mercial enterprise and chivalrous adventure. The voyage was made by Columbus, and we now live in the new world to which he led the way. A similar juncture has now arrived a new world of knowledge exists-which the savans of Europe and America have deemed utterly inaccessible. They have supposed that a fathomless and shoreless ocean-a trackless and impassable waste of waters— surrounded the present limits of our knowledge, and forbid all approach to that new world of truth, which, we now know, is easily accessible. Shall we hesitate to go forth and explore this new region? To those who desire to make the voyage, the "Journal of Man" proposes to furnish the compass and the chart, by the assistance of which it will be rendered a voyage of pleasure and of romantic interest.

ART. IV. NEUROLOGY IN NEW YORK.*

QUÆQUE IPSE vidi.

IN surveying the history of discoveries in natural science, one of the most peculiar facts that strike the view is the circumstance that for years, aye and even ages, preceding the development of some important principle, many of the leading phenomena had been repeatedly observed; and when the grand conclusion deduced from these phenomena was once announced to the world, the result excited less astonishment than the circumstance of its having been so long unperceived. Men of the most exalted genius would seem often to stumble over these facts, and even not unfrequently to pick them up and handle them, and still fail to discover their most obvious bearing. Hence it has always occurred that attempts have been made to rob the discoverer of his honors, however well merited, on the ground that certain of the essential facts had been previously well known. Thus has it been with the kindred subject of Phrenology, whose enemies, failing in the effort to subvert its principles, endeavored to show that what was true in it was not new, and what was new was not true. And in illustration of the circumstance just adverted to, that the tendency of natural phenomena is often by no means appreciated even by the most acute observers, it may be mentioned that Gall/himself once struck accidentally upon one of the most important facts of "Neurology" without discovering the general law to which it most obviously pointed. The same remark is applicable to the experiments without number performed during the From the Democratic Review-January, 1843.

last fifty years in France, Germany, England, and the United States, upon subjects put into the somnambulic state by means of the Mesmeric process.

The earliest knowledge that we have of these discoveries in "Neurology" on the part of Dr. Buchanan, is, that in April, 1841, he was giving public lectures and experiments on the subject at Little Rock, Arkansas. We are the more particular in referring to this date, as an attempt has been made in the city of New York to establish a priority of claim, based upon experiments made in the latter part of the same year. But by this time the announcement of Dr. Buchanan's discoveries had spread, by means of the Journals of the day, over the whole extent of our wide domain. "These experiments," in the words of their author, "occupied the whole ground of Phrenology; more than doubled the number of distinct organs; and established propositions in physiology and therapeutics, of much more importance than the Phrenological doctrines which had thus been established." Instead of hastening to our Atlantic cities, in the reasonable hope that here a discovery of such magnitude would be speedily and fully appreciated, Dr. Buchanan remained in the far West, quietly prosecuting his investigations to the end of perfecting his system of Neurology. So far as regards cerebral excitability, he could not but be aware that others would, by this process, attract the public mind, and that it would be caught up even for popular exhibitions; but justly considering this as entirely subordinate to the science he aimed to establish by this means, he directed his efforts solely to the accomplishment of the scientific end in view.

As these discoveries embrace, in their wide range, not only the mental physiology of the brain, constituting Phrenology, but also the physiology of every corporeal organ as dependent upon special portions of the cerebral mass, it follows that it was necessary to substitute a new term. Were the functions of the brain exclusively mental, the term, Phrenology, would be sufficiently comprehensive; but as its control over the corporeal functions is not less decided and important, the term Neurology, or science of the nervous substance, has been judiciously selected as expressive of all the phenomena comprised within its wide limits. These two classes of functions, Dr. Buchanan distinguished by the terms psychological and physiological, which are, indeed quite expressive in their more popular acceptation; but, as the phenomena of the mind, in our present existence, can be manifested only through the cerebral structure, we cannot see that this class of functions is less physiological than the other. This double function of the brain, as demonstrated by Dr. Buchanan, we consider as its mental and corporeal physiology.

To Dr. Buchanan is due the distinguished honor of being the first individual to excite the organs of the brain by agencies applied externally directly over them, before which the discoveries of Gall, Spurzheim, or Sir Charles Bell-men who have been justly

regarded as benefactors of their race-dwindle into comparative insignificance. This important discovery has given us a key to man's nature-moral, intellectual, and physical; for, by this means, in "impressible" subjects, have become discoverable the various cerebral organs which are not only connected with the phenomena of thought and feeling, but control the corporeal functions. As man is pervaded by the imponderable and invisible fluids, which radiate from him unceasingly, such as the electric, galvanic, magnetic, and (according to Dr. Buchanan) "nervauric," the laws of these he would seem also to have demonstrated. He has likewise clearly established the general truths of Phrenology, corrected many errors of detail, and developed the subject with such a degree of minuteness, that it now may be said to resemble the full-grown adult as compared with the child.

"Neurology," says Dr. Buchanan, "while it incorporates the entire mass of Physiology with Phrenology, makes a revolution in the latter science. Although the greater portions of the organs discov ered by Gall and Spurzheim, have been, in the main, correctly discribed, yet experiment has proved about one-third of the number to have been incorrectly understood. Nor does the catalogue of Gall, Spurzheim, Combe, or Vimont, embrace a sufficient number of functions to explain the diversified phenomena of human character.

* The number of independent functions which may thus be demonstrated by experiment with an adequately susceptible person, amounts to one hundred and sixty-six; but, for convenience of instruction, I demonstrate usually not more than one hundred. With a subject of large brain, well cultivated mind, and high susceptibility, I have no doubt that even as many as two hundred might be shown distinctly."

