IRLF 1 _ 'Q -THE- -'-JOHN -FF CHINESE- Ll IYER- BRARY - WINDOWS OF CHARACTER AND OTHER STUDIES IN SCIENCE AND ART. BY REV. EDWARD PAYSON THWING, M.D., Pn.D., L FELLOW OF THE LONDON SOCIETY OF SCIENCE, LETTERS AND ART, MEMBER OF THE BRITISH MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, VICTORIA INSTITUTE, NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, ACADEMY OF ANTHRO- POLOGY, N. Y. MEDICO-LEGAL SOCIETY, ETC., ETC., NEW YORK : LONDON : M. L. HOLBROOK & CO. S. W. PARTRIDGE & CO. IOHN FRYER CHINESE LIBRARY TO SIR JAMES GRANT, M.D., F.R.C.P., Lond., etc. IN TOKEN OF HIS PERSONAL AND PROFESSIONAL \VQRTH, THIS VOLUME IS, BY HIS FRIENDLY PERMISSION, RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. The artist first makes his study. It may be a mere outline of what he is to paint, a fragment, a memory, yet full of suggestive hints for future elaboration. These papers are but STUDIBS in Science, Art and Character ; Thoughts for Thinkers. They outline, rather than finish ; they recall, suggest, analyze. The synthesis that begins with careful analysis, ends in a system, not in a hypothesis. If abler hands find helpful data here, the author will be amply repaid. Citations in one paper may perhaps be found in another. These are not, however, vain repetitions. References to local circumstances made in the original addresses are preserved. They will not detract from the general interest of the themes presented. The aim of the whole has been to verify the beautiful figure borrowed from the ancient Athenian torch race, "WE, SWIFT RUNNERS, PASS FROM HAND TO HAND LIGHTED TOUCHES. " To the thousands who have honored him with their patient hearing in the lecture room, the college or the church, on either side the sea, these silent pages give again his grateful greeting. 6ia6i6oftsv 751617 CONTENTS* Page. WINDOWS OF CHAEACTER ; THE VOICE, THE EYE, THE HAND, THE STEP, delivered in London, 1882. - 9 A PERSUASIVE VOICE ; London, 1883. 23 PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES ; Academy of Anthropology, New York, 1888. 33 MENTAL AUTOMATISM ; A Prize Essay, 1888. ... 49 A CLINICAL AND FORENSIC STUDY OF TRANCE ; Medico-Legal Society, New York 1889. 73 THE BASIS OF REMEDIAL SCIENCE, an Inaugural Address, New Jersey Medical College, 1889. 95 THE MYSTERY AND MASTERY OF MEN ; American Institute of Phrenology, New York 1884. 109 THE PERIL OF THE CITY ; Manhattan Association, 1889, - 123 AMERICAN LIFE, As related to Inebriety, London, 1888. - - 129 VOCAL AND MUSICAL CULTURE IN AMERICA, London, 1888. 141 THE WORKS OF CANOVA, a University Thesis. - - - - 149 INDEX. Page. Academy of Anthropology.. 33, 48 Agassiz, unselfish 35 Alcibiades and Socrates 44 American Nervousness 133 Architecture and Elocution. . . 145 Asinine Criticism 165 Automat ism 51 Bayard Taylor 135 Beard, Dr. G. M 72, 130 Bells of Antwerp 24 Bonaparte and Canova 152 Canova a Reformer 163 Character like a Cathedral .... 10 Church Work in Cities 125 Conversational Power 44 Cosmopolitan America 137 Criminal Anthropology 101 Crowded Homes 124 Deceptions discovered 90 Detectives and Trance 92 Disguised Artist 172 Environment 68 Erethism of Trance 83 Erratic and Erotic Feelings ... 116 Experience of Agassiz 80 Experts 70, 87, 88 Eyes 12 Fascination of Angelo 44 Flaxman and Canova 154 Forsyth a critic 150 French Revolution 128 Garb of Statues 164 Generosity of Canova 176 Gentleness a Power .... 27, 32, 120 Gesture and Character 18 Greek Architecture 40 Handel's Music 173 Heaven a City 127 Hurried Lives 134 Huxley on Science 50 Hypnotism and Surgery 59 Imagination 61, 107 Indocility, unscientific 67 Insanity in the U. S 105, 139 Intense Study 136 Involuntary Life 73 Jarves on Art 155 Jarvis, Dr. W. C 180 Kindness, a Language 31 Kinglinessof Science 101 Laboratories, Psychological . . 55 Law and Psychology 76 Page. Lecture System 145 Legal Testimony 83 London Churches 125 London Society of Science . . . 148 Materialism sterilizes 36 Medical Expert 87 Mental Therapeutics 106 Mendelssohn and the Opera. . . 179 Methods of Canova 153, 175 Metaphysics defined 34 Nancy, Experiments at 46 Non-experts a peril 70 Nude in Art 156, 169, 179 Ocular Illusions 84 Oscar WildQ 178 Pantomime 17 Personal Equation 52, 97 Personal Magnetism. ..43, 111, 115 Pseudo-^Esthetics 177 Psychic Contagion 54 Purity in Artists 174 Remedy for Infidelity 47 Roubiliac's Methods 178 Rhetoric of Persuasion 28 Ruskin 156, 170 Seasickness cured 57 Senses untrustworthy 83 Science a tacking Ship 50 Scientific Candor 67 Soul an Ocean 109 Stars in Sparks 156 Statues, location, material 159 Suicide in Trance 94 Sympathy, rain and mist 41 Temperaments 116 Theology and Psychology 78 Thermal Changes 132 Thought Transference 64 Tobacco Heart 132 Trance explained 78 Trance Testimony worthless . . 84 Unconsciousness, active 50 Unity of Sciences 38 Usurpation of Science 35 Voice, in America 144 Vulgarity of Americans 170 Wandering Imbecile 164 Will, free 68 Will of the Insane 68 Wit of Erskine 118 Youth a June Morning 9 Youthful Dullards 45 WINDOWS OF CHARACTER: THE VOICE, THE EYE, THE HAND, THE STEP. It is a joy to me, this bright, June morning, to talk to you, students of Euston College, about Life and Character, their silent forces and their grand results. One of your own poets has said that life is a casket, valuable not for itself alone, but for what you put into it. Life is not measured by years, but by deeds. It is rich and royal, grand and opulent when filled with thought and effort, love and labor, aspiration, toil and victory ! It is a June morning with you all. It is early autumn with me. But the Alps lead to the Appenines, the glacier to the vineyard, and January leads on again to June. Life's autumn and winter bring in eternal summer. As the morning is the prophecy of noon, so is youth of manhood and woman- hood. The golden gates are just opened to you, dear friends the doors of opportunity but soon, as with me, they will begin to swing the other way. Be Delivered at Euston College, London, Jnne 27, 1882. 10 Windows of Character. earnest, then, to make the most of life and its mag. nificent possibilities ! Follow'the advice of Holmes in his " Nautilus " : : BUiid thee more stately mansions, O niyoul, As the swift seasons roll ! Leave thy low vaulted past, Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from Heaven with dome more vast, 'Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea ! The silent forces of character and their grand re- sults, who can even catalogue them, still less de- scribe ? The will, the conscience, memory, imagin- ation, the judgment, the sensibilities and the affec- tions all those glorious gifts that form the dowry of each richer than all Victoria's jewels, how I should love to talk to you about their place, their possibilities, and their discipline. But there are, among many others, four indices of character to which I wish to turn your thought : the Voice, the Eye, the Hand, the Step. We will call them " Win- dows." Character, like an illuminated cathedral, reveals itself through many windows. Some men, indeed, are more transparent than others. The distributive and penetrating power of personality varies with in- dividuals. Some, like the cathedral, are luminous with commanding beauty, vocal with music, and shed an atmosphere of warmth and fragrance about The Magnetic Sphere. 11 them. The savor or flavor of others is so subtle and elusive that you can not at first detect it. The . melody of some shrinking souls is so quiet that you do not catch it. There is no speech or language; their voice is not heard ; yet their influence goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. Some vainly seek to veil the windows and to shut in the incense and the song. They fancy that spirit can be caged, pent in by bar and bolt, by hasp and clasp of self-restraint and silence. But it is impossible for one to thus stand guard over himself and hide the revelation of his inner life. Character is self -revealing, as ointment on the hand, Solomon says, betrays itself. Whether we will or not, this spiritual efflux, call it character, influence, deportment, or whatever you choose, will disclose it- self. This physical, mental, and moral atmosphere we are to analyze is what some have termed "the mag- netic sphere." It belongs to a person as inevitably as the light belongs to the sun, or odorous sweetness to an orange-grove. The importance of understanding all that goes to make up one's bearing can hardly be overestimated. To old or young, to peer or peasant, this knowledge is a key to success anywhere. " Prepare yourself," says Chesterfield, " for the world as the athletes used to do for their exercises ; oil your mind and your manners, to give them the necessary suppleness and 12 Windows of Character. flexibility; strength alone will not do." Noble man- ners are not bred in moments, but in years, as Bishop Huntington has said. They come "of goodness, of sincerity, of refinement. The principle that rules your life is the sure posture-master." The bloom on the peach and the golden hue on the corn came from maturity within and not through human art. So we can get out of life and character no more than we put in. The external refulgence is measured by the inward illumination. The Eye, the Voice, the Hand, and the Step are four prominent windows out of which designedly or unconsciously every one's personality shines. Win- dows vary in size and in clearness, and so with these avenues through which the soul's life hourly pours. The principles, however, that we are to examine re- main the same in all the diversities of application. THE HUMAN EYE. The great engineer Stephenson was once asked the mightiest power in nature, and he said that it was a woman's eye, for it would send a man to the ends of the earth, and that same eye would bring him home again. Some eyes are so liquid and deep that Emerson fitly calls them "wells into which one might fall." Others, he says, have no more expression than blueberries. Some are ask. ing eyes, some assertive, some prowling, some full of bayonets. " The eyes of men converse as much as their tongues, with the advantage that the ocular dialect needs no dictionary, but is understood all the The Human Eye. 13 world over. Each man carries in his eye the exact indication of his rank in the immense scale of men, and we are always learning to read it. The reason why men do not obey us is because they see the mud at the bottom of our eye." It is said that gamblers rely more upon the expres- sion of the eye of their opponent to discover the state of the game than upon anything else. Bushnell tells of a preacher he knew whose eyes were " six-shoot- ers, "keen, gray, individualizing, loaded with thought and emotion, and leveled directly at each hearer in turn. There was no special merit in the style or sub- stance of his speech, but his penetrating eye made every one feel that eye-bolts were shooting surely and swiftly into the very soul. Of some eyes Shake- speare says : " They are the books, the arts, the academies That show, contain, and nourish all the world." Tennyson tells of other eyes that are " Homes of silent prayer." In Eber's "Egyptian Princess," Sap- pho's lover said, "If you had whispered 'I hate you !' your eyes would have told me with a thousand glad voices that you loved me." Brutes are kept at bay by the eye. The tamer and trainer govern, by a glance, creatures that could easily crush them did they know their power. So the human eye is at once a weapon of defense and assault cf incomparable strength. "Next to the voice in 14 Windows of Character. effectiveness," says Cicero," is the countenance, and this is ruled over by the eyes." In Delsarte's system there are seven hundred and twenty-nine expressions of the eye, grouped of follows : normal, indifferent, morose, somnolent, contemptuous, deeply reflective, surprised, and resolute. But, as in music, so here, the chromatic scales and gamuts of expression beg- gar all description. Darwin's work on the " Expres- sion of the emotions of Men and Animals " is a help- ful treatise.