most infinite diversity of mankind-a diversity so complete, that no two individuals are exactly alike, is quite at variance with the frequent similitude of particular features in different persons, and would limit the diversifica tion of the human race to the possible diversification of a single organ. The greater part of the volume is devoted to the proving of physiognomy to be a science; as if a true science could be better proved than by its own exposition. The prefatory proofs of an incipient science are not only necessarily indirect and unsatisfactory, but are moreover somewhat suspicious, like the urgent asseverations of veracity with which a narration is prefaced. Under how much difficulty this author, and Lavater before him, have laboured, in endeavouring to set forth their works with preliminary proofs of the truth of physiognomy, may be judged from their pushing to the very foreground of the argument that hackneyed anecdote of Zopyrus pronouncing a false opinion of Socrates, an anecdote which must either prove the science to be false, or Zopyrus to have been destitute of physiognomical knowledge; for Socrates, notwithstanding his own modest admission, could never have been a dunce, and besides, whatever he might have been, was at that time the wisest of men. To the 112th page, and from the 202d, where the author again digresses into general rhapsodical remarks, he keeps aloof from his subject, and fights vehemently with the wind. How far in the intervening ninety pages, where he comes into contact with human faces, he succeeds in establishing physiognomy upon scientific principles, we come now to inquire. He professes to treat of the face, which, after the example of Lavater, he denominated physiognomy, although it may be doubted, whether any thing has been gained by the importation of a Greek name, to express what is as well and more shortly expressed in our own tongue. The terms face, countenance, and visage, supersede the necessity of this new term, while its own ambiguity condemns it as deserving to be for ever discarded. Though he professes to discuss the face, he omits the ears, evidently because on them his Lavaterian archetype was so scanty as not to be transmutable. As this author limits his observations to the face, we propose to term him, all such prosopologists, discoursers on the face, in contradistinction to craniologists, discoursers on the scull, who limit their observations to the head But here a difficulty starts with regard to the line of demarkation between the face and the head. The craniologists lay claim to the brow, as the richest territory in the whole map of their craniological domain, upon the ground that the frontal bone is a part of that scull, which is an adapted covering to the brain. The prosopologists, on the other hand, confidently lay claim to the brow as their uppermost and most expressive feature, upon the ground, that it is naked and sensitive, like the rest of the face, and that it is even spoken of as part of the face by the neutral vulgar, who are frequently heard to say, that such a person must be clever, for he has so much face above his eyes. We think that the brow belongs both to the face and to the head; and, for the safety of the foreheads of the lieges, recommend a reconciliation between these mighty competitors, the more especially as the prosopologists care only for the surface, whereas, the craniologists being Germans, and therefore excellent miners, care only for what is below. Let it be understood then, that the craniologists may take their surveys upon the brow as the covering of the brain, provided they desist from converting the temporal muscles, which belong to the mouth, into organs for their schemes, and from fixing their locality in the frontal sinuses which belong to the nose; and that the proso pologists may form their estimates of the brain, as giving size and shape to the exterior parts of the forehead, provided they do not efface the cranioscopical landmarks drawn so geometrically by their rivals. Having settled these preliminaries, we must next prepare the readers for appreciating Mr Cooke's remarks upon the brow, which, on the authority of Lavater, he emphatically pronounces "the gate of the soul-the temple of modesty." Of this preparation, the first and most important point is to ascertain the function of the brain, that great fountain and conflux of the nerves, whence they issue, as so many aidesde-camp, to the muscles, and whither they terminate, as so many scouts, from the surface; for, as Lord Bacon and says, "of the concordances between the mind and the body, that part of inquiry is most necessary which considereth of the seats and domiciles which the several faculties of the mind do take, and occupate in the organs of the body, which knowledge," he adds, "hath been attempted, and is controverted, and deserveth to be much better inquired." But to bring forward our arguments at present upon the functions of the brain, would be to anticipate an intended inquiry into a number of late works on that very organ. Suffice it, in the meantime, to take for granted the opinion generally received, from Plato down to the present day, that the brain is the organ or instrument of the intellect. If we err, therefore, we err with the majority, and enjoy this farther consolation, that, as truth generally lies in the middle between the extremes of human opinions, we must be in the fair way of finding her out; for we steer a middle course between Gall and Spurzheim, on the one hand, who have improved upon the ancient doctrine, that the whole man