Phrenology proved, illustrated and applied : accompanied by a chart : embracing an analysis of the primary, mental powers in their various degrees of development, the phenomena produced by their combined activity, and the location of the phrenological organs in the head : together with a view of the moral and theological bearing of the science / by O. S. & L. N. Fowler ; assisted by Samuel Kirkham.

  • Fowler, O. S. (Orson Squire), 1809-1887.
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Phrenology proved, illustrated and applied : accompanied by a chart : embracing an analysis of the primary, mental powers in their various degrees of development, the phenomena produced by their combined activity, and the location of the phrenological organs in the head : together with a view of the moral and theological bearing of the science / by O. S. & L. N. Fowler ; assisted by Samuel Kirkham. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    faculties. (See second argument under this proposition.) It is likewise admitted, that the functions of love, hatred, rea- son, &c, are intellectual functions, differing in their nature and qualities no less than those of seeing and hearing. If, then, the economy of nature requires, that the mental opera- tions of seeing and hearing, should be performed by differ- ent faculties, why should not the same economy also demand, that the mental operations of loving, hating, reasoning, &c. should also be performed by as many different faculties'? The mind, therefore, consists of as many different faculties, or primary powers, as it performs different classes of func- tions. Second. The mind is capable of doing several things at the same time—of seeing and loving a friend, of reasoning and feeling upon a subject, of talking, walking, looking, thinking, hearing, &c, and all simultaneously; which could not possibly be done by a single faculty. According to the theory of Dr. Thomas Brown,* the mind is but a single faculty or power, and all the various mental operations are the product of this single faculty in different states, or modes of action:—seeing, for example, is the mind, or, what is the same thing, the man, in a state of seeing; hating, the mind, or the man, in a state of hating; reasoning, the man in a state of reasoning, &c. If this is so, how can the same mind, or, Avhat is equivalent, the same man, be in tivo or more different states at the same instant ? How can an in- dividual, at one and the same time, be wholly engrossed in seeing his friend and in loving him? How can a speaker carry on, simultaneously, a train of thought and a process of feeling ? or how can he reason better when excited than when not excited 1 If this theory were true, while looking at a wound we could not. feel its pain, but, with perfect ease, we might relieve its pain by simply looking at the wound, or at any other object, or by engaging the mind in the exer- cise of any other function ; for, inasmuch as it would be im- possible for us both to see and feel at the same time, the instant we should begin to look, or think, or do any thing else, we should cease to feel. But since we can see the per- forating needle whilst we feel its smart; can see our friend whilst loving him ; can be, at the same instant, both devising; and executing ; can be walking, and talking, and seeing, and • Brown's Philosophy of the Human Mind.