* The matter of facial expression is a copious sub- ject, and will find fuller treatment as we study an- other of the avenues through which one's character and personality find outlet, the voice. THE VOICE. This is regarded by many as the truest index of character. The mouth has two thou- sand one hundred and eighty-seven well-defined phases of expression, thrice those of the speaking eye. The lips are " curved and channeled with the memorials of a thousand thoughts and impulses." In the beautiful phrase which Wordsworth applied to the mountains, it may be said, the lips " look familiar with forgotten years," recording, as they do, the his- tory of the life of which they are the instrument of expression. Here, however, we trench on the domain of Physiognomy. It is the voice itself, rather than * Vide Thwing's "Drill-Book in Vocal Culture and Geg ture,"pp. 91-111. The Voice. 15 its mechanism, that we have to do with. This is "the key-stone which gives stability to all the rest," says Dr. W. M. Taylor. Effective utterance gives force to feeble thought, " while careless, hesitating, and indistinct speech will make the finest composi- tion fall flat and powerless on the listener's e"ar." It was the inward life that gave the speech of Christ that mysterious power it had over men. "Never man spake like this man," they said. As Jerome says of Paul, " His words were thunder, because his life was lightning." As we contrast the sparkle of the eye in a viva- cious, intelligent youth, with the vacant stare of a microcephalous idiot, so we may set over against each other the indistinct, muffled, and reluctant tones of a person who is shamming, or trying to con- ceal truth, and the clear, clean, frank tones of an- other who speaks with the emphasis of conviction. The masterful power of Mirabeau, it is said, was in his larnyx. " He ruled tumultuous assemblies, not by the lightning of his thought, but by the thunder of his throat." But there was a vehement soul beat- ing below his larynx that revealed its passionate emotion in tones that electrified an audience. Speak- ing of the witchery which the voices of certain dra- matic artists possess, M. Legouve, of the French Academy, says: "It seems as if there were a little sleeping fairy in their throat, who wakes as soon as they speak, and, touching them with her wand, 16 Windows of Character. kindles in them unknown powers. The voice is an invisible actor concealed in the actor, a mysterious reader concealed in the reader, and serves as a blower for both." The hidden fairy that sleeps in the singer, actor, or orator is Emotion. Only what is in the soul can come out of it. As Prof. Mathew s justly observes: " The magnetic force must saturate one's own spirit before it will flow out upon those around him an invisible efflux of personal power which radiates like heat from iron ; which attracts and holds an audience as a magnet draws and holds steel-filings." A lecturer once asked a hearer at the close of the lecture: "What did you think of my train of thought?" "It lacked only one thing." "Pray what was that ?" "Your train only needed a sleep- ing-car ! " A drowsy heart will inspire sleepy tones, to lull, like poppy-juice, those on whom they fall ; whereas an electric nature makes a man a magician, like Antiphon at Athens, who affirmed that he could heal mental diseases with words, or, like the modern psychologist, who works similar marvels, by his voice alone. The fiery invectives of Burke made Warren Hastings feel for the time that he was "the most culpable being on earth." Philip of Macedon said of Demosthenes: "Had I been there, he would have persuaded me to take up arms against myself." A glowing, ebullient nature not only sets "logic on fire," producing what is called eloquence, but often The Hand. 17 exerts a more commanding power over a hearer. Mere oratorical eloquence we can admire, analyze, and criticise, but with a magnetic vocal delivery we are spell-bound in spite of ourselves. THE HAND. This furnishes us with a third index. I do not refer to the assumptions of Palmistry or Chiromancy, that is, divination by the hand. In the dark ages Paracelsus and others elaborated a system by which they pretended to find out one's destiny by examining the lineaments of the hand. Wandering gypsies still continue the imposition among the credulous and curious. The shape and texture of the hand and other physical features do, indeed, reveal much of the temper, the health and the employments of the possessor, but it is rather with the conscious and unconscious movements of the hand that we now have concern. What to do with the hands is a difficult question with the callow youth and the untrained speaker. Their self-consciousness is shown by this form of embarrassment. As character is matured, some skill at concealment is gained, but after all, the mo- tions of the hands, taken in connection with other acts, betray feeling and purpose to one who has studied their signs. THE PANTOMIME is a vivid illustration of the power of "pictures in the air" to reveal intention. In its rudest form, gesticulation was the silent language of barbarians. It is said that one could have traveled 18 Windows of Character. from Hudson's Bay, to the Gulf of Mexico, centuries ago, by the help of the pantomime. Only six of 150 signs used by the Indians of that day need explana- tion. The oriental " winketh with his eyes, speaketh with his feet and teacheth with his fingers." Prov. vi., 13. Canova once held a silent interview with a Neapolitan by hand and eye alone. These quick mo- tions of the hand form the alphabet of mutes. One of them will tell the story of a shipwreck, for ex- ample, so that an intelligent idea is gained of the thrilling scene. By "the talking hand" Greek audi- ences were held hour after hour, entranced by this form of mimetic art. The general use to-day of pen and type has made us poorer in certain resources of impressive speech. CHARACTER IN GESTURE is revealed in much the same way as in vocal tones. The positive man uses a vigorous downward motion, as he uses downward inflections of voice in strong, assertive utterances ; the apologetic person uses slower and less forcible gesture, as he speaks in quieter tones. The glowing imagination naturally indulges in descriptive gest- ures wider in range than those which accompany merely didactic speech. Mobility of the hand, as of the mouth, is not altogether a natural gift. Culture gives wonderful expressiveness, not only to conscious, but to involuntary motions of the hand, as to those of the head. Delsarte says that an edu- cated man, wishing to look at an object on either The Step. 19 side, will turn first his eye, then his head, and lastly, if needful, the whole body, but a clown turns with one motion and at one moment, eye, head and body. This whole matter is thus connected with the last point . THE STEP. Your coach is a deceptive index of your true condition in life, but by your "carriage" you are known and read of all men. It is more than a figure of speech when the Bible associates character with one's "WALK and conversation," and again, when it says, "having done all, stand." "The drill- master's first command to the soldier is, "Stand well!" The apostle's last injunction is the same. God's special blessing is on the upright. Such are likely to be downright. Positive characters and weak ones are thus distinguished. The reveler reels, the miser stoops, and the voluptuary yawns, but the true man shows his inward disposition by his out- ward bearing. He stands, not as the pugilist or fencer, with one side advanced, as in a hostile ati- tude to give or to take a blow, but cequo pectore, uniting self-possession and dignity with gentleness and grace. One's manner is more than his manners. The latter are acquired and are often so artificial that we call them mannerisms, and regard them offensive. But one's mien or air is inclusive of far more than those arts and artifices learned in the schools. The whole outward appearance, including the dress, goes to make up this atmosphere which 20 Windows of Character. one carries wherever he goes. His habits make his " habit," the garb in which, and by which he is known day by day, a " second nature," as we say. His cus- tom becomes a costume, which he rarely lays aside. As Dry den says : " The habits are the same We wore last year." " When we strive To strip them, 'tis being flayed alive," adds Cowper, with profound truth. The wiry, nervous man moves with rapid gait ; the phlegmatic man with heavy step, and so on with vari- ous temperaments. Then there are other principles that form a test, illustrated, for instance, in the stealthy, creeping movements of the thief, the halt- ing step of the inquisitive, or the aimless walk of the day-dreamer. " I know that man has been a soldier," said one. " How ?" "I know it by his walk." He carried the trunk and shoulders steady and firm, while the motion of walking brought into action the lower limbs. The turning in of the toes is not a favorable sign. Some associate it with mental weak- ness. A shuffling gait is another tell-tale sign of character. But to go into details would require a volume. A school to teach youth to walk has been established in Philadelphia. A noble, graceful car- riage is a more useful accomplishment than dancing. If shoemakers will only help the teachers of such a The Eye. 21 school by making sensible shoes, there might be hope of seeing here the graceful step one notices among the humblest Spanish peasants. But art will never impart the polish which true culture gives. It is the soul within that illumines the face, that gives a per- suasive charm to the voice and perfection to gesture and to step. Here ethics and aesthetics unite. It is "by his personality," as Goethe says, that man acts on man. If one wishes to charm or to command by either of these functions it will be through the cul- ture of the moral sensibilities, largely. By such a training, a person will come to wield by his walk and talk, his eye and his unconscious gestures, a power over his fellows alike masterful and beneficent. Pope truly says, u WORTH makes the Man, and want of it the fellow. . . 'Tis from high LIFE high Characters are drawn." This is a daily work. As Longfellow saw the village smithy toil from morn to night, something attempted, something each day done, so " at the flaming forge of life Our fortunes must be wrought ; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped, Each burning deed and thought ! " Then, fellow students, will your character, like the illuminated cathedral, full of light, melody and in- cense, pour out the same from every window. Your eyes and lips, your hands and feet will unconsciously 22 Windows of Character. reveal a knightly soul, sweet, radiant, commanding. Again I congratulate you on your privileges in this college, in this historic city, and in this goodly land. You wear the scholar's gown and cap. Put on, as well, the true manliness of the scholar, and let your lives grow richer and more resplendent as the years roll by. Then will your earthly studies fit you the better for the fellowships, employments and enjoyments of a better life. "We bow our heads At going out. We rise and enter straight Another golden chamber of the King's, Larger than this we leave, and holier." A PERSUASIVE VOICE. There are various voices of Nature. Last Tuesday I spent an hour of restful enjoyment on the cliffs at Eastbourne, .overlooking the shining waters that divide these shores from France. It was a season of serene solitude, undisturbed by foot or voice of man. Alone with nature and with nature's God, I learned lessons that I could not learn here in the roar of Lon- don. JThe bright tranquility of earth and sky and sea lifted my thoughts to heaven's crystal sea. The day previous brought a storm, and that had voices too. The seasons have their changeful speech, win- some and austere by turns, but always admon- itory. Youth has its voice, when every step is a bound, and every breath a song ; age, too, when the daughters of music are brought low. Life in all its phases of grief and joy, at home and in lands remote, has its voices. The closet, the sanctuary, the ceme- teryhave theirs, in a figurative sense, but the Human Delivered July 29, 1883, at Tolmer's Square Church, London. 