THE DOCTOR DISSENTS FROM A PROPOSITION OF WARBURTON'S AND SHEWS IT TO BE FALLACIOUS.—HUTCHINSON'S REMARKS ON THE POWERS OF BRUTES.—LORD SHAFTESBURY QUOTED.—APOLLONIUS AND THE KING OF BABYLON.—DISTINCTION IN THE TALMUD BETWEEN AN INNOCENT BEAST AND A VICIOUS ONE.—OPINION OF ISAAC LA PEYRESC.—THE QUESTION DE ORIGINE ET NATURA ANIMARUM IN BRUTIS AS BROUGHT BEFORE THE THEOLOGIANS OF SEVEN PROTESTANT ACADEMIES IN THE YEAR 1635 BY DANIEL SENNERTUS.
Toutes veritez ne sont pas bonnes à dire serieusement.
GOMGAM.
Warburton has argued that “from thenatureof any action morality cannot arise, nor from its effects;—not from the first, because being only reasonable or unreasonable, nothing follows but a fitness in doing one, and an absurdity in doing the other;—not from the second, because did the good or evil produced make the actionmoral, brutes from whose actions proceed both good and evil, would have morality.” But Warburton's proposition is fallacious, and his reasoning is inconclusive; there is an essential difference between right and wrong, upon which the moral law is founded; and in thereductio ad absurdumupon which he relies, there is no absurdity. The language of the people is sometimes true to nature and philosophy when that of the learned departs widely from the one, and is mistaken in the other. When we call a beast vicious, we mean strictly what the word implies; and if we never speak of one as virtuous, it is because man reserves the praise of virtue to his own kind. The word good supplies its place. A horse that has any vice in him is never called good.
“In this case alone it is,” says Lord Shaftesbury, “we call any creature worthy or virtuous, when it can have the notion of a public interest, and can attain the speculation or science of what is morally good or ill, admirable or blameable, right or wrong. For though we may vulgarly call a horsevicious, yet we never say of a good one, nor of any mere beast, idiot, or changeling, though ever so good-natured, that he isworthyorvirtuous.
“So that if a creature be generous, kind, constant, compassionate, yet if he cannot reflect on what he himself does, or sees others do, so as to take notice of what isworthyorhonest;and make that notice or conception ofworthandhonestyto be an object of his affection, he has not the character of being virtuous; for thus, and no otherwise, he is capable of having a sense of right and wrong; a sentiment or judgement of what is done through just, equal and good affection, or the contrary.”
The Jews upon this subject agree with the common and natural opinion; and the Talmud accordingly, when any mischief has been done by an animal, distinguishes between an innocent beast and a vicious one, the owner of an innocent one being required to pay only half the amount of an injury thus, as it was deemed, casually incurred. There have been cases in which the laws have considered a beast as guilty of a crime, and amenable therefore to penal justice. In the year 1403 Simon de Baudemont, Lieutenant at Meulont of Jhean Lord of Maintenon the Bailiff of Mantes and Meulont, signed an attestation making known the expences, which had been incurred in order to execute justice on a Sow that had eaten a child. “For expences with the jail the charge was sixsols. Item, to the executioner who came from Paris to Meulont to put the sentence in execution by the command of our Lord the Bailiff and of the king's Attorney, 54sols. Item, for the carriage that conveyed her to execution, 6sols. Item, for ropes to tie and haul her up, 2sols, 8deniers. Item, for gloves 12deniers;amounting in the whole to 69sols, 8deniers.” It must be supposed the Executioner insisted upon the gloves, as a point of honour, that no one might reproach him with having sullied his hands by performing upon such a subject.
When Apollonius was introduced to the King of Babylon, the King invited him to sacrifice with him, for he was about to offer a Nisean horse to the Sun, selected for its beauty and adorned with all pomp for the occasion. But the Philosopher replied, “O King do you sacrifice after your manner, and give me leave to sacrifice after mine.” He then took frankincense, and prayed, saying, “O Sun, conduct me so far as it seemeth good to me and to thee. And let me become acquainted with virtuous men; but as for the wicked, let me neither know them nor they me.” And throwing the frankincense in the fire he observed the smoke, how it ascended and which way it bent, and just touching the fire when it seemed that he had sacrificed enough, he said to the King that he had performed the rites of his country, and forthwith withdrew that he might have nothing to do with blood and slaughter. Afterwards when the King took him where were many lions, bears and panthers reserved for sport, invited him to go with him and hunt them, Apollonius replied, “King, you should remember, that I did not chuse to be present at your sacrifice, much less should I like to see animals wounded, and by the pain of their wounds rendered more ferocious than nature has made them.”
