Although the physiological, intellectual, and moral are united in man, yet it is plain that each of these has its peculiar station where it more especially unfolds itself and acts.
It is, beyond contradiction, evident that, though physiological or animal life displays itself through all the body, and especially through all the animal parts, yet it acts more conspicuously in the arm, from the shoulder to the ends of the fingers.
It is not less evident that intellectual life, or the powers of the understanding and the mind, make themselves most apparent in the circumference and form of the solid parts of the head, especially the forehead; though they will discover themselves to the attentive and accurate eye in every part and point of the human body, by the congeniality and harmony of the various parts. Is there any occasion to prove that the power of thinking resides not in the foot, nor in the hand, nor in the back, but in the head and its internal parts?
The moral life of man particularly reveals itself in the lines, marks, and transitions of the countenance. His moral powers and desires, his irritability, sympathy, and antipathy, his facility of attracting or repelling the objects that surround him—these are all summed up in, and painted upon, his countenance when at rest.
Not only do mental and moral traits evince themselves in the physiognomy, but also health and sickness; and I believe that by repeatedly examining the firm parts and outlines of the bodies and countenances of the sick, disease might be diagnosed, and even that liability to disease might be predicted in particular cases.
The same vital powers that make the heart beat and the fingers move, roof the skull and arch the finger-nails. From the head to the back, from the shoulder to the arm, from the arm to the hand, from the hand to the finger, each depends on the other, and all on a determinate effect of a determinate power. Through all nature each determinate power is productive of only such and such determinate effects. The finger of one body is not adapted to the hand of another body. The blood in the extremity of the finger has the character of the blood in the heart. The same congeniality is found in the nerves and in the bones. One spirit lives in all. Each member of the body, too, is in proportion to the whole of which it is a part. As from the length of the smallest member, the smallest joint of the finger, the proportion of the whole, the length and breadth of the body may be found; so also may the form of the whole be found from the form of each single part. When the head is long, all is long; when the head is round, all is round; when the head is square, all is square.
One form, one mind, one root appertain to all. Each organised body is so much a whole that, without discord, destruction, or deformity, nothing can be added or subtracted. Those, therefore, who maintain that conclusion cannot be drawn from a part to the whole labour under error, failing to comprehend the harmony of nature.
II.—Physiognomy and the Features
The Forehead. The form, height, arching, proportion, obliquity, and position of the skull, or bone of the forehead, show the propensity of thought, power of thought, and sensibility of man. The position, colour, wrinkles, tension of the skin of the forehead, show the passions and present state of the mind. The bones indicate the power, the skin the application of power.