Buchanan’s Journal of Man, April 1887.

Psychometry: The Divine Science.

It is presumed that every reader of these pages has some knowledge of this subject, either by reading the “Manual of Psychometry” or otherwise, and has at least read the “Introduction to the Journal of Man” on our cover pages.

It is not of the directly practical bearings of Psychometry that I would speak at present, but of its imperial rank among sciences, entitling it to the post of honor.

In all human affairs, that takes the highest rank which has the greatest controlling and guiding power. The king, the statesman, the hero, the saintly founder of a religion, the philosopher that guides the course of human thought, and the scientist who gives us a greater command of nature, are the men whom we honor as the ministers of destiny.

When we speak of science, we accord the highest rank to that which gives the greatest comprehension of the world as it is—of its past and of its future. Geology and astronomy are the sciences which reach out into the illimitable alike in the present and past. Biology will do the same for the world of life when biology is completed by a knowledge of the centre of all life, the brain. But in its present acephalous condition it is but a fragment of science—a headless corpse, unfit to rank among complete sciences. Theology claims the highest rank of all, but based as it has been on the conceptions current in the dark ages, it has become, in the light of modern science, a crumbling ruin. Does psychometry compare with astronomy and geology in its scientific rank, or does it compare with the acephalous biology, which occupies all medical colleges?

It compares with neither. Like astronomy, it borders on the limitless; like geology, it reaches into the vast, undefined past; and like biology, it comprehends all life science; but unlike each, it has no limitation to any sphere. It is equally at home with living forms and with dead matter—equally at home in the humbler spheres of human life and human infirmity, and in the higher spheres of the spirit world, which we call heaven. It grasps all of biology, all of history, all of geology and astronomy, and far more than telescopes have revealed. It has no parallel in any science, for sciences are limited and defined in their scope, while psychometry is unlimited, transcending far all that collegians have called science, and all that they have deemed the limits of human capacities, for in psychometry the divinity in man becomes apparent, and the intellectual mastery of all things lifts human life to a higher plane than it has ever known before.

Psychometry is therefore in its nature and scope not classifiable among the sciences, since it reaches out above and beyond all, in a higher and broader sphere, and hence may truly be called the Divine science, for it is the expression of the Divine element in man. Wherein is Divine above human knowledge? And wherein is human above animal knowledge and understanding? The superiority in each case consists in a deeper and more interior comprehension of that which is, which realizes in the present the potentiality of the future, enabling us to act for future results and accomplish whatever is possible to our powers. That forecast, that comprehension through the present of that which is to be, constitutes foresight,—the essential element of wisdom; and in its grander manifestations it appears as prophecy. Prophecy, then, is the noblest aspect of psychometry; and if this prophetic power can be cultivated to its maximum possibilities, there is no reason why it should not become the guiding power of each individual life, and the guiding power for the destiny of nations. Moreover, in its prophetic role its superiority of rank is manifest, since it is then the instructor of all hearers,—the revealer of that in which they readily confess their ignorance.

Hence it was that St. Paul especially recommended the cultivation of prophecy as the most sacred and Divine of all religious exercises, saying, in 1 Corinthians xiv. 21-25: “If therefore the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there come in those who are unlearned or unbelievers, will they not say ye are mad? But if all prophesy, and there come in one that believeth not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all: and thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest; and so falling down on his face, he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth.” This is a description of a congregation in which all are developed up to a psychometric and spiritual condition in which the truths of religion and the ministry of angels may have full power.

Wherever the highest order of religious sentiment is in active operation, prophecy becomes one of its results. It was so in Jewish history, and has been so in many eventful periods since.

George Fox had the most exalted religious sentiment of his time, and he had an eminently prophetic mind. All nations have had prophetic minds and well-attested prophecies. Egypt and India, Greece, Rome, France, England, and America, have their recorded prophecies, and in the height of ancient civilization prophecy commanded sufficient respect to influence the course of public events. Cicero expressed the general intelligence of the ancients in recognizing prophecy as a power of the human soul.

Modern materialism has ignored all this, and one of the noblest works to-day for a man of genius whose mind is sufficiently vigorous to throw off the trammels of collegiate ignorance and fashionable conservatism, would be to produce a volume upon prophecy, in which its vast historic development should be sketched.

The limitations of the Journal of Man do not permit me to introduce this historic matter which would be sufficient to exclude everything else from its pages, and I would merely refer to an almost forgotten example of the intuitive and prescient faculty connected with the introduction of Universalism into this country.

A worthy and pious farmer on the seacoast of Delaware, named Potter, built a church at his own expense, but having an advanced idea of the Divine benevolence, he could never find any preacher whose doctrines suited him. Nevertheless he was profoundly convinced that such a preacher would be sent to realize his hopes, and was not discouraged by the disbelief of his neighbors. His anticipation was strangely fulfilled. Rev. John Murray, almost crazed by the death of his wife, sailed from England for America in 1770, intending to abandon the pulpit entirely. The vessel put in at Philadelphia instead of New York, and as the stage for New York had left, Mr. Murray concluded to remain on the vessel and go to New York that way. But on the voyage they got lost in the fog, and got into Cranberry Inlet in a dangerous position. They went ashore, being out of provisions, and found a country tavern. Mr. Murray strolled along the coast, intending to get fish for the crew, and fell into company with Farmer Potter, who had a supply, and who at once told him, to his astonishment, that he was glad to meet him, and had been looking for him a long time. Potter decided at once that this was the minister he had been looking for, and of whom he had often spoken when telling his neighbors, “God will send me a preacher of a very different stamp from those who have heretofore preached in my house; that God who has put it into my heart to build this house will send one who shall deliver to me His own truth, who shall speak of Jesus Christ and His salvation.” Potter briefly sketched his own life and said:

“The moment I beheld your vessel on shore, it seemed as if a voice had suddenly sounded in my ears: ‘There, Potter, in that vessel cast away on that shore is the preacher you have been so long expecting.’ I heard the voice and I believed the report; and when you came up to my door and asked for the fish, the same voice seemed to repeat, ‘Potter, this is the man, this is the person whom I have sent to preach in your house.’”

Murray says: “I was astonished, immeasurably astonished at Mr. Potter’s narrative, but yet I had not the smallest idea that it could ever be realized. I requested to know what he could discover in my appearance which could lead him to mistake me for a preacher.” “What,” said he, “could I discover when you were in the vessel that could induce this conclusion? No sir, it is not what I saw or see, but what I feel, which produces in my mind a full conviction.” “But, my dear sir, you are deceived, indeed you are deceived. I shall never preach in this place nor anywhere else.”

Potter maintained that he had preached and that he would preach in his church, and that the wind would not allow him to leave until he had. To shorten the story, Murray at last yielded and preached in that church, of which we have a picture in his biography. He had a great fear of giving out the doctrine of universal salvation, expecting universal denunciation of himself by the clergy and their followers, but he went on from this beginning and established Universalism in America.

In this instance it is evident that Potter was of a spiritual temperament, and was indebted to a spirit influence for his impressions and convictions. But whatever is possible to the disembodied spirit in the intellectual way is also possible to the embodied spirit which has not lost its material body, if the interior faculties are well developed and prophecy does not require supernal aid. In innumerable cases mesmeric subjects, in their somniloquent condition, have made most accurate predictions in reference to their own cases and others, which have been accurately verified. There is probably no good clairvoyant physician who has not often made successful predictions concerning patients.

In the daily practice of psychometry, Mrs. Buchanan, of whose powers the “Manual of Psychometry” gives a fair idea, is accustomed in speaking of the present to feel impressions of the past and the future. In reference to public men she has spoken in advance of their election or defeat, their policy and their death. She spoke prophetically of the election of Cleveland and the defeat of Blaine, of the deaths of Disraeli and Garibaldi, of the career of Gladstone and his becoming “the best friend of Ireland;” and when Ireland was believed to be on the brink of a bloody revolution or rebellion, she announced that no such outbreak would occur, but that at the end of two years Ireland would be pacified and quiet. At the end of two years this was verified, for the magistrates commented on the fact at that time that there were fewer crimes of violence before them than had been customary.

I have learned to rely on this prescience, and in reference to public men and public affairs, when they interested me, have satisfied my curiosity by the psychometric method.

For twelve months past the newspaper press and the statesmen of Europe and America have been continually agitated by apprehensions of a great European war, and have made numerous estimates of the power of belligerents and the result of the contest. France and Germany have been expected to engage in a fatal conflict, and even a noted public medium has fallen in with these ideas and predicted a coming war this year.

I have kept the record of public opinion, and from time to time have invoked the aid of psychometry, which has dissipated every fear and contradicted all the pessimistic notions of politicians and newspaper correspondents down to the present time.