Isaac la Peyresc thought differently from the Talmudists and the French Lawyers. He says, quoting the Apostle,Ubi non est lex, neque prævaricatio est.Where ‘no law is, there is no transgression.’Prævaricatio autem eadem est, quæ transgressio legis: illa ipsa proprie quæ peccatum imputationis labe infecit. Quod ut compingatur in oculos: pecudes actualiter et materialiter eadem faciunt, quæ transgrediuntur homines; incestant, rapiunt, occidunt; non erit tamen uspiam adeo supinus qui dicat, pecudes peccare ad similitudinem transgressionis hominum; quia pecudes quæ hæc peccant, sequuntur tantum suam naturam et suam materiam; neque legum transgrediuntur ullam, quia nulla eis data est cujus transgressione formetur in eis et imputetur peccatum.
Yet it cannot be doubted that in such a case Peyresc himself, disregarding his own arguments would have ordered the Sow to be put to death.
This author derivespeccatumfrompecus, for, says he, “as often as a man wilfully departs from that right reason which constitutes him man,—as often as under the impulse of that brute matter which he has in common with beasts, he commits any action fitting in a beast, but unworthy in man, so often he seems to fall below his own species, and sink into that of a brute.” “Latini nomen peccati mutuati sunt à pecore. Quoties enim homo delirat à rectâ ratione illa quæ hominem constituit; quoties impulsu materiæ suæ quam habet communem cum brutis, quid agit dignum pecore, et indignum homine, toties cadere videtur à specie suâ, et incidere in speciem pecoris sive bruti.”
Pecuniais known to be derived fromPecus, wealth, of which money is the representative, having originally consisted in cattle. As money is proverbially the root of all evil, this etymological connection might be remarkable enough to be deemed mysterious by those who are fond of discovering mysteries in words.
“Brutes,” Hutchinson says, “are made in scripture objects to inculcate the duties in society, and even emblems of spiritual and divine perfections. Many of them are more strictly bound in pairs than is common between men and women; many both males and females take greater care and pains, and run greater risques for the education and defence of their young, than any of our species. Many of them excel us in instructing their young, so in policy, in industry, in mechanical arts and operations. And there are other species among them, examples to deter men from the vices in society.” “The power in brutes,” he says, “is by the same agent as that in the body of man, and they are made of the same species of dust; most of them are guided by what is called instinct; some of them are tamed and disciplined and their powers made serviceable to men, and all of them are subject to the immediate power of God, when he pleases to direct them. Mechanism is carried so far in them, that in the parts or degrees of sensation they excel man; that by every one of their actions man might see thene plus ultraof sense, and know how to distinguish the difference between them and the decayed image in him, to value it accordingly, and excite a proportionate zeal in him to recover the first perfections in that image, and augment them to secure the pleasure of exercising them upon the most desirable objects to all eternity.” So far so good, but this once influential writer makes an erroneous conclusion when he says, “if you allow anything farther than mechanism to Brutes, imagine that they have souls, or think, or act the part of souls: you either begin to think that you have no soul, or that it is, such as are in Brutes, mortal.”
The questionde Origine et Naturâ Animarum in Brutiswas brought before the Theologians of seven Protestant Academies in the year 1635, by Daniel Sennertus Professor of Medicine at Wittemberg, of whose Institutes Sir Thomas Browne says to a student in that art, “assure yourself that when you are a perfect master of them you will seldom meet with any point in physic to which you will not be able to speak like a man.” It was the opinion of this very learned professor that what in scholastic language is called theformof every perfect thing, (distinguished fromfigure,—forma est naturæ bonum, figura, artis opus) though it is not a soul, yet even in precious stones is something altogether different from the four elements, and that every soul, or living principle, is a certain quintessence; the wonderful operations in plants, and the more wonderful actions of brute creatures, far exceeding all power of the elements, had convinced him of this. But for asserting it, Freitagius the medical Professor at Groninghen attacked him fiercely as a blasphemer and a heretic. Sennertus being then an old man was more moved by this outrage than became one of his attainments and high character. So he laid the case before the Universities of Leipsic, Rostock, Basle, Marpurg, Konigsberg, Jena, Strasburg, and Altorff, and he requested their opinion upon these two propositions, whether what he had affirmed, that the souls of brute creatures had been created at first from nothing by the Deity, and were not of an elementary nature, but of something different, was blasphemous and heretical, or whether it were not an ignorant opinion of his assailant, that brute animals consisted wholly of elementary matter, both as to their body and soul?
They all answered the questions more or less at large, the Leipsic Doctors sayingofficii nostri duximus esse ut in timore Domini ea sub diligentem disquisitionem vocaremus.They saw nothing irreligious in the opinion that God at the creation had formed the bodies of brutes from elementary matter, and created their soulsex nihilo;after which both were reproduced in the natural course of generation; these souls however were not immortal, nor so separable from the matter with which they were united, as to survive it, and exist without it, or return again into their bodies; but when the animals died, the animal soul died also. Thus the excellence of man was unimpaired, and the privilege of the human soul remained inviolate, the prerogative of man being that God had breathed into him the breath of life, whereby he became a living soul. Thus they fully acquitted Sennertus of the charge brought against him; and waiving any such direct condemnation of his accuser as he had desired, condemned in strong terms the insolent manner in which the accusation had been preferred.
