While such a regular proportion prevails in births and deaths, a still more singular law seems to regulate the commission of crimes, of which the following registers of the cases brought to trial in France is a proof.
The criminal statistics of France have produced the following calculation: From 7000 to 7300 criminals are tried every year, out of which number 61 out of 100 are found guilty; 170,000 offenders are charged with minor offences and misdemeanors, of whom 85 in the 100 are condemned to various punishments, and the greatest annual calculation which Quetelet remarks in an annual budget, paid much more regularly than taxes, is as follows:
The following curious table has been drawn of the causes that excited to the commission of murder and the means resorted to:
To what are we to attribute this apparent regularity in the scale of births, deaths, and the commission of crimes? Are we ruled bycertainlaws that are only changed in the manifestations of Providence, by peculiar visitations, such as war, famine, and pestilential maladies? What a vast and curious field of research and reflection! what an argument for the fatalist! Man no doubt possesses a moral power that to a certain extent subjugates the creation to his influence and his will. Plants and animals seem to obey certain natural laws, that are only disturbed by perturbative agents; and it is difficult to point out what are the human actions that arise from natural impulses, or from accidental circumstances, although experience would tend to show that they bear a singular proportion in the similarity of their results; and one must come although reluctantly to the conclusion, that this perturbative power exercises but a slender influence on the laws of nature, which seem to set at defiance the destructive efforts of man. Thus have we seen of late years, that the most fearful and long-protracted wars, which one might have imagined would have devastated the fairest parts of Europe, have not checked a surprising increase in its population, and the destructive effects of the most fatal pestilence have vanished with a promptness that seemed to keep pace with the preceding havoc. Bigotry and fanaticism are the only scourges which appear to dare the benevolent views of Providence, and when we traverse the desolate fields of most Roman Catholic countries, one would imagine that Heaven has abandoned their inhabitants to their own blind wills and evil ways. Spain at this period and at many epochs of her bloody history, seems to corroborate the fable of the Titans who sought refuge in that ill-fated land from the anger of the gods.[48]
To return: we find in the precedingresumésof longevity that poets are the shortest-lived; next to them, authors on natural religion, dramatists, and novelists. May not this circumstance be attributed to the fervour of their imagination and to their unequal mode of living? A species of madness is the attribute of genius. Many authors on natural religion may come under the denomination of monomaniacs. The jealous irritability of poets and dramatists,—and next to them in the scale of vanity we find musicians,—may alsocontribute to wear them out, and bring on various chronic diseases, by digestive derangements; more especially as their habits of living are seldom regular, fits of sobriety alternating with bouts of merry-making. Moral philosophers, painters, and sculptors, whose average life appears the longest, follow more sedentary pursuits; and, although artists in general cannot boast of remarkable discretion in their mode of living, the nature of their profession requires much steadiness. It is moreover to be observed that, in the preceding calculation, historical painters have chiefly been noticed. Would the same calculation apply to the lighter branches of the art? It has been remarked that actors generally attain old age, notwithstanding the fatiguing and harassing nature of their profession. This may be attributed to the constant excitement of a similar nature to which they are subject, as well as to their continued exposure to the sudden transitions from heat to cold, which renders them less susceptible of the variations of temperature that affect those who can avoid these vicissitudes. Any person who would expose himself to the constant checked perspirations to which dancers are liable, would infallibly pay dear for the experiment; and those who have had occasion to witness the fatigues of their exercises, marvel at their not being constantly attacked with pulmonary inflammation, and the many maladies that result from similar exposures. On the very same principle, troops when engaged upon active service do not suffer from the inclemency of the weather, although saturated with wet by day, and sleeping under torrents of rain by night. So long as they are marching with an object in view, this excitement supports them, even against hunger; but the moment this excitement ceases, let them halt, in tranquil cantonments, or commence a retreat under unfavourable circumstances, that moment the invasion of disease is observed. The chief source of health and long life is an equilibrious state of the circulation. This condition a moderate mental excitement tends to maintain. Depression, on the contrary, will produce a languid flow of the vital stream, congestion, and chronic diseases.
On the same principle, good temper and hilarity are also necessary to prolong life. Violent passions must tend to occasion dangerous determinations, while the inward gnawings of offended vanity and pride corrode every viscus, and lay the seeds of future mental and bodily sufferings. Apathy and insensibility are, unfortunately, the best sources of peace of mind, and as Fontenelle observed, a good stomach and a bad heart are essential to happiness. Perhaps the best maxim to prolong our days, andrender them as tolerable as possible, is the “Bene vivere et lætari.”
I have just observed that conformation materially affects our existence; and this circumstance may in a great measure be referred to temper, and the wear and tear that it occasions in ill-conditioned individuals. Little people seldom attain the longevity of stronger individuals; and it is also a well-known fact that diminutive persons are generally spiteful and malicious. As Providence has bestowed destructive venoms on reptiles, so has it gifted these insignificant members of society with obnoxious qualities, to make amends for their want of physical power in the strategies of attack and defence. The same observation holds good with the deformed; but here we have a moral cause for this sourness of disposition. They too frequently are objects of ridicule, contempt, or pity, sentiments the most humiliating to mankind. In childhood they are not able to partake of the boisterous and active sports of their companions; they have not the power to resent an injury, and the more powerless we are, the greater is our thirst of revenge. Hence does tyranny degrade, and renders its victims cruel and vindictive. The deformed, moreover, find it necessary to improve their intellectual faculties, which in aftertimes fill their quivers with keen shafts of retaliation. In this study they also have more leisure, and they apply to their books while their comrades are at play. This very study adds to their sense of inferiority; they can never hope to share the warrior’s laurels, or, what is perhaps still more painful, the myrtle of successful love. Their only chance of success in either of these careers is by kindling wars by their intrigues, or winning a woman’s heart by intellectual superiority,—two very improbable events. Thus they gradually envy men who are looked upon by the world as their superiors, and hate women for the preference they show to those privileged individuals. In general we find these ill-shaped beings bitterly sarcastic whenever woman’s name is mentioned. Pope, perhaps from these very reasons, was inexhaustible in his abuse of the sex: and Boileau abhorred them, since he had been emasculated by a turkey-cock.