On the 26th of January I recorded the psychometric impressions, again in February, and again on the 11th of March. The psychometer answers questions or discusses subjects by impression alone, not knowing what is under her hand, but expressing what arises in her mind. The first impression, January 26, was as follows:

“It looks misty, but the finale looks bright. The result of this, whatever it is, will be a grand success or achievement—good will result. There is a dissatisfaction or rivalry on a very large scale—very momentous—is it war? There is agitation and blustering.”

Q.—How will it be in the summer?

“There will not be war. There is a growing contention, like growling, angry dogs; they may keep up growling for a year, but it will be nothing; there will be good coming out of it—a better understanding; this experience will elevate the views of the people; they will see the folly, and not be so belligerent. There will be no war this summer.”

What was the drift of opinion, however, as shown by the press? The correspondent of the New York Sun said: “Everybody talks of war as a sure thing which must soon appear somewhere. The work of getting ready for the fray, of which I have often sent details, goes steadily on.” M. Thibaudin “hopes for peace, as do all other diplomats trained and admired for their ability to say what they don’t think; and finally he announces that France is ready to fight whenever the time comes.” January 29 he writes: “The Daily News war scare which shook us up early in the week seems not to have exhausted its disquieting influence yet.” “France and Germany are looked upon as certain to lead off the ball, and Germany, it is generally thought, will be found at the head of the set and take the initiative. Preparations for a big fight continue in every direction.” “Russia, if we can believe the tales from that unreliable country, is quietly making preparations on a tremendous scale to have her paw fall heavily on somebody.”

The French Revue des Deux Mondes said about this time that a war between France and Germany would almost inevitably lead to a general European war, on a scale such as the world has never before seen.

The Russian Viedomosti of February 5 said: “No compromise is possible between Russia and Austria concerning Eastern affairs, without detriment to Russia and the Eastern races. German intervention is useless, and will only create hostility between Russia and Germany.”

The Boston Herald correspondent of February 5, said of France and Germany: “Now both are counted as among the most civilized and most humanitarian on the face of the globe, and yet the certainty of war between the two hereditary enemies on either side of the Rhine is as certain as anything can be. When it comes, be it sooner or later, one of the two adversaries is inevitably condemned, if not to total annihilation, at least to such a crushing punishment that for many long years the defeated power will be little more than a geographical expression on modern maps.” His letter concluded with an elaborate statement of the military resources and condition of the two nations, which approximate an equality in the aggregate.

A Paris dispatch of the same date said that “Prince Bismarck has succeeded in establishing a coalition between Austria, England, and Italy against Russia. Germany will join the coalition if France supports Russia.”

The New York Sun of February 7, said: “We suppose there is no subject which just now is more earnestly discussed among intelligent Americans than the probable result of the war between France and Germany which is believed to be approaching. France ought by this time to have outstripped her enemy in point of military efficiency. She has laid out since 1871 nearly twice as much on her permanent armament, and she devotes nearly twice as much to the current military expenses of each year. She has maintained a larger peace establishment, and she should have it in her power to bring to the field a larger number of soldiers who have served under the colors.”

February 10 the Paris correspondent of the Berlin Post said that General Boulanger was growing in popularity, and “is regarded by the masses as the long-expected liberator. The whole country is anxious for revanche [revenge], and is arming silently, but with the evident belief that the hour is coming.” To add to the growing hostility, the Post quotes from the Paris Figaro an article imputing the grossest immorality to German women.

At the same date, the Buda Pesth Journal urged Austria to attack Russia before the latter has completed her preparations on the lower Danube. It said: “War is inevitable, and it is better to begin fighting before the Balkan states have been Russianized.”

Senor Castillo, the Spanish minister of the interior, said that Spain had taken steps to augment her defences and protect her colonies, in view of the possible European war.

February 12 a despatch to the London News from St. Petersburg said: “Ominous fears of a European war prevail here. It is announced that German colonists in the Caucasus have been notified to hold themselves in readiness to return to Germany and join the reserves.”

At the same date the North German Gazette said that since General Boulanger had assumed charge of the French war office not a day had passed without measures being taken to augment the offensive strength of the army, and there were constant movements of troops upon the frontiers.

February 19 the news was still more alarming at Berlin. Work was going on night and day on the fortifications at Verdun and Belfort. “All commerce has been suspended at Metz, excepting in food. The inhabitants are storing their houses from cellar to garret.” A Russian paper of that date said, “Existing circumstances admit of no delay.”

At Vienna, February 18, it was announced that “a semi-official letter from St. Petersburg represents that Russia is waiting for a Franco-German conflict, which she considers inevitable, to realize her own Balkan projects. Russia would consider it to be to her own interest not to allow Germany to be victorious.”

February 19 Senator Beck at Washington referred to an extract from a late speech of Count von Moltke before the German Reichstag, to show that war is inevitable.

February 27 the London despatch to the Boston Herald said: “Within the last forty-eight hours confidence in the maintenance of peace has visibly lessened.”

About the same time in Russian government circles the conviction was said to be gaining ground that a Franco-German war was inevitable, and that it would be for the interest of Russia to save France from disaster.

March 6 the North German Gazette said that the Alsace elections had strengthened the war party in France. War seems to have been the general anticipation of military men. General Wolseley (February 26) is reported to have said: “I feel sure that a vast, appalling war is certainly in the near future; but this, indeed, everybody may be said to know.”

But “everybody” is as liable to be mistaken on questions of futurity as on questions of philosophy and religion, on which the multitude called “everybody” has been largely mistaken ever since the earliest periods known to history. “Everybody” is generally pessimistic, apt to be superstitious, and never philosophic. A single good psychometric perception is worth much more than Mr. Everybody’s opinion, whether upon national policy, personal character, historical truth, or medical science.

The psychometric opinion is the opposite of that of General Wolseley and Senator Beck, for the psychometric soul is in the calm sphere of truth, in which the passions have no deceiving power. I have already published in the “Manual of Psychometry” the prediction of universal peace at the end of five years from the prophecy, and I now repeat the statement that great Franco-German war is but the fantasy of passion and fear. The last psychometric expression, March 11, confirms the uniform statements heretofore. Upon the question “What of the war in Europe?” this was the impression:

“This seems a question of occurrences. I seem to disagree with other people on this question. It does not seem to me that it will occur. If there are any prognostications, they are intensified. The result will not be what is predicted. There is something like a foreshadowing that might cause a prediction, but it will pass over. There is a good deal of agitation and concern, but nothing will occur this year as apprehended. I feel that it will all subside, and a picture of brightness and a clear sky appears. The fire will burn out; the boiling caldron which sends up steam will be quiet; a peaceful time is coming.”

When the Journal shall have a little more space, for it must be enlarged, and psychometry is a little better understood, I propose to establish a prophetic department, and speak to my readers of coming events.

(From the Pall Mall Gazette, London, Jan. 12.)

A Modern Miracle Worker.

AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. GEORGE MILNER STEPHEN.

Every one knows Sir James Fitzjames Stephen; most people have heard of Mr. Leslie Stephen—the two most distinguished members of the Stephen family resident in this country. The Stephen clan, however, is widespread, and there are eminent Stephens scattered all over the world. “Any Stephen,” said Mr. Froude in his “Oceanea,” “could not fail to be interesting.” Sir Alfred Stephen, the deputy governor of New South Wales, is declared by Mr. Froude to be regarded as the greatest Australian, by nine out of every ten of the people of Sydney. But the judicial renown of Fitzjames, the literary fame of Leslie, and the colonial reputation of Sir Alfred, all pale their ineffectual fires before the marvellous claims of George Milner Stephen, across whom Mr. Froude stumbled in New Zealand, and who has now turned up unexpectedly in London. He is, as Mr. Froude said, a very noticeable person. In fact, he is a thaumaturgist of the first order. While his relatives in the old country have devoted all the energy of their intellect to demonstrate the absurdity of all the superstitions built upon any arbitrary interference with the invariable laws of nature, their kinsman George Milner suddenly displays at the antipodes a gift of healing which, if the veracious records of colonial and American newspapers can be relied upon, rivals the most famous exploits of apostolic times. Not, indeed, that George Milner has yet raised the dead to life. That is beyond his powers. But all the minor marvels, such as making the blind to see, the deaf to hear, the dumb to speak, and the lame to walk, are accomplished by him in the ordinary course of his daily practice. Although this miracle-working Stephen is a physician whose patients are healed by the touch, he is nevertheless a physician practising the healing art like other eminent authorities—for the prescribed fee of the ordinary medical practitioners. The only difference is that whereas the ordinary physician attends his patient daily for weeks and sometimes months, Mr. Stephen’s course, if a course at all, ends at the latest in three visits, and the charges, therefore, are correspondingly low. Two guineas for consultation fee, one guinea each subsequent visit, or four guineas at the outside, are to be regarded as his retaining fee; but in those cases—and they are said to constitute a large proportion of those submitted to him—in which he effects a complete cure he naturally expects to be remembered by the grateful patient whom he has restored to health. This, however, by the way. In response to an invitation to the Pall Mall Gazette office, Mr. George Milner Stephen described to a member of our staff with much detail the nature of his work. It is a sufficiently marvelous story to arouse attention, even on the part of the incredulous; and the unbelieving authorities owe it to the public to institute a series of investigations into their relative’s claims, in order that he may either be claimed as the master healer of his age, or summarily prosecuted as a rogue and vagabond, who is obtaining money under false pretences. It is monstrous that a gentleman of his rank and position should be allowed to go at large, making such enormous claims of quasi-supernatural powers, without having them promptly brought to the most rigorous of scientific tests.