The Theologians of Rostock replied more briefly. Dismissing at once the charge of blasphemy and heresy as absurd, they treated the question as purely philosophical, saying, “Quod de elementari naturâ animarum brutorum dicitur, de illo nostrum non est disserere. Arbitramur, hæc non solum Philosophorum, sed et libertati, super his modestè, veritatis inveniendæ studio, philosophantium permittenda; quos nimium constringere, et unius hominis, Aristotelis, alteriusve, velle alligare opinioni, pugnare videtur cum naturâ intellectus humani, quem nulli opinioni servum Deus esse voluit.” Concerning the second question, they were not willing, they said, to draw the saw of contention with any one; “Si tamen, quod sentimus dicendum est, respondemus, illum qui cœlum et terram ex nihilo creavit, non eguisse ullâ materiâ, ex quâ brutorum animas produceret; sed illi placuisse iis quæ Moses recitat verbis compellare terram et aquam, et ad solius Omnipotentis nutum et imperium, ex subjectis quæ compellârit, animas emersisse.” This answer Sennertus obtained through his friend Lauremberg the Horticulturist and Botanist, who advised him at the same time to disregard all invidious attacks; “Turbas tibi dari quòd liberè philosophari satagis, id ipse nôsti, neque novum esse, neque insolens, hâc ætate. Eandem tecum sortem experiuntur omnes eleganter et solidè eruditi, quibus qui paria facere non valet, invidet et oblatrat. Tu verò noli hoc nomine te quicquam macerare neu obtrectationem illam gravius vocare ad animum. Nota est orbi tua eruditio, tua virtus et ingenuitas, quæ ea propter nullam patietur jacturam. Tu modo, ut hactenus fecisti, pergito bene mereri de Republicâ literariâ, et mihi favere, certò tibi persuasus, habere te hîc loci hominem tui amantem, et observantem maxime.”
Zuinger answered more at large for the Faculty at Basle. They bade him not to marvel that he should be accused of heresy and blasphemy, seeing that the same charge has been brought against their Theologians, who when they taught according to Scripture that God alone was the Father of the spirits as their parents were of their bodies, and that the reasonable soul therefore was not derived from their parents, but infused and concreatedθύραθεν à Deo ἀμέσωςwere accused either of Pelagianism, as if they had denied Original Sin, or of blasphemy, as if they had made God the author of sin. They admonished him to regard such calumnies more justly and quietly, for evil and invidious tongues could never detract from that estimation which he had won for him in the Republic of Letters. Nevertheless as he had asked for their opinion, they would freely deliver it.
First then as to the postulate which he had premised in the Epistle accompanying his Questions, that wherever there is creation, something is produced from nothing,(ubicunque creatio est, ibi aliquid ex nihilo producitur)if by this he intended, that in no mode of creation, whether it wereκτίσις, orποίησις, orπλᾶσιςthere was no substrate matter out of which something was made by the omnipotent virtue of the Deity, in that case they thought, that his opinion was contrary to Scripture, forasmuch as it plainly appeared in the book of Genesis, that neither the male nor female were created from nothing, but the man from the dust of the ground, and the woman from one of his ribs,tanquam præcedentibus corporum materieribus. But though it is indubitable that the creation of the soul in either parent was immediatelyex nihilo, as was shewn in the creation of Adam we see nevertheless that the name of creation has been applied by Moses to the formation(plasmationi)of their bodies. But if Sennertus's words were to be understood as intending that wherever there was a creation, something was produced in this eitherex nihiloabsolutely, or relatively andκατά τιout of something, some preceding matter, which though certainly in itself something, yet relatively,—that which is made out of it, is nothing,(nihil, aut non ens)because it hath in itself no power, liability, or aptitude that it should either be, or become that which God by his miraculous and omnipotent virtue makes it, they had no difficulty in assenting to this. As for example, the dust of which God formed the body of Adam was something and nothing. Something in itself, for it was earth; nothing in respect of that admirable work of the human body which God formed of it.
As for the question whether his opinion was blasphemous and heretical, it could be neither one nor the other, for it neither derogated from the glory of God, nor touched upon any fundamental article of faith. Some there were who opined that Chaos was createdex nihilo, which they understood by Tohu Vabohu, from which all things celestial and elementary were afterwards mediately created by God. Others exploding Chaos held that heaven, earth, water and air, were createdex nihilo. But they did not charge each other with blasphemy, and heresy because of this disagreement, and verily they who thought that the souls of brutes were originally created by Godex nihiloappeared no more to derogate from the might, majesty and glory of God, than those who held that brutes were wholly created from the element. The virtue of an omnipotent God became in either case presupposed.