is a microcosm; and even upon the fantastical straining given to that doctrine by Paracelsus, and the alchemists, who went the length of finding, "in man's body certain correspondencies and parallels, which should have respect to all varieties of things, as stars, planets, minerals, which are extant in the world;" for Gall and Spurzheim have conceived the brain itself to be a complete microcosm, not merely endowed with general correspondencies and parallels with external things, but consisting of a congeries of distinct organs for weight, colour, shape, and every possible quality of external objects, as well as for a greater number of internal feelings and faculties than metaphysicians have yet dreamed of; and the unlearned antagonists of these most learned Thebans, the Edinburgh Reviewers, on the other hand, who, in their physiological wisdom, think that " sensation, thought, and volition are altogether independent of the central mass, and are confined entirely to the nerves." We proceed, therefore, to inquire what sizes and shapes of brain, viewing it as the organ of intellect, are most conducive to, and indicative of, intellectual functions. It holds in the lower creation, that sagacity is generally proportional, other things being equal, to the mass of brain. This rule does not stop short at mankind, but serves to shew how far they, as a race, transcend the lower tribes, and how far one man, other things being equal, is capable of surpassing another. The proverb, "a big head has little wit," is neither true nor is generally believed, and must have arisen, like many other absurd sayings, from mistaking the mere smartness, which belongs to persons with little round heads, for genuine wisdom. It holds also in the lower creation, that activity is generally proportional, other things being equal, to the compactness of the brain, or to its conjacency, if we may be allowed to contrive a useful word that more justly conveys our meaning. In mankind, also, we find that the activity of the intellect, or rather its natural adaptation for activity, whatever may be its powers, is generally proportional, other things being equal, to the smallness of the superficial measurement in relation to the cubical measurement of the brain, whatever may be its size. Now the surface upon which the brain rests being given, what shape upwards would be the greatest map, within the least area of enclosure? Undoubtedly that shape which approaches nearest to the globe, the very perfection of figures, according to the ancients. The skull, if it were extensible to a considerable degree in early life, and if an enlarging force within were acting equally against its whole external surface, would gradually approach nearer and nearer to the globular shape, and, in the progress of this approximation, would come to rise perpendicu larly, before beginning to swell outwardly, and would naturally swell more outwardly at the sides where the longitudinal extent is greatest, than before or behind. (Here it must be recollected, that the existing surface of the cerebrum, the brain in question, extends backwards to the extreme point of the occiput.) Accordingly, we find that persons of a naturally acute and energetic intellect, have broad heads, sometimes even swelling considerably outward on both sides. If we consider that the brain is divided longitudinally by the falx, which at once holds the brow from being protruded, and, by dividing the front of the brain, diminishes the protruding force, we can easily see how the most luxuriant brain, swelling out at both sides, shall in front rise perpendicular ly, and then gradually fall back into globosity. What has been said of the shape which a growing brain would assume from a given basis, applies also to the shape of that basis, so far as it affects the shape of the brain; so that a broad basis, which conduces to the globosity of the brain, indicates a natural capability of intellectual energy, and, being accompanied with a corresponding broadness of face, is naturally calculated for exerting that intellectual energy to the best purpose. But the brain, although its intellectual powers are great in proportion to its size, and are concentrated in proportion to its conjacency, must not be considered as one homogeneous mass. As the intellectual faculties are divisible into perception, memory, and judgment; so the brain seems to be divisible into three corresponding portions-into a perceptive, a remembering, and a reasoning portion. Waving arguments at present, for the reason already mentioned, we lay down as a hypothesis, to be afterwards converted into a theory, and ultimately, we flatter ourselves, into an undeniable truth, that the anterior portion of brain, lying within the sensitive brow, is devoted to perception; that the middle portion, lying under the parieetal bones, is devoted to memory; and that the posterior portion, lying within the occipital bone, is devoted to judgment. Keeping to our present text, the brow, we remark, that the perceptive powers are proportional to the total dimensions of the brow, its breadth being referable to the force, and its height to the extensiveness of perception. As this portion of the scalp is hairless, evidently for the sake of being sensitive, and as this sensitiveness is the earnest to us of how much of the brain is devoted to external perception, so the more exquisitely sensitive the brow, the more exquisitely perceptive is the brain; hence, what is called a clear brow indicates a clear perception, and thus the ἐλιφαντινον με TWTO is at once a mark of beauty and of