Mr. George Milner Stephen is a man of wide and varied culture, of great experience in affairs, and has spent his life in public service of the most varied kind. Brought up to the bar, he has been a trained lawyer all his life. He has been acting-governor of South Australia; he refused the colonial secretaryship of New Zealand; he has been official draftsman for the colony of Victoria; he has held the balance of power in more than one colony; and in the colony of New South Wales, at the time when he suddenly discovered his miraculous powers, he was leading counsel on circuit, and in receipt of one of the largest professional incomes of any lawyer at the antipodes. Nor was his training solely colonial. He had repeatedly visited England, and had been called to our bar. He takes a keen interest in mineralogical science, and in the course of his career has exhibited on more than one occasion great personal bravery and indomitable nerve. That such a man, so highly connected, so carefully trained, with the intellect of a lawyer and the experience of a statesman, should be in our midst claiming to be endowed with the gift of healing spoken of in the New Testament as vouchsafed to the Christians of apostolic times, is a portent indeed, and one well worthy of the attentive consideration of the most sceptical among us.

“It was six and a half years ago,” said Mr. Stephen in reply to a question, “that I first discovered that I possessed this gift of healing—it was by pure accident. A friend who suffered from deafness jokingly appealed to me to give him back his hearing. I, also in joke, made some passes over his head, when to my utter astonishment I discovered that his deafness disappeared. One experiment of this kind led to another, and in a short time I found myself overwhelmed with patients of high and low degree, begging me to heal them of their diseases. For three months after the discovery of my gift the sudden influx of patients who would not be denied left me no time to attend to my practice; and, willy nilly, I was compelled to give up the law and take to medicine—if you may call by the name of medicine a profession in which no medicine is given.”

“Then do you use no medicine at all?”

“None whatever. The nearest approach to medicine that I ever gave to a patient is a little magnetized ointment—that is, camphorated lard, and a little magnetized oil. But it is only occasionally that I use these. Neither do I use passes, although it was by the use of passes that I first discovered that I possessed this gift.”

“But how do you proceed?”

“Variously. Sometimes I lay my hand upon the part affected; at other times I breathe into the eye, ear, or mouth of the patient. Then, again, on other occasions I am able to banish the disease by a mere word or gesture.”

“Are you a mesmerist or a magnetic healer?”

“Mesmerist I am not; for mesmerism implies the throwing of the patient into a mesmeric sleep. Neither am I a magnetist, properly so called, for there is no outgoing of magnetism from my body when I am healing. The ordinary magnetist admits that he cannot cure more than four persons per diem; I have cured as many as thirty, and beyond the weariness caused by standing, I have been no worse at the end than at beginning.”

“How do you explain these miracles?”

“I don’t call them miracles. They are marvels, and I cannot explain them. All that I know is that I have gone through the Australian colonies, New Zealand, and many of the States in America, and that wherever I have gone the same effect followed. At my touch, diseases and defects declared incurable by the first physicians of the faculty, disappear. I remember well healing Sir James Martin, the chief justice of New South Wales. Six years ago he was given up by the doctors and declared to be dying, breathing with great difficulty, and hardly able to speak without pain. I laid my hand upon his chest, and in a few minutes all difficulty of breathing disappeared, he was able to speak freely, and in a short time he had completely recovered. He resumed his seat upon the bench, and remained a hale, active man till his death, which occurred just the other day. That is only one case out of many.”

“How many?”

“I think I have been the means of healing about 30,000 patients in the six and a half years during which I have devoted my time to the work. Of course many of those patients were suffering from diseases which might have been cured by ordinary means. Others were declared to be incurable.”

“Declared to be incurable by whom?”

“By the chief physicians in the colonies. I have in my pocket”—producing the papers as he spoke—“certificates signed by the witnesses, attested sometimes by magistrates, and at other times by ministers of religion and colonial ministers, that the person named in the certificate has received instantaneous relief by my touch. Here is one in which a person stone-blind from birth received sight when I blew into his eyes.”

“Then do you cure all diseases?”

“Certainly not. There are many things which I cannot do. I cannot raise the dead, nor can I restore an arm which has been cut off, a joint which has been excised, or an eye which has been destroyed. When there has been complete destruction of any important organ I cannot effect a cure; but when destruction of the organ has not been complete, I am frequently able to effect a cure in cases which the regular faculty have given up as utterly hopeless.”

“Take cancer, for instance: can you cure that?”

“I have treated some cases with remarkable success; but of course I can do so only when the cancer has not eaten too far into the vital organism of the sufferer. I have treated some thirty cancer cases, the cure in all being complete. The treatment was that of laying my hands over the part affected, anointing with a little magnetized ointment, and sometimes the injection of magnetized oil. Beyond that I do nothing. I have here records of ten cures of cancer in all parts of the body. If you will glance over the accounts, described by the newspapers at the time when they occurred, or copies of the certificates which I leave with you, you will see that there is almost no limit to the variety of the cures which I have been able to effect.”

“That is all very well, Mr. Stephen, but you will not make converts by newspaper extracts. The point is this: Will you consent to submit your gift to a practical test?”

“Certainly,” said he; “I have already written to Sir Baldwin Leighton, asking him if he can place me in communication with the governors of deaf, dumb, and blind asylums, in order that I may be able to try my powers upon the patients of those institutions. I am quite satisfied that if I am allowed a fair opportunity of trying the effect of my healing touch, ten out of every hundred of the inmates of these asylums will receive their sight, or regain their speech and hearing. I ask for no payment: I simply request that in these institutions which are maintained by the public charity for the relief of helpless sufferers, and where, therefore, there can be no collusion or any suspicion of trickery or fraud, I should be allowed to lay my hands upon the eyes or the ears of the inmates. I can do them no harm; and I am perfectly sure that in at least ten per cent of the cases I shall be able to give great if not entire relief.”

“This is all very well; but before you can expect the governors of public institutions to allow you to touch their inmates there must be a preliminary illustration of your power. Otherwise they would say justly that they would be over-run with quacks, all of whom might wish to try a patent nostrum upon the unfortunate ‘inmates of public institutions.’”

“Very well,” said Mr. Stephen, “I am willing to submit my gift to the most stringent test which your scientific sceptics can suggest. I am willing to give an exhibition of my power under any test, in the presence of any picked number of sceptics whom you may nominate, and you may bring there half a dozen cases of disease certified by the faculty as incurable. Of course you will not bring sufferers whose complaints are manifestly beyond my power to cure. As I said before, I make no claim to restore organs that are destroyed, but there is a sufficiently wide category in the complaints ‘that flesh is heir to’ to afford you an ample choice of half a dozen typical incurable cases. When the deaf, dumb, lame, and otherwise suffering persons whom you wish experimented on have been brought and are in the presence of those whom you shall name, I will undertake to effect an immediate improvement in the condition of, say, four out of the six. It will probably become a complete cure on the second or third visit. I seldom or never see a patient more than thrice.”

“Well, that seems fair. You have no objection to my publishing this offer in the Pall Mall Gazette?”

“None. I make no profession to any skill. I can only exercise a power which I discovered quite accidentally was vested in me. The limits of that I can ascertain only by experience. I am perfectly willing to have that power subjected to the severest tests which you can suggest, and I have no doubt at all, from the invariable experience of the last six years, that cures will be effected for which no existing scientific hypothesis can adequately account.”

The Gazette says in another column:—“We commend the challenge of Mr. George Milner Stephen, which we publish in another column, to the special attention of all interested in the exposure of popular delusion. Here is an educated English barrister of unimpeachable character, who has rendered no little service to the state, informing all the faculty that he can heal patients whom they have dismissed as incurable, by merely breathing on them or touching them. In an ordinary, unknown, vulgar charlatan this challenge might have passed unnoticed. In the case of the Australian cousin of Mr. Justice Fitzjames Stephen it must be treated more seriously. We invite communications from our scientific readers as to the best way of putting our visitor to the test.”

