Matrimony, or, Phrenology and physiology applied to the selection of congenial companions for life : including directions to the married for living affectionately and happily / by O.S. Fowler.

  • Fowler, O. S. (Orson Squire), 1809-1887.
Date:
1880
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Matrimony, or, Phrenology and physiology applied to the selection of congenial companions for life : including directions to the married for living affectionately and happily / by O.S. Fowler. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    11/48 (page 7)
    to sick in a boarding-house or tavern l Let those who know its horrors bear witness. To be sick at home, with all the attentions that affection can bestow, is bad enough ; but to be sick among strangers, and have only such attention as money can procure, is the climax of wretchedness. Let young men whose circumstances compel them to board, choose some good family, and identify themselves with it, and cultivate the social affections, and then change the boarding-house for a home as soon as possible. Nor should young men leave their father’s house as soon as they generally do: they should, in most cases, stay at home till they get homes of their own. I have always observed that children who have lived in one dwelling, and. especially on a farm, till they were fifteen, have this organ large, whereas it is small in those who have lived in different places during childhood. This says to parents, in the language of nature, “ Make as few moves as possible, and generally keep your children at home™ It is also large in most farmers, and, with Approbativeness large, gives a kind of pride in having a nice farm, house, furniture, garden, &c., together with a disposition to improve one’s residence. The lower portion of Parental love is supposed to create a fondness for pets, stock, and the young and tender of animals, with a disposition to improve their breed; and the union of the two increases the charms of husbandry and farming. No life is so independent, so free from care, so healthy, or so favourable either to virtue or intellectual pursuits. If our farmers, instead of labouring with all their might to become rich, would labour just enough to earn a livelihood, and devote the remainder of their time to reading and study, no class of people on earth would be so happy, or moral, or talented. To leave the farm for the city or counting-room, evinces a species of folly bordering on derangement, or else sheer igno¬ rance of the road to happiness. The best heads I have examined have been those of farmers ; and a majority of our great and good men will be found to have once followed the plough and reaped the harvest. This organ also is supposed to be double: the innerportion creating attachment to the home of childhood, to the family domicile, to the stones, trees, and place of youth, and delighting to revisit them ; the outer creating patriotism and love of the more recent homestead^ with unwillingness to “ move.™ THE COMBINATIONS OF THE SOCIAL FACULTIES* Though the individual action of these social faculties is powerful, and productive of intense enjoyment or suffering, their combinations are much more so. Their combinations also account for the infinite diversity of tastes in the selection of friends and companions, and in the management of children. Thus, those whohave large Amativeness,-combined with large Adhe¬ siveness, not only love the other sex as such, but contract a strong f riendship for them, and make them their warmest and most confidential t'riends; and, with the addition of large “ Union for Life,” experience that love for some congenial spirit, some kindred soul, which makes “of twain one flesh,” and perfectly unites “ two willing hearts.” Persons thus constituted are tender and affectionate as companions; will mingle pure friendship with devoted love; “ cannot flourish alone,” but will be inclined to love and marry young ; will invest the beloved one with almost angelic purity and perfection ; magnify their mental and moral charms, and overlook, their defects ; feel happy in their company, but miserable without it; freely unbosom every feeling ; communicate and share every pain and pleasure; and have the whole current of the other faculties enlisted in their behalf. With large Ideality and the mental temperament added, they will experience a purity, a devotion, a fervour, an elevation, and intensity, and even ecstasy of love well nigh romantic*