24 A Persuasive Voice. Voice is a reality more potent and palpable than those already named. It is a marvelous weapon of assault, defence or persuasion. It has a capacity for improve- ment immeasurable. In song and speech, in prayer and praise, in oratory and in argument, it is a power of which we have but a feeble conception. Each of these "mouthfuls of air" is a blessing or a bane, for life and death are in the keeping of the tongue. More august, however, than human speech or any of the voices of nature was the " Voice from the excel- lent glory, "of which the apostle speaks 2 Peter i. 17. It is not earthly or angelic, but deific. Yet it is in- telligible, authoritative and consolatory. This celes- tial voice loses none of its sweetness and purity by coming down into the dissonance of a noisier sphere. Some of you have heard the famous Antwerp chime of bells, ninety and eight of them, that have for cen- turies been ringing through storm and sunshine; now a marriage peal, now a funeral knell ; as cheer, fully when Castilian butchers made the streets run rod with martyrs' blood, as when they announced the birth or marriage of a king. No matter how dark the sky or thick the atmosphere through which their pulsations throb, high, airy, distant, their har- monies are daily wafted down amid the jarring dis- cords of the street to cheer and quicken the heart with thought of a better sphere. So does this voice out of the cloud, heard by the disciples on "a high mountain apart," which issued not from a human The Heavenly Voice. 25 source, but from the "excellent glory" of Heaven, teach us of God's unspeakable Gift and quicken us with its supernal sweetness. " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." This certification of the character and cre- dentials of Christ is an authoritative message. Let him that hath ears, hear and heed. It is an impera- tive call, coming from One who has the right to com- mand. How shall we escape, if we turn away from Him who speaketh from Heaven ? To reject this call is to reject life, The gift of God is Eternal Life, and this life is found alone in Christ. Hear ye HIM ! But this celestial call is one of consolation. It comes from Him who is the center and source of peace. In the world, our Lord says, we shall have tribulation. In Him we have peace. Earth is full of care. It was not made to give us abiding rest. Its atmosphere is full of sighs. Science tells us that the bulk of nature's voices are pitched on the minor key. The winds sob, the waves moan and the voice of many a beast and bird have the tone of complaint and un- rest. But this is a voice of peace. Moreover, there is continuing and unwasting sweet- ness in this voice from the upper realm. The story and the glory of God's grace continue through the ages heard above earth's riot, more heavenly and jubilant than Antwerp's ancient chime. It is the "Old, old story" which is forever new. When all other earthly voices die away upon the ear, this will 26 A Persuasive Voice. abide in undecaying purity and power, for it is the voice of the King Eternal, the same yesterday, to-day and forever. These and many other thoughts suggested by the phrase quoted might be dwelt upon at length. There is one practical lesson, however, which winners of souls may well heed. The manner in which we pre- sent Christ to men has much to do with our success. The tone in which we say ' ' Behold the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world ; " the method of approach to the indifferent or hardened hearer ; the attitude we take in meeting the inquiring, the de- spairing or the shrinking soul, will win or alienate as we follow, or as we forget, the example given in this voice from the excellent glory. The teacher or preacher who would persuade men, must speak the truth in love, cultivating at once a tender compas- sion for sinning souls lying under the thrall of Satan and a loyal, loving sympathy with Jesus, to whose almighty grace it is our glad employ to bring them. John Newton wrote this text in large characters on his study walls at Olney: "Remember that thou wast a bondman in the land of Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee." Gentleness is often power in repose. It is the beauty which should ever be wed- ded to strength. It is " the scented flame of an ala- baster lamp, yielding both light, warmth and fra- grance. It is the tenderness of feeling, the glow of love; it is promptitude of sympathy, everything in- Austerity of Speech. %7 eluded in that matchless grace, the gentleness of Christ." There is, indeed, a time for martial virtues and for valiant words. There is a stormy eloquence befitting stormy times, that reminds one of the hurricane which nothing can divert or control. Demosthenes took his audiences by storm. His arguments and appeals marched forward like invincible squadrons, crushing everything in their way violent and venge- ful, coercive and peremptory. There are those who uniformly adopt a style of speech that is minatory and defiant, autocratic and triumphant. Their only aim seems to be to demolish their opponents. Their model is Phocion, whose power of argument was that of a falling ax, which flew swift, sure and with re- lentless energy. One dreads to fall under their merciless logic, feeling, as Whately says the Romans did, who would often hold out in a hopeless siege a longer time because they dreaded the humiliation of passing under the yoke. Personally, these imperious speakers may be the most genial of men. Their austere, rigorous and Draconian style of argument is only a rhetorical dress. They disclaim the slightest ruffle of personal resentment toward their antagonist. They never dream that the habit of their mind has affected their style of composition, and that, in turn, has made their voice sterner, more dictatorial, and sometimes objugatory. It does not come from "the excellent glory." I heard one of these preachers who 28 A Persuasive Voice. presented the usual arguments for future punish, ment, ending each division of the discourse in a tone of triumphant satisfaction. His arguments were co- gent and conclusive, but his tone inspired disgust, and so disbelief. He imitated JEschylus, who cried: "Blood for blood and blow for blow ! " The power of gentleness was wholly unrecognized in his rhetoric, logic and vocal delivery. How can we preach on such an appalling theme otherwise than in tears? "Of whom I now tell you, weeping " was Paul's expres- sion of sympathy. A parent that chides or corrects his child in a cold, unfeeling manner, with no pity in his eye, no tremor in voice or hand, hardens him. The child himself is defenceless and weak. He submits outwardly but nurses rebellion within. A single tear would have melted the icy obstinacy and brought the cringing culprit to his knees in sorrowing repent- ance. O for that insight of love, to which all hearts capitulate ! Pre-eminently does the public speaker need it. It helps him in the composition of his dis- course. It enriches his vocabulary with those con- ciliatory utterances which disarm opposition, and makes his most unpremediated speech like ointment poured forth. By not a whit does he need to lower the stringent and compulsory nature of truth, but his phrases are so formed and adjusted that he conquers by new modes of assault. Quibbling, sophistry, eva- sion, cant, subterfuge in his opponent, are met, not by sarcasm, which only exasperates, or by scorn, but Conciliatory Methods. 29 by a quietude of manner which veils, oftentimes a tremendous amount of reserved strength, by a sin- cere candid spirit of concession, which often half- persuades the objector to yield all, and by a frank, in- genuous manliness that challenges fairness in an antagonist. There are nameless and numberless arts of per- suasion that lurk in language, in facial expression and in gesture itself, which no winner of souls can afford to despise. Nearly thirty years of preach- ing, and many years of public and private teaching, only have impressed me with my own poverty in the resources of persuasion. The drift away from the sanctuary in many communities is a fact to be in- terpreted in the light of this question of persuasive speech. When shall we learn that the " gentleness" of God makes one great ? Its conquering power is yet to be learned. Without omitting the preceptive and assertive the dogmatic style, if you please may we not gain reluctant ears of tener by the interro- gative form of appeal ? Christ often accomplished more by indirections than by direct assault. He was a master of persuasive speech. He did not confine himself to declarative forms, but continually made the hearer a judge in his own case. " What do you think of this ? What would you say of that ? Isn't it thus and so ? " Without a parable he spake not unto them. He knew how to awaken curiosity. He disarmed opposition by the tone of his voice which 30 A Persuasive Voice. was like ointment poured forth, and by the phrases used. His thoughts were " apples of gold," while his speech was like ''baskets of silver." Men wondered at the gracious words that proceeded out of his lips. * ' Do you write for the Ear as well as for the Eye ? " a student once asked me. " Certainly," was the answer, "it is the charm of written composition to express oneself so naturally in structure and in tone that a blind person listening would not suspect the presence of a manuscript. If one writes with an audi- ence of living souls before his thought, his sentences will not be long and involved. They will be colloquial and euphonious, easy to read and easy to remember. This alluring subject will, however, lead us too far from the central thought that underlies this analysis of vocal delivery and written speech, namely Heart Culture. As I have said in my Drill-Book in Vocal Culture, "Art can give us rules, but the fervor, solem- nity and power that move the conscience and the will, must be the natural and not the assumed expres- sion of the man." There is no teacher like the Holy Spirit. He in- spires not only spiritual but real rhetorical power. With his annointing oil on our lips and the salt of his grace in our speech, we shall speak as from the ex- cellent glory. The weary will be cheered, the wan- derer restored, the caviller silenced and the hungry soul will be fed. Daniel Webster's voice was called a trumpet, but Channing's was a harp of matchless The Secret of Power. 