Scores of American healers do similar works to those of Dr. G. M. Stephen, but the fashionable press ignores them because they have not wealth and social position. The Journal of Man will endeavor to do them justice. In all such cases, in which the healing power is inexhaustible, we know that it is replenished from spiritual sources. Dr. Stephen exercises a little policy in not mentioning the spiritual source of his power. Godless science and dead sectarianism recoil from spirit life. No human constitution contains an inexhaustible fountain of life—the fountain is above, and fortunate are they who can reach it.

Human Longevity.

The possibility of long life, illustrated in the first number of this Journal, may easily be corroborated by referring to numerous examples; but the fact that the nobler qualities of human nature are the most efficient promoters of longevity is our most important lesson, and it is illustrated by the superior longevity of women. He is a misanthrope who does not recognize their superior virtue, and he is a poor statesman who does not wish to see that virtue imparted to our political life, and who does not recognize the importance of giving to woman the most perfect intellectual and industrial education, that she may be self supporting. The British census show that there are 948,000 more women than men in Great Britain. The St. James Gazette says:—

“Prof. Humphry of Cambridge has prepared a series of tables which contain some interesting information about centenarians. Of 52 persons whom he mentions, at least 11—2 males and 9 females—actually attained the age of 100. Others attained very nearly to the hundred years. Only one of the persons reached 108 years, while one died at the alleged age of 106. Of the 52 persons, 36 were women and 16 men. Out of the 36 women 26 had been married, and 11 had borne large families. Of the 26 who had been wives, 8 had married before they were 20, 1 at 16, and 2 at 17.

“Twelve of the fifty-two centenarians were discovered to have been the eldest children of their parents. This fact, adds Dr. Humphry, does not agree with popular notions that first children inherit a feebleness of constitution, nor with the opinion of racing stables, which is decidedly against the idea that ‘firstlings’ are to be depended on for good performances on the course. The centenarians generally regarded were of spare build. Gout and rheumatism were as a rule, absent. ‘It seems,’ says Prof. Humphry, ‘that the frame which is destined to great age needs no such prophylactics, and engenders none of the peccant humors for which the finger joints (as in gout) may find a vent.’

“Of the fifty-two aged people, twenty-four only had no teeth, the average number of teeth remaining being four or five. Long hours of sleep were notable among these old people, the period of repose averaging nine hours; while out-of-door exercise in plenty and early rising are to be noted among the factors of a prolonged life. One of the centenarians ‘drank to excess on festive occasions:’ another was a ‘free beer drinker,’ and ‘drank like a fish during his whole life.’ Twelve had been total abstainers for life or nearly so, and mostly all were ‘small meat eaters.’”

The oldest woman in Austria at this time is Magdalene Ponza, who is 112. “She was born at Wittingau, Bohemia, in 1775, when Maria Theresa sat on the Austrian throne. George III. had then been but 15 years King of England, Louis XVI. who had ruled a little more than a twelvemonth in France, was still in the heyday of power, the Independence of the United States of America had not yet been declared, Napoleon and Arthur Wellesley were as yet but six years old. Magdalene Ponza retains full possession of her mental faculties. Unfortunately she can only speak the Czech language, and she can neither read nor write. However, she answers questions briskly enough through the youngest of her surviving grandchildren, herself a woman of 60. Magdalene Ponza’s age is authenticated by the outdoor relief certificate of the Viennese Municipality.”

Of American centenarians we have a number, some of whom are still living. Harrisonville, New Jersey, has two, Michael Potter and Bartholomew Coles. Polly Wilcox of Hope Valley, R. I., celebrated her centennial last year; so did Jane Wilcox of Edgecomb, Maine, while she had a sister 94, and a daughter 81. Old Auntie Scroggins, of Forsyth Co., Georgia, is now 104 years old, and is still one of the most effective shouters of the Methodist Church to which she has belonged 94 years.

Miss Phebe Harrod, of Newburyport, Mass., celebrated her centennial last year. She still takes a lively interest in passing events.

Grandmother Sarah Drew, at Halifax, celebrated her centennial a year ago. Her constant companion is an old Bible which has been in the Drew family for 250 years.

Mrs. Triphene Bevans, of Danbury, Mass., held a lively centennial reception in the parlors of the West Street Church, April 14, 1886. Her health, hearing and speech were good, and her step brisk. She attributes her age and good health to good habits and allowing nothing to trouble or worry her. She has always been a strict church member.

William Waterman, of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, is said to be 109 years old. It is said he “is a Methodist, uses liquor and tobacco, and finds no fault with the world.”

Joseph O’Neal of Barnesville, Georgia, might have been living still if he had not been frozen to death last winter, at the age of 107, in a sudden blizzard. He was a negro, and had over 200 descendants.

Mrs. Elizabeth Thomas, of Reading, Penn., who had lived a century, might be still living if she had not been killed last year, while walking on the railroad track.

Of those who overrun the century, we might mention further, Simon Harras, who died in Putnam Co., Indiana, last January, aged 109. His memory was good to the last.

Mrs. Elizabeth Small, relict of Dr. Samuel Small, at Lewiston, Maine, had passed her hundredth birthday a few weeks, when she died of apoplexy; and Mrs. Susan Phillips, of Wilson Creek, N. C., died last year just as she finished her century.

Nathan, formerly slave of Benj. W. Bodie, died last year in Mississippi, Talbot Co., aged 107.

Christopher Mann, of Independence, Missouri, died last year, aged 111.

The oldest of all, and probably the oldest minister in the world, is Rev. Thos. Tenant, of Vineyard Township, Arkansas, an itinerant Methodist preacher, born in 1771, now in his 116th year.

Mr. Edward Gentry told a more remarkable story at Indianapolis, last July. He was at the governor’s office, and gentlemen were guessing at his age. None supposed him over fifty; but he said he had a son fifty-two years old, and was himself seventy-eight. He added: “My doctor has given me a fifty years’ longer lease on my life, barring accidents. My father is 128 and is still living. My mother died at the age of 117, and her mother lived to the same age.” Mr. Gentry is of English birth.

Perhaps the best specimen of family health is that of the Atkinson family of Gloucester, Mass. Nine children were born, and all lived. The first death in the family was a few weeks ago, when John Atkinson died, aged eighty-four. When he died the ages of the nine amounted to 703 years.

Aunt Dinah John, the oldest Indian at the Onondaga reservation died in May, 1884, aged 109.

About ten years ago, when Governor Seymour was about to make an address at an Indian fair on the Onondaga reservation, Aunt Dinah walked upon the platform and asked to be introduced to him.

Mr. Gardner said, “Governor Seymour, this is Aunt Dinah, who wants to become acquainted with you.”

“Oh, no; him get acquainted with me,” Aunt Dinah explained. “Me know him before he know anybody. Many years ago me go to Pompey Hill, his father’s grocery. Governor’s father say: ‘My squaw very sick.’ I ask, ‘What matter?’ His father say, ‘Go in and see for yourself.’ He go into a room; see a little pappoose about a foot long.” Then moving toward Governor Seymour, and pointing her finger at him, she said: “That pappoose was you, Governor Seymour, born that night.”

Aunt Dinah called frequently at Mr. Seymour’s and took especial delight in rocking the cradle and showering caresses in her native fashion upon the future Governor of the State.

About three years ago she became blind, and has since been kept at her home on the Onondaga reservation. She retained her faculties to the last. Her husband died thirty years ago. Her dying request was that the pagan ceremony be first observed and afterward the Christian ritual.

What are we to reckon, says the Home Journal, as the declining period of man’s existence? The point at which old age taps us on the shoulder, and says it comes to keep us company, varies with every individual. It depends a great deal on circumstances, which are hardly the same in any two cases. Some writers have said that a man is old at forty-five, others have set down seventy as the normal standard. Dr. John Gardner, who has written on “Longevity,” remarks: “Long observation has convinced me that sixty-three is an age at which the majority of persons may be termed old, and as a general rule we may adopt this as the epoch of the commencing decline of life.”

Suppose then we agree to call no man old till he is past sixty-three. Let us set down the names of some of the illustrious people of the world who have prolonged their days of usefulness after that age. We shall make a table of them, and begin it with those who have died at seventy,—that is to say, with those in whom the springs of life have not stood still till they have had at least seven years of old age. It will be found, however, to be far from exhaustive, and every reader may find pleasure in adding to it from his own stock of information:

Age at Death.