The intellectual superiority of hunchbacks has also been attributed to their physical condition; and it is generally believed that with them the circulation of blood in the brain is more rapid than in well-conformed subjects, and this increased action is supposed to contribute materially to the vivacity of the imagination, and the quickness of apprehension. Another circumstance is said to increase their mental powers, and that is, their continence,considered both by the ancients and the moderns as a source of intellectual energies. Minerva and the Muses were virgins; and in this and other fabulous traditions, we find the ancients illustrating in their mythologic allegories many physical facts and observations. Our Bacon had made the same remark; and Newton, and many other great men, considered the passion of love beneath the dignity of science. Continence and abstinence were deemed by Horace as indispensable privations in the cultivation of genius. In the deformed both are to a certain degree natural, or at least cannot be lost sight of without endangering life. The digestive powers of the deformed are generally weak; and this debility has ever been looked upon as a concomitant of superior intellects. Thus in Celsus, “Imbecilli stomacho penè omnes cupidi litterarum sunt;” while on the contrary, “Obesus venter non parit subtilem intellectum.”
The common expression of a child being too clever to live, is unfortunately founded on observation. Scrofulous and sickly children are in general remarkable for the quickness of their intellects; and Rousseau maintained that a man who could meditate was a depraved animal. It is a fact that the perfection of one faculty can seldom be attained but at the expense of others. The more our faculties are generally called into action, the less perfect will they be individually;—“Pluribus intentus, minor est ad singula.” Thus, the singing of birds is improved by depriving them of sight.
The influence of the mind upon our health is as evident as the influence of our health in the duration of existence. This corollary explains the shortness of life of the diminutive and the deformed, unconnected with such physical defects of organization as might impede the due exercise of their organs.
The fable of Prometheus is a strong illustration of the pernicious effects of intemperance; and by Darwin, and other physiologists, has been considered as comparing the celestial fire that he purloined, to the artificial inspirations of excitement that ultimately preys upon the liver and the other viscera like a voracious vulture. A much deeper philosophy is concealed in this theogenic allegory. Prometheus was the son of Japetus; brother to Atlas, Menœtius, and Epimetheus, who all surpassed mankind in fraud and in guilt. Prometheus himself scoffed the gods, and violated their shrine. Heaven and Earth had formed his father, who had united his destinies with Clymene, one of the Oceanides. Thus Prometheus and Epimetheus arose from the very cradle of the universe; and their very names, Προμανδάνειν and Επιμανδάνειν, signify foresight andimprovidence,—prædiscere et postea discere,—the prevalent characteristics of all mortals, that either tend to promote or retard the progress of human reason and human happiness. Prometheus strove impiously to possess himself of Divine knowledge, and created man with a base amalgam of earth and the bones of animals, vivified by the celestial fire he had obtained. Jupiter, indignant at his audacity, commanded Vulcan to create a beauteous tempter in the form of woman, on whom every attractive gift might be conferred; and Pandora was sent upon earth with the fatal present of the father of the gods, the box that contained all the evils and distempers that were destined for mankind. The foresight of Prometheus resisted her charms; his improvident brother opened the dreaded casket. Have we not here an illustration of the vanity of science, that aims even at Divine attributes, and whose votaries, like Prometheus, would endeavour, if possible, to deprive wisdom of her power, and break down the boundaries of human intellects? His punishment describes in energetic language the endless and consuming studies of the learned, whose very viscera are corroded in lucubrations too often fruitless, and not unfrequently injurious to themselves and others. Hercules alone could relieve him from his torments:—and does not Hercules in this allegory typify the power of reason, that enables us to release the mind from the trammels both of ignorance and vanity, separated from each other by a gossamer partition? Prometheus, who could resist the most powerful of temptations,—beauty and talent combined,—dared Olympus to seek for that wisdom which would have doomed him to everlasting sufferings, had not strength of mind and the powers of reflection destroyed his merciless tormentor. Can we be surprised that the ancients consecrated games to this beautiful allegory?—games that are still carried on in our days; but, alas! where every vain competitor pretends that he has reached the goal with an unextinguished torch!
This singular disorder was first discovered and noticed by Plater, about the middle of the seventeenth century, among the poor inhabitants of Carinthia and the Valais, where, as in the valleys of the Lower Alps and the Pyrenees, it is also found to be an endemic affection. According to Sir George Staunton, it is also observed in Chinese Tartary. It has been erroneously confounded by some writers with bronchocele and rachitis, from both of which it is totally distinct.
Cretinism presents various modifications in kind, and every intermediate grade between that extreme degree of physical and mental debasement which is characterized by the utmost deformity, and entire absence of mental manifestation, the organic and vegetative functions only being performed. There are certain circumstances that distinguish cretins from idiots; and their infirmities appear to depend upon endemic or local causes, regarding which much diversity of opinion has prevailed both amongst medical men and travellers.
The cretins were also calledCagotsandCapots. In Navarre these unfortunates go by the name ofGaffosandGanets; and in various valleys of the Pyrenees they are calledGézitsorGezitains. Near La Rochelle, some of them are also found, and there they are known by the appellation ofColiberts; and in BritannyCaconsandCagneux. The derivation of these names shows the contempt and disgust that they excited,—Cagot, according to Scaliger, being derived fromCanis Gottus, orDog of a Goth;Colibertis traced toquasi libertus, or slave. The Spaniards call themGavachos, a term of reproach, which they also applied to the French during the Peninsular struggle.