The agent employed most generally by Dr. Buchanan to excite the various functions of the nervous system, is the same as that used in the operations termed Mesmerism or Animal Magnetism, viz.: the aura of the nervous system, which is radiated and conducted freely from the human hand. Instead, however, of putting the subject first into the Mesmeric somnambulic condition, which renders the phenomena that follow highly deceptive and inacurate, Dr. Buchanan operates upon his subject in the waking state, free from the mental delusions which may be supposed to pertain to somnambulism. This impressible class, which is a very limited one, may not only have a portion of the brain so energetically stimulated, by the touch of another, as to manifest its particular function predominantly; but the individual becomes equally excited when he places his fingers on the cranial regions of the cerebral organs of another person.

These characteristic and leading principles of Dr. Buchanan's system, are here adverted to merely in a general way, as they will be again brought under notice by us, both in a sketch of the principles of Neurology by Dr. Buchanan himself, and in the diversified experiments of a committee, appointed by a public audience in the

city of New York, for the purpose of investigating the pretensions of Dr. Buchanan to the claim of having enlarged the boundaries of anthropological science.

These announcements are, indeed, of a startling character, extraordinary to all, and to many wholly beyond credence. Had Dr. Buchanan lived in an earlier age of the world, when philosophy had not yet asserted its noble prerogative of releasing the mind from the bondage of superstition, instead of being regarded as a bold and original thinker and an untiring searcher after truth, he would have been dreaded, or perhaps persecuted, as a necromancer casting his magic spells over the body and soul of his victim. But, notwithstanding the wise in all ages, seeing the deceptions constantly practiced on mankind by the marvellous, have been very justly on their guard against easy credulity, it does not become the true philosopher of the nineteenth century to close the organs of his five external senses against the intrusion of any evidence which might possibly disturb some favorite and long cherished system. It does not become the philosophic enquirer to decide precipitately that any phenomenon is too marvellous for belief. Many natural phenomena, which were formerly regarded with superstitious awe, as, for instance, the Spectre of Brocken, which consisted of the gigantic image of a man delineated on the sky-the fact of troops performing their evolutions on the surface of a lake, or on the face of an inaccessible precipice-or the equally extraordinary phantasm of a ship's being seen in the air, in the solitude of the ocean's waste, notwithstanding no vessel was within reach of the eye-are all now satisfactorily explained by the unequal refractive powers of the atmosphere arising from its variable temperature. "It is impossible," says Dr. Brewster, "to study these phenomena without being impressed with the conviction, that nature is full of the marvellous, and that the progress of science, and the diffusion of knowledge, are alone capable of dispelling the fears which her wonders must necessarily excite, even in enlightened minds."

In like manner, to those unaware that each mental faculty has its distinct organ in the brain, the proposition that these emotions or faculties may be excited at will, as when we call forth the different notes of a musical instrument, is so startling as to be beyond credibility; but to the mind of the phrenologist, who has been wont to contemplate the great truths of his science, the announcement of such results offers no violence. This field of scientific research, which offers a harvest rich in new and valuable facts, is open to every laborer; and we find, accordingly, that it has been already entered upon by many philosophical enquirers. We, as well as may others, have witnessed repeated experimental verifications of the excitement of the separate organs of the brain, thus calling forth, in an intense degree, their natural language and action. Although the number of those having brains thus excitable is comparatively small, yet in every society of a few hundred individuals, there will be found some subjects impressible in a greater or less degree. To those

in whom scepticism is a predominant organ, we would seriously recommend the perusal of the following lines written by Galileo to Kepler, which are not the worse for having been often quoted:

"Here, at Padua, is the principal professor of philosophy, whom I have repeatedly and urgently requested to look at the moon and planets through my glasses, which he pertinaciously refuses to do."

We would now proceed to illustrate the general subject of NEUROLOGY, by bringing before the reader certain portions of a report on experimental investigations, published in the "Evening Post" of the 6th December, entitled-"Minutes of the proceedings of a Committee appointed by the public audience attending the lectures of Dr. Buchanan, to superintend experiments relating to Neurology,' and to prepare experiments suitable for public exhibition."

The committee met on the 4th and 5th of November, and spent several hours each day in the performance of a variety of experiments; but, as a general impression prevailed that the results exhibited were not, on the whole, of a character so marked and unequivocal as to be very satisfactory, Dr. Buchanan stated that he had relied on the expectation that some impressible subjects would be brought to the meeting by members of the committee, but that there had not been any of a character other than very imperfect and doubtful. He suggested that a sub-committee should be appointed, who could witness experiments, in greater privacy, upon some subjects who might be found unwilling to appear before so large a number as the general committee, and who would also be able to bestow more time on the investigation of the subject than could be done by the larger number. This suggestion being adopted, the following gentlemen were appointed as that sub-committee:-Rev. Henry W. Bellows, Messrs. William C. Bryant and John L. O'Sullivan, and Dr. Samuel Forry. The first named of these gentlemen was prevented by absence from the city from being present at the greater part of the experiments made, and from participating in the

report.

We will present, in the first place, the conclusions of this sub

committee:

6: REPORT OF THE SUB-COMMITTEE.

"The sub-committee, appointed to witness private experiments by Dr. Buchanan, beg leave to report, to the committee from which their appointment emanated, that they have held meetings, of which an account is given in their minutes subjoined. Their object has been to give the subject an attention, at the same time cautious and candid, and to present a simple statement of their observations, to serve as a basis for the deductions of others, rather than of any positive conclusions of their own, as to the correctness of those views and opinions to which Dr. Buchanan has given the name of the science of Neurology,' as discovered and developed by him.

"For the sake of rendering more intelligible the bearing of the