There was no heresy they said in his assertion that the souls of brutes were not of an elementary nature, but of something different: provided that a just distinction were made between the rational soul and the brute soul, the difference being not merely specific but generic. For the rational soul is altogether of a spiritual nature and essence,adeòque Ens uti vocant transcendens, bearing the image of God in this, that properly speaking it is a spirit, as God is a Spirit. 2d. The rational soul as such, as Aristotle himself testifies, has no bodily energies, or operations; its operations indeed are performed in the body but not by the body, nor by bodily organs; but the contrary is true concerning the souls of brutes. 3dly. The rational soul, though it be closely conjoined with the body and hypostatically united therewith, nevertheless is separable therefrom, so that ever out of the bodysit ὑφιστάμενον aliquod;but the souls of brutes are immersed in matter and in bodies, so that they cannot subsist without them. Lastly, the rational soul alone hath the privilege of immortality, it being beyond all controversy that the souls of brutes are mortal and corruptible. These differences being admitted, and saving the due prerogative, excellence, and as it were divinity of the rational soul, the Theological Faculty of Basil thought it of little consequence if any one held that the souls of brutes were of something different from elementary matter.
They delivered no opinion in condemnation of his assailant's doctrine, upon the ground that the question was not within their province. “Certum est,” they said, “uti formas rerum omnium difficulter, et non nisi a posteriori, et per certas περιστάσεις, cognoscere possumus; ita omnium difficillimè Animarum naturam nos pervestigare posse, nostramque, uti in aliis, ita in hac materiâ, scientiam esse, ut scitè Scaliger loquitur, umbram in sole. Ac non dubium, Deum hic vagabundis contemplationibus nostris ponere voluisse, ut disceremus imbecillitatis et cæcitatis nostræ conscientiâ humiliari, cum stupore opera ejus admirari, atque cum modestia et sobrietate philosophari.” They declared however that the rational soul differed from that of brutes in its nature, essence, properties and actions, and that this was not to be doubted of by Christians: that the soul of brutes was not spiritual, not immaterial, that all its actions were merely material, and performed by corporeal organs, and they referred to Sennertus's own works as rightly affirming that it was partible,et dividatur ad divisionem materiæ, ita ut cum corporis parte aliquid animæ possit avelli, inferring here as it seems from a false analogy that animal life was like that of vegetables,quæ ex parte a plantâ avulsâ propagantur.
They entered also into some curious criticism metaphysical and philological upon certain texts pertinent to the questions before them. When the dust became lice throughout all the land of Egypt, the mutation of the dust into lice was to be understood: so too in the creation of Adam, and the formation of Eve, there could be no doubt concerning the matter from which both were made. But when water was miraculously produced from the rock, and from the hollow place in the jaw,ibi sanè nemo sanus dicet, aquam è petrâ aut maxillâ à Deo ita fuisse productam, ut petra aut maxilla materiam aquæ huic præbuerit.
The answer from Marpurg was short and satisfactory. There also the Professors waived the philosophical question, sayingNos falcem in alienam messem non mittemus, nec Morychi in alieno choro pedem nostrum ponemus, sed nostro modulo ac pede nos metiemur, nobis id etiam dictum putantes, τὰ ὑπὲρ ἡμᾶς οὐδὲν πρὸς ἡμᾶς. Nobis nostra vendicabimus, Philosophis philosophica relinquentes.Tertullian they said had asserted that Philosophers were the Patriarchs of Heretics, nevertheless a philosophical opinion, while it keeps within its own circles, and does not interfere with the mysteries of faith, is no heresy. They adduced a subtle argument to show that upon the point in question there was no real difference between something and nothing.Creatio ex nihilo intelligitur fieri tum ratione sui principii, quod est nihilum negativum; tum ratione indispositionis, ob quam materia, ex quâ aliquid fit, in productione pro nihilo habetur. Quamvis igitur animæ bestiarum dicerentur in Creatione ex potentiâ materiæ eductæ, nihilominus ob indispositionem materiæ quam formæ eductæ multum superant, ex nihilo creatæ essent.And they agreed with Luther and with those other Divines who held that the words in the first Chapter of Genesis whereby the Earth was bade to bring forth grass, herbs, trees and living creatures after their kind, and the water to bring forth fishes, were to be strictly understood, the earth and the waters havingex Dei benedictione, activè et verèproduced them.
The answer from Konigsberg was not less favourable. The dispute which Freitagius had raised,infelix illa σύῤῥαξιςthey called it, ought to have been carried on by that Professor with more moderation. Granting that the souls of brutes were not created separately like human souls but conjointly with the body, it still remained doubtfulquomodo se habuerit divinum partim ad aquam et terram factum mandatum, partim simultanea brutalium animarum cum corporibus creatio.For earth and water might here be variously considered, 1, as the element, 2, as the matter, 3, as the subject, and 4,ut mater vel vivus uterus ad animalium productionem immediatâ Dei operatione exaltatus.Water and earth themselves were first created, and on the fifth the vital and plastic power was communicated to them, in which by virtue of the omnipotent word they still consist. They were of opinion that the souls of brutes and of plants also, were divinely raised above an elementary condition, it being always understood that the human soul far transcended them. The expression of Moses that formed every beast and every fowl out of the ground, proved not the matter whereof, but the place wherein they were formed.
