Phrenology, its nature and uses : an address to the students of Anderson's University, at the opening of Dr. Weir's first course of lectures on phrenology in that institution, January 7th, 1846 / by Andrew Combe.

  • Combe, Andrew, 1797-1847.
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Phrenology, its nature and uses : an address to the students of Anderson's University, at the opening of Dr. Weir's first course of lectures on phrenology in that institution, January 7th, 1846 / by Andrew Combe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    I rejoice that you are to deliver the opening lecture of the first course of Lectures on Phrenology founded in any pub- lic educational institution in Scotland. As having formerly held office in the Andersonian Institu- tion ; and as having, in 1839, delivered, within its walls, a brief popular course of Lectures on Phrenology, I feel natu- rally much interested on the present occasion. The Managers have always been distinguished by liberal- ity of sentiment; and in no one of their proceedings have they more honourably acted up to the liberal spirit of their Insti- tution, or more conscientiously performed the duty which they owe to society, than in assisting in the foundation of a Lectureship on Phrenology. It is possible that some may look on this step as impru- dent, or even unjustifiable ; but no one acquainted with the recent progress and present state of Phrenology will hold such an opinion. On the contrary, those who have attended to the subject, and watched its progress most closely, cannot but look forward with confidence to the time when there shall be a chair for teaching the true physiology of the brain in every flourishing seminary, as no longer remote. The ex- ample now set by Anderson's University will, ere long, be followed by other seminaries; and the managers and mem- bers of the Andersonian University will then derive just honour and praise from the result of their foresight, candour, and liberality. The students attending these lectures will enjoy very great advantages ; for they will no longer be shut out from the rich harvest of observations, and the valuable practical applications of these which abound in the works of phrenolo- gists. When they listen to their learned instructor, Dr Weir, of whom it is unnecessary, and would be very pre- sumptuous, for me to speak in terms of praise, they will find it impossible to hold the doctrine, so comforting to indolence and prejudice, that a phrenologist is necessarily a bad or in- ferior anatomist. The subject being presented to them as it ought to be, not in the form of a gross caricature, but in the words of the great founder and prom ' p T>i,v^0i0(VTr they will soon perceive, that the cereb and Spurzheim surpasses that of their p. as their cerebral physiology does; and ever lived who adhered to the golden ml carefully observed facts more strictly tha„ l'..: tunate students, hearing Phrenology spoken of like any other branch of natural or physiological inquiry, as a field for ob- servation and induction, and not sneered at, when alluded to at all. as an absurd system of divination, will proceed to the