Intermarriage; or the mode in which, and the causes why, beauty, health and intellect result from certain unions, and deformity, disease and insanity from others ... / By Alexander Walker.

  • Walker, Alexander, 1779-1852.
Date:
1839
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Intermarriage; or the mode in which, and the causes why, beauty, health and intellect result from certain unions, and deformity, disease and insanity from others ... / By Alexander Walker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    _ 4 * aiid PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. The following work of Mr. Alexander Walker has received strong marks of public favour in England, where it first appeared, and has been considered by many, as eminently worthy of republication here. On examining it, however, it was soon perceived, that though highly original in its design, and peculiarly valuable in its details, still its phraseology was some. times exceptionable, as it seemed to violate those con- ventional forms of language, to which American rea- ders are mostly accustomed. It was therefore deemed expedient to modify, and in some cases, change certain modes of expression, so as to obviate all objections on the score of refinement, and thus render the work acceptable to the most fastidious taste. This has been done, however, without in the least abridging the original, and without the suppression of 4 single sentence, necessary to the complete elucidation of the author’s views. | We are aware that there is a class of persons, who condemn all works of a physiological character, ad- dressed to general readers ; who seem to regard Physi- ology—that science which teaches us all we know of the laws of Life,—as “the tree of knowledge of good and evil,” the taste of whose fruit, if not like