“Sollt es wahr Sein....
Dasz die Menschengestalt, von allen sichtlichen Dingen
Ganz allein uns lügt, dasz wir, was edel und albern,
Was beschränkt und grosz, im Angesicht zu suchen,
Eitele Thoren sind, betrogne, betrügende Thoren.”
GÖTHE.
COUNTENANCE INDEX OF MIND.
Talleyrand was wont to say, that speech was given to man for the
purpose of concealing his thoughts. Among mankind in general the
countenance may, with equal force, be said to represent a series
of hieroglyphics by which the internal emotions of the mind may be
readily deciphered. Observe a child thrown for the first time among
a number of strangers. To some it will immediately, and as it were
instinctively, attach itself, while to others it will manifest the
greatest repugnance and dislike. Such first impressions are not the
result of reasoning, they spring from the quickness of perception
peculiar to childhood; and the choice is in general not the less happy,
although the reason may have had no effect in determining it. With a
rapid glance a mere infant will seize the prevailing expression of
the physiognomy, and detect at once the mental constitution of those
by whom it is surrounded; for pride and impatience, and kindness and
benevolence, are written on the plastic countenance in broad legible
characters, though the many, with their blunted perceptions, may, to
a certain extent, have lost the key to their solution. Contrast the
expression of the physiognomy of some of the more celebrated among the
ancients, as exemplified in the collection of antique busts preserved
in the museum of the Capitol at Rome. Compare the broad open brow
and finely-chiselled features of Trajan, or the beauty, majesty, and
grace expressed in the countenance of either of the Antonines, with
the coarse, heavy, animal face of Vitellius, or the dull, morose
expression of Caligula or of Commodus,—
——“Without a ray
Of mind, that makes each feature play
Like sparkling waves on a sunny day.”
The difference is as striking as that which we know from daily
observation to exist between the face of a rogue and that of an honest
man; indeed, we are disposed to believe, with Benjamin Franklin,
“that if rogues knew the advantages attached to the practices of the
virtues, they would become honest men from mere roguery.” It was for
this reason, probably, that beauty of form and proportion were so
highly prized by the ancients; and when they prayed the gods to grant
them the beautiful with the good, was it not because by experience
they had found that in fact they were most frequently associated? In
support of this position, we may cite the authority of Bacon, who, in
his Essay on Beauty, remarks, “that Augustus Cæsar, Titus Vespasianus,
Philip le Bel of France, Edward IV. of England, Alcibiades of Athens,
and Ismael the sophi of Persia, were all high and great spirits, and
yet the most beautiful men of their time.” Again, the physiognomy of
the passions affords us further proof that the emotions of the mind
betray themselves by peculiar corporeal phenomena,—each having, as it
were, its own proper dialect. Notice the expression of the passions
which follow each other in such quick succession, and are so forcibly
depicted upon the mobile countenance of an infant, even before any
voluntary movements can be executed by the feeble and powerless limbs.
Look at a coward, his countenance blanched, and almost cadaverous,—the
heavy limbs drooping and powerless,—the instruments of life paralysed,
as though the fountain of existence were suddenly dried up. For grief,
take the testimony of Byron, where he describes its effects in producing
“The intersected lines of thought,—
Those furrows which the burning share
Of sorrow ploughs untimely there,—
Scars of the lacerated mind
Which the soul’s war doth leave behind.”
Regard a man under the influence of a sublime or heroic thought, with
his head proudly elevated and nostrils dilated,—he raises himself to
his utmost height; while, at the idea of infinity, or the prospect of
a boundless expanse, the arms are involuntarily extended as though he
would soar away into unlimited space. The impress of pride is stamped
in the bold erect bearing, and that of fear in the drooping head and
timid step. So true is it that joy and sorrow, love and hate, pain
and pleasure, virtue and vice, all betray themselves by their organic
signs, that when any of these affections are habitual, or frequently
recur, their external manifestations become permanently marked in the
form; and it is in this sense that the habits and emotions of early
youth stamp the lineaments with a character never to be effaced,
or which, in _many cases_ at least, are destined to endure through
life. Are we not then justified in concluding, that the kind and
degree of mental developement,—the presiding thought,—the ruling
and predominating principle of life, is influenced by the physical
temperament and constitution, and that this latter is in its turn
reacted upon by the mind?
PARTICULAR PARTS OF ORGANISM INDICATIVE OF MODE OF LIFE AND MENTAL
TENDENCY.
We have next to inquire, whether that which is undoubtedly true with
respect to the whole does not also obtain with respect to a part?
whether, in fact, from the examination of a small portion of an
organism—an extremity, for example—we should be enabled to determine
the nature, mode of life, and mental tendency of the being to which it
belonged? For a satisfactory solution of this important question we
must appeal to the testimony afforded by the animal world.