The body of these poor creatures is stunted, their height not exceeding four feet. There is a total want of due proportion between it and the other parts, the height of the head with reference to the body being from one-fourth to one-fifth, instead of one-eighth, the natural proportion; the neck is strong, and bent downwards; the upper limbs reach below the knees, and the arm is shorter than the fore-arm; the chest narrow, the abdomen hemispherical, and of a length not exceeding the height of the head; the thighs, with the haunches, of greater widththan the shoulders, and shorter than the legs, the calves of which are wanting; the feet and toes distorted. In the head, the masticating organs, the lower jaw, and the nose, preponderate considerably over the organs of sense and intelligence; the skull is depressed, and forms a lengthened and angular ellipsis; the receding forehead presents internally large frontal sinuses, to which the brain has yielded part of its place; the top of the head is flattened, instead of being vaulted; the occiput projects but slightly, and runs almost even with the nape of the neck, as in ruminating animals. The face is neither oval nor round, but spread out in width; the eyes are far apart, slightly diverging, small, and deep-seated in their orbits; the pupil contracted, and not very sensitive to light; the eyelids, except when morbidly swollen, are flaccid and pendent. Their look is an unmeaning stare, and turns with indifference from every thing that is not eatable. The elongated form of the lower jaw, the thick and puffed lips, give them a greater resemblance to ruminating creatures than to man. The tongue is rather cylindrical than flat, and the saliva is constantly running from the angles of their mouth. Enlargement of the thyroid glands generally prevails, sometimes to an enormous extent. Indeed, this appearance is commonly considered as a distinguishing sign of cretinism. The other glands of the throat are also obstructed. Many of these poor wretches are both deaf and dumb; yet do they appear unconscious of their miserable existence. Stretched out or gathered up under the solar rays, their head drooping in idiotic apathy, they are only roused from their torpor when food is presented to them.
This endemic malady is supposed to arise from the use of snow-water, or of water impregnated with calcareous earth. Both of these opinions are without foundation. All the inhabitants of districts near the glaciers, drink snow and ice waters without being subject to the disorder; and the common waters of Switzerland, strongly impregnated with calcareous substances, are most salubrious. At Berne, the waters are extremely pure, yet Haller observed that swellings of the throat are not uncommon. De Saussure has assigned another cause, and refers the disorder to the physical features of the mountainous districts in which it prevails. The valleys, he tells us, are surrounded with very high mountains, sheltered from currents of fresh air, and exposed to the direct, and what is worse, the reflected rays of the sun. They are marshy, and hence the atmosphere is humid, close, and oppressive. When to these chorographical causes, he further says, we add the domestic ones, which arealso well known to prevail among the poor of these regions,—such as innutritious food, indolence, and uncleanliness, with a predisposition to the disease from an hereditary taint of many generations,—we can sufficiently account for the prevalence of cretinism in such places, and for the most humiliating characters it is ever found to assume.
This specious reasoning, however, is overthrown by observation. In the first instance, this character of the country does not affect its other inhabitants; and secondly, thegoîtreis found in warm latitudes, and Mungo Park observed it amongst the Africans of Bambara, on the banks of the Niger. Marsden has also seen it at Sumatra. Moreover, this affection is scarcely ever seen in the mountains, but principally prevails in the valleys.
It is more than probable that these ill-favoured creatures belong to a particular race; for we must take care not to confound goître with cretinism, since goître is common where cretinism is prevalent. It has been remarked that the offspring of the natives of the Valais who intermarry with persons from the Italian side of the Alps, are more subject to goîtres than those born of native parents; and that females who have husbands from the higher Alps, seldom have children affected with this infirmity. It is pretty clear that in these observations, goître and cretinism are confounded.
That these miserable cagots belong to a particular race of men, most probably accidentally degraded in their transmission from our primitive stock, appears most likely. We have sought the derivation of the several terms of contempt and disgust attached to them in different countries, to which migration may have led their parents. Some writers have traced their descent to the Goths and Vandals, thus chastised for their devastations. Gébelin, Belleforêt, and Ramont consider them as descendants of the Visigoths; while Marca, bishop of Cousérans, denounces them at once as Jews and Saracens; and other clerical writers have maintained that they are the miserable relicts of the heretic Albigenses who had escaped the holy massacres of 1215; although there did exist cagots in the year 1000, in the abbey of St. Luc, as they are described in aforof Navarre, bearing date 1074, and issued by Ramirez.
These helpless beings have also been considered as the offspring of Bohemians and gipsies. Bishop, or rather Senator Gregoire, maintained that they sprung from the hordes of northern barbarians who overran the south of Europe in the third and fourth centuries. Whatever might have been theorigin of these poor creatures, they seem to share that ignominious destiny that has marked various races in different countries. TheAgotosof Navarre, theMaragotosof Leon, theBatuecosof Castile, theWendesof Silesia, are all held in as much contempt as thePariasand theVaddahsof India. Even in Otaheite a degraded caste was found, from which victims were selected to appease Divine wrath, or propitiate their gods.
The traditional contempt in which certain races are held, a contempt that seems to have affected their physical appearance, may perhaps be traced to the degradation of slavery, that seems to deprive man of all his proud attributes, both in a moral and physical point of view. The effects of tyranny, and the distinctions that oppression has created in the several castes and ranks of mankind, are every where evident. What a difference exists in Scotland between the chieftains and the humbler individuals of their clans!—between the naïres of India and their vassals! In France, said Buffon, you may distinguish by their aspect, not only the nobility from the peasantry, but the superior order of nobility from the inferior, these from the citizens, and citizens from the peasants. “The field-slaves in America,” observes the enlightened Dr. Smith, “are badly clothed, fed, and lodged, live in small huts in the plantations, remote from the example and society of their superiors. Living by themselves they retain many of the customs and the manners of their ancestors. The domestic servants, on the other hand, who are kept near the persons or employed in the families of their masters, are treated with great lenity, their service is light, they are well fed and clothed. The field-slaves, in consequence of their condition, are slow in changing the aspect and figure of Africa; while the domestic servants have advanced far before them in acquiring the agreeable and regular features, and the expressive countenance, of civilized society. The former are frequently ill-shaped; they preserve in a great degree the African lips, and nose, and hair; their genius is dull, and their countenances sleepy and stupid. The latter are straight and well proportioned; their hair extends to three or four, sometimes even to six or eight inches; the size of their mouth is handsome, their features regular, their capacity good, and their looks animated.” Dr. Prichard has also stated that similar changes become visible in the third and fourth generations in the West India islands; and I have seen several negresses in those colonies perfectly beautiful. In the Bahama islands I knew a female slave of the name of Leah, belonging to my late friend Mr. Commissary Brookes, as black as jet, and descended in the third generationfrom African parents, whose features would have vied in symmetry with the fairest specimen of the Caucasian race.