perspicacity. From the sensitive office of the brow, we are enabled to deduce an argument corroborative of our geometrical argument in favour of the perpendicular rise; for the more the brow slants, the less is it capable of coming into contact with objects; whereas, the more it projects, the farther does it keep back the rest of the face; but it is the better calculated for. both allowing and accomplishing the completest contact, the more it rises in the same plane with the rest of the face. Though the brow is little employed in sensitive offices, yet the solicitude of nature to extend the sensitive surface is not the less manifest. In viewing the brow as a covering for the brain, we must make allowance for the temporal muscles, situated on the temples, and for the frontal sinuses, those excavations in the bone of the brow, or rather that separation of its two plates,-situated above, and communicating with, the nostrils, and extending less or more upwards and to either side, and sometimes pervading the whole lower half of the bone of the brow. It is only under these allowances that contours of the brow can be considered as contours of the fore part of the brain. During life, the thickness of the temporal muscles can only be computed from the force with which the nether jaw can be pulled up; and the size of the frontal sinuses, when they form no distinct bulging, can only be computed from the sonorousness of the voice, and from how far the general structure or character is masculine; for in children and women these sinuses are small, in men they are larger, and in the most robust and most courageous men they are largest. Being now somewhat prepared, let us follow Mr Cooke through his scattered observations on the brow. We are told, that a long brow indicates a weak mind, and that a short brow indicates a strong mind. According to the foregoing principles we think, that short brows indicate a clouded perception, and are quite inconsistent with original genius, and have remarked the shortest brows belong to a certain description of naturals. On the contrary, the most elevated brows that occur to our recollection are those of Bacon, Shakspeare, and Walter Scott, in whom is also observable "The cast of thought upon the face, That suited well these foreheads high." Now, the question is, shall these men be still esteemed the paragons of intellectual perspicacity, or must mankind, as they improve in clear-sightedness, decrease in brow? "And all be turned to barnacles or apes, With foreheads villainous low.” We agree with the author, that a long narrow forehead is never accompanied with an energetic mind, not, however, on account of the length, but of the deficiency in breadth; and venture to add, that if this narrow brow had also been short, it would have been accompanied with still less intellect. He says that arched (round) contours, without angles, are indicative of gentleness and flexibility of character, but that straight contours are indicative of firmness and inflexibility." If this be true, then Bonaparte, whose brow is the segment of nearly a globe, must have a gentle and flexible character; nor must the rugged brow be any longer proverbial for ruggedness of character. We grant that " complete perpendicularity from the hair to the eye-brows never occurred along with great understanding, or along with little. He found superiority of intellect invariably attend a retreating forehead." We must here refer our readers to what has been said of the frontal sinuses; for we most decidedly pronounce, that a slanting brain is incompatible with superiority of intellect. He afterwards allows, that the perpendicular brow, if bent at the top, is capable of steady and profound reflection.-Are not all brows that rise perpendicularly less or more rounded a-top? He says in one place, that prominent brows, starting in sudden projections, and overhanging the face, indicate a feeble and contracted mind: in another place, that brows rising perpendicularly, and then becoming "rounded and prominent above," indicate considerable judgment, vivacity, and irritability, but a want of sympathy. We have generally found, that brows projecting above, are accompanied with extraordinary memory, which so exclusively engrosses cultivation, and leaves the other faculties, from want of exercise, so comparatively inane, that the persons are often little better than changelings. He informs us, that newly-born infants generally have somewhat prominent brows, which recede in the progress of years. We deny that the generality of newly-born children have prominent brows, and most positively deny that they ever recede. The frontal sinuses and face, as they become developed in the progress of life, throw the upper part of the brow into an apparent, not a real, recession. Does he mean that the brain undergoes diminution just when increase is required; and that the fœtal brain is enlarged merely to accomplish the mother's doom? (Genc 66 sis iii. 16.) If he thinks that the sup posed original projection is merely a difference in shape from the supposed subsequent recession, and is intended to facilitate the " processum parturiendi," he betrays " ignorantiam presentationum." He says, that in men "straight foreheads" indicate profundity, but in women cannot indicate a quality which they neither have nor need. We are more certain that the fair ones have not straight foreheads, than that they have not profundity; and are farther certain that many women have considerable profundity, but that neither men nor women have straight foreheads. Straight and curv ed lines