The Faculty at Jena returned a shorter reply. The ingratitude of the world toward those who published their lucubrations upon such abstruse points, reminded them they said of Luther's complaint in one of his Prefaces:Sæpe recordor boni Gersonis dubitantis num quid boni publicè scribendmn et proferendum sit. Si scriptio omittitur, multæ animæ negliguntur, quæ liberari potuissent; si verò illa præstatur, statim Diabolus præstò est cum linguis pestiferis et calumniarum plenis, quæ omnia corrumpunt et inficiunt.What was said of the production of fish, plants and animals might be understood synecdochically,salvâ verborum Mosaicorum integritate,as the text also was to be understood concerning the creation of man, where it is said that the Lord formed him of the dust of the earth, and immediately afterwards that he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
The Strasburg Divines entered upon the subject so earnestly that their disquisition far exceeds in length the whole of the communications from the other Universities. Sennertus could not have wished for a more elaborate or a more gratifying reply. The Faculty at Altdorff said that the question was not a matter of faith, and therefore no one could be obnoxious to the charge of heresy for maintaining or controverting either of the opposite opinions. They seem however to have agreed with neither party; not with Freitagius because they denied that brute souls were of an elementary nature, not with Sennertus, because they denied that they were created at first from nothing. It is manifest, said they, that they are not now created from nothing, because it would follow from thence that they subsist of themselves, and are not dependent upon matter, and are consequently immortal, which is absurd. It remained therefore that the souls of brutes, as they do not now receive their existence from mere nothing, so neither did they at the first creation, but from something pre-supposed, which the Peripatetics call the power of matter or of the subject, which from the beginning was nothing else and still is nothing else, than its propension or inclination to this or that form.Quæ forma multiplex, cum etiam in potentia primi subjecti passiva præcesserit, per miraculosam Dei actionem ex illa fuit educta, actumque essendi completum in variis animalium speciebus accepit.
Sennertus either published these papers or prepared them for publication just before his death. They were printed in octavo at Wittenberg, with the titleDe Origine et Natura Animarum in Brutis, Sententiæ Cl. Theologorum in aliquot Germaniæ Academiis, 1638.Sprengel observes that none of the Historians of Philosophy have noticed,—
Cætera desunt.
Cætera desunt.
THE JESUIT GARASSE'S CENSURE OF HUARTE AND BARCLAY.—EXTRAORDINARY INVESTIGATION.—THE TENDENCY OF NATURE TO PRESERVE ITS OWN ARCHETYPAL FORMS.—THAT OF ART TO VARY THEM.—PORTRAITS.—MORAL AND PHYSICAL CADASTRE.—PARISH CHRONICLER AND PARISH CLERK THE DOCTOR THOUGHT MIGHT BE WELL UNITED.
Is't you, Sir, that know things?SOOTH. In nature's infinite book of secresy,A little I can read.SHAKSPEARE.
Is't you, Sir, that know things?SOOTH. In nature's infinite book of secresy,A little I can read.SHAKSPEARE.
The Jesuit Garasse censured his contemporaries Huarte and Barclay for attempting, the one in hisExamen de los Ingenios, the other in hisIcon Animorum, to class men according to their intellectual characters:ces deux Autheurs, says he,se sont rendus criminels contre l'esprit de l'homme, en ce qu'ils ont entrepris de ranger en cinq ou six cahiers, toutes les diversitez des esprits qui peuvent estre parmy les hommes, comme qui voudroit verser toute l'eau de la mer dans une coquille.For his own part, he had learnt, he said,et par la lecture, et par l'experience, que les hommes sont plus dissemblables en esprit qu'en visage.
Garasse was right; for there goes far more to the composition of an individual character, than of an individual face. It has sometimes happened that the portrait of one person has proved also to be a good likeness of another. Mr. Hazlitt recognized his own features and expression in one of Michael Angelo's devils. And in real life two faces, even though there be no relationship between the parties, may be all but indistinguishably alike, so that the one shall frequently be accosted for the other; yet no parity of character can be inferred from this resemblance. Poor Capt. Atkins, who was lost in the Defence off the coast of Jutland in 1811, had a double of this kind, that was the torment of his life; for this double was a swindler, who having discovered the lucky facsimileship, obtained goods, took up money, and at last married a wife in his name. Once when the real Capt. Atkins returned from a distant station, this poor woman who was awaiting him at Plymouth, put off in a boat, boarded the ship as soon as it came to anchor, and ran to welcome him as her husband.
The following Extraordinary Investigation, cut out of a Journal of the day, would have excited our Doctor's curiosity, and have led him on to remoter speculations.
