The Sun. — 1824-01-12 (London, England)

MORNING HERALD.] fn adverting for a moment to the unhappy criMinal who has just paid the forfeit of his life at Hertford, it is not our intention to moralize on his fate, still less to suggest any thing like sympathy or palliation, and least of all to perform the unnecessary revolting workof stripping hiM of whatever he yet held in common with human, kind, and heightening the atrocity of his impulses, or the horror of his crimes. We would merely call attention for a moment to a slight incident in the history of the affair. It is stated that the " Phrenological Society" aPPlied for, and obtained permission to take a cast of the back part of his head. Does the reader know what this - Phrenological Society" is ? The name, as generally happens in such matters at the present day, instead of giving any indication of the natore and purposes of the fraternity, will Only lead one astray. Like most other pieces of modern quackery ,and impertinence it, is clothed in the envelope of a Greek derivative- The purpose of these phrenologhits is to exhibit, the relation of cause and effect between certain 'protuberances of the skull and certain animal impulses, and mental or intellectual powers and aptitudes. It must strike every %%ell constituted mind at first sight, that nothing could be more pernicious and absurd—and accordingly, cc phrenology" has been ridiculed or reprobated, from its very cradle, by men of sense, reflec!i°", and real learning throughout Europe. The inventor, Doctor Gall, of Vienna, is, we believe, still living—at least he was very littelF— and labouring in his vocation at Paris. .11 confederate, Doctor Spurzeim, made himself I somewhat notorious in this country, but obtained no success. But it appears the thing is n©t abandoned, and that there are some of his disciples labouring to preserve or revive it. To point out one or two samples, from a thick volume published last year by Dr. Gall--he lays it down that the same protuberance of the cranium determines an honest good-natured man to the. wing of a chicken or to a beefsteak, when he hungers, and arms the murderer against his victim, or impels the tiger upon his prey. To give a sample of the pernicious effrontery of the uses to which the Doctor would apply his system—he in the same works points out how infinitely useful his doctrine of protuberances may be to criminal tribunals in discovering guilt and apportioning punishment._ But this doctrine is supported by induction —like other branches of experimental knowledge. Let us see what sort of induction is that of the Phrenologists. The lecturer ranges you a battalion of sculls on his table, and tells you that in all the several owners of those sculls, and in.some hundreds which he has in his closet, the protuberances agreed with the dispositions and- intellect of the party. Thus, we are told, the chemist relates his experiments. But there is this material difference. The chemist does not merely relate but exhibits the experiment, and sends the hearer or reader to repeat and verify it for himself—whereas, in the case of the phrenologist we can only have the word of Dr. Gall ! But enough of this pernicious imposture. It is to be regretted that any- encouragement should be given the application at Hertford. It is only giving an additional instrument to the two great enemies of true science— visionaries and quacks.  On Friday last John Pratt, a private in the 75th Regiment, aged 19 years, who had stolen a sovereign from one of the Pay Serjeants, at Albany Barracks, hearing that the fraud was discovered, and that the guards were in pursuit of him, withdrew to an out-house, and cut his throat in so dreadful a manner, that he shortly died. The Coroner's Verdict was—that he died in a fit of mental derangement.  From the LONDON GAZETTE, Jan. 10.