whether all laws and all phenomena may not rather be resolved into one sole agency, is still a moot point on which different schools are at issue. And those schools, which assume but one agency, have, on the nature of that agency, again divided into separate and extreme courses. So that in the very foundations of this department of philosophy, there is as yet nothing fixed, nothing permanent; and, however some may think to build upon loose conjectures and groundless assumptions, we are convinced, for our part, that there will be no real progress in metaphysics, until the great questions to which we have alluded, are finally solved, or, in case such solution be found impossible, until the impossibility has been demonstrated and some other foundation agreed on. Now there have arisen from time to time grave men, who spake with authority, saying that philosophy must not meddle with questions like these, and that it behoved philosophers to withdraw their efforts from the hopeless structure of transcendental theorems, on which ages had been laboring in vain, and to give them a more profitable direction. But, no sooner had these teachers ceased, than philosophers returned to the forbidden work and raised anew the old Babel, and wrought and wrangled upon its unfinished walls, until scattered again by new disorder and confusion of tongues. Nor were they wrong in their search after absolute knowledge. The strong craving of the mind for such knowledge is a sufficient apology for pursuing it, a Godgiven charter and a free warrant for whatever course it may elect. The true seeker of wisdom may not suffer himself to be guided by authority. No one must say to him, Lo here! or lo there! His own experience and not another's must teach him what ways are practicable, and what are not practicable, to man. It is not well to inquire too curiously concerning the limits of our knowledge. When men affirm that nothing can be known à priori, they do themselves judge à priori, and that too in direct contradiction of the only science which has ever arrived at absolute truth. In like manner, when it is asserted that there is no knowledge beyond the limits of experience, the limits of experience are already transgressed. Therefore let trancendental inquiry continue, let speculation, the loftiest, the wildest, have free course, until it shall be proved, not by the negative tes timony of previous failures, but by positive evidence, how far philosophy may go, and where God hath fixed her bounds. We have said that speculations about matter and spirit are as old as philosophy. Dualism, or the doctrine of two principles, was the prevailing theory of the most ancient schools. The Spirit and Water of Thales, the Nous and the Homoiomeriai of Anaxagoras, the Monas and Dyas of Pythagoras, the Heaven and Earth of Parmenides, the Enmity and Friendship of Empedocles, the Fire and Density of Heraclitus, are all different forms of this system. We must not, however, suppose that Dualism, as held by the ancients, involved that perfect antithesis which we understand by matter and spirit. Their notions of spiritual existence seldom went beyond the idea of an aura or æther, or some other infinitely attenuated form of matter. But there can be no doubt that they intended by this a separate and distinct principle, -an antagonist to grosser matter. Socrates too, though on far higher grounds, was a Dualist, so far as the human constitution is concerned. The systems which immediately succeeded him, the school of Megara, the Cynics, Stoics, Epicureans, &c., paid but little regard to these matters; and it was not till after their appearance, that philosophy developed itself in that two-fold direction in which it has come down to us. To the influence of Plato (who however was not a formal Idealist) must be traced that tendency to idealism, which in these latter times has been perfected in Berkeley and Fichte; and with the school of Aristotle, himself no materialist, originated those sensual views which have received their full developement in the systems of such philosophers as Hobbes, Priestley, and the French Encyclopædists. If, in addition to these two divisions, we reckon the various attempts made by Des Cartes, Malebranche, and Leibnitz, to reconcile the opposite principles which they represent, we have, without regarding minor distinctions and skeptical theories, three grand divisions or schools of philosophy; the Ideal, comprehending all those systems which deny the objective reality, or, at least, the material basis of the outward world; the Sensual or Mechanical, embracing not only the different schemes of Materialism, but all those systems which attempt to explain the origin of our ideas mechanically, i. e. by sensations and im - pressions; *— and lastly, Dualism, comprising every philosophical recognition of two principles or agencies, accompanied with an attempt to define their limits and relations. Our purpose in these remarks, -the bearing of which on the subject before us may seem somewhat remote, was to determine, as nearly as possible the position which Phrenology must occupy in relation to previous systems of philosophy, if allowed to take its place among them. It is evidently a branch of the Sensual school, and must be considered as belonging to the lowest form of that school. It is in fact a system of pure Materialism. We are fully aware that some of its professors have labored to avoid this imputation, but, as it seems to us, unsuccessfully and unwisely. Unsuccessfully, because the fundamental principle, and indeed the whole structure, of their doctrine is an everlasting contradiction to any disclaimer which they may see fit to make on this subject; - unwisely, because the disavowal of Materialism gives an appearance of inconsistency to their system, and by this means deprives it of the small degree of consideration it might otherwise claim. If we are right in our suspicions, the motive of this disavowal