gently undulating, we do not understand. Perfect straightness and sharp-pointed angles are incompati ble with greatness of intellect" just because they are incompatible with na ture. He says, that prominence of the bone of the eye indicates aptitude for mental labour, sagacity for great enterprises, and great foresight; but that foreheads whose lower part sinks like a perpendicular wall under horizontal eyebrows, and rounds towards the temples, indicate the more solidity that they want prominence of eyebrows. We think that where the orbits, those sheaths of the two visual instruments which direct us to all our objects of pursuit, have prominent, circular, well-marked edges, there we find an aptitude for activity of intellect, without regard to its powers. We are told that perpendicular foreheads, whether narrow and wrinkled, or smooth and very short, "which advance without resting on the root of the nose, indicate a destitution of wit, imagination, and sensibility." We think that the narrowness forbids wit, that the shortness precludes fancy, and that neither narrowness nor shortness, nor smoothness nor wrinkles, have any relation to the presence or absence of sensibility. He says that foreheads loaded with many angular and knotty protuber ances, mark a fiery, unreasonable, and impetuous spirit;-Gall and Spurzheim have placed their destructiveness behind the ear. He says, that two arches, of which the lower one advances, are always accompanied with clear understanding and good complexion. As the lower arch must be caused by a bulging of the frontal sinuses, so this sort of brow, if we rightly understand the description, is most frequently seen in persons of stout make and swarthy the brows of Sir Isaac Newton, Samucomplexion. He says, that profound el Johnson, and Lord President Blair. perpendicular incisions in the frontal This interesting shape of, brow seems bone, between the eye-brows, denote to owe its production to the forepart uncommon capacity and thought. We of the brain swelling out the brow at have found one deep perpendicular line each side, while the middle is held of depression, appearing to divide the back by the falx. brow, in persons of great perspicacity of intellect, Of this description were (To be continued.) MR EDITOR, ON SIR THOMAS URQUHART'S JEWELL. 8 Ir was with great pleasure I observed the notice of Sir Thomas Urquhart, in your review of the life of the admirable Crichton. As many of your readers may, perhaps, wish to 1 be better acquainted with his Jewell, certainly one of the most curious works which ever issued from the press, some further account of this extraordinary production and its author may not be unacceptable to them. The character of Sir Thomas Urquhart was singular in the extreme. To all the bravery of the soldier and learning of the scholar, he added something of the knight-errant, and more of the visionaire and projector. Zealous for the honour of his country, and fully determined to wage war both with his pen and his sword against all the defaulters who disgraced it; credulous yet sagacious, enterprising yet rash, he appears to have chosen the admirable Crichton as his pattern and model for imitation. For his learning he may be denominated the Sir Walter Raleigh of Scotland, and his pedantry was the natural fruit of erudition deeply ingrained in his mind. To this I may add, he possessed a disposition prone to strike out new paths in knowledge, and a confidence in himself that nothing could weaken or disturb; the former of which, however, often led him to contend against impossibilities, and the latter sometimes induced him to supply what was wanting in argument by empty gasconade. His diction, a truly Babylonish dialect, is such, perhaps, as it would be difficult in any author or in any language to parallel; it is, indeed, composed of particles taken from every language most fantastically intermixed. But if he has Manchester, February 8, 1820. made use of extraordinary expressions we must remember he had extraordinary thoughts to express; and as he himself observes, the bonification and virtuification of Lully Scotus's Hexcity and Albedineity of Suarez, are words exploded by those that af fect the purity of the latine diction; yet if such were demanded, what other no less concise expression would comport with the neatness of that language, their answer would be altum silentium; so easy a matter it is for many to find fault with what they are not able to mend. For it boots not so much by what kind of tokens any matter be brought into our minde, as that the things made known unto us by such representatives be of some considerable value; not much unlike the Innes-a-court-gentlemen at London, who, usually repairing to their commons at the blowing of a horne, are better pleased with such a signe (so the fare be good) than if they were warned to coarser cates by the sound of a bell or trumpet." For his life there are, I believe, few materials. We are informed that he was a partizan of king Charles, was taken prisoner at the battle of Worcester, and that, during his imprisonment, the greatest part of his productions were published-some of them probably to procure a subsistence.Nothing is more truly illustrative of his character than the method he took to propitiate the parliamentary side, and free himself from his imprisonment. Too steady a loyalist to sacrifice his integrity to his safety; too much of a cavalier to degrade himself by a mean-spirited submission, he hit upon expedients which few, perhaps, besides himself could have invented, or would have adopted. To induce |