“On Tuesday afternoon an adjourned inquest was held at the Christchurch workhouse. Boundary-row, Blackfriars-road, before Mr. R. Carter, on the body of Eliza Baker, aged 17, who was found drowned at the steps of Blackfriars-bridge, on Saturday morning, by a police constable. Mr. Peter Wood, an eating-house-keeper, in the Bermondsey New-road, near the Brick-layers Arms, having seen a paragraph in one of the Sunday newspapers, that the body of a female had been taken out of the Thames on the previous day, and carried to the workhouse to be owned, and, from the description given, suspecting that it was the body of a young female who had lived in his service, but who had been discharged by his wife on account of jealousy, he went to the workhouse and recognized the body of the unfortunate girl. He was very much agitated, and he cut off a lock of her hair, and kissed the corpse. He immediately went to an undertaker, and gave orders for the funeral. He then went to the deceased's parents, who reside in Adelaide-place, Whitecross-street, Cripplegate, and informed them of the melancholy fate of their daughter. They also went to the workhouse, and, on being shown the body, were loud in their lamentations.
“On the Jury having assembled on Monday evening, they proceeded to view the body of the deceased, and, on their return, a number of witnesses were examined, mostly relations, who swore positively to the body. From the evidence it appeared that the deceased had lived with Mr. Wood as a servant for four months, but his wife being jealous, she was discharged about a month ago, since which time Mr. Wood had secretly supplied her with money, and kept her from want. Mrs. Baker, the mother of the deceased, and other relations, in giving their evidence, spoke in severe terms of the conduct of Mr. Wood, and said that they had no doubt but that he had seduced the unfortunate girl, which had caused her to commit suicide.
“The Jury appeared to be very indignant, and, after five hours' deliberation, it was agreed to adjourn the case until Tuesday afternoon, when they re-assembled. Mr. Wood, the alleged seducer, was now present, but he was so overcome by his feelings at the melancholy occurrence, that nothing could be made of him; in fact, he was like a man in a state of stupefaction. Mrs. Wood, the wife was called in; she is twenty-eight years older than her husband, and shook her head at him, but nothing was elicited from her, her passion completely overcoming her reason.
“A Juryman.—The more we dive into this affair the more mysterious it appears against Mr. Wood.
“This remark was occasioned on account of some marks of violence on the body; there had been a violent blow on the nose, a black mark on the forehead, and a severe wound on the thigh. The Jury were commencing to deliberate on their verdict, when a drayman in the employ of Messrs. Whitbread and Co., brewers, walked into the jury-room, and said that, he wished to speak to the Coroner and Jury.
“Mr. Carter.—‘What is it you want?’
“Drayman.—‘I comes to say, gentlemen, that Mrs. Baker's daughter, you are now holding an inquest on, is now alive and in good health.’
“The Coroner and Jury (in astonishment).—‘What do you say?’
“Drayman.—‘I'll swear that I met her to-day in the streets, and spoke to her.’
“The Coroner, Witnesses, and Jury were all struck with amazement, and asked the drayman if he could bring Eliza Baker forward, which he undertook to do in a short time.
“In the interim the Jury and Witnesses went again to view the body of the deceased. Mr. Wood shed tears over the corpse, and was greatly affected, as well as her relations: the drayman's story was treated as nonsense, but the Jury, although of the same opinion, were determined to await his return. In about a quarter of an hour the drayman returned, and introduced the real Eliza Baker, a fine looking young woman, and in full health. To depict the astonishment of the relations and of Mr. Wood is totally impossible, and at first they were afraid to touch her. She at last went forward, and took Mr. Wood by the hand (who stood motionless), and exclaimed ‘How could you make such a mistake as to take another body for mine? Do you think I would commit such an act?’ Mr. Wood could not reply, but fell senseless in a fit, and it was with great difficulty that seven men could hold him. After some time he recovered, and walked away, to the astonishment of every one, with Eliza Baker, leaving his wife in the jury-room. Several of the Jurors remarked that they never saw such a strong likeness in their lives as there was between Eliza Baker and the deceased, which fully accounted for the mistake that the Witnesses had made.
“The whole scene was most extraordinary, and the countenances of Witnesses and Jurymen it is impossible to describe. There was no evidence to prove who the deceased was: and the Jury, after about eleven hours' investigation, returned a verdict of ‘Found drowned,’ but by what means the deceased came into the water there is no evidence to prove.”
But in such likenesses, the resemblance is probably never so exact as to deceive an intimate friend, except upon a cursory glance, at first sight: even between twins, when any other persons might be perplexed, the parents readily distinguish. The varieties of countenances are far more minute and consequently more numerous than would appear upon light consideration. A shepherd knows the face of every sheep in his flock, though to an inexperienced eye they all seem like one another.
The tendency of Nature is to preserve its own archetypal forms, the tendency of art and of what is called accident being to vary them. The varieties which are produced in plants by mere circumstances of soil and situation are very numerous, but those which are produced by culture are almost endless. Moral and physical circumstances effect changes as great, both externally and internally in man. Whoever consults the elaborate work of Dr. Prichard on the Physical History of Mankind, may there see it established by the most extensive research and the most satisfactory proofs, that the varieties of the human race, great and striking as they are, are all derived from one stock; philosophical enquiry here when fully and fairly pursued confirming the scriptural account, as it has done upon every subject which is within the scope of human investigation.
