for thirty years, act with perfect effect at the first attempt, amid the irritation and torment of a painful operation; and, even admitting that the eye was perfectly sound, the internal organs which perceive the distance are not so. By disuse, every organ of the body becomes unfitted for the due performance of its functions. In civilized nations, the muscles of the external ear being prevented from acting during childhood, by the head-dress, not only lose all contractile power, but actually dwindle into nothing. In the savage state, the power of moving the ear is often as perfect in man as in the lower animals. The same unfitness for action is observed after long confinement of a limb for the cure of fracture, &c., and the muscles diminish in size. In the same way, during blindness, the organs which judge of colour and distance never are called into action, and therefore become, to a certain degree, unable to execute their functions, and it is only by degrees that they acquire sufficient energy to do so.

Dr THOMAS BROWN, whose acuteness I shall have frequent occasion to notice and to praise, admits that the lower animals perceive distance instinctively; and, although, on the whole, he agrees in the opinions of BERKLEY, REID, and STEWART, yet he holds the opposite opinion, which the phrenologists maintain, as far from ridiculous. "It is," says he, "not more wonderful, à priori, that a sensation of colour should be immediately followed by the notion of a mile of distance, than that the irritation of the nostril, by any very stimulant odour, should be immediately and involuntarily followed by the sudden contraction of a distant muscular organ, like the diaphragm, which produces, in sneezing, the violent expiration necessary for expelling the acrid matter."-Vol. ii. p. 69.

It is very true that Nature does not give us intuitive perceptions of the number of feet or inches at which any object is distant from us; because these are artificial measures, with which nature has nothing to do. But when two objects, equal in size, are presented to the eye, the one

double in point of distance to the other, the mind has always an intuitive perception that they are not equally near, unless the external or internal organs, or both, are deficient or deranged.

What, then, are the true functions of the eye? No organ of sense forms ideas. The eye, therefore, only receives, modifies and transmits the impressions of light; and here its functions cease. Internal faculties form conceptions of the figure, colour, distance, and other attributes of the objects making the impressions: and the power of forming these conceptions is in proportion to the perfection of the eyes and the internal faculties jointly, and not in proportion to the perfection of the eyes alone. Hence the lower animals, although they have eyes equal in perfection to those of man, are not able to form the ideas of the qualities of bodies, which he forms by means of his internal faculties, through the instrumentality of the eye, because in them the internal faculties are wanting.

The senses may be exercised, and their powers greatly improved, by exercise. The taste of the gourmand is more acute than that of the peasant; and the touch of the artisan than that of the ploughman.

GENUS II.

INTELLECTUAL FACULTIES WHICH PERCEIVE THE EXISTENCE OF EXTERNAL OBJECTS AND THEIR PHYSICAL QUALITIES.

THE faculties now to be treated of take cognizance of the existence and qualities of external objects. They correspond, in some degree, to the Perceptive Powers of the metaphysicians; and form ideas. Their action is attended with a sensation of pleasure, but (except in the case of

Tune) it is weak, compared to the emotions produced by the faculties already treated of; and the higher the functions, the less vivid is the emotion attending their active. state. In judging of the size of these organs, the rules laid down on pages 89. and 91. requires to be particularly attended to.

22.-INDIVIDUALITY.

THIS organ is situated in the middle of the lower part of the forehead, immediately above the top of the nose. When large, it produces breadth and descent between the eyebrows, at that part; when small, the eye-brows approach closely to each other, and lie in a horizontal line. The figure of King GEORGE III. shews the organ large; that of CURRAN moderate.

In surveying the external world, we may observe, 1st, Objects simply as substances or existences, such as a rock, a horse, a tree, a man; these perceptions are designated by substances; in the next place, the properties or attributes of things which exist, such as their form, size, weight, colour, number; 3dly, their relations to other objects, such as their place and order of arrangement. After these perceptions, we may notice their active phenomena, the rock falls, the horse runs, the tree grows, the man walks; these actions are designated by verbs. As size, form,

weight, and colours are adjuncts of physical existence, Time is an adjunct of action. Now, the faculty of Individuality observes objects which exist; it gives the notion of substance, and forms the class of ideas represented by nouns when used without any adjected word. We owe to Dr SPURZHEIM the discovery of the organ, and analysis of its functions.

The faculty gives the desire, accompanied with the ability, to know objects as mere existences, without regard to their modes of action, or the purposes to which they may be subservient. Individuals in whom it is large, will observe and examine an object with intense delight, without the least consideration whence it has come, or to what it may be applied, a quality of mind which is almost incomprehensible to persons in whom the organ is small and Causality large. It prompts to observation, and is a great element in a genius for those sciences which consist in a knowledge of specific existences, such as natural history. It leads to giving a specific form to all the ideas entertained by the mind. A student in whom this organ is small, and the reflecting organs large, may have his mind stored with general principles of science, and with abstract ideas, but will experience much difficulty in reducing them into precise and specific forms. Another, in whom this organ is large, will have all his knowlege individualized; if he hear lectures or conversation in which general views chiefly are presented, he will render them specific for himself; but unless his reflecting organs also be large, he will be prone to miss the essential principle, to seize upon the most palpable circumstance attending it, and to embrace this as his conception of it. Such persons are learned, and owing to the store of facts with which their memories are replenished, to the great definiteness and precision of their ideas, and the readiness with which they command them, they often take a lead in public business; but if their reflecting organs are deficient, they show no depth in comprehensiveness of understanding; they do not advance the

principles of science, and rarely acquire a permanent repu

tation.

In common life, this organ large, confers a talent for observation, curiosity to know, and aptitude for acquiring knowledge of details. The character of Miss Pratt, as drawn by the author of "Inheritance," a novel, is a personification of Individuality, when predominantly powerful, and not directed by higher faculties. "But people who make use of their eyes," says this author, “have often much to see, even between two doors; and in her progress from the hall door to the drawing room, Miss Pratt met with much to attract her attention. True, all the objects were perfectly familiar to her; but a real looker, like a great genius, is never at a loss for a subject-things are either better or worse since they saw them last-or if the things themselves should happen to be the same, they have seen other things, either better or worse, and can therefore either approve or disapprove of them. Miss Pratt's head then turned from side to side a thousand times as she went along, and a thousand observations and criticisms about stair-carpets, patent-lamps, hall-chairs, slab-tables, &c. &c. &c. passed through her crowded brain.-At length Miss Pratt and Mr Lindsay were announced, and thereupon entered Miss Pratt in a quick paddling manner, as if in all haste to greet her friends."—" Miss Pratt then appeared to her (Gertrude) a person from whom nothing could be hid. Here eyes were not by any means fine eyes-they were not reflecting eyes— they were not soft eyes-they were not sparkling eyes-they were not penetrating eyes; neither were they restless eyes, nor rolling eyes, nor squinting eyes, nor prominent eyes— but they were active, brisk, busy, vigilant, immoveable eyes, that looked as if they could not be surprised by any thing-not even by sleep. They never looked angry, nor joyous, or perturbed, or melancholy, or heavy; but morning, noon, and night they shone the same, and conveyed the same impression to the beholder, viz. that they were

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