70—Columbus; Lord Chatham; Petrarch; Copernicus; Spallanzani; Boerhaave; Gall.
71—Linnæus.
72—Charlemagne; Samuel Richardson; Allan Ramsey; John Locke; Necker.
73—Charles Darwin; Thorwaldsen.
74—Handel; Frederick the Great; Dr. Jenner.
75—Haydn; Dugald Stewart.
76—Bossuet.
77—Thomas Telford; Sir Joseph Banks; Lord Beaconsfield.
78—Galileo; Corneille.
79—William Harvey; Robert Stevenson; Henry Cavendish.
80—Plato; Wordsworth; Ralph Waldo Emerson; Kant; Thiers; William Cullen.
81—Buffon; Edward Young; Sir Edward Coke; Lord Palmerston.
82—Arnauld.
83—Wellington; Goethe; Victor Hugo.
84—Voltaire; Talleyrand; Sir William Herschel.
85—Cato the Wise; Newton; Benj. Franklin; Jeremy Bentham.
86—Earl Russell; Edmund Halley; Carlyle.
88—John Wesley.
89—Michael Angelo.
90—Sophocles.
99—Titian.
100—Fontenelle.

It may be said that they were exceptional in living so long, but if what the best authorities say be true, the exceptions ought to be the people who died young, and not those who prolong their lives and carry on their work till they are old. Few of us may find ourselves, like Lord Palmerston, in our greatest vigor at seventy, or be able, like Thiers, to rule France at eighty, or have any spirit for playing the author, like Goethe and Victor Hugo, when over eighty; or for playing the musician, like Handel and Haydn, when over seventy; but by good management we may do wonders.

The wisest men and the best have been conspicuous for working to the end, not taking the least advantage of the leisure to which one might think they were entitled. They have found their joy in pursuing labors which they believed useful either to themselves or to others. John Locke began a “Fourth Letter on Toleration” only a few weeks before he died, and “the few pages in the posthumous volume, ending in an unfinished sentence, seem to have exhausted his remaining strength.” The fire of Galileo’s genius burned to the very end. He was engaged in dictating to two of his disciples his latest theories on a favorite subject, when the slow fever seized him that brought him to the grave. Sir Edward Coke spent the last six years of his life in revising and improving the works upon which his fame now rests. John Wesley only the year before he died wrote: “I am now an old man, decayed from head to foot…. However, blessed be God! I do not slack my labors; I can preach and write still.” Arnauld, one of the greatest of French theologians and philosophers, retained, says Disraeli, “the vigor of his genius and the command of his pen to his last day, and at the age of eighty-two was still the great Arnauld.” It was he who, when urged in his old age to rest from his labors, exclaimed, “Rest! Shall we not have the whole of eternity to rest in?”

A healthy old age cannot be reached without the exercise of many virtues. There must have been prudence, self-denial, and temperance at the very least. According to the proverb, he that would be long an old man must begin early to be one, and the beginning early just means taking a great many precautions commonly neglected till it is too late. More people would be found completing their pilgrimage at a late date if it were not that, as a French writer puts it, “Men do not usually die; they kill themselves.” It is carelessness about the most ordinary rules of healthy living.

The enjoyment of old age may be looked on then as a reward, and the aged may pride themselves on being heirs to a rich inheritance, assigned to forethought and common sense. Many years are an honor. They are an honor even in the case of the worldly, and a great deal more so when life has been regulated by motives higher than any the world can show. “The hoary head,” says Solomon, “is a crown of glory;” but he adds this qualification, “if it be found in the way of righteousness.” Old people form a natural aristocracy, and to be ranked among them may be recommended to all who have an ambition to close their lives well up in the world.

For a picture of an old man in this enviable state of mind take Cornaro. In his eighty-third year we find him congratulating himself that in all probability he “had still a series of years to live in health and spirits and to enjoy this beautiful world, which is indeed beautiful to those who know how to make it so.” Even at ninety-five he wrote of himself as “sound and hearty, contented and cheerful.” “At this age,” he says, “I enjoy at once two lives: one terrestrial, which I possess in fact; the other celestial, which I possess in thought; and this thought is equal to actual enjoyment, when founded on things we are sure to attain, as I am sure to attain that celestial life, through the infinite mercy and goodness of God.”

Jeremy Bentham, who lived to be eighty-five, retained to the last the fresh and cheerful temperament of a boy. John Wesley, who died when he was eighty-eight, also had a happy disposition. “I feel and grieve,” he says, “but by the grace of God I fret at nothing.” Goethe, who reached his eighty-third year, is another good example. Then there is Boerhaave, one of the most celebrated physicians of modern times, who held that decent mirth is the salt of life. Indeed in the case of most old people, we believe it will be found that cheerfulness is one of their leading characteristics.

The recent death of Mr. Beecher, who with his splendid constitution ought to have lived twenty years longer, illustrates the principles of hygiene which he blindly disregarded. For years he was threatened with the form of death that seized him, and came near a fatal attack some years ago in Chicago while delivering a lecture. Men of a strong animal nature, hearty eaters, and restless workers, making great use of the brain, are liable to such attacks. If Mr. Beecher had observed ordinary prudence, and had a little scientific magnetic treatment, he would never have had an apoplectic attack; but he was commonplace in thought. He went the old way, and died as short-sighted men die. He had read my “Anthropology,” and told me he kept it in his library, but its thought did not enter into his life.

Justice to the Indians.

BY JOHN BEESON.

President Grant placed them under control of the churches, making them responsible for all their Indian agents, whom the churches were to nominate. But as fraud and war have been more or less as rampant as ever, it seems that the first thing should be, to relieve the Indians from church rule, and recognize at once the Indian’s inalienable right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” the same as we claim for ourselves; so long as they do not disturb the peace or violate the rights of their white neighbors, we have no right to interfere with either their religion or laws upon their reserves. It is this meddlesome injustice which makes all the trouble; it would make trouble with any other community, if another religious sect should be allowed to dominate over them in all their affairs. It is not Indian, but human, nature, to do so, the world over. Dr. Bland, editor of The Council Fire, says:

“I have been long and intimately acquainted with many tribes. I find that they are not savages, but the peers of white men, with great self-respect, a high sense of honor, and love of truth.”

Even the civilized tribes still retain their mutual confidence. Hence, they use no locks, no bolts nor bars, when absent from their homes; a stake in the ground, about three feet from the door, is a sufficient guarantee from intrusion. It would be deemed a reflection upon neighborly honor to lock a door in the Indian Territory. I was there when they built their first prison; they now number sixty thousand, most of whom have lived there forty years, and then, they said,

“The new railroad brought so many white renegades among us that we had to build a prison for them.”

I asked, “What do you do when one Indian kills another?” They answered: “We have a trial, and if the killing was without great cause, we sentence the guilty one to be killed by the near of kin to his victim; we appoint the time and the place, and we have never known an Indian to fail to come voluntarily in time for his own execution.”

They believe that the Great Spirit will give all the hell or all the heaven that each deserves; that there is no possibility of escape from a just penalty and no danger of losing a deserved heaven, but to them it is unjust to hope for anything on the merits of another. H. W. Beecher said in his first lecture after his return from the Pacific Coast:

“I made special inquiry of those who are posted on Indian affairs, as to their moral status, and was always told that when fairly treated they are quite reliable.”

Gen. Crookes said of the Apaches, that while they were protected on their reserves from outside aggression they were as well behaved and orderly as any community of people in the United States.

It is true, they killed Generals Canby and Custer, but the first had, contrary to preliminary agreement, moved his soldiers twenty-five miles, and placed them in two companies on each side of the place where the treaty was to be made. The first demand of the Modoc chief was, to take back the soldiers, and it was not until a long delay, and a firm refusal on the part of Canby, that the Modoc chief fired the fatal shot.

And as for Custer and his men, they fell while ignobly, and without right or authority, invading the peaceful home of Sitting Bull and his people.

General Harney says:

“I have lived fifty years on the frontier, and I have never known an Indian war in which they were not in the right.”

Dr. McLaughlin said:

“I have been fifty-three years an Indian trader, and more than fifty years superintendent of the Hudson Bay Fur Company, and in all that time, I have never seen an occasion to shed the blood of an Indian. The American people suppose that their revenge is proof of savagery. But that is a mistake. It is their sense of justice, and whatever they do is but an echo of what has been done to them. They believe as Moses taught, blood for blood, life for life.”

Gen. Fremont said:

“I lived two years among the Indians with only one white woman, and was never more kindly treated. I lost nothing, although all I had was accessible to them.”

Surely, testimony like this, in connection with their healing magnetism so freely given to Spiritualism, should awaken sympathy if not gratitude in their behalf.—New Thought.

Talent, Oregon, Jan. 19, 1887.

Miscellaneous Intelligence.

Anatomy of the Brain.—Anatomy is considered the driest and most difficult of biological studies, but a careful attention to our description of the brain will show that it is very intelligible. After we get through with the anatomy, the description of organs and their functions is simple and practical. Every one should understand the outlines of cerebral anatomy, and then he can discuss the subject with imperfectly educated physicians, and show them their errors.

