A brain of the proper temperament has its vital energies and excretions
moderate, and is not liable to be affected by any externals. Such
persons, when infants, have the hair of their head somewhat tawny—when
boys, yellowish—and when adults, a bright yellow; being also intermediate
between the curly and the straight, and they do not readily fall out.
When the temperament is hotter than moderate, all the parts about the
head are hotter and redder, the veins in their eyes are perceptible,
their hair is grown at birth; and if much hotter, it is black, strong,
and curly; but if not much, it is yellowish at first, and then grows
black, and in more advanced life such persons become bald; their
excretions are small when they enjoy good health; their head becomes
filled and oppressed by heating food, drink, and odours, or by any
external casualties. Such temperaments are satisfied with little sleep,
and even that is generally not profound. The following are the marks of
a brain which is colder than proper: The excretions are excessive; the
hairs are straight, yellow, and durable; and it is hurt readily by cold
things. Such persons are constantly seized with catarrhs and defluxions,
the veins of their eyes are not visible, and they are much given to
drowsiness. The following are the marks of a brain which is drier than
natural: In the excretions nothing redundant, the senses acute, not being
given to drowsiness, the hair strong and soon formed, rather curly, and
soon falling out. In the more humid temperament, the hairs are straight,
do not readily drop out; the senses are muddy, and the excretions
redundant, sleep long and profound. In the compound of the hot and dry,
the excretions of the head are small, the senses acute, there is a
disposition to watchfulness, and baldness. Their hair at first is formed
quickly and abundantly, is of a black colour, hot to the touch, and they
are ruddy until manhood. But if moisture be joined to heat, and they are
not immoderate, the colour and heat are good, and the veins of the eyes
large. The excretions are plenteous and moderately concocted. The hair
is straight and yellowish, and does not readily drop out. The head is
easily filled and oppressed by heating and moistening things. But should
an increase of humidity and heat take place, the head becomes diseased,
and easily affected by heating and diluent things. Such persons cannot
endure long watchfulness, but their sleep is disturbed by fantastical
dreams, their sight is dim, and their senses not distinct. The cold and
dry temperaments of the brain conjoined together render the head cold and
pale, the veins of their eyes do not appear, and they are readily hurt
by cold things: wherefore, their health is precarious. Their senses in
youth are distinct and faultless, but as they advance in life soon decay.
In a word, as far as regards the head, they experience a premature old
age; their hair after birth is of slow growth, stunted, and tawny. The
humid and cold temperaments of the brain render those affected with them
prone to lethargy and drowsiness; their senses are bad; they abound with
recrementitious humours; are easily affected with cold and fulness of the
head; and are liable to catarrhs and defluxions; but such persons do not
readily become bald.
* * * * *
COMMENTARY. This is taken from Oribasius (Synops. v, 46), who abridges
Galen. (Ars Med.)
As our author’s description of the temperaments is sufficiently
intelligible, and the others, whether Greeks or Arabians, deliver exactly
the same views of the subject, without any material improvement, we
consider it unnecessary to multiply references to, and extracts from
them, on the present occasion; and, therefore, instead of crowding our
pages with superfluous repetitions, we shall give in this, and the five
following Sections, a brief exposition of the physiological doctrines of
the ancients, with regard to the principal organs of the human body:
The ancients divided the powers or faculties of the human body into the
Natural, the Vital, and the Animal. The brain they held to be the seat
of the animal powers—that is to say, they considered it to be the organ
from which sensation and motion are derived, and these, they maintained,
are the powers by which animals are distinguished from vegetables. This
doctrine is fully explained by Galen, in his work, ‘De Facultatibus
Naturalibus,’ and by several of the Arabian authors, among whom we will
venture to mention Haly Abbas, as being particularly worthy of being
consulted on this subject. The brain, then, was accounted the seat of the
five external senses, and of muscular motion, which also was reckoned as
one of the senses by Hippocrates. (De Insomniis, c. 1.) Galen and his
followers decidedly taught that the nerves of the senses are distinct
from those which impart the power of motion, that the former derive their
origin from the anterior part of the brain or cerebrum, and the latter
from the posterior, called by the Greeks encephalis (under this term they
comprehended the cerebellum, tuber annulare, and medulla oblongata of
modern anatomists), or from its process, the spinal cord. They maintained
that the nerves of the finer senses are formed of matter too soft to be
the vehicles of muscular motion; whereas, on the other hand, the nerves
of motion are too hard to be susceptible of fine sensibility. See Galen
(de Usu Partium, ix; de Administ. Anat. vii); Haly Abbas (Theor. iv);
Averrhoes (Collig. iii, 33); Avenzoar (ii, 7); and Rhases (Contin. i.)
The ancients were also of opinion that the brain is the coldest viscus
in the animal frame, being in this respect the antagonist of the heart,
the heat of which they supposed that it counteracts. See Aristot. (De
Part. Anim. ii, 7); and Pliny (Hist. Nat. xi, 49.) There appears to be
some foundation for this opinion, since, as is remarked by Haly Abbas,
those parts of the body which are vascular, and contain much blood, are
naturally hot; whereas such as contain little blood are comparatively
cold. Of this latter class are the brain, nerves, and fat. (Theor. i.)
The later Greek authorities, as, for example, Theophilus Protospatharius
and Nemesius, adopt a division of the brain as regards its connexion with
mind, to which Galen and his immediate followers appear to have been
strangers. According to it, Fantasy is connected with the anterior part
of the brain; Cogitation, or the _discursus mentis_, with the middle; and
Memory with the posterior. See, in particular, Theophilus (p. 184, ed.
Greenhill.) This hypothesis was received by all the Arabian writers on
medicine. See, for example, Averrhoes (Collig. ii, 20.) It was evidently
an approach to the arrangement adopted by the phrenologists of the
present day, who maintain that intellect is seated in the anterior part
of the brain; the moral feelings in the middle; and the animal appetites
in the posterior.