Let us not, therefore, seek in snow-water or calcareous impregnations for the causes of deformity and degradation in any unfortunate castes of mankind. Their misery may more probably be traced to the iron rod of despotism, or the oppression of bigotry,—influences that mark out races as abject slaves, or objects of Divine wrath, that ought to be scorned by the wealthy and the powerful, and spurned and persecuted by the faithful and the elect; although, when it has served its purposes, priestcraft has held up the cagot, and the leper, and the idiot, as objects of veneration. When the tourist, in his Alpine and Pyrenean excursions, meets a wretched cagot, let him pause and contemplate the offspring of slavery, and reflect on what man is, and on what man might be,—nay, on what manwillbe.
The different prevalent propensities in various individuals, the development of which appeared to be under the influence of a certain and constitutional organization, have received the name of temperaments; or, rather, this term applies to this peculiar organization of the constitution or idiosyncrasy. The Greek physiologists were the first to classify these peculiarities, ortemperamenta,—thenaturæof Hippocrates, themixturæof Galen. They considered organized bodies as an assemblage of elements endowed with different properties, but combined in such manner that their union should constitute a whole, in which none of them should predominate in a healthy condition; but, on the contrary, they were to modify andtempereach other, their simultaneous action being directed and controlled by the spirit of life,spiritus. It was the due combination of these elements that constituted a perfect temperament; their aberrancy produced disease of body or of mind.
The ancients divided these elements into cold and hot, dry and moist; from the combination of these principles they classified the fluids of the body. The blood was hot and moist, the bile hot and dry, the phlegm cold and damp, and themelancholy cold and dry. This division led to a further classification; and temperaments, according to the predominance of these elements, were divided into thesanguineous, thebilious, thephlegmatic, and themelancholic.
These supposed radical fluids, influencing the whole animal frame, were dependent upon certain organs for their specific production. The blood was furnished by the heart, the phlegm by the head, the yellow bile by the gall-duct, and the black bile or atrabile,—the principle of melancholy,—by the spleen. Notwithstanding the many revolutions in the doctrine of physiology that have shaken the schools since the days of Hippocrates, this classification of his has remained to a certain degree to the present day, and has laid the foundation of all the systems of temperaments, constitutions, and natural characters, that have at various periods been advanced by philosophers; the only novel introduction in this ancient classification being the nervous temperament, which, after all, is only a modification of the four other categories.
To illustrate the operations of these temperaments, it became necessary to adopt terms expressive of their combination, andtemperandhumourwere adopted. Both are Latin terms; the first, in its original sense, imports mingling, modifying, tempering the four radical fluids, and producing that equilibrious condition of the frame, termedconstitution.Humourwas derived from the Greek χυμὸς,chumos; and its radical sense imported moisture, or fluid of any kind. Hencehumidandhumidity. This doctrine of fluidity is still applied to many functions that we cannot otherwise describe, and we talk, although in a figurative manner, of the nervous fluid, the vital fluid; and a good humour, a bad humour, a vein of humour, or a humorous vein, are illustrations of peculiar tempers and temperaments,—for temperaments are still distinguished by the same terms applied to them by the ancients, and we describe one man ascholeric, or bilious, forcholer(χολὴ) means bile; another as beingmelancholic; a third of asanguine disposition; and a fourth of aphlegmatic habit. Thesanguine, that imports a predominance of the blood, indicated a warm and ardent exuberance of spirits; whereas thephlegmatic, denoting a thin and cold watery fluid, referred to a frigid and spiritless indolence.
We thus see that modern physiology has scarcely advanced this branch of science, for thenervous temperamentmay be considered as merely a modification of the other ones; and it is more than probable that the old classification will long prevail, notwithstanding the ingenuity of modern hypotheses.Husson divided the temperaments into those that referred to the vascular system, to the nervous system, and to the muscular system, with subdivisions applied to regions and to organs; all these temperaments being either natural and primitive, or acquired. Dr. Thomas, of Paris, has founded his arrangement according to the predominance of the head, chest, or abdomen,—or the mental, circulatory, or digestive organs,—and according to the relative bulk and predominance of these three regions will be the relative energy of the mental, muscular, or abdominal functions. Notwithstanding the ingenuity of these systems, the old arrangement, as I have already observed, is likely to prevail; and as Blumenbach observes, that although this division was founded on an imaginary depravation of the elements of the blood, if made to stand alone it will prove both natural and intelligible.
This division I shall therefore endeavour to illustrate. In thesanguineous temperamentthe heart and arteries possess a predominant energy; the pulse is strong, frequent and regular; the veins blue, full, and large; the complexion florid, the countenance animated, the stature erect, the muscular forms marked and firm; the hair of a yellow, auburn, or chestnut colour; the nervous impressions acute, the perception quick, the memory retentive, the imagination lively and luxuriant, the disposition passionate but not vindictive, and passion is easily appeased; amorous, and fond of conviviality and good cheer.
In this temperament we find athletic strength and fortitude of mind in resisting the power of external agency, with mental tranquillity in the midst of danger; a calmness arising from a consciousness of power, and from less acuteness of external impressions and mental perceptions. Such a man, when roused to action, will endeavour to surmount every physical difficulty; but he will rarely attain pre-eminence in sciences and the fine arts, which require exquisite sensibility and mobility,—qualities seldom met with in such forms as those described by the poets in Hercules and Ajax.
In thecholericorbilioustemperament the liver and biliary organs are as redundant in their power as the sanguineous vessels, and, for the most part, at the expense of the excernent or cellulous and lymphatic system. The pulse is strong and hard, but more frequent than in the sanguineous; the veins superficial and projecting; the sensibility extremely acute and easily excited, with a capacity of pondering for a long time on the same object. The skin is sallow, with a tendency to a yellow tinge; the hair black or dark brown; the body moderatelyfleshy, the muscles firm and well marked, the figure expressive; the temper of the mind abrupt, impetuous, and violent,—bold in the conception of a project, inflexible in its pursuit, persevering and dauntless in its execution. These are the temperaments that have urged men both to noble and to execrable deeds. Such were Alexander, Brutus, Mahomet, Cromwell, Charles the Twelfth, Robespierre, Napoleon. All these celebrated characters evinced from their earliest youth the ambitious nature of their dispositions; and though circumstances might have checked the development of their predominant passions, it was also to adventitious circumstances that they owed their elevation, and the opportunities of displaying their good or evil qualities. Most of these men were irascible, vindictive, and cruel, and equally susceptible of ardent love and mortal hate. In these temperaments we find a mixed exuberance of blood and bile in a constant struggle for predominance.