Mesmeric Cures of countless variety and marvelous success have occurred all through the present century. But when not effected by distinguished physicians, they have generally been ignored by the press, and their knowledge confined to a very narrow circle. Now, however, since eminent physicians at Paris are engaged, and the word hypnotism is substituted for mesmerism and magnetism, their performances are proclaimed by journalists and even by the medical press. The following is one of the latest reports. The reader will observe that when the medical faculty after a prolonged opposition yield to any new idea, they endeavor to ignore entirely the pioneers by whom the discoveries were made, and by whom an interest was created in the subject while the faculty were hostile. It will probably not be long before they adopt the leading ideas of homœopathy and endeavor to obliterate the memory of Hahnemann.

“Hypnotism has been employed with considerable success in Paris for some time past in the treatment of hysterical diseases, by Charcot and others, but the case recently reported by M. Clovis Hugues, in France, is the most extraordinary application so far on record. A young lady of twenty was attacked six months ago with a nervous ailment which completely derived her of her voice. Electricity was tried, with a certain amount of success, but after a time it lost its effect and was abandoned in despair. As a last resort, her friends applied to Dr. Berillon, the hypnotic specialist. After consultation with Dr. Charcot, he undertook the cure. The girl was thrown into a mesmeric trance by the usual means, and Dr. Berillon suggested that she should say on waking, ‘I am twenty.’ On opening her eyes she uttered these words without the least effort. On the second day the suggestion was that she should converse with Dr. Berillon, and this she also did, but could talk with no one else. On the third day the doctor commanded her to talk with any one and at any time that she chose. She has been able to use her tongue freely ever since.”

Medical Despotism.—The infamous law juggled through the Legislature of Iowa, which deprives every citizen of the right of relieving her neighbor of disease without the authority of a diploma, and renders Christian benevolence a crime, does not produce much effect. The natural healers pay no respect to it. In every prosecution under the law so far, the attempt to enforce the law has been defeated. Juries are unwilling to aid an ignorant Legislature in trampling on the Divine law and the principles of American constitutions.

The Dangerous Classes.—The existence of considerable classes, chiefly of foreigners, who are contemplating murder and rapine, should interest every good citizen. At Cincinnati on the 6th of March, it is said, “The institution of the Paris commune in 1848 and 1871 was celebrated tonight by the Cincinnati anarchists. It was the most revolutionary gathering ever seen in this city, and the speech of Mrs. Lucy E. Parsons, wife of the condemned anarchist, was of a very inflammatory character. The hall was crowded with men and women who drank beer at tables. It was a motley and dangerous looking throng. On the walls were mottoes with red borders, and the entire hall was profusely decorated with large red flags. There wasn’t an American flag in the hall, and above the stage was a picture of the condemned anarchists. Several pictures of notorious Anarchists who have been beheaded for murder and riot were conspicuously displayed. The band played no national airs except the ‘Marseillaise,’ and everything said and done showed a bitter hatred of American institutions. Mrs. Parsons gave a history of the Paris commune of 1871, and said the mistake made was in showing any mercy to capitalists. Her remarks were loudly applauded, although a majority of her audience couldn’t understand one word of English. Dancing followed the speeches, and was kept up all night.”

Arbitration.—In the Sinaloa colony, “Any disputes that arise between colonists will be settled by arbitration. There will be one lawyer to protect the interests of the corporation in dealings with outside parties.” This is a great step in advance. When a true civilization arrives, arbitration will supersede courts, and psychometry will assist in making it perfect.

Criticism on the Church.—If any readers of the Journal think its criticisms on the church have been too harsh, because their own acquaintance is confined to worthy professors of the present time, I would call their attention to the unquestionable statements of Hallam, Guizot, and Draper, as follows:

“With respect to the last, the grandest of all human undertakings (i. e., the circumnavigation of the earth), it is to be remembered that Catholicism had irrevocably committed itself to the dogma of a flat earth, with the sky as a floor of heaven, and hell in the under world.”—Draper’s Conflict, p. 294.

“Persecution for religious heterodoxy, in all its degrees, was in the sixteenth century the principle as well as the practice of every church.”—Hallam’s Middle Ages, vol. 2, p. 48.

“When any step was taken to establish a system of permanent institutions, which might effectually protect liberty from the invasions of power in general, the church always ranged herself on the side of despotism.”—Guizot’s History of Civilization in Europe, p. 154.

“There was fighting and fighting between the old and new school, and all on a question that would make a crab laugh,—questions that were hypercritical and infinite, and about which everybody knew nothing at all, and they thought they knew as well as God. Questions were talked of with positiveness, and argued; and, when I look back upon them, I cannot help thinking they were no better than the contentions of children around the cradle. But all this gave me great repulsion for dogmatic theology, and it is a repulsion which I have not got over, and the present prospects are that I never shall.”—Henry Ward Beecher.

Earthquakes and predictions.—Professor Rudolf Falb, of Vienna, it is reported, predicted to an hour the earthquakes which have occurred in France and Italy.

“Writing in the Austrian papers some days ago, he pointed out that the annular eclipse of the sun, which commenced on Tuesday morning at 6.41 Greenwich time, was central at 9.13 P. M., and ended on the earth generally at twenty-five minutes past midnight on Wednesday morning, was likely to be accompanied with strong atmospheric and seismic disturbances. The learned physicist has gained great reputation by previous similar forecasts. His first and great success was the foretelling the destructive shock at Belluno, on June 29, 1873. Nearly the whole of Northern Italy was affected, and upwards of fifty lives were lost. Very shortly afterwards he gave warning of the probability of an eruption of Etna, which followed at the time anticipated in 1874.”—London Echo.

“John S. Newberry, professor of geology and paleontology at Columbia College, being the American authority upon all matters pertaining to the crust of the earth, was naturally interested in the earthquake that visited Long Island on Wednesday. He derides the idea that the local seismic disturbance has any connection with the recent occurrences at Mentone, as the shocks were too far apart, and, if connected, should have been felt within eight hours of each other, whereas there was several days’ difference. His theory, which is amply sustained by observation, is that an earthquake is a movement caused by a shrinking, from loss of heat, of the interior of the earth and the crushing together and displacement of the rigid exterior as it accommodates itself to this contraction. It has been noticed that the earth is shaken along the Alleghany chain nearly every year. It is impossible to predict a recurrence of the shocks, but it is quite probable they will recur. There is a record of 231 earthquakes in the New England States between the years 1638 and 1869.”—Brooklyn Eagle.

Chapter II—Structure of the Brain.

Man a triple being—Materialists and illusionists misconceive him—Relation of the soul to the brain and body—The nervous system; illustration—Embryonic condition—Anatomical descriptions unsatisfactory and the phrenological school incorrect—Exterior view of the brain in the head, illustrated and described—The cerebrum, cerebellum, and tentorium—Interior view of the base of the skull—Bones of the head illustrated—Division of the brain into lobes and convolutions, with illustration—Frontal, middle, parietal, tempero-sphenoidal, and occipital—Anatomical plan or grouping of convolutions differs from their actual appearance—View of the superior surface illustrated—Difference between the irregular convolutions and the angular maps—View of the inferior surface of the brain—Illustration and description of the parts—Interior view of section on the median line—Divided and undivided surfaces-Corpus callosum explained—The two brains and their diagonal relations to the body—Penetrating and describing the lateral ventricles—The serum in the brain—Variations of serum and blood—Variations in hydrocephalus and insanity—Our power to modify the brain and change our destiny—Power of education—Responsibility of society—The lateral ventricles the centre of the brain—Base of the ventricles, the great inferior ganglia of the brain, corpora striata, and thalami—Their radiating fibres inclosing a cavity—The thalami and their commissure and third ventricle—The medulla oblongata, cerebellum, and arbor vitæ—The pons Varolii and crura of the brain—the corpora quadrigemina, pineal gland, fourth ventricle, and calamus scriptorius.

Man is essentially a triple organization, consisting of the permanent psychic being, intangible to our external senses, but nevertheless so distinctly recognized internally by consciousness and externally or in others, by intuition and understanding, that the psychic is as well understood and known as the physical being. This being is the eternal man—the material body being its temporary associate.

The physical being, or material form, consists of the portion directly and entirely occupied by the psychic existence—which is called the brain or encephalon, and is in life also beyond the reach of our senses in the interior of the cranium—and the non-psychic structure, the body, which, though not the residence of the soul, has so intimate and complete a connection with the entire brain that during active life it feels as if it were the actual residence of the soul, so far as sensation and action are concerned.

The soul, or psychic being, has external and internal perceptions (for which it has cerebral organs). When the former predominate too greatly, the human body and all external objects are realized most vividly, and the reality of psychic life is not so well realized or understood. Hence persons so organized are disposed to materialism, and either doubt the existence of their psychic being, or are indifferent to it.

