Human physiology, with which is incorporated much of the elementary part of the Institutiones physiologicae of J.F. Blumenbach.

  • Elliotson, John, 1791-1868.
Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Human physiology, with which is incorporated much of the elementary part of the Institutiones physiologicae of J.F. Blumenbach. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    The ANIMAL FUNCTIONS demonstrate mind. This is seated in the brain, to which the spinal marrow, nerves, and voluntary muscles are subservient. Mind is the functional power of the living brain. As I cannot conceive life any more than the power of attraction unless possessed by matter, so I cannot conceive mind unless possessed by a brain, or by some nervous organ, whatever name we may choose to give it, endowed with life. I speak of terrestrial or animal mind; with angelic and divine na- ture we have nothing to do, and of them we know, in the same respects, nothing. To call the human mind positively a ray of the divinity, (Divince particula dUYCB ipso Deo decerptusy Ex universa mente delibatus appears to me absolute nonsense. Brutes are as really endowed with mind, — with a consciousness of personality, with feelings, desires, and will, — as man. ^ Every child is conscious that it thinks with its head, and common lan- guage designates this part as the seat of mind. ^ Observation shows that superiority of mind in the animal creation is exactly commensurate with superiority of brain that activity of mind Horace. ^ Cicero, De Senectute et Qucsst. Tuscul. ^ See Gall, 1. c. t. 1. p. 56. sqq. Aristotle no sooner asserts that a share of divinity is bestowed on man only of all animals, than he is obliged to retract, and say, or most of all animals,—^ fidXiffra iravTuv. Depart, animal. I. ii. c. 10. ^ A stupid person is honoured with the expressions numb-scull, thick-Ziearf, addle-j)ated, shaWow-pated, badly furnished in the upjier story; a clever person with sixong-headed, long-headed, having plenty of brains,- a madman is said to be wrong in the head, touched in the noddle, &c. A person whose memory or power of attention is impaired, says he has no head, &c. When a catarrh chiefly affects the head, we complain of stupidity, because we have such a cold in the head,^' &c. A man is always said to have an idea in his head. * The same progression which exists in the gradual perfection of animal organisation, as far as regards vegetable life only, is observed in the gradual perfection of the nervous system, and of animal life which depends upon it. Comparative anatomy has followed the gradual perfection of animals, from the most simple absorbent vessels to the most complicated apparatus of mastication, deglutition, and digestion, — to the most perfect circulation. With every fresh viscus, every fresh apparatus for sensation, is discovered a fresh function, and this function is more complicated in proportion as the organisation of the viscus or apparatus of sensation is more perfect. The stomach, kidneys, lungs, heart, eyes, ears, are the more complicated as their functions become so. The same gradation may be demonstrated in the structure of the brains of the different species. I have demonstrated in the preceding chapter, that the exist- ence of each moral quality and intellectual faculty, depends solely upon the