In such cases of animal predominance we find that the moral region does not rise above the forehead, but runs back flat without elevation, while the depth of the ear below the level of the brain and the massiveness of the base of the brain running into a large neck show plainly that the animal organs rule.
In the more noble characters, the rounded elevation of the coronal region, combined with the moderate depth and thickness of the base of the brain, make it easy to see that their vertical measurement is due to height and not to depth. The great error of the phrenological school has been in estimating moral development by the total vertical measurement, and estimating animal development without regard to depth, which is its chief indication.
In a profile view, a line drawn from the middle of the forehead backward, horizontally, is sufficiently near the line of the lateral ventricles to enable us to compare the upward and downward development of the brain. In the two profiles here presented we see a marked difference of character illustrated by drawing a line back horizontally from the brow. The head in front, which is that of a private citizen of excellent character, named Smith, I obtained in Florida nearly fifty years ago. At the same time I obtained the other, which is that of a French count who lost his life on the coast of Florida by wreck when engaged in a contraband slave trade with Cuba. In the count we observe much less elevation and much greater depth. He is especially deficient in Benevolence.
In proportion as men or animals rise in the scale of virtue the brain is developed above the level of the face, and in proportion as they incline to gross brutality the development falls behind the face; and there is no exception to this law, either in quadrupeds, birds, or reptiles. Indeed, notwithstanding the smallness of the brains of fishes, their portraits show that this law applies also to them—as if nature had determined to warn mankind of the character of every animal. Alas for the dulness of human observers! Our naturalists and anatomists have said not one word of the most conspicuous fact that may be seen in the general survey of the animal kingdom.[3]
To return to the theory of cerebral development: The reader will understand by referring to the last chapter that the summit of the spinal system or great inferior ganglion of the brain, bearing the names of optic thalami and corpora striata, is the true beginning of the cerebrum, instead of the medulla oblongata, which does not contain the fibres of the cerebral organs.
No one can begin the study of brain development in men and animals guided by a correct system without being delighted with the uniform accuracy of the science; for even the incomplete and inaccurate science of Gall and Spurzheim, marred in its application by misconceptions of anatomy, has proved sufficiently correct and instructive to maintain its hold upon the minds of all students of nature, by giving them more truth than error, and sometimes giving the truth with marvellous accuracy. The errors they did not attempt to investigate.[4]