On the other hand, those in whom the interior faculties predominate too greatly vividly realize their psychic life, but have more vague and feeble conceptions of material objects, including their own bodies, and attach undue importance to the imaginary and subjective in preference to the objective. The materialists and the illusionists, however, are not entirely composed of these two classes of subjective and objective thinkers. The majority consists of persons of moderate reasoning capacity, who simply follow their leaders.

In making a critical distinction between the psycho-organic brain and non-psychic body, the former may be confined strictly within the cranium, leaving the exterior portions of the head as a part of the non-psychic body; but as they are more intimately associated with the brain than any part below the neck, this distinction is not important; and if the whole head, as the environment of the psychic brain, be grouped with it, it may not lead to any material error. The brain is intimately associated with the entire physical person by twelve pairs of cranial or cerebral nerves, and by the spinal cord, which descends from the base of the brain through a great foramen or opening midway between the ears, and while passing down the spinal column gives off thirty pairs of nerves.

The cranial nerves are all for the head, except the pneumogastric or lung-stomach nerve, which belongs to the organs of respiration, voice, and digestion; and the spinal nerves are all for the body, except a few which ramify in the neck and in the scalp.

The entire nervous system is so instantaneously prompt in conveying to the brain the impressions which originate feeling, and in conveying from the brain the nervous energies that produce voluntary motion and modify all the processes of life, that we feel as if we had sensation and volition in every part of the body; or, in other words, that our conscious existence was in the body; but we rationally know that the sensation and volition occur in the brain, for neither sensation nor voluntary motion can occur if the nervous connection with the brain is interrupted by compression and section, or if the brain itself be sufficiently compressed. When the brain is exposed by an injury of the cranium, the pressure of a finger suspends all consciousness and volition, making a blank in the life of the individual.

Animal life resides in the nervous system alone, and its character is proportioned to the development thereof, of which the brain is the principal mass. A subordinate portion of the general life, however, is in the nervous system of the body, and in proportion as the brain declines in development the relative amount of psychic energy in the body is greater. Thus the body of the alligator after decapitation is capable of sensation and voluntary acts, such as pushing away an offending body with its foot. The character of the life in the body is explained by physiology and sarcognomy. Its universal presence is due to the universal diffusion of the nervous system, of which the accompanying figure, showing the location of the spinal cord and spinal nerves, will give a proper conception. In this figure the spinal cord, with its thirty pairs of nerves, eight cervical at the neck, twelve dorsal in the back, five lumbar in the loins, and five or six in the sacrum (between the hips), is seen descending from the base of the brain below the cerebellum (which is rather too large in engraving), and proceeding throughout the body until lost in fine ramifications which the microscope can scarcely trace, but which quickly inform us if they are touched or disturbed.

It cannot properly be said that the spinal cord proceeds from the brain, nor on the other hand that the brain proceeds from the spinal cord, for they originate simultaneously in a soft, jelly-like condition in which the microscope cannot detect the latent structure, not as they are in the adult, but as they are in the fœtus in which they first appear, with a structure similar to that of the lowest class of vertebrate animals, the fishes.

From this embryonic condition, in which there is very little resemblance to the adult brain, its progress has been carefully traced by many observers, but chiefly by Tiedemann, through all the stages of life before birth into the soft, infantile form of the human brain. Some knowledge of this embryonic growth is necessary to a correct understanding of the adult brain, its essential plan, its growth, and the correct estimate of its development.

I have not found in our anatomical works what I consider a satisfactory exposition of this subject. Beginning as a student with Spurzheim’s anatomy of the brain, which ought to have been the clearest and most complete of all, I found it so obscure and unsatisfactory that until I had made many dissections I had no very clear understanding. I have never found any pleasure in the writings of Spurzheim. In more recent authors the anatomical details are very abundant indeed, and sufficient to tax the memory heavily, but without that system and philosophy which appeal to the understanding and make our conceptions satisfactory, as I hope to make them to my readers, who must have very incorrect conceptions of the plan of the brain, if they have relied upon the writings of Mr. Combe and his successors of the phrenological school, none of whom, so far as I am aware, have really understood cerebral anatomy.

Let us approach the subject by taking an exterior and general view, then by tracing the embryonic growth of the brain, and the interior connections of its fibres, until we are fully prepared to judge of its development as it lies in the skull, and to understand the relation of each organ to all other portions. Then we can study its functions with a clear understanding of the relations of the organs to each other, which is the material basis of psychic science, and with full confidence in our ability to judge and compare living heads and skulls of man and animals.

Let us take an exterior view by removing one half of the skull from the right side of the head. This enables us to see that the front portion of the brain rests above the sockets of the eyes, coming down in the centre as low as the root of the nose, but a little higher exteriorly. When we touch the forehead just over the root of the nose, our finger touches the lowest level of the front lobe, the seat of the intellect; but when we touch the external angle of the brow on the same level, we touch a process of bone, and our finger is fully half an inch below the level of the brain.

In the posterior view we see that below the great mass of brain which is called the cerebrum there lies a smaller body, shaped much like a small turnip, called the cerebellum or little brain, separated from the cerebrum by a firm, horizontal membrane called the tentorium (covering the cerebellum), on which the cerebrum rests.

Head cutaway showing the brain: right rear.

The position of the tentorium can easily be ascertained in your own head by the fact that where it crosses the median line there is a little projection of bone called the occipital knob, very prominent on some persons, barely perceptible on others. After locating the occipital knob, a horizontal line forward will give us the portion of the tentorium. When we carry this line forward just over the cavity of the ear, thus locating the tentorium, we easily recognize below it the rounded prominence on each side in which the two hemispheres or halves of the cerebellum lie, with a depression between them on the median line. To make these and other observations on the head (which no one should neglect), the hand should be placed firmly on the scalp, so that as it slides on the bone we feel the form of the skull beneath. In most persons a distinct depression will be felt along the line of the tentorium, separating the cerebrum and cerebellum—the cerebellum being located at the summit of the neck, and extending down about as low as the end of the mastoid process, which is the large, long prominence just behind the cavity of the ear.

The cerebellum may be regarded as the physiological and the cerebrum as the psychic brain, for the cerebellum is void of intelligence and volition, but has important influences on the body. It may be considered, like the spinal cord, an intermediate structure between the controlling and conscious brain and the corporeal organs.

The tentorium does not entirely separate it from the cerebrum, for anteriorly it is open to permit the passage of the fibres which connect the cerebrum with the spinal cord and the cerebellum,—fibres which pass up midway between the right and left ear, so that a bullet fired horizontally through from ear to ear would sever the connection of the cerebrum with the bodily organs, producing instant death. This will be understood by looking at the profile of the interior of the right hemisphere, on which we see the position of the pons and the medulla and their relation to the cerebrum by their ascending fibres. As these ascending fibres correspond to a position just above the cavity of the ear, and as they are the channels of all muscular impulses, the reader will perceive that breadth of head immediately above the cavity of the ear must be associated with muscular impulsiveness.

The position of the cerebrum in the cranium may be best understood by sawing the head in two horizontally, taking out the brain, and looking down into the base of the skull, in which we see anteriorly a shelf for the front lobes, behind which are the cavities for the middle lobes, and behind that the rounded cavities for the cerebellum.

Cutaway of the bottom half of the skull, looking down from the top (no brain).

Thus the front lobe occupies the highest plane, resting on the vault of the sockets of the eyes, and extending back as far as the sockets. The middle lobe lies behind the sockets of the eyes and above the cavities of the ears, its base being as low as the bottom of the sockets of the eyes and corresponding nearly with the upper edge of the cheekbone, as it extends from the sockets to the side of the head just in front of the ears. In the posterior base of the skull, the reader will observe an opening (foramen magnum or large foramen) through which the spinal cord ascends. The spinal cord is exposed in the neck below the foramen.

Going back, we find the middle lobe rises higher, ascending over the cavity of the ear and resting upon the ridge of bone in which the apparatus of hearing is situated, thus reaching the level of the tentorium, on which the occipital lobe rests.

The bones of the cranium seen by looking down into the basis of the skull, as above, are the frontal bone over the eyes, the sphenoid bone, behind the sockets of the eyes, extending from the right to the left temple, the temporal bones, forming the ridge that holds the apparatus of hearing, and extending up about two inches on the side head, and the occipital bone at the back, between the two temporals, meeting the sphenoid bone in the centre of the base. The cerebellum rests in the deep double concavities of the occipital bone, and the spinal cord ascends through the large opening (foramen magnum) in the middle of its base, assuming the form called the medulla oblongata.