31 sweetness. A skeptic once complained to Dr. Chaii- ning of the severity of Christ's denunciation of the Pharisees. The man of God read the passage in tones so calm, solemn and sympathetic that the dis- believer exclaimed : "If He spoke that way, my ob- jection is withdrawn.'' The trumpet has its place. So has the harp. Strength and beauty are in the sanctuary, and they both alike adorn a symmetrical life. Self-mastery is indispensible to the mastery of others. In "the very torrent and tempest'' of eloquence, there is, as Shakespeare suggests, "a temperance that may give it smoothness." The calmness of suppressed emotion is mightier than th'3 frantic expressions of uncontrolled passion. Mark Antony, stifling his sorrow, concealing his grief, begged the Romans to bear with him till his heart, coffined with CaBsar, should come back to him. Thus the imagination is called into play and the smothered feeling really gains in intensity. Genuine sympathy and kindness of heart will be revealed in written and spoken words. Theophilus Trinal says of winsome words: " LOVE in the writing peeps and hides Like stars in twilight air." Love sweetens speech as mellow chimes and bal- samic odors fill the encircling air with sweetness. Thus heart and voice, pen and tongue, together cre- ate a power persuasive and masterful. "Kindness is a language which the dumb can speak, and which 32 A Persuasive Voice. the deaf can understand." Men cannot be scolded into the love of truth, or dragooned into its service. As Maclaren says: "Gentleness is mightiest. We best adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour when we go among men with the light caught in the inner sanctuary still irradiating our faces, and our hands full of blessings. We are to be soldier-priests, strong and gentle, like the ideal of those knights of old who were both, and who bore the cross on shield, helmet and sword-hilt." Such a bearing the true philosophy of persuasion teaches us to cultivate. It is rational, for "The most profound conceptions of truth," says Professor Phelps, " tend always to a state of repose. The in- terest they excite is the interest of equalized sensi- bilities. In such a state of Christian culture there is a remote resemblance to the serenity of the mind of God. Well do painters represent Christ as gestur- ing with the open palm, or with the monitory finger pointing skyward. Who believes that He ever pound- ed the desk or stamped His foot in Divine anger, or rivaled the bulls of Bashan in His intonations ? Do we not think rather of His low and solemn tones, His sitting posture, His stooping form, His still or tremulous hand and His melting eye." The more we are with Christ the more shall we gain this soul- winning power; then will men see that we have been with Jesus and have learned of Him. PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES THEIR SCOPE AND UTILITY. Delivered at the opening 1 of a course of fortnightly lectures, under the direction of the ACADEMY OF ANTHROPOLOGY, at Cooper Union, New York City, October 9th, 1888. An enthusiastic German philosopher has said, "He touches heaven who lays his hand upon a human frame." True, for it is fearfully and won- derfully made. But he draws very near to God who wisely lays a guiding hand upon a human soul; who can detect, evoke, control and use aright the powers of its endless life ! It will be my aim briefly to define the significance and use of that branch of our studies which the Acad- emy has properly placed first in its curriculum. Psychology, the science of the human soul, is a better term than Metaphysics, or Mental Philoso- phy, which refers rather to the cognitive, intellec- tual functions. Though the term Psychology is not three hundred years old, the study is not new. Popularly speaking, the soul includes both the prin- ciple of life and of intelligence. In stricter lan- guage the soul is the sentient and the spirit is the 34 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. higher, rational principle. A pure spirit is.ont3 that never was incorporate; but we are souls and have bodies. We are, however, more interested in the phenomena of consciousness than in its essence ; more in empirical or experimental Psychology than in rational Psychology, which involves one in end- less philosophical speculations. Anthropology treats of man, body and soul, that is, of Somatology his structure and functions, Anatomy and Physiolgy and Psychology. We study the body through the senses, but the mind, as manifested by consciousness. Psychology is well called the highest court, for it defines conscience and duty. It thus links itself to Ethics, Law, Theology and Political Economy. So far as it gives canons of taste it is related to ^Esthet- ics. Yet Logic has been called its lawgiver and Metaphysics its voucher, for the one prescribes the rules of right thinking, and the other presents the primitive grounds of being itself. The frivolous subtleties of schoolmen brought Metaphysics into contempt, and even now one is ready to admit that the blacksmith of Glamis was not far out of the way in saying that a discussion may be called metaphy- sical where the listeners "disnaken what he that's speakin' means, and he that's speakin' disna ken what he means himsel'." Psychology, like all other inductive sciences of nature, is a science of observation, persistent, con- The Usurpation of Physical Science. 35 tinuous and comprehensive. Professor Porter, in his "Elements of Intellectual Science," shows the great value of its study as related to self-knowledge, moral discipline and success in life. The education of the sensibilities, the art of conversation, the pedagogic and homiletic science, sociology, jurisprudence, theology and medicine are all illuminated by Psy- chology. This is a scientific age, but as Dr. R. D. Hitchcock says, "Science is inordinately physical instead of metaphysical. It staggers under its burden of facts, and" is frequently mistaking its own unproven hy- potheses for laws." Nor is it strange that physical science usurps the place of the spiritual when we remember the domination of the senses over the noble powers of man ; when we also remember the pecuniary rewards which are had in turning thought niid labor to material things, and the temptation to subordinate science to popular opinion, or to make merchandise of scientific opinions. Professor Louis Agassiz once said that he was " never a quarter of a dollar ahead in the world, and never expected to be." When offered a large sum to go to a distance and lecture he replied, "I cannot afford to waste my time in making money." He was always look- ing through mere things up to ideas, up to the Maker of all. He said that "the ignoring of God will end in making natural science itself sterile." Over the doors of the Academy where Plato taught 36 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. were placed the words, "Let no one unacquainted with geometry enter here." It is not mathematical inaptitude that bars the way to the lecture room or laboratory to-day, but it is that frigid and sterilizing materialism which dwarfs the soul by its deceptive and degrading conceptions, and drowns its outcry with a chilling creed. " A scientist who lives without God in the world," said the illustrious scholar just quoted, "seems to me to be worse off than ordinary men. I never make preparations for penetrating into some small province of Nature hitherto undiscovered without breathing a prayer to the Being who hides His secrets from me only to allure me graciously on to the unfolding of them." We must also discriminate between science and sciolism, between the substantial and the specious and pretentious. "A little knowledge is a danger- ous thing" if it breeds conceit. Too many self- satisfied explorers write their "Ne plus ultra" over the little boundaries of their own knowledge, as did Spain at the gates of Hercules. They refuse to see "more beyond." A truly scientific spirit is calm, candid, cautious, exacting and yet hospitable to all truth. It is as free from indociiity and per- verseness as it is from credulity, remembering that now we know in part, and prophesy in part, and that to-day is but the cradle of to-morrow. Having thus shown some reasons why physical Unity of the Sciences. 3? science has often usurped the place of higher studies, we may briefly note the ground of their unity, and thus show that, so far from, antagoniz- ing each other, they are mutually helpful. This unity is a unity of origin, method and aim. Matter and mind come from one origin. The spiritual ground of existence is an undeniable fact. It is needless to argue this here. In God all things con- sist, stand together. " Matter, pressed to the utmost, declares itself to be force. Force, pressed to the utmost, declares itself to be Thought and Will. Thought and Will, pressed to the utmost, declare that they are the breath of the Spirit of God. The Alpha and Omega of human experience is Spirit. At the end of all our science, at the summit of all our philosophy we stand to-day where, in the dim antiquity of an almost prehistoric age, one stood in the Spirit of the Lord and said, " In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." Science measures thermal changes to the eighty- eight one hundredth of a degree, and the size of atoms to the hundred thousandth of an inch ; but it is well said, " On the other side of the atoms is God. Beyond the last conceivable subdivision of matter is the One substance, the continuous, indivisible, omnipotent, spiritual ground of existence, the Liv- ing God." Spectroscope, microscope, galvanoscope, delicate as are their adjustments, are insufficient in- terpreters of the mysteries of being. We must, 38 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. with the "Microcosm of Lotze," build on the postu- late of a spiritual cause. Again, there is a unity in method. The plan of the Creator of physical and psychic forces is a con- structive, orderly and progressive plan. There is continuity in the evolution of life, whether in the flowers of the field or in the brain of the botanist that studies them. Sensible and supersensible pro- cesses in each are under law, are parts of a definite system, orderly, rational and open to intelligent eyes. The growth of a plant, the formation of a crys- tal, or the grander growth of memory, will and con- science are alike regular, methodic, progressive, so that normal and abnormal phenomena may be de- tected and classified. Nature is not chaos but cosmos. There is preci- sion, harmony and balance in her work. Tyndall says that not a particle of vapor is lifted without being paid for in solar heat. Gain involves its equivalent expenditure, everywhere, every time. Nothing is gratuitous, haphazard. The great lesson of Science to us is, says Emerson, " That the history of nature, from first to last, is incessant advance from less to more, from rude to finer organization ; the globe of matter thus conspiring with the princi- ple of undying hope in man." This is the third feature of unity, that of aim and purpose. The science of things and of thoughts, of matter and of mind, of monads and of men, proceeds Nature the Priestess of Heaven. 