Themelancholyoratrabilioustemperament is of a different character. Here the biliary organs are brought into a constant and a morbid action, while the sanguineous system is weak and irregular. In these gloomy subjects the skin assumes a sallow, unearthly tinge, the pulse is hard and contracted, the digestive functions torpid and irregular, the imagination is gloomy and full of suspicion, and a dark gloom is shed on all around the morbid sufferer, for such he may be called, since the condition under which he labours may be considered one of disease. These subjects are prone to various monomanias; uncertain, fickle, and oftentimes capriciously cruel. Tiberius and Louis the Eleventh are quoted as examples of this temperament. Many melancholic individuals have displayed great genius, and at the same time great depth of thought. Richerand considers Tasso, Pascal, Zimmermann, and Rousseau as illustrating this unhappy disposition.
The fourth temperament is thephlegmatic,lymphatic,pituitous, orwatery, for all these terms used by different physiologists are synonymous. Here the proportion of fluids is too considerable for that of the solids; hence the body attains a considerable, unwholesome bulk. The muscles are soft and flaccid, the skin fair and transparent, the hair flaxen or sandy, the pulse weak and slow, all the vital actions are languid, the memory little tenacious, and the attention wavering; an insurmountable indolence prevails; and, averse to mental and corporeal exercise, thefar nienteis their greatest enjoyment, and a nightcap is preferable to a diadem. These subjects are generally good, easy persons; susceptible of kindly feelings, but of a transientnature. Their mind is generally depraved by effeminacy, and their love is purely animal. They are not courageous; yet they show great tranquillity of mind in moments of danger, and would rather quietly sink than struggle with the waves. If their dwelling was on fire, they would calmly walk out of it, but not exert themselves to put down the conflagration; and, when hereditary power places them at the helm of a state, a wreck of the vessel may be speedily expected, unless the sceptre is wrested from their feeble hands by the choleric or the atrabilious enthusiast.
The fifth, ornervoustemperament, as I have already stated, may be considered of a complex nature, as it influences the sanguineous as well as the choleric, the melancholy, and the phlegmatic. In this constitution the sentient system predominates, and there exists a great susceptibility to all external impressions. This temperament is generally acquired, and proceeds from a sedentary life, too great an enjoyment of sensual pleasures, and fanciful ideas brought on by romantic readings and romantic thoughts indulged in hours of idleness. The determination of such individuals is prompt, but uncertain; their affections warm for a while, are selfish and fickle; their sensations are vivid, but leave no impressions. Women, especially when educated in boarding-schools, essentially belong to this class, and are subject to hysterical and convulsive affections that render them a plague to others and a nuisance to themselves. In man the muscles are small, flabby, and wasted. The nervous may possess much vivacity of conception, but no depth of judgment; and, in general, their productions are as morbid as their mind. This condition frequently attends the melancholy temperament, “that wings the soul, and points her to the skies.”
Nervous excitability seldom prevails in the sanguineous constitution, where muscular masses are pronounced in athletic forms. Hence the sanguineous are not easily brought into action; but, when once roused, their energies are irresistible. This power is beautifully described by Virgil in the conflict between Entellus and Dares; still are these exertions governed by nervous influence, and the result of the excitability and contractibility of the muscular fibre, termed by Chaussier itsmyotility.
Mason Good has very justly observed that these temperaments, or generic constitutions, are perpetually running into each other, and consequently that not one of them, perhaps, is to be found in a state of full perfection in any individual; hefurther aids this remark by the following illustration: “Strictly speaking, Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox belonged equally, in the main, to the second temperament; there was the same ardour, genius and comprehensive judgment in both, with a considerable tendency to the sanguineous, and hence with more irritability, but more self-confidence, audacity, and sanguine expectation: the latter, while possessing the same general or bilious temperament, was at the same time more strongly inclined to the lymphatic, and hence his increased corporeal bulk, and with less bold and ardent expectation he possessed one of the sweetest and most benevolent dispositions to be met with in the history of the world. The first was formed to be revered, the second to be beloved; both to be admired and immortalized.”
I apprehend that a profound study of human temperaments and propensities may afford a more desirable guide in the education of youth, and the selection of men in the different concerns of life, than that of either physiognomy or phrenology; although the temperament must materially affect the general character of the countenance. Yet, from the apparent prevalence of any temperament we are not to form a rash and hasty judgment in regard to the future capacities or propensities of youth. As one temperament runs into another, and assumes a complex form, so can education regulate the one that naturally predominates, and modify it by a fusion with another. Thus, the restlessness of the bilious and choleric may be attuned to a phlegmatic state by the power of reason, and the brute courage and audacity of the sanguineous checked by inspiring sentiments of true valour. That every temperament, excepting perhaps the phlegmatic, is capable of displaying bravery, has been well described by Joanna Baillie in the following lines:
The brave man is not he who feels no fear,For that were stupid and irrational;But he whose noble soul its fear subdues,And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from.As for your youth, whom blood and blows delight,Away with them!—there is not in their crewOne valiant spirit.