When we fully understand this view of the base of the skull, let us look at it in profile, and observe the frontal bone connected by the coronal suture to the parietal and the parietal by the squamous or scaly suture to the temporal, and by the lambdoid suture to the occipital. The sphenoid or bat-wing bone appears in the temples by its wing, between the frontal and temporal, while in the centre of the base its solid body is between the frontal and occipital.

The sphenoid bone is in contact with organs of sensitive delicacy, refinement, and inspiration, the occipital with organs of vital force, the temporal with organs of appetite, excitement, and force, the frontal with organs of intellect and refined benevolence, the parietal with the organs of virtue, amiability, self control, and general strength of character, which make a superior person.

Modern anatomists do not divide the brain into front, middle, and occipital lobes as would seem most natural, by erecting vertical lines from their bases, but follow up the oblique courses of the convolutions so as to extend the front lobe into the upper surface of the brain, and extend the middle lobe from the middle of the upper surface backward into the region of Self Confidence, giving the name of temporo-sphenoidal to its lower portion behind the sockets of the eyes and over the ears, which name is taken from the temporal bone, that contains the apparatus of hearing, forming the middle of the basis of the skull, and the sphenoid bone, which lies just back of the sockets of the eyes, supporting the front end of the lower portion of the middle lobe, called temporo-sphenoidal.

Left view of the brain, with parts labeled.

The sphenoid bone thus sustains the region of Sensibility, while the temporal bone lodges the organs of the most sensual, selfish, and violent impulses, the action of which is downward into the muscular and visceral organs of the body. The sphenoid bone as it extends up touches the base of the front lobe and of the Ideal region, where it assumes the name of Somnolence. (See the profile view of the cranium.)

The upper portion of the middle lobe has been given the name of parietal, as it has a general correspondence with the parietal bones, while the occipital lobe has a general correspondence in position with the occipital bone, as will be seen by comparing the plan of the brain seen in profile with the engraving of the cranium.

The plan of the brain is given, instead of an engraving of the actual convoluted surface, to simplify the study to the learner. An examination of the brain itself or of a good model offers at first sight such a vague and irregular mass of convolutions, differing so much in different brains, that any systematic arrangement would seem impossible. But by studying the subject more extensively and considering the structure of the simpler brains of animals, in which the complexity of the human brain is reduced to simpler forms, a mode of grouping and classifying the convolutions has been adopted by anatomists which is illustrated by the engraving, in which we see, not the numerous convolutions of a well developed human brain, but the groups in which they have been arranged by the aid of comparative anatomy.

The front lobe is grouped into the superior, middle, and inferior convolutions, or groups of convolutions, and the ascending frontal; but the inspection of a brain would show an irregularity of forms in which a casual observer would be puzzled to trace this arrangement.

The appearance of the brain, divested of its membranes, when we look upon its superior surface, is shown in the annexed engraving, in which it is presented as it lies in the head when the cranium and membranes are removed which form the rim of the figure. The front lobe is the upper portion, and the outline of the nose is just visible. In the full exposition of this subject hereafter in a larger work, I propose to show the exact seats of the various functions in the convolutions, which are much more irregular than the angular figures we make on the surface of the head to show the average positions of organs. Of course no intelligent person supposes the psychological maps and busts of the organs to be representations of the brain, or anything more than approximations to the true interior organology, which, however, do not lead to any great error, as adjacent portions of convolutions have very analogous functions.

Top cutaway of a skull, showing the brain. The nose of the head is at the bottom of the picture.

When we place the brain on its upper surface and inspect the bottom, we observe at the back the cerebellum, which dips into the neck, the middle lobe, which is over the ears and the side face, and the front lobe, which rests over the eyes.

We observe posteriorly the medulla oblongata, on the face of which we may observe the crossing of the fibres, and on the side of which we observe the origins of many nerves. Above the medulla we observe the pons Varolii, just above which we observe the fibres ascending to each hemisphere under the name of crus cerebri, or thigh of the cerebrum. Next we see the optic nerves crossing on the median line, the olfactory nerve, running under the front lobe, which is separated by the fissure of Sylvius from the middle lobe. There is also a glimpse of the corpus callosum at its anterior end, obtained by pulling the front lobes apart at the median line.

View of the (labeled) brain from below. Brain stem at the bottom of the picture.

Let us next cut through the head exactly on the median line, dividing the right and left hemispheres, and look at the inner face of the right hemisphere. We observe that it has convolutions, just like the exterior surface, which do not join across the median line, but are separated from those of the left hemisphere by a firm membrane (an extension of the dura mater or principal investing membrane) called the falx, which is removed, leaving the convolutions in view.

The reader will observe that it is only in the lower portion of the engraving that he sees any surfaces produced by cutting to separate the right and left halves of the brain. It is by these structures which are here divided that the right and left halves are connected, so that the whole brain is adapted to acting in a unitary manner.

The first section we encounter as we pass down is that of the corpus callosum, a body of white fibre firmer than the external surface of the brain, and therefore called the corpus callosum or callous body, which consists of white nerve fibres gathered in from nearly all parts of the brain on each side and crossing the median line. We may regard it as a mass of representative fibres rooted in the soft substance of the convolutions or gray matter of the brain generally, and thus connecting across the median line the corresponding parts of the right and left brain.

It must be borne in mind that the brain like the body is double, and that every organ is fully developed in each brain, so that no amount of injury or paralysis of organs would deprive us of any faculty, unless corresponding parts were destroyed in each hemisphere.

The left brain governs the right half of the body, and the right brain governs the left half, the connecting fibres having their crossing (called decussation) in the spinal cord. Hence the left brain is usually more fully developed in the occipital and basilar regions than the right, in right handed people, as may frequently be detected by a careful examination of the head, or an inspection of the interior the skull. The left brain, also, seems to have a general ascendency over the right; so that paralysis of speech is most generally produced by disease in the region of language on the left side.

Whatever occurs on one side of the body is in relation to the opposite side of the head. Paralysis, if not dependent on the spinal cord, is dependent on the basilar region of the opposite side of they brain; and conditions of the right eye affect the lower margin of the left front lobe, in which the perceptive organs are situated.

If we thrust our fingers into the brain immediately under the corpus callosum, pushing away the delicate little structure called the septum lucidum (or translucent septum), and pressing down fornix (which is a thin, horizontal nerve membrane) we find that our fingers enter a cavity by pressing its walls apart, of which the corpus callosum is the vault or roof,—a cavity which may be explored back and forth, far into the interior of the occipital lobe within an inch of the surface, and far into the front lobe, near the surface of the frontal convolutions, as well as downwards and forwards into the bottom of the middle lobe (the part called temporo-sphenoidal). These extensions of this great cavity or ventricle are called the anterior and posterior horns (cornua) and the descending horn (cornu).

Their importance arises from the fact that in these ventricles of the right and left sides of the brain a watery fluid, effused from the blood, called serum, exists, which also extends downward along the spinal cord, and which has to do with the pressure and equilibrium of the various parts. When there is a strong pressure of blood to the brain on account of its unusual activity, especially in the activity of the emotions, the serum of the ventricles and also in the substance of the brain is absorbed, and the brain acquires a more compact texture, which is found in all persons of strong mentality, the brain being hardened by exercise, as well as the muscles. But when the action of the brain is feeble, and the blood in an impoverished condition, there is a greater tendency to the exudation of fluid; the substance of the brain is thereby softened, and serum, to the extent of one or more ounces, is frequently found in the ventricles, especially when the brain is much impaired by disease of its substance. In some cases of hydrocephalus pints of serum are effused, distending the brain and head enormously, and in many cases of insanity the ventricles and membranes of the brain are distended with serum. “Pritchard on Insanity” speaks of this distention of the ventricles, which were “very full of serum” in twenty-nine out of a hundred cases, and “in twenty-three ready to burst,” and “in ten among twenty-four melancholies astonishingly distended.” Dr. Spurzheim dissected a case of hydrocephalus, child of eighteen months, with two and a half pounds of water in the membranes of the brain; and James Cardinal, who died at the age of thirty years in London, had a pint of water in the lateral ventricles, and about nine pints between the brain and its membranes.

A. C. LADD	Publisher.
G. W. KATES	Editor.

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BUCHANAN’S
JOURNAL OF MAN.

CONTENTS.

Psychometry: The Divine Science.

A Modern Miracle Worker.

Human Longevity.

Justice to the Indians.

Miscellaneous Intelligence.

Chapter II—Structure of the Brain.

BUSINESS DEPARTMENT.

College of Therapeutics.

BUCHANAN’S JOURNAL OF MAN.

CONTENTS.

Psychometry: The Divine Science.

A Modern Miracle Worker.

Human Longevity.

Justice to the Indians.

Miscellaneous Intelligence.

Chapter II—Structure of the Brain.

BUSINESS DEPARTMENT.

College of Therapeutics.

BUCHANAN’S
JOURNAL OF MAN.