The mind and its machinery. Vol. I, The scientific basis for reading character : a new and simplified description of the temperaments, explaining how to estimate the powers, talents, tendencies and capabilities of man and all other animals, a description of body and mind, their mutual inter-relations, and the influence of each upon the other, together with a new and original philosophy regarding the operation of a part of the bodily organs / by V. P. English.

  • English, V. P. (Virgil Primrose), 1858-
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The mind and its machinery. Vol. I, The scientific basis for reading character : a new and simplified description of the temperaments, explaining how to estimate the powers, talents, tendencies and capabilities of man and all other animals, a description of body and mind, their mutual inter-relations, and the influence of each upon the other, together with a new and original philosophy regarding the operation of a part of the bodily organs / by V. P. English. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    is not the workshop of a cabinetmaker, carpenter nor shoemaker, but that it is a blacksmith shop; and that these tools are adapted only to the work of a black- smith, and consequently that it is a blacksmith who works there. THE SCIENCE OP READING CHARACTER is based upon the same principles, and the student of human nature reaches his conclusions in about the same way. His observations and the manner of his reason- ing are practically the same. When he carefully ex- amines the machinery used by a human mind, and correctly estimates what can be best accomplished by the aid of that machinery, he can then correctly de- scribe the mind that uses it. Or perhaps it will more clearly express our meaning, to say that he can correctly describe this combination of mind and body, and success- fully estimate their combined capacities and capabilities. For the mind is something that we really know but little about except as we see its manifestation through its appropriate machinery—the body. CAPABILITIES OF MIND, LIKE A MUSICIAN’S PERFORM- ANCE, LIMITED BY CAPACITY OP INSTRUMENT USED. But this is all that is required to enable us to cor- rectly estimate character, because the capabilities of the mind are limited by the capabilities of the body. Just as the performance of an instrumental musician is