While both ancient and modern physiologists were of opinion that the various phenomena of organized bodies were influenced by lunar phases, the power of the solar rays was not less active in regulating our functions both in health and in disease. The name of Phœbus signified the torch of life, and Apollo was the father of medicine and the fine arts. The sun was considered as a deity in most countries, the Supreme Being,—the father of light, Diespiter,—Jupiter, Jehovah, the creator of all living matter,—the residence of the Most High—In sole posuit tabernaculum suum, said the Psalmist;—and in Egypt three hundred and sixty-five priests were ordained to watch its heavenly movements during the year, while many philosophers attributed the propagation of the human race to the union of man with the orb of day. The disciples of Plato and Pythagoras considered it as possessing a soul; and Origenus, in his Periarchon, maintained that it displayed both virtues and vices,—an heretical doctrine very properly condemned by the second Synod of Constantinople; and, although St. Augustin was of that opinion, it was warmly combated by St. Basil and St. Ambrose, and many other beatified divines. Anaxagoras, on the contrary, considered this luminary to be a burning stone; Plato called it a compact fire; Aristotle maintained that it was formed of one-fifth of the elements that constitute the planets; Epicurus, a mass of lava, or ignited pumice-stone; Xenophon asserted that it was fed by exhalations, and Zeno by watery vapours; Empedocles considered it a translucent body; Philolaus, a concave mirror, concentrating the rays of light from every part of the universe to reflect it upon nature. Kepler was of a similar opinion, and further insisted that the sun was composed of a limpid fluid upon which a luminous æther was reflected, whence its centre was blue, while the limbs were yellow. A modern philosopher, Woodward, attempts to show that the sun and fixed stars are masses of electric fluid, requiring no alimentation, yielding no smoke, and the light that emanates from them offers the bluish brilliancy of the electric spark. It has been justly observed, that if, like Eudoxus, we endeavoured to approach this luminary, the better to study anddescribe its nature, we should still remain in impenetrable darkness,—in which I must leave the matter, to confine myself to those influences which experience seems to show that the sun actually exercises on the animal economy.
The genial and invigorating glow that moderate solar heat produces has ever been considered as tending to prolong our life. Hippocrates observed, that old men are double their age in winter, and younger in summer. To enjoy this reviving influence, the ancients had terraces on their house-tops calledsolaria, in which, to use their own expression, they took a solar air-bath. Pliny the younger, in speaking of his uncle, tells us,Post cibum, æstate, si quid otii, jacebat in sole. The ancients fancied that when the sun rose diseases declined, andLevato sole levatur morbusbecame a medical axiom. Aristotle records the case of an innkeeper of Tarentum, who, although able to attend to his business by day, became insane so soon as the sun had set. The moderns relate many similar instances of derangement brought on by the absence of solar influence. Bouillon mentions a woman who lost her senses at sunset, but who recovered them at break of day. Other cases are recorded of a different nature, when maladies were aggravated by this influence. Sauvage tells us of a woman who became maniacal whenever the sun was at its zenith; an influence that could not be prevented even by various stratagems, such as keeping her in a dark room, and deceiving her in regard to the hour. Humboldt knew a Spanish lady in Madrid who lost her voice the moment the sun dipped in the horizon, but the paralysis of the nerves of the tongue ceased the following morning. A removal to Naples cured this singular affection. Parham relates the cases of several individuals who were deprived of vision when the sun had set. In a former paper I have alluded to the effects of a vivid flood of light upon the Italian peasantry, as observed by Ramazzini. Daily practice shows us that the paroxysms of fever and various maladies are under a similar influence; and the evening gun in our garrisons is often the signal of severe exacerbation in certain febrile cases, while thereveilléedevelops acute aggravation in others. Sydenham and Floyer had observed that the gout and asthma were usually ushered in after our first sleep; and I have noticed that, during the prevalence of the cholera, the invasion of this fatal disorder generally occurred towards daybreak. The ancients divided their elementary predominance according to the diurnal cycle: thus, morning regulated the blood, noon the bile, evening the atrabile, and night the cold phlegmatic influence. Norwas this arrangement unnatural; we more or less observe it in a state of health, when man awakes refreshed and active at morn; towards noon his train of thoughts becomes more serious and busy; in the evening his mind is more gloomy and susceptible of unpleasant impressions; until night either sheds its poppies o’er his couch, or agitates his frame with its fearful dreams. The repose of night is ever more refreshing than that of day, however we may have changed the natural applications of our hours, and find, as Seneca said of Roman civilization, thatantipodes habemus in urbe. The influence of night and day is equally observable in animals. Towards evening myriads of insects, who had shunned the solar heat, hum around us; while night calls forth its choristers; and as they cease to sing other creatures proclaim the dawn. Some animals, such as thesimia beelzebud, and thesimia seniculus, salute both the setting and the rising sun with fearful howls; and it may be considered as a law of nature, that we cannot turn night into day with impunity.
Dr. Balfour’s opinion on the influence of the heavenly bodies is of great weight: he conceives that the influence of the sun and moon when in a state of conjunction, which he names solar-lunar influence, produces paroxysms or exacerbations in continued fever, in all cases at least where paroxysms are observable. As this influence declines in consequence of the gradual separation of these luminaries from each other, and their getting into a state of opposition, a way is left open for a critical and beneficial change; in other words, that paroxysms and exacerbations in fever may be expected to take place at spring-tides, and crises at neap-tides.
It has been observed in intermitting fevers, that paroxysms of the quotidian recur in the morning, the tertian at noon, and the quartan in the afternoon; in no instance do they take place at night.
There can be no doubt that lunation, more especially in tropical climes, influences diseases; but the effects of insolation are every where observable. One of the most serious accidents resulting from this exposure is theictus solis, thecoup de soleilof the French, and the σιρίασις of the Greeks, from the starSirius, to whose influence they attributed the scorching heat of the dog-days. This attack is in general sudden, and the patient falls down as if struck with a blow on the head. Troops on a march, and labourers in the field, frequently are the victims of this solar power, which usually kills them on the spot. It has been known to destroy great numbers. In Pekin, from the14th of July to the 25th, in the year 1743, it is related that eleven thousand persons were struck dead. On a hot day’s march in Portugal, I lost six men in a brigade under my charge. They first reeled as if under the influence of liquor, and then fell dead with a slight convulsive struggle. One of them, the bâtman of the paymaster of the 3rd foot, or Buffs, was struck dead while speaking to me. A great number of greyhounds perished on the same march; but no other species of dog seemed to suffer, although we had many pointers and spaniels with us. Horses, mules, and cattle were also exempt from the attack, though it proved fatal to some weak donkeys who were following the troops. The shakos worn by our army are well calculated to preserve the soldier from these accidents, to which troops are constantly exposed during summer operations.