Dr. Dove in the course of his professional practise, had frequent opportunities of observing the stamp of family features at those times when it is most apparent; at birth, and in the last stage of decline,—for the elementary lines of the countenance come forth as distinctly in death as they were shaped in the womb. It is one of the most affecting circumstances connected with our decay and dissolution, that all traces of individual character in the face should thus disappear, the natural countenance alone remaining, and that in this respect the fresh corpse should resemble the new born babe. He had in the same way opportunities for observing that there were family dispositions both of body and mind, some remaining latent till the course of time developed them, and others till circumstances seemed as it were to quicken them into action. Whether these existed in most strength where the family likeness was strongest was a point on which his own observation was not extensive enough for him to form an opinion. Speculatively he inclined to think that moral resemblances were likely to manifest themselves in the countenance, but that constitutional ones must often exist where there could be no outward indication of them. Thus a family heart, (metaphorically speaking) may be recognized in the “life, conduct and behaviour,” though the face should be a false index; and hereditary tendencies in the great organs of life show themselves only in family diseases.
Under our Saxon Kings, a person was appointed in every great Monastery to record public events, register the deaths, promotions, &c., in the community, and enter in this current chronicle every occurrence in the neighbourhood which was thought worthy of notice. At the end of every reign, a summary record was compiled from these materials,—and to this we owe our Saxon Chronicle, the most ancient and authentic in Europe.
But he often regretted that in every generation so much knowledge was lost, and that so much experience was continually allowed to run to waste, many—very many of the evils which afflict mankind being occasioned by this neglect and perpetuated by it. Especially he regretted this in his own art: and this regret would not have been removed if Medical Journals had been as numerous in his days as they are at present. His wishes went much farther.
We are told that in the sixteenth century the great Lords in France piqued themselves upon having able and learned men for their secretaries, and treated them as their friends. The principal business of such secretaries was to keep a journal of the most interesting events; and the masters having witnessed or borne a part in the business of state were well able to inform them of the intrigues and tortuous policy of their own times. From such journals it is that most of those old Memoirs have been formed, in which French literature is so peculiarly rich. They usually include as much general history as is in any way connected with the personage whom the writer served.
Boswell, who if ever man went to Heaven for his good works, has gone there for his life of Johnson,—Boswell, I say thought, and Johnson agreed with him, that there ought to be a chronicler kept in every considerable family, to preserve the characters and transactions of successive generations. In like manner Milton's friend, Henry More the Platonist and Poet, would have had the stories of apparitions and witchcraft publicly recorded, as they occurred in every parish, thinking that this course would prove “one of the best antidotes against that earthly and cold disease of Sadducism and Atheism,” which he said, “if not prevented might easily grow upon us, to the hazard of all religion and the best kinds of philosophy.” Our philosopher had more comprehensive notions of what ought to be. He wished not only for such domestic chronicles, but that in every considerable family there should be a compleat set of portraits preserved in every generation, taken in so small a size that it might never be necessary to eject them in order to make room for others. When this had been done for some centuries, it might be seen how long a family likeness remains, whether Nature repeats her own forms at certain times, or after uncertain intervals; or whether she allows them to be continually modified, as families intermarry, till the original type at last may altogether be obliterated.
In China there are not only learned men whose business it is to record every thing remarkable that is either said or done by the reigning Emperor, (which is done for his own instruction, as well as for that of his successors,) but the great families, have in like manner their records, and these are considered as the most precious part of the inheritance which descends from sire to son. All who aspire to any high office are required to be well acquainted with the history of their ancestors, and in that history their indispensable qualifications are examined.
That excellent good man Gilpin drew up a family record of his great grandfather, grandfather and father, who had all been “very valuable men.” “I have often thought,” said he, “such little records might be very useful in families; whether the subjects of them were good or bad. A light house may serve equally the purpose of leading you into a haven, or deterring you from a rock.”1
If it may stand with your soft blush, to hearYourself but told unto yourself, and seeIn my character what your features be,You will not from the paper slightly pass.No lady, but at some time loves her glass.And this shall be no false one, but as muchRemoved, as you from need to have it such.2
If it may stand with your soft blush, to hearYourself but told unto yourself, and seeIn my character what your features be,You will not from the paper slightly pass.No lady, but at some time loves her glass.And this shall be no false one, but as muchRemoved, as you from need to have it such.2
1WARNER'SRECOLLECTIONS.
2BENJONSON.
There was once a German who being poet, physician and physiognomist, saw in a vision of Paradise Physiognomy herself, and received from her a most gracious compliment, which lay buried among the Heidelberg Manuscripts in the Vatican, till Frederick Adelung in the year 1799, brought it to light some centuries after the very name of the poet had perished. Read the compliment, reader, if thou canst as given by the German antiquary, without note, comment, glossary, or punctuation. I can answer for the fidelity of my transcript, though not of his text.
