Like Gall, Spurzheim denominates the faculties of the soul internal senses; in the same spirit he says: “The sense of colour, the sense of number, sense of language, sense of comparison, sense of causality,”[143] &c. &c.
Both authors begin by calling the faculties of the soul internal senses; and then, misled by the word, they conclude from the independence of the external senses, to the independence of their internal senses; that is to say, the independence of the faculties of the soul.
2. Names of the faculties. Spurzheim accuses Gall of having given denominations only to actions, and not to the principles of those actions.
“Finding,” says he, “a relation betwixt the development of a cerebral part and a sort of action, M. Gall denominated the cerebral part from the action; thus, he spoke of the organs of music, poetry, &c.”[144] “The nomenclature,” says he further, “ought to be conformed to the faculties, without regard to any action whatever.... When we attribute to an organ cunning, management, hypocrisy, intrigue, &c. we do not make known the primary faculty which contributes to all these modified actions.”[145]
Gall replies: “M. Spurzheim cannot have forgotten how often we reasoned without end, with a view to determine the primitive destination of an organ.... I confess, that there are several organs, with whose primary faculties I am not yet acquainted; and I continue to denominate them from the degree of activity that led me to the discovery of them. M. Spurzheim thinks himself more fortunate: his metaphysical temperament has led him to the discovery of the fundamental or primitive faculty of every one of the organs. Let us put it to the proof.”[146]
Indeed, Spurzheim’s expedient for rendering himself master of the primary faculties is very simple. He creates a word: he calls the instinct of propagation amativity, the propensity to steal, convoitivity; courage is combativity, &c. &c.
Gall and Spurzheim talk a great deal about nomenclature; but they do not perceive, that as to nomenclature, the first difficulty, and indeed the only one, is to get at simple facts. Whoever has come to simple facts, is very nigh to a good nomenclature.
Descartes says: “Had some one clearly explained the simple ideas that exist in the imagination of men, and which constitute all that they think, I should venture to hope for a language that it would be very easy to learn, ... and, which is the principal matter, that would assist the judgment, representing to it things so distinctly that it would be almost impossible for it to be deceived; whereas, on the contrary, the words we now have possess, so to speak, only confused significations, to which the human mind has been so long accustomed, that it therefore understands scarcely any thing perfectly well.”[147]
3. Number of the faculties. Spurzheim adds eight faculties to those established by Gall, and Gall is vexed by it. One does not see why.