This disastrous pestilence, which proved, if possible, more fatal and terrific than the cholera, made its first appearance in London, in 1480 or 1483, first showing itself in the army of Henry VII. on his landing at Milford Haven. In London it only broke out a year or two after, and visited that capital occasionally for upwards of forty years. It then spread to Holland, Germany, Belgium, Flanders, France, Denmark, and Norway, where it continued its ravages from 1525 to 1530; it then returned to England, and was observed for the last time in 1551.
Dr. Caius calls it a pestilential fever of one day; and it prevailed, he says, with a mighty slaughter, and the description of it was as tremendous as that of the plague of Athens. Dr. Willis states that its malignity was so extreme, that as soon as it entered a city it made a daily attack on five or six hundred persons, of whom scarcely one in a hundred recovered. This malignant fever ran its course in a single paroxysm; and the cold fit and hot fit were equally fatal. If the patient was fortunate enough to reach the sweating stage, he was in general saved. It commenced its attack with a pain in the muscles of the neck, shoulders, legs, and arms, through which a warm aura seemed to creep; after these symptoms a profuse perspiration broke forth. The internal organs grew gradually hot and burning, the pungent heat extending to the extremities; with anintolerable thirst, sickness soon followed by jactitation, coma, and delirium. At Shrewsbury it raged for seven months, and carried off upwards of one thousand patients. The invasion of this terrific disorder was generally preceded by a thick noisome fog, especially in Shropshire. A dark cloud usually took the lead, and the distemper followed its course. It is somewhat singular, but most fatal contagions have been ushered in, both in ancient and modern times, by noxious fogs or mists, with clouds of various insects, either bending their course in innumerable bodies, covering vegetation, or falling in dead heaps upon the ground. The disease was generally supposed to arise from inclement seasons and injured grain; particularly wheat infested with the mildew or smut, or rye attacked with the spur. It was observed by Dr. Willan, that the contemporary inhabitants of Scotland and Wales, who fed on barley and oats, were not affected.
One of the most singular features of this malady was its only attacking the English. Foreigners, and even the Scotch and Irish, in England, seemed to be exempted from this scourge, which attacked the monarch himself, and two Dukes of Suffolk, who sunk under its virulence. In Westminster the number of daily deaths averaged one hundred and twenty. It may be easily imagined that this special liability of Englishmen to contract the disease was attributed to Divine wrath for their manifold offences; and we find the following lines in Phemtophius:
Cœlestia numina nobisNil sunt quàm nugæ, fabula, verba, jocus:Indè fames nobis, pestes, Mars; denique fontemHinc etiam inclemens ιδοωνρετος habet,Sævum, horrendum, atrox genus immedicabile morbi,Nostræ perfidiæ debitum.
Dr. Armstrong has also recorded this peculiar visitation in the following:
Some, sad at home, and, in the desert, some,Abjur’d the fatal commerce of mankind.In vain: where’er they fled, the Fates pursued.Others, with hopes more specious, cross’d the main,To seek protection in far distant skies;But none they found. It seemed, the general airFrom pole to pole, from Atlas to the East,Was then at enmity with English blood;For, but the race of England, all were safeIn foreign climes; nor did this Fury tasteThe foreign blood which England then contained.
That the atmosphere was saturated by this disease was obvious from the circumstance of vast numbers of birds falling dead, when, upon examination, pestilential swellings were found under their wings. Schiller attributed the disease to sideral influence. England, however, was not the only country where the wrath of Heaven was considered as having fulminated this scourge! and at Marburg it had such an effect, that it actually put an end to the violent disputes between Luther and Zuingle concerning the Eucharist, and which were on the eve of kindling a religious war.
A disease somewhat similar manifested itself in Picardy in 1773, having first appeared at Hardivilliers, five leagues from Beauvais; but, instead of terminating in a single day, it ran on to the third, fifth, and seventh: a fever of the same description was also observed in Gascony.
But of all the maladies that affect cutaneous transpiration,diapedesis, or sweating of blood, is the most singular; so much so, indeed, that its existence has been doubted, although several well authenticated cases are on record, both in the ancient and modern annals of medicine. It is mentioned by Theophrastus and Aristotle, while Lucan thus describes it:
Sic omnia membraEmisere simul rutilum pro sanguine virus.Sanguis erant lacrymæ; quacumque foramina novitHumor, ab his largus manat cruor: ora redundant,Et patulæ nares; sudor rubet; omnia plenisMembra fluunt venis: totum est pro vulnere corpus.
The detestable Charles IX. of France sunk under this disorder, thus described by Mezeray: “La nature fit d’étranges efforts pendant les deux dernières semaines de la vie de ce Roi. Il s’agitait et se remuait sans cesse; le sang lui rejalliait par les pores et par tous les conduits de son corps. Après avoir longtems souffert, il tomba dans une extrème faiblesse et rendit l’ame.” The same historian relates the case of a governor of a town taken by storm, who was condemned to die, but was seized with a profuse sweating of blood the moment he beheld the scaffold. Lombard mentions a general who was affected in a similar manner on losing a battle. The same writer tells us of a nun who was so terrified when falling into the hands of a ruthless banditti, that blood oozed from every pore. Henry ab Heer records the case of a man who not only laboured under diapedesis, but small worms accompanied the bloody secretion.
