a stronger specimen of this •
than in Hoffman, the blind traveller. This was. the organ of
above size. , He thought that space
ltscality. and was situated a
would be abetter term than size, but it was an organ which
wanted to be inure accurately.defined. Those who had it large
wutsid find it stretch up to the middle of the forehead like
two horns- Where locality exists at gives a desire to travel.
The , next quality was eventuality. It gave the desire to
acquire knowledge. Where they found the forehead ex-
ceedingly.flat,. there they would find
.a want of this power. It
was the connecting link between the reflecting and perceptive
powers. .It was situated above individuality, in the middle of the
l 4 patient
,who fanciedhe was twelve miles
froreol:eawhdere,He be was, a
but who in ather.respects was quite sensible.
After his death he examined his head, and found that there, as
a large hydatid, occupying. the whole, space of eventuality.
Why did not this hydatid destroy other parts of theenind, and
interfere with colour and firm? Simply because one.part of the
brain manifests one faculty, and one part another. Some men
had a powerful faculty of discriminating sounds. Some men
had a much finer perception of sounds than others. Some men,
though with as fine ears as other men, Could never discriminate
between discord and concord. Mr. Rumball introduced a num-
ber of instances of this faculty largely developed,,Handel for
instance. - This faculty was situated in the external angle of the
eye, in a direction upwards. Where, there was a- decided want
of this faculty they would not only find the forehead flat, but
sometimes absolutely a hollow. Im'tation was the-next faculty
which was largely developed in ch ldren. It was situated on
either side of benevolence. The mockieg bird had this faculty
very large., The elephant was no imitator, but no doubt with
ether animals had the iudiments of the faculty. He did not
know but animals had the rudiments of every faculty. It was in
the amount only that they differed from man. ' Some men had
the powers of ,memory to such an extent, that they could mimic
every thiniet hey saw. This faculty was situated on each side of
the bead, between wonder and beneiolence, going up to renera
Lion. After they had seen objects. it was necessary that they
should compare things with one another. , This faculty gave
judgment; the want of it led to forming hasty sophisms. Wit
was the next quality. What was wit. Wit was the discovery
of incongruity where congruity was expected, and where you
expected things to resemble each other you found a difference.
flit was placed at the external superior angle of the forehead.
It was necessary man should have the power to communicate
his thoughts to his fellows., It was a power which animals and
birds possessed; man only possessed the power of coigning
signs and symbols, Lanyuage was a faculty which enabled man
to spealeto his fellow-roan. There was no greater mistake.than
to suppose that. being full of ideas, and being capable of speaking
were the same thing. They would have one man who could
-talk an hour about nothing; another Mall who was full of ideas,
and yet be was wanting in the selection of words to give them
,Utterance. Some men could get up in the House of Commons
,and speak against time for an hour, and when their speech was
examined it was absolutely nothing. In all great orators noto-
rious for facility of speech they would find the eyes prominent.
Where the eyes were sunken,,not,because the brows projected,
they would find with such a conformation ideas communicated
with difficulty. Lavater ascribed this faculty to the month. He
paid they would find all good speakers with thin lips and long
mouths. But Lavater was fanciful. Wherever they found
language strong, they found the eyes prominent, as in Voltaire.
He had now got through the dull part of phrenology—the detail.
What was the' use of knowing things unless they knew why such
and such things were, and why they happened. Unless men
asked why things happened they would never- be phrenologists.
Thee were laughed at for this doctrine; but when their oppo-
nents brought as many facts as Gall and Spurzheim to prove
their theory wrong, they would then have some right to laugh at
them. In proportion to this faculty of enquiry into cause and
effect, would be the man's faculty of philosophy. Those who
-
have had this faculty largely developed, tied a large upper fore
head; but when it retreated in towards the eyebrow, it showed
deficiency of the perceptive powers. .This erean was called the
organ of causality., Blind people generally had the reflective
powers very large, because their perceptive -faculties coul;lnot
philosopher which was the
fully apply, owing to their want of vision. This faculty in its
entilanthce ould attain; because he bad
shhhilihi:veenssltthenehra
tri
not gain knowledge, and misdi-
rected, it was the blind leading the blind. The perceptive facul-
ties did not reflect, and it was the reflective faculties which raised
us in the scale of intelligence. It was these faculties which
corrected religious feeling. Without these reflective faculties we
should-all, atop in the same state of savageness in which beasts
.are. After tome remarks on the classification of the faculties
and sentiments, which he condemned, till perfect certainty
ahould be attained in the knowledge of the various organs, he
exhibited several heads, of the Greek or Caucasian variety o
the human race,and compared them with the heads of savages.
In, the former, the reflective faculties were largely developed ;
in the latter they were shaved off. It would be as impossible
for a man with such a formed retreating forehead to become a
philosopher, as for a monkey• He might be shrewd and can
nine, but be never could become intellectual.*

*We resume our remarks on Mr. Rumball's lectures. In
nor last paper we contended, that instead of phreno.,gv going
on " the Newtonian doctrine of deductions :from facts," it was
opposed to facts throughout, and that facts tended to-prove the
brain to be one organ only, and not a plurality of organs. One
of Mr. .Rumhall's arguments in favour of this plurality was,
that in genius we must have Hen clever in all things, which
was not the fact. if we did not suppose the brain to be divided into
faculties. and one of these faculties to be the seat of genius, which
was the case as one man had a genius for music, ,another•for
poetry, &c. We ventured to assert a contrary belief, and in-