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.

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    yourself and all concerned. Till you rid yourself of your selfishness— till your moral sentiments rule—you are neither fit to marry, nor to mingle with your fellow-men at all. Your selfishness renders you necessarily miserable, and also all with whom you have to do. So have as little to do with your fellow-men as possible, both on your own account and on theirs. Above all, avoid this closest of all contacts, and especially refrain from becoming a parent, lest you render your posterity miserable by entailing upon them that animal organization which torments yourself. An extremely active Temperament forms another exception to this rule. When both parents are extremely active and nervous, then children will be liable to precocity, and subject to a premature death. For the same reason two persons having small chests and weak vital powers should not become parents, but should off-set these defects by opposite qualities in their companions on account of offspring. The domestic felicity of parents, and indeed of the whole family, is greatly augmented or diminished by the good or bad dispositions of the chil¬ dren, by their life and health, their sickness or death, &e., &c.; hence, this matter becomes an item of no inconsiderable consequence to be taken into account in selecting a husband or wife. Since this subject has thus inadvertently been broached, I will just allude to the manifest impropriety of choosing companions who have hereditary tendencies to mental and physical diseases, such as insanity, consumption, scrofula, apoplexy, &c., and show the importance of choosing a companion who is qualified to become the parent of healthy, moral, and intelligent offspring ; although to show what qualities are requisite in parents as parents, in order to prepare them to impart to their children the most desirable physical and mental qualities does not come within the design of this work ; it being detailed in one on ‘ Hereditary Descent, its Laws and Facts/ The leading principle of Phrenology in regard to marriage, together with its reasons, is now before the reader. But the next inquiry is, How can this harmony be effected ? By what means, and in what way can it be brought about] For, to know how to obtain this harmony is quite as important as the harmony itself. The answers of Phre¬ nology here also are clear and directly in point, and its directions so plain thati he that runs may read/ They are— First.—Study yourself thoroughly. Study both your physical organization and your phrenological developments. Ascertain your own qualities, and that will tell you just what qualities you require in a companion to harmonize with them. I say, study yourself phreno- logically ; because no other method is equally satisfactory or certain. Without a knowledge of this science, your Self-esteem, if large, will magnify all your good qualities, and throw the mantle of charity over your defects; or, the deficiency of this organ, with large Conscientious¬ ness, will give you too low and humble an opinion of yourself; magni¬ fying your faults and hiding from you your good qualities. Our own organization constitutes the medium, or the coloured glass, through which we look at all subjects, ourselves included. If that organization be defective, that is, if our characters be faulty, our standard of self¬ estimation is erroneous, and our self-knowledge proportionably deficient or defective. But in case Phrenology be true, it affords certain and tangible data for self-examination—data that cannot be mistaken—so that it leaves scarcely a possibility of our being deceived or mistaken in regard to our real characters ; especially when we combine our own consciousness with a knowledge of our phrenological developments. Secondly.—Phrenology will also tell you the true character and disposition of your intended, and thereby show wherein each is adapted to the other, or discover their want of adaptation. Modern courtship is little else than a school of deception. The time being previously appointed, the best dress is put on; the mouth put in prim and set off