39 from one Teacher, and they have one end. The material is the silent teacher of the spiritual. Nat- ure is not only the servant of our coarser needs, but the minister to our higher wants. " Giving us bread to eat, water to drink, raiment to put on, air to breathe and soil to stand on and build on, nature might have been clothed with homely, russet gar- ments, girded for toil; but as the priestess of heaven, ministering in the holy place, appealing to the higher faculties of man, she is clothed like Aaron, with temple vestments, and Solomon with all his glory, is not arrayed like her. Her forms are evanescent ; but her ministry is everlasting. Her grass withereth, and her flower fadeth; but the word of the Lord that speaketh through her, endureth for ever." It is spiritual law in the natur- al world, as Hugh Macmillan shows in ' k The Min- istry of Nature." Professor Drummond has unwittingly inverted the order in the title of his work. It is quite true that the supernatural is not unnatural, but it is also true that for spiritual ends this material crea- tion stands. Nature should not be regarded as un spiritual, but as a parable of moral truth. There is a law of correspondencies between physical and psychic facts, higher and nobler than Swedenborg ever dreamed of, or Bishop Butler ever outlined. Men of keen spiritual tastes, like Agassiz, feel this quickening truth. He once remarked, "My ex- 40 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. perience in prolonged scientific investigations con- vinces me that a belief in God, a God who is behind and within the chaos of ungeneralized facts, beyond the present vanishing points of human knowledge, adds a wonderful stimulus to the man who attempts to penetrate into the regions of the unknown." Speaking of him, Whipple says, " His soul flamed out in every expression of his magnificent nature, conveying the impression of intense, superabundant life. He told me that he had never known a dull hour in his whole life. To be ten minutes in his company was to obtain the strongest argument for the immortality of the soul." " Recent discoveries in Greek architecture," says Professor Phelps, " are said to prove that the lines of certain fluted columns, always till now regarded parallel and vertical, are really convergent, and would meet if continued upward." This illustrates the unity of the aspirations of great souls among themselves, and the converging approach of all such lives to the supreme and unifying center of all truth above. It is in God our Saviour, by whom the worlds were made, that the partial views we hold, the dim ideals sought, all blend and are realized in symmetrical unity. He is the Truth. To see Him as He is, is to focus in one center the scattered gleams of truth we elsewhere gain. Having thus glanced at the method and spirit of our studies let us look at their practical value in a The Education of the Sensibilities. 41 few particulars. The education of the sensibilities has been alluded to. Human emotion is a factor of immense power. It is a subordinate but invaluable ally in the art of persuasion. To understand the laws of influence and to be able to utilize them in the mastery of men is an exhilerating possession. The power of Circe with her magic wand is sur- passed by that wondrous witchery which he wields who can arouse, restrain and guide emotion at will, causing another soul to capitulate at his pleasure, all unconscious of the thrall thrown over it. This is illustrated in public speech. It is well to have our feet on facts and to handle arguments like arrows ; but after all, persuasion does not come through intellectual processes merely or mainly. There is what Professor Phelps calls "a conglomerate of thought and feeling, spiritual power and animal! magnetism." There is a mutual sympathy gener- ated between the true orator and his audience. " He gives back to them in rain what he receives in mist," to use the figure of Gladstone. It is the pro- vince of Psychology to teach one to discriminate, identify and use these psychic forces that are de- veloped in the play of human sensibilities. Other- wise there will be a waste. The chemist gives me a pinch of powder and a few drops of liquid. I fling the fluid to the floor and blow the feathery dust from my fingers. They are gone. But wed them and I have an electric battery. Thought travels over the 42 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. wire. So he who can unite and control these deli- cate, elusive yet mighty elements of spiritual life is a master of men. We hang crystal tuhes in our hall ways. They answer to every breath of heat and cold. Stone and iron respond to the sunshine. The rain drop on the window pane records itself in the flame of the evening lamp. But with more phenomenal delicacy do human sensibilities reveal themselves by furtive movements, unintended but irrepressive symbols which the skilled diagnostician of mind reads as readily as does the physician in the work of physical diagnosis. The color of the eye, the curva- ture of a vein, the fibriliary tremor of a muscle, the voice, breath, odor and a score of other unconscious revelations teach the medical man what he might not learn by direct questioning of his patient. So with the subtle influences of the soul.* Few, in- deed, appreciate the affluent resources of power found in our emotional life. It is one of the practi- cal advantages of this study that one comes to know the contents of his own being and the laws which control the commerce which his soul holds with others. We speak of magnetic men. Why ? Be- cause a magnet draws and holds. It has something to give. The steel is made to receive. As with metals so with men. There is a hidden potentiality, and it rests in part upon a physiological basis. He who expects to put forth power must have a pleni- * Vide "The Windows of Character." The Genesis of Personal Magetism. 43 tude of power at hand. This is not muscular energy or physical health merely. An ox is healthy, but he is as stolid as he is strong, for certain functions have been arrested. A man may be stalwart and sinewy, yet sodden and passionless, with little fiery or erup- tive life. Like the Duchess of Marlborough, he may have been born before nerves were invented. He is a metal man, but not a man of mettle ! How can he master men of vehement, palpitating sensi- bilities ? I have elsewhere referred to the vital unity between intellectual and sexual energy, and how, as Mandsley illustrates, the finest poetic and artistic emotion, as well as the essence of religion and mor- ality stand related to the development and control of the reproductive system. These lower, animal sensibilities are to be treated something as were Abraham's domestics, " circumcised and made serv- ants." The chisel of Praxiteles, the counsels of Peri- cles, the eloquence of Demosthenes are truly seen and appreciated when viewed in their relation to Phryne, Aspasia and Lais.* There is also in the man of magnetic sensibilities the powers of elimination and of restraint. He may find himself in contact with a responsive soul, and can exhale the fullness of that " atmosphere" which is peculiarly his own. The conjunction of an afflu- ent, distributive nature with a sensitive, receptive * Homiletic Monthly, June, 1884, "Pulpit Magnetism.* 44 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. one produces marvelous effects. The efflux of soul is partly automatic and partly volitional. It is easy to feel, but hard to analyze it ; a radiation as real as heat from fire, and which constitutes the indivi- dual's "air." It is partly a gift, but quite as much a growth. It is a polarization that touches certain souls and draws them like doves to their windows. Conversation is a field for the play of these nsychic forces. There are men who not only entrance their hearers when they teach in the lecture room, sing on the stage or preach in the pulpit, but in the street and parlor hook others to them as with claws of steel. Time is annihilated, engagements forgotten, and discomfort, even, swallowed up by the charm of their discourse. Alcibiades was held as by a mes- meric spell at the feet of Socrates. The warrior bowed to the philosopher. "When I listen to him my heart beats and tears come to my eyes. I am more roused by far than are the revelers in the rites of Cybele. I see that it is so with every one else. Therefore, stopping my ears, as if to shut out the voice of Sirens, I tear myself away by force lest I grow old, sitting by his side." So did the fascination of Michael Angelo's speech hold as with fetters D'Ollanda, sent to Rome by the King of Portugal, " He awakened such a feeling of faithful love in me, that if I met him in the papal palace or in the street, the stars would often come out in the sky before I let him go again." The attraction is mutual. Psychology and Pedagogy. 45 Friendship is mental gravitation, and not to be re- sisted any more than the earth's. It comes of neces- sity rather than of choice. The fountain before the Lateran in Rome at Rienzi's election as tribune gushed with both red wine and white. So the com- manding and the consenting soul are one in this out- flow of spiritual wealth, the real wine of life. The rhetorical, homiletic and histrionic elements of this personal power are manifest and manifold. The tongue of the talker is reinforced by facial ex- pression, and the entire sermo corporis which cannot be located in any member, but speaks with swift ,and certain emphasis, creating, in fact, a man's atmosphere which envelops him, and which is all the more significant because an inexpressible, in- separable and unconscious efflux. The philosophy of gentleness as a power, and the phonetic as well as rhetorical features of persuasion could easily be here developed into a chapter,* but the aim of this lecture is but to suggest thought, and not to elabor- ate it. Psychology and pedagogy are vitally related. The eager and inquisitive French mind has been quick to utilize in this line certain psychic exper-i merits, as in the training of dullards, for example. Seguin, at Paris, since his death his widow in this city, and the educators at Elmira Reformatory, have reported marvelous results in physical and mental Homiletio Monthly, February 1882. "Persuasive Speech." 46 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. renovation. The speech, gait and facial expression are improved immediately. But still more wonder- ful are the moral transformations reported by Dr. Liebault at Nancy, among the poorest and most de- praved whom he and his colleagues have treated by psychological experiments that cannot here be described in detail. Victims of drink, opium and tobacco are inspired with a permanent disgust of the vices which have enslaved them. Abandoned females, obscene in speech, incorrigible in evil ways, have become virtuous and respected. Some of them have taken and held for years positions of trust. The transactions of the French Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Nancy in 1886, and the reports of Professors . Berillioii and Augustin Voisin, at the Salpetriere and elsewhere, suggest the immense power for good in psycho-therapeutics. The relations of these studies to medicine, to sur- gery, to the care of the sick and insane, to many questions in civil and criminal law have been con- sidered in my papers presented to this Academy, and to the Medico Legal Society. The field of heredity, of sociology, indeed of all remedial science, is cleared up by a knowledge of Psychology. Here we have, as Dr. Beard observed, a key to half the world's delu- sions and the scientific basis of those occult phenom ena that have ever been at once the wonder, the terror, and the joy of men. Religious truths which familiarity has monotonized become august and au- Religious Bearings of the Theme. 47 thoritative, and invested with reality and signifi- cance. Theological questions like the study of miracles, demoniacal possessions, the biblical trance, death and immortality are also illuminated by the light which these investigations shed on them. As physiological chemistry has revolution- ized old systems of pathology, as modern astronomy has rewritten solar physics, may we not believe that the practical study of the principles of Psychological science, now so general throughout the thinking world, will bring to light newer and truer concep- tions of man's nature and needs, and introduce a philosophy of human life more intelligent, compre- hensive, humane and Christian than has yet prevailed? James Martin eau voiced the heart-cry of an un- numbered multitude when he said " The only true remedy for the dark infidelity and cold materialism that threaten the utter destruction of the religious life in a large portion of the people is to give them a living faith, true to the conscience, true to the intel lect, TRUE TO THE REALIZED SCIENCE OF THE DAY.'