In the Memoirs of the Society of Arts of Haarlem, we read of the case of a sailor, who, falling down during a storm, was raised from the deck streaming with blood. At first it was supposed that he had been wounded, but, on close examination, the blood was found to flow from the surface of the body. Fabricius de Hilden mentions a case that came under the observation of his friend Sporlinus, a physician of Bâle; the patient was a child of twelve years of age, who never drank any thing but water: having gone out into the fields to bring home his father’s flocks, he stopped upon the road, and contrary to habit, drank freely of white wine. He shortly after was seized with fever. His gums first began to bleed, and soon after an hæmorrhage broke out from every part of the integuments, and from the nose. On the eighth day of the malady he was in a state of extreme debility, and the body was covered with livid and purple spots, while every part from whence the blood had exuded was stopped with clots. A case is also related of a widow of forty-five years of age, who had lost her only son. She one day fancied that she beheld his apparition beseeching her to relieve him from purgatory by her prayers, and by fasting every Friday. The following Friday, in the month of August, a perspiration tinged with blood broke out. For five successive Fridays the same phenomenon appeared, when a confirmed diapedesis appeared. The blood escaped from the upper part of the body, the back of the head, the temples, the eyes, nose, the breast, and the tips of the fingers. The disorder disappeared spontaneously on Friday the 8th of March of the following year. This affection was evidently occasioned by superstitious fears; and this appears the more probable from the periodicity of the attacks. The first invasion of the disease might have been purely accidental; but the regularity of its subsequent appearance on the stated day of the vision may be attributed to the influence of apprehension. Bartholinus mentions cases of bloody sweat taking place during vehement terror and the agonies of torture.
The case of Catherine Merlin, of Chamberg, is well authenticated, and worthy of being recorded. She was a woman of forty-six years of age, strong and hale. She received a kick from a bullock in the epigastric region, that was followed by vomiting of blood: this discharge having been suddenly stopped by her medical attendants, the blood made its way through the pores of various parts of her body, every limb being affected in turn. The sanguineous discharge was invariably preceded by a prickly and itching sensation; frequently this itchingexudation proceeded from the scalp. The discharge usually occurred twice in the twenty-four hours; and on pressing the skin, the flow of blood could be accelerated and increased.
Dr. Fournier relates the case of a magistrate who was attacked with diapedesis after any excitement, whether of a pleasurable or a painful nature.
A singular idiosyncrasy was transmitted to her male children by an American Female named Smith, occasioning a severe hæmorrhage wherever the skin was slightly pricked or scratched. This loss of blood would sometimes continue for several days. Several of her sons sunk under the affection, which was found at last to yield to the sulphate of soda. What is most singular, all her daughters were exempted from this fearful predisposition.
It is probable that this strange disorder arises from a violent commotion of the nervous system, turning the streams of blood out of their natural course, and forcing the red particles into the cutaneous excretories. A mere relaxation of the fibres could not produce so powerful a revulsion. It may also arise in cases of extreme debility in connexion with a thinner condition of the blood.
Curious cases are recorded of a sandy sweat, in which the perspiration becomes crystallized on the surface of the skin. Bartholinus, Schunig, and Mollenbroek have related several cases of the kind. It is probable, as Mason Good observes, that this morbid secretion may arise from an excess of uric acid, translated from the kidneys to the skin; this sand is generally of the same red colour as that of the renal secretions deposited in a lateritious sediment.
Scented perspiration is another singular peculiarity. This odour, frequently unpleasant, has also been known to shed an agreeable aroma, compared to the perfume of violets, roses, and musk. This quality is common in various animals; in theSimia jacchus, hedgehogs, hares, serpents, and crocodiles. TheViverra zibethaandV. civettayield this odour abundantly; and it has been observed in a faint degree in our domestic cat. Many insects exhale an agreeable odour; especially theCerambix moschatus, theApis fragrans, theTipula mochifera. TheCerambix suaveolensemits a delicious smell of roses, and the Petiolated sphex a highly fragrant balsamic ether. In the Memoirs of the Queen of Navarre, we read that Catherine de Medicis was a perfect nosegay; and Cujacius and Lord Herbert of Cherbury were equally distinguished by the suavity of their transpiration.
The general perspiration of every man seems to be of a peculiar nature. Savages can distinguish their friends and foes by the scent. The boy born deaf and dumb, whose history is related by Dugald Stewart, distinguished persons by their odour; and the dealers in hair can ascertain by the smell the nation to which the hair belongs.
The quantity of perspiration secreted by a well-grown adult weighing about one hundred and forty-six pounds, is at the rate of twenty-eight ounces in the twenty-four hours, sixteen ounces during the period usually allotted to waking, and twelve ounces during sleep.[49]It is not so much increased by moderate elevation of temperature as might be imagined; it appears increased after meals and during sleep. While the skin thus secretes so considerable a quantity of watery fluid, its powers of absorption are wonderful, and are frequently resorted to for medicinal purposes. This absorption evidently tends to assist in repairing the strength. A boy at Newcastle who had been greatly reduced for a race, gained thirty ounces in weight in the course of an hour, during which time he had only taken a glass of wine. Dr. Home, after going to bed much fatigued and supperless, gained two ounces before the morning. Keill says that one night he gained eighteen ounces in his sleep. Immersion in water and damp air materially increases this power. Frogs, toads, even lizards, increase in weight although only partially dipped in water; and remarkably so if previously deprived of part of their moisture by exposure to air. The power of absorbing medicinal substances when immersed in their solution has been demonstrated by Dr. Massy, an American physician, who found that if the body was immersed in a decoction of madder,[50]this substance immediately tinged the renal secretion. Dr. Rousseau made a similar experiment with rhubarb. It is now clearly demonstrated that friction is not necessary to produce absorption.
The keenness of the deaf and dumb boy in ascertaining the effluvium of various individuals, to which I have alluded, induces me to give a short sketch of this curious individual. His name was James Mitchell; and having no other source by which he could discover or keep up a connexion with surrounding objects than those of smell, taste, and touch, he depended chiefly upon the first, like a domestic dog, in distinguishingpersons and things. By this sense he identified his friends and relations; and conceived a sudden attachment or dislike to strangers. It was difficult, however, to ascertain at what distance he could thus exercise this faculty; but, from Mr. Wardrop’s observations, it appears that he possessed it at a considerable distance. This was particularly striking when a person entered the room, as he seemed to be aware of this before he could derive any information from any sense than that of smell. When a stranger approached him, he eagerly began to touch some part of the body, commonly taking hold of his arm, which he held near his nose; and, after two or three strong inspirations through the nostrils, he appeared to form a decided opinion concerning him. If it were favourable, he showed a disposition to become more intimate, examined more minutely his dress, and expressed in his countenance more or less satisfaction; but if it happened to be unfavourable, he suddenly went off to a distance, with expressions of carelessness or disgust.