Zu mir in gar glicher wiseQuam us hymels paradyseVil manich schöne frouwe nameJeglicher wol die kron zamSie waren schöne und gecleitVrauwelicher zuchte mynnekeitSie ziert ine danne riche gewantMir wart iglicher name bekantWanne er in geschriben wasAn ir vorgespan als ich lasPHISONOMIAkunstenricheGutlicht redt wider michWir byden dich herre bescheidenDas du in gottes geleidenDust machen myne lobelich kunstSo hastu mynneclichen gunstVon mir und myner gespilen vilDer igliche dich des bidden wilDas du in erkennen gebestUnd du in unser früntschaft lebestAlleine din cleit sy donneGot wil dir geben solich wonneDie mannich gelerter maneNummer mer gewynnen kan.
Zu mir in gar glicher wiseQuam us hymels paradyseVil manich schöne frouwe nameJeglicher wol die kron zamSie waren schöne und gecleitVrauwelicher zuchte mynnekeitSie ziert ine danne riche gewantMir wart iglicher name bekantWanne er in geschriben wasAn ir vorgespan als ich lasPHISONOMIAkunstenricheGutlicht redt wider michWir byden dich herre bescheidenDas du in gottes geleidenDust machen myne lobelich kunstSo hastu mynneclichen gunstVon mir und myner gespilen vilDer igliche dich des bidden wilDas du in erkennen gebestUnd du in unser früntschaft lebestAlleine din cleit sy donneGot wil dir geben solich wonneDie mannich gelerter maneNummer mer gewynnen kan.
There was no truth in Physiognomy when she made this promise to her medico-poet. Yet he deserved her gratitude for he taught that her unerring indications might be read not in the countenance alone, but in all the members of the human body.
In cases of disputed inheritance, when it is contended that the heir claimant is not the son of his reputed father, but a spurious, or supposititious child, such a series of portraits would be witnesses, he thought, against whose evidence no exception could be taken. Indeed such evidence would have disproved the impudent story of the Warming Pan, if any thing had depended upon legitimacy in that case; and in our times it might divest D. Miguel of all claim to the crown of Portugal, by right of birth.
But these legal and political uses he regarded as trifling when compared with the physiological inferences which in process of time might be obtained, for on this subject Mr. Shandy's views were far short of Dr. Dove's. The improvement of noses would be only an incidental consequence of the knowledge that might be gathered from the joint materials of the family portrait gallery, and the family chronicle. From a comparison of these materials it might be inferred with what temperaments of mind and of body, with what qualities good or evil, certain forms of feature, and certain characters of countenance were frequently found to be connected. And hence it might ultimately be learnt how to neutralize evil tendencies by judicious intermarriages, how to sweeten the disposition, cool the temper and improve the blood.
To be sure there were some difficulties in the way. You might expect from the family chronicler a faithful notice of the diseases which had proved dangerous or fatal; to this part of his duty there could be no objection. But to assure the same fidelity concerning moral and intellectual failings or vices, requires a degree of independence not to be hoped for from a writer so circumstanced. If it had still been the custom for great families to keep a Fool, as in old times, our Philosopher in his legislative character would have required that the Fool's more notable sayings should be recorded, well knowing that in his privileged freedom of speech, and the monitions and rebukes which he conveyed in a jest, the desiderated information would be contained. But in our present state of manners he could devise no better check upon the family historiographer,—no better provision against his sins both of omission and of commission, than that of the village or parish chronicle; for in every village or parish he would have had every notable event that occurred within its boundaries duly and authentically recorded. And as it should be the Chronicler's duty to keep a Remembrancer as well as a Register, in which whatever he could gather from tradition, or from the recollections of old persons was to be preserved, the real character which every person of local distinction had left behind him among his domestics and his neighbours would be found here, whatever might be recorded upon his monument.
By these means, one supplying the deficiencies of the other, our philosopher thought a knowledge of the defects and excellencies of every considerable family might be obtained, sufficient for the purposes of physiology, and for the public good.
There was a man in the neighbouring village of Bentley, who he used to say, would have made an excellent Parish Chronicler, an office which he thought might well be united with that of Parish Clerk.3This person went by the name of Billy Dutchman: he was a journeyman stone-mason, and kept a book wherein he inserted the name of every one by whom he had been employed, how many days he had worked in every week, and how many he had been idle, either owing to sickness or any other cause, and what money he had earned in each week, summing up the whole at the year's end. His earning in the course of nine and twenty years beginning in 1767, amounts to £583. 18s.3d., being, he said, upon an average, seven shillings and ninepence a week.
3Such a Chronicler is old James Long—now 77 years of age—50 of which he has served in the capacity of Parish Clerk of West-Tarring, in the County of Sussex. There is no by-gone incident in this, or the neighbouring Parishes,—no mere—stone or balk—with which he is not acquainted. Aged and truthful Chronicler!