> Towards the fulfillment of this hope, the studies of this Academy, the course of free fortnightly lectures begun with this, our papers, debates and publications point. We have twenty-five hundred years of phil- osophy behind us, but we remember that the soul of man is a serial publication. Human life appears in parts, chapters, paragraphs, even. The world's drama is coming to its close. " Time's noblest off- 4:8 Scope and Utility of Psychological Studies. spring is its last!" The present is full of stimulat- ing possibilities, and the future, of inspiring promise. We are, as was said at the outset, to be observant, cautious, candid, thorough, never mis- taking unproven hypotheses for laws, sciolism for science, the specious for the substantial ; but avoid alike the extreme of credulity on the one hand, and that of indocility and self conceit on the other. Moreover, we are. not a guild of Agnostics, but have, from the start, recognized the spiritual ground of existence ; the unity of origin, method and aim in all the sensible and supersensible processes of nature. Behind matter is power ; behind power, will ; behind will is Spirit, personal, indivisible, ubiquitous, eter- nal ! As the lines of fluted columns in Greek sculp ture meet, and as the tunneling lines of Alpine engineers converge to one point, so find we there in God, the unifying center of truth, the summit of all our philosophy and the realization of all our hopes. MENTAL AUTOMATISM. This paper received the Academy Prize of fifty dollars, and was read be- fore the International Congress, called by the Academy of Anthropology, at Columbia College, New York City, June 1888. It will be the aim of this paper to illustrate certain forms of unconscious mental action, and to show the scientific and ethical value of this department of Anthropological study. The chief fact in human existence is the Involun- tary Life, according to an eminent psychologist. "Consciousness appears to be but a helpless spec- tator of a minute fraction of a huge amount of automatic brain-work." The latter is compared by Francis Galton to the ocean with its millions of waves ; the former is a single line of breaking surf along the shore. "The unconscious operations of the mind frequently far transcend the conscious Ones in intellectual importance. I begin to think that my best brain-work is wholly independent of consciousness. " It would be irrelevant to enter here upon the meta- physical and scientific speculations on the origin 50 Mental Automatism. and essence of thought and the unity of physical and psychic action, "the conflict literature' 5 as Zoch- ler terms it, for physicists and. philosophers alike confess their inability to solve these problems. Shadworth Hodgson thinks that it is time that Sci- ence was heard, for "The present position of Phil- osophy is not only a scandal to the intellectual world, but fraught with danger to the best interests of humanity." But Professor Huxley candidly admits that the advance of Science is slow and circuitous, " That of a tacking ship, the resultant of divergencies from the straight course.'' (1) Says another, "We must recognize our limitations with reverent agnosti- cism, the folly and futility of further investigations. In the vast land of unconsciousness, intellectual ac- tivity becomes manifold, and each of the many sides of our nature, untrammelled by the restraints of con- scious volition, carries on a ceaseless activity, the results of which we sometimes receive and recognize in consciousness. "< 2) Though by-gone mental experiences and acquisi- tions are hourly fading into forgetfulness, they are imperishable. " Physical processes are complete in themselves and would go on just as they do, if con- sciousness were not at all implicated. . . . The problem of the connection of the body and soul is as insoluble in its modern form as it was in the pre- scientific ages." (3) With this declaration of Tyn- dall we may rest the case. It would be a waste of Terms Defined. 51 time to discuss the materialism of early philosophers, or tho guarded materialism of Professor Bain, his " double-faced unity of matter and spirit ;" or " the convex and concave sides of one indentical curve," as Lewes suggests, for either must be the property of the other, or else a third something exists. We simply know that " Soul is a conscious unity which materialism has failed to comprehend, and this is a firmer fact than even the existence of the material universe. The established unity of physical and psychic forces, however, as now understood, is in advance of the dualism of Liebnitz and Descartes.*' The soul needs an incarnation in its pupilage and the body needs a soul for its own perfection. The harmony is not one of mere "mechanical adjust- ment, but of two gr.owths from the same spiritual and divine source. The spirit has not been impris- oned in matter, as^a woman with her child was walled in by the masons of Magdeburg, who built up around her the walls of the city, but our souls have air and life from the great world without. " (i) TERMS DEFINED. At the outset we are to distin- guish between natural and educated automatism, instinct and habit. The latter is predicated of that unconscious cerebration which is the product of re- petitious thought and effort in certain lines and grooves. Prof. Wundte has shown < 5 > by labratory experiments that there is a measurable interval be- tween sensory nerve impressions on the brain, a 5% Mental Automatism. purely physical process, and the mental action through the attention and will. The processes are not identical, synchronous or co-extensive. Delicate tests show this interval to be from one-tenth to a quarter of a second. This makes that personal equa- tion which is so important to ascertain in every indi- vidual in order to eliminate error. Astronomers understand this primary, congenital condition. An observer, for example, is to note the instant that a star touches the wire stretched across the field of a telescope. He counts the beats of the clock and notes the beat at which the transit occurs. A number of observers are tested, and a variation of half a second, according to W. M. Williams, is noticed between the records made, which represents the variation in auditory perception and alertness of volition, hence the length of time required for a sensory impression to reach the brain and for the response to be trans- mitted outward to the muscles. Not only do indi- viduals differ among themselves, according to age, sex, temperament, and in observatories are rated and registered accordingly, but the personal equation of each observer requires periodic revision as much as do watches and chronometers. Just here an ethical fact asserts its presence, the determining power of the will, as related to spon- taneous and automatic activity. While the will may not originate mental activity, it may select, utilize and improve, and thus dominate, automatic tend- Ambulatory Thinkers. 53 encies. Intensity of attention is in inverse ratio to extensity. Here is a hint at mental discipline and moral growth, which is of highest importance. 2. Another preliminary consideration is this, we are to differentiate ordinary, normal action from aberrant, pathological conditions, or those forms of the Involuntary Life which are artificially induced for scientific study, as hypnosis, and sleep-walking. 3. We may admit with Spier, that there is an Ante-Chamber of consciousness, "a general environ- ment of nervous activity, where the recognition of the Ego is partial and indistinct. Ambulatory think- ers illustrate this half-conscious condition, as did Stuart Mill, who thought out a good part of his. "System of Logic, during his daily walks between Kensington and the India House.- So deeply ab- sorbed was he that he did not recognize the friends he saw, yet he avoided every vehicle and obstruc- tion, in obedience to the lower centers which con- trolled muscular motion, while the higher centers of the nervous mechanism were busy with ideation. A reporter of night debates informed an acquaint- ance of mine that he had repeatedly fallen asleep through sheer fatigue, yet, rousing himself, would find that he had continued to note down correctly the speaker's words. He added that this was not an uncommon experience among his associate re- porters in the House of Commons. In this connection we do well to keep in mind the 54 Mental Automatism. distinction between, yet the unity of, the Sympa- thetic system, which has control of our organic life, and the Cerebro-Spinal, which rules our animal life. Carpenter says that the motor endowments of the former are chiefly dependent upon its connection with the latter, through the nerve fibres that enter the sympathetic plexuses ; also that in disease the sensory endowments possessed by parts supplied by the Sympathetic system, unrecognized in health, cause a radiation in impulses and morbid sympathies between remote organs. There is also an exalta- tion of the autonomy of the spinal cord, simultane- ously with neural suspension of cerebral influence. There is an increase of what Brown Sequard calls " dynamogenic processes," a force producing or force transforming action in one group of nerve cells, and an inhibition of another sphere or group, through Expectation and Attention. Striking illustrations of this occur in the study of psychic contagion, where audiences are enraptured by song or speech, "their breath sucked out by the spongy eloquence of some cunning orator," as Dr. O. "W. Holmes pictured Helen Darley, till they fairly heave and gasp for air. Madame de Sevigne's ac- count of Bourdaloue, Prof. Frazer's description of Chalmers, and Dr. Croly's portraiture of Pitt, record the same results following the unconscious tension to which attention subjects one part, and the inhibi- tion of another part of the nervous mechanism. Psychological Laboratories. 55 We owe much to Lotze, Fechner and Helmholtz, but even more to Prof. Wundt for the establishment of Psychological Laboratories. The first was begun in 1879, at Leipsic. The University furnished rooms, apparatus and a salaried demonstrator. Students from America, Russia and other distant countries are working in chapters or groups. One in each sec- tion acts as registrar of data. Psychometry, the measurement of mental processes, is the leading study, related as it is to molecular changes in the brain and variations in personal consciousness. Be- sides this, elaborate and conscientious methods are used to determine the kinship of the psychic state and the physical stimulus. This branch is called Psycho-physics. It is founded on the constant and indivisible interactions of the forces of these distinct yet inseparable spheres. It assumes that perception, comparison, memory, consciousness are as real and potential in their realm, as heat and electricity are in their own. The use of the word " Laboratory " in this connection is a declaration of this fact. The old definition, "a place for chemical investigations," must go. Mind is more than matter. Conscience and will are more than quiverings of brain-jelly, and the intercourse of souls is a grander study than that of electricity. With Tennyson we say " Star to star vibrates light. Can soul to soul Strike through a finer element than its own ? " 56 Mental Automatism It is time to pass to another field of illustrations of the Unconscious Life. We have glanced at the primitive, instinctive, spontaneous automatism of mind, and also at the secondary or educated auto- matism which is the result of habit and training. We now consider abnormal mental automatism. ARTIFICIAL, AUTOMATISM. The supreme expression of the Involuntary Life is the Trance. This compre- hensive term covers ten or fifteen varieties, but the hypnotic form is the only one from which illustra- tions will now be drawn. Artificial sleep-walking has been termed " artificial insanity," and properly considered as a study in Mental Pathology. Its defi- nition, methods of induction and control have been elsewhere described and need not here be repeat- ed. < 6 > From one hundred and forty different cases, some original data have been obtained, and the veri- fication of many observations and deductions of other experimenters. MEDICAL AND HUMANE ASPECTS. My attention was directed to various forms of artificial uncon- sciousness, soon after beginning to read Medicine, in 1852. A follower of Braid, who lectured extensively in America, offered to teach me the art of inducing the Trance state. Frequent voyages to foreign countries the last ten years have brought me into contact with sufferers from sea-sickness. Believing this to be, primarily, a cerebral disturbance and not a gastric, it occurred to me that hypnosis would be an Seasickness Relieved. 57 . effective therapeutic agent in this distressing, and sometimes dangerous, ailment. I say dangerous, for, if atheromatous changes have begun to take place in the arteries, retching may cause death by rup- ture of cerebral arterioles. Three cases of personal friends are recalled, one on shipboard, where fatal results have followed emesis. The ineffectiveness of bromides and intoxicants, and the after-effects of these and other forms of medication, made the trial of the new remedy interesting. The notes made of numerous cases, beginning with two clergymen who gratefully acknowledged relief were never in- tended for the public. Dr. George M. Beard, how- ever, insisted on their publication, being, as he said, the first contribution of the kind to the literature of Trance. ) In the cases cited, unconsciousness was not always secured at the first trial, though relief was immediate, with some degree of somnolence in nearly every in- stance. Others seemed insensible as if chloroformed, so that knife or needle was unheeded. One Parisian, in middle life, asked bewildered, on waking, " What has happened to me ? " Another, a Welsh quarry- man, with whom no words were spoken, -neither understanding the other's tongue, almost immedi- ately was entranced, and his heavy weight, thirteen stone, became a crushing load on the operator, seat- ed as I was, behind him. Another, after four days anguish, exclaimed, within a moment after the first 58 Mental Automatism. touch, " What a heaven to be relieved of pain !" In a fourth patient, the ventral and cerebral disturb- ance was so soon arrested that concealed nitrite of amyl or some other depressant was suspected, and the excited query was put by another, " What was on your hand ?" Further details appear in the Transactions of the Academy of Sciences. Results, or deductions, are what we are looking for. Here, as in law, l 'Viden- dum non a quo, sed ad quid." 1. The unconsciousness of Trance in many cases relieves seasickness by restoring nervous equilib- rium, and in surgery is sometimes an adequate sub- stitute for ether. Not every one responds. Not every one is able to awaken that faith and expect- ancy, out of which the phenomena are ordinarily evolved. This persuasion cometh not to every yielding soul, still less to the reluctant, incredulous. Failures occur alike with three classes : Those who are so anxious to test the reality of this automatic, involuntary condition, that their own alertness, vigi- lance and introspection defeat their aim ; those who are of an opposite temper, volatile, voluable and frivolous, lacking the power to fix their attention on anything; and the dogged, despairing, querulous sort, who seem to " enjoy poor health," as they say. Failures, however, are not decisive. Sequestration and silence on the part of the patient, and patience Trance in Seasickness. 69 on the part of the experimenter, have secured success after a dozen failures. 2. Tranciform states, where the unconsciousness is partial, incomplete, usually afford proportionate' relief. A multitude of facts might be cited. 3. The sense of subjugation when one finds him- self in the hands of Neptune or the surgeon, is a helpful accessory to the operator, analogous to the yielding attitude of an animal under a tamer and trainer, or paralyzed by panic. 4. A vital factor of success is the feeling of cer- tainty on the part of the experimenter. Fear is not more infectious than confidence. It is unintention- ally revealed in the eye, the voice, the step, the touch. To its masterful influence the strongest, most intelli- gent wills capitulate. Possunt quia posse videntur. As to this artificial unconsciousness as a substitute for the usual surgical anesthetics little need be said. A New York physician who had used it, remarked, at the meeting referred to, " I can frankly admit the main facts contained in this most useful paper by Professor Thwing, not only relying on his acute and accurate process of observation, but on my own convictions after careful investigation of phenomena as remarkable as any he relates." The president of the Academy of Sciences spoke of seeing this same form of anaesthesia used in surgery, thirty years ago, in Paris. Still earlier, Dr. Esdaile, in India, performed amputations and the removal of tumors from two to 60 Mental Automatism. eighty pounds weight, with no other hypnotic, ether being then unknown. In the Maternity at Vienna this unconscious sleep is seen to be not only a lethal power in the pangs of labor, but a practical haemos- tatic, as would be expected in the reduced tension of the vascular system when nerve centers are quieted. It once was a source of surprise and suspicion that tactile sensibility remained when pain was abolished. Now that Physiology shows them to be distinct, this ground of doubt and distrust is removed. In this connection I have noticed not only the arrest of pain, but of the organic consequences of pain, through suggestion or otherwise. Prof. Del- boeuf, of Liege, burned with a hot iron both arms of a patient, saying, before hand, that the wound on the on the right arm would never be felt. Removing the bandages the following day, only a scorch remained, while the left arm showed inflammation and a vesi- cular sore. Both applications of the iron were the the same. Pain, as an irritant retards healing. Its absence accelerates repair. Prof. Delboeuf argues that healing wounds by mental impression is a legiti- mate function of the surgeon when he discovers this susceptibility. This principle is a key to the healing of the wounds tof African dervishes, and not a few faith cures. I have, with hundreds of other experimenters, produced real inflammation through hallucinatory impressions, as of the sting of the bee, and removed genuine pain by simple suggestion. Hypnotic Phenomena. 61 That most cautious alienist, Dr. D. Hack Tuke, of London, puts "psychical agents in the A rmamenta Medico, of every medical man." Dugald Stewart saw no reason why a physician should scruple to use them any more than electricity. Sir John Forbes, in the British and Foreign Medical Review, took the same ground, when he advised the use of inert sub- stances at times, "for the satisfaction of the patient's mind," alone. The French Academy, a century ago, in rebuking Mesmer as a charlatan, enunciated the very idea now illustrated. " The power which man has over the imagination may now be reduced to an art and practiced methodically." But so many other points are waiting notice that the medical and human aspects of this department of Anthropological study must be dismissed with the single remark, that ideation and sensation are vitally and vividly connected. In the sphere of special sense it is eminently true that they act surely and swiftly in concert, while " an automaton is substituted for the true volitional self, and the will is a slave of a dream or a suggestion." Darwin illus- trated this by putting irritating snuff in the nostrils of several persons and inhibiting reflex action so that they could not sneeze. OTHER PHENOMENA. The lecturer on physiology at Westminster Hospital says that when he was hypnotized he seemed to exist in duplicate ; his inner self alive to an external world, but f ally determined 62 Mental Automatism. not to interfere with the acts of the outer self. This indisposition or inability to control volition increased until consciousness ceased. He then conversed in German, but did not recall his remarks afterward, though he did ejaculations in Italian, connected with readings in that tongue the day previous. These acts of his outer self seemed fatuous and irra- tional to his incapacitated inner self. When he tried to strike the operator, he had no more power to do so than the Lotus Eaters, "Deep asleep, yet all awake, weighted with heaviness." He put his fingers into what he knew was flame, unable to resist. Afferent impressions and efferent processes went on, yet so identified was he with the experimenter, and so obedient to his will, his own individuality was great- ly obscured ; indeed, he was hardly disenchanted the next day, although going to his University duties. The experience of a London surgeon and of an edu- cated clergyman, added to the foregoing, are given by Dr. Tuke in his work on "Sleep -Walking." To him, to Prof. Victor Horsley, and Dr. J. Hughlings Jackson, of the National Hospital for Paralyzed and Epileptic, I am indebted for clinical opportunities at Bethlem Hospital, at Queen's Square and University College, London. Heidenhain further illustrates this ideoplastic, automatic condition by experiments on his brother, whom he made remove, while asleep, his carefully cultivated and much valued whiskers. This bare- Tests of Trance. 63 faced outrage greatly angered him. The same ex- perience is related by Dr. Esdaile, in India, when a devotee had removed a long finger-nail sacredly kept. The emotions show the genuineness of the experiment. I have offered a gold eagle to one, and a jeweled ring to another, in good faith, promising them ownership, if each would extend the hand or open the eyes, but each interpreted the very em- phasis of invitation as a declaration of inability, as it really was. Inadequate analogues of this disturbed and tyran- nizing state of mental perception are furnished by the strange antics of the late Prof. Robert Hamilton, of Aberdeen, and of Gauss, the famous German mathematician, when carried away by some domi nant idea. They acted like machines in their rela- tions to what was outside of themselves. Other cases nearly as marked may be recalled by almost any one, which show enthrallment of the will in its guid- ing, purposeful energy. They are hardly indentical, however, with the duplex life shown by the true Trance, for in hypnosis, as Gurney says, the atten- tion, so far from being withdrawn from what is auto- matically done, is concentrated with special activity on these acts in obedience to suggestion without. The action is reflex, so far as the certainty of re- sponse to stimulus is concerned, yet for all that, " a conscious reflex action." The psychic rather than the physical sense of the word " reflex" is employed. 64 Mental Automatism. Normally we focus thought on one aim, and yet yield to a score of subordinate perceptions that modify and make our action rational. Trance breaks this equilibrium. So does absent-mindedness. But in this, the mind works "with unusual force and indi- viduality in its self-selected channels, and what its owner says or does in response to external influences is as little attended to by him as the influence itself. The other mind is working with marked absence of individuality in a channel elected by others, and what its owner says or does in response to external influence is that on which his attention is concen- trated to the complete exclusion of every other thought." Leaving abruptly this form of mono-ideism and the opposing views of theorists arguing from purely mental or physical outlooks, " the misty bights of purely abstract reasoning," passing over a wide field elsewhere studied < 8) and so omitted here, I allude, in passing, to that which seems to me to en- courage what psychologists till recently ridiculed. THOUGHT TRANSFERENCE or telepathy is that sup- posed dynamic connection between one brain and another which enables the one to communicate with the other, independently of the recognized channels of sense. Volumes have been filled with the reported cases of spontaneous telepathy, where the agent or percipient was in danger, or otherwise disturbed, and volumes more ought to be filled with cases of Thought Transference. 65 experimental thought-reading, which transcend, if they do not oppose hitherto known laws. Referring to this inter-communication, the late Prof. Carpen- ter, of London University, thirty years ago, frankly asked, " Would any man of science have a right to say it is impossible ? Some of the writer's own ex- periences have led him to suspect that a power of intuitively perceiving what is passing in the mind of another, called thought-reading, may be extra- ordinarily exalted by the entire concentration of at- tention." Prof. Janet records fifteen completely successful cases of trance-induction at a distance ; W the Revue Scientifique narrates the same success of Dr. Herecourt, a colleague of M. Richet. Without word or gesture he willed D., his subject, to sleep while in the midst of animated conversation with friends. Once he made D. sleep at 3 P. M. , while in a remote locality, and being called away, forgot to break the spell till 5 P. M., though D. had, in a normal state, been asked to call at 4.30. In the evening D. said that at 3 P. M., a strange desire to sleep was felt, a habit never indulged in during the day. A servant found D. unconscious, who, in spite of efforts to rouse, remained so till 5 p. M. To exclude the pos- sibility of collusion, on the common explanation of " Expectancy, 5 ' or " Chance/* disinterested parties varied the test. The results were the same. Dr. Beard's method of eliminating fraud was also tried. Dr. H. willed wakefulness, and verbally commanded 66 Mental Automatism. sleep and vice versa. The will, not the word, pre- vailed. In each case D. innocently told the doctor that he had failed. The Tribune Medicale gives an account of more than one hundred trials of sommeil a distance, by Dr. Dusart, who, vrith varying tests, induced or arrested hy steroid conditions ; prevented or allowed at will, miles away, the father of the patient to induce sleep, as he had learned to do after the physician had dis- continued his visits. What is this "magical in- fluence proceeding from intelligent willing" as Schopenhaur calls it, in his " World, Will and Idea ?" What is the nexus between these identical processes of physic interaction ? Is there a "potential unity of all similarly constructed minds ? " That we can- not now tell what that latent unity is, if any, should not militate against the supposition of a wider self- hood than we ordinarily claim. This involves, as Gm> ney says, no disruption of individuality, while it does involve a pervading sense of association with an- other organization and a special mental sensitive- ness, at times, as when shock of peril or approach of death concentrate will and attention. My own experiments and those of other medical friends have been so successful that I heartily repeat the dictum of Dr. Carpenter on this point, published a generation ago, that we shall be wise "in main- taining a reserve of possibility " in reference to phe- nomena of this class, occult, but not incredible. Scientific Candor. 67 Truth is a sphere. We see segments, sections, frag- ments. We know in part. Philosophy asks, " What may we know ? " but science, exact, exacting, deal- ing in frozen facts, asks " What do we know ? " The opinions of the non-expert are often more under the control of the will than of the understanding. A true, scientific instinct avoids prepossessions, indo- cility and obstinacy in receiving evidence, as reso- lutely as it avoids romancing, sentimentality and credulity. It is hospitable to all truth. This leads one to say with Socrates, " I would be gladly refuted if I say aught untrue, and would gladly refute another if untrue ; but not more glad than to be myself refuted if untrue." To be free, ourselves, from error is the first duty, and to free another is a privilege not less sacred. This study of what we may call Morbid Psychology is related to serious and perplexing moral questions. Heredity, environment, parentage, atavism, and other facts modifying human responsibility, at once confront us. Are we only what our ancestors made us, or have we still the power of contrary choice ? Is the will a mere deduction of successive states of mind, and our conscious personality a mere memory of past and passing experiences ? Are our legal re- straints and educational methods a mockery ? If the Cartesian dogma is to stand, ''Animals are auto- mata," and man to be but the best machine, which Descartes would not admit ; if the potentialities of 68 Mental Automatism. matter explain the genesis of mind ; if character is made for us and not by us, and the idea of duty is a delusion ; then Atkinson and Martineau are right, " I am a creature of necessity. I claim neither merit nor demerit ; I am as completely the result of my nature, and impelled to do what I do as tne needle to point to the pole, or the puppet to move as the string is pulled. I cannot alter my will or be other than what I am. I cannot deserve either reward or punish- ment." If this be true, life is not worth living. But it is not true ! Common sense revolts against it. Every sane man knows that he has the power of choice and self-control. Even the insane " can com- mand themselves up to a certain point," and the laws of a lunatic asylum always recognize this fact.< 10) Those who accept the authority of the Scriptures are satisfied with its restatements of man's primitive and irradicable convictions. The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The children shall not bear the iniquity or guilt of the fathers. Though the law of uniform- ity prevails, there is the law of diversity, a tendency to divert from the original type. There is also the law of compensation. Environment, which works for evil, also works in redemptive processes ; slower, perhaps, than deteriorating influences, but surely in the way of recreation. A friend of mine knew a lad in St. Giles, London, whose father was a burglar and whose mother was a prostitute. He was keen, adroit, intelligent, but thoroughly wicked. He robbed my Regenerative Forces. 69 informant while talking with him. He would have ended his life, very likely, in a street brawl, in prison, or on the gibbet, had he been left alone. But, put into a Christian home, he became a pure, upright man, and never was known to violate the principles of strict honesty and truth. I saw in Spain a girl whom the missionary described as a " perfect angel," so chaste, lovely and Christ-like. Yet she, two years before, was, he said, " a perfect devil," so vile in heart and life. There is a freedom of choice and a recuperative power in a will set towards yirtue. There is a renewing power in a will set towards virtue, and in a helpful environment, by which congenital evils are corrected. As Anthropology is justly called the " Queen of Sciences," so Psychology is, by far, the most im- portant department of this enticing- study. It in- volves a knowledge of all the rest, man's physical and psychic, his social and ethnic relations, with all the events and products of human existence, illumi- nating the questions of his origin, progress, welfare and destiny. European societies have given less prominence to the psychic than to the physical and historic features ; but the New York Academy of Anthropology was founded with special reference to the study of the neglected data with which this paper is concerned . We are endeavoring to verify, classify and formulate facts of the Involuntary Life which underlie the whole structure of philosophy, 70 Mental Automatism. religion and social life, in its structural forces. Psy- chology is the youngest of sciences, we are told. This may explain some crudities and errors, for children are often pretentious and presumptuous. The gen- erals of Alexander fancied that they saw the Nile of the far west, when really it was the Indus of the East. Generalizing from insufficient data an un- scientific student may jump at a conclusion as wide from the truth as is the Indus from the Nile ! " Non-expertness in science," says Dr. Beard, ' ' makes more blunders than the most atrocious dis- honesty. It cannot be too often repeated, line upon line, precept upon precept, that in science the prime requisite is not honesty, not general ability, not skepticism, not genius even, in other departments, but expert skill. That being absent all else is as sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal." He refers to an educated physician of acute observation, skep- tical, as to psychical phenomena, who with this panoply of prejudice cannot attend a seance with- out falling into a trance state. The account he afterward gives of his vagaries are as amusing to himself as they are to his friends. He will hardly expect to become an expert. It is because of this natural disqualification on the part of some experimenters and the impatient and superficial methods of others, that the course of science has been a halting, zigzag advance, as Prof. Huxley admits. It is for this reason that its hiero- Dignity of Science. 71 phants often speak disdainfully of introducing dis- covered truth into the patrimony of general knowl- edge as "a work of vulgarization." There is an esoteric and an exoteric side of these lofty themes. Science is not to dilute her teachings, or cheapen her treasures, by ill-timed familiarity. The phenomena before us have been justly viewed with prejudice be- cause of the grotesque and mercenary uses made of them. But all reverent students of every class and calling in life, all who are qualified by nature, tern, per and training to prosecute these experiments and formulate their results, will find recognition and re- spect. The foregoing considerations are not the utterance of final truth. They are intended to elicit, and not to close discussion. As an accomplished scholar, an English knight, known in both hemispheres for his medical and surgical skill, remarked to me at the close of a conversation on the Unconscious Life: " I feel like a little child." So must every adventurous explorer into this solemn realm of mystery feel. Yet truth is alluring. Shall we, then, stand still like islands, or move on like ships ? (1) Mind, April 1887. " Science and tlie Bishops. " (2) Francis Speir, jr. Pop. Science Monthly, March, 1888. (3) Tyndall, "Vichrow and Evolution." Tyndall, "Physiology and Pathology of Mind, ' ' p. 124. 72 Mental Automatism. (4) Lotze "Microcosm," Bk. II. , iii. Smyth's "Old Faiths.'* Mach's " Die Willensfreiheit des Menschen." (5) "Grundzuge der Phys. Psychologic," p. 730. (6) Thwing's " Hand Book of Anthropology, " chaps. VII., VIII. (7) Accordingly, a paper was read by me, Jan. 22, 1883, before the N. Y.' Academy of Sciences on ' ' Trance as related to Surgery and Sea- Sickness." My friend had promised to be present and corroborate the principles which my experiments had illustrated. Alas, that very hour Dr. Beard, himself, was entering the solemn trance of death ! Suddenly interrupted in his studies