proceeds partly from a natural, though very unphilosophical, dread of a consequence so startling, but chiefly from a fear of the discredit which it might bring upon their doctrine. This is mistaken policy. The worst feature which any philosophy can exhibit is inconsistency; and no system is entitled to respect, which does not candidly admit, and resolutely meet the consequences which naturally flow from it. Not that Phrenology would be any more true, if it assumed the form of avowed Materialism. God forbid! But it would certainly deserve in that form a more patient hearing. The Phrenologist may profess, if he pleases, that he is not a Materialist; such a profession is nothing to the purpose, except to prove, that his instinctive good sense is truer than his * It need hardly be observed, that this division includes Locke and all metaphysicians of that class. With regard to Locke, indeed, the cool insinuation contained in his "Essay," (Book IV. c. 111.), and afterwards defended in a letter to Bishop Stillingfleet, that God may have "superadded to matter a power of thinking," seems to discover in that philosopher a strong inclination, to say the least, toward downright Materialism. philosophy; but when he asserts that Phrenology is not Materialism, he shows himself utterly deficient in logic, and renders his whole system ridiculous. Phrenology is Materialism. Every theory of the mental faculties, professing to be the whole account of man, and not taking its stand within the mind as an immaterial substance, - but in a collection of matter, does, by its very definition, come under that denomination. In vain would the phrenologist distinguish between the manifestations of the mind and the mind itself. The mind has absolutely and professedly no place in his system; it does not come into consideration. What does come into consideration? A mass of cineritious and medullary matter called the brain, to which all intellectual and moral phenomena are referred. Consequently the manifestations of which he speaks, are manifestations of this cineritious and medullary substance, and he has no authority whatever for calling them manifestations of the mind. He has found what he deems a sufficient cause for the phenomena in question, and it is altogether unphilosophical to speak of any other. When, therefore, the phrenologist talks of mind as distinct from the brain, he talks extra scholam, i. e. from a point not given in the philosophy itself, but assumed beyond it. He speaks, not as an expounder of the system, but as a critic sitting in judgment upon it. Now it must be evident, even to one less skilled in dialectics, if that were possible, than the author of the work before us, that every system of philosophy is to be judged from its own principles and the deductions naturally flowing therefrom, and not from the exoteric assertions of it disciples. The Phrenologist says, "The organs do not constitute the mind." That we well know; but what then are these organs? They are the causes of mental phenomena. What is the conclusion? Evidently that there is no mind. And this conclusion, derived from the direct testimony of the system itself, is confirmed by many hints which have fallen from its chief expounders. Mr. Combe is consistent, and boldly declares that we have no knowledge of mind independent of matter. "The mind, as it exists by itself, can never be an object of philosophical investigation "*! It is not easy to gather from Dr. Spurzheim's Introduction, made up as it is of in * See Combe's Phrenology. Last Edition. P. vi. coherent and often unmeaning propositions, any definite opinion. The following sentence, however, the only one out of three pages, which can be considered as expressing the writer's own views, seems to corroborate the truth of our assertion. "The doctrine of immaterial substances is not sufficiently amenable to the test of observation; it is founded on belief, and only supported by hypothesis." Both of the abovementioned writers have labored to prove, that metaphysical inquiry is useless, and that anatomists and physiologists are the only true interpreters of man's moral and intellectual nature. This modest example has found ready imitators. The pretensions of these men have been loudly echoed by their followers. Phrenology is proclaimed, with that boastfulness which always distinguishes sciolism, to be the ultimate and complete science of man, the last and highest attainment of human wisdom. The beautiful region of mental philosophy is to be converted into a barren Golgotha, or place of skulls. Yes! this ignoble doctrine, born of the dissecting-knife and a lump of medulla, betraying at every step its mean extraction, thus carnal philosophy, with its limited conceptions, its grey truisms, its purblind theories, its withering conclusions, and its weary dogmatism, is to supplant the lofty faith of antiquity, and the sublime philosophy of the Bible, and to sit in judgment on the infinite and eternal! A great discovery has been made! It is ascertained, that there is no indwelling spirit in man. Those godlike powers which raise us above time and sense, - those thoughts which compass heaven and earth, and commune with the All-Wise and True, are not, as was once fondly deemed, the immaterial functions of an immaterial being. "Nous avons changé tout cela." The anatomist has taken the subject into consideration. Those powers, those thoughts, are the products of little lumps of flesh, measuring each an inch in diameter, weighing altogether about two pounds avoirdupois. Behold here the true nature and the full dimensions of the human soul ! A discovery so important certainly deserves attention. We can give it, however, but a brief ex amination. The brain is the sole organ of the mind; it is divided into several compartments, each of which exercises a separate function, producing a corresponding manifestation of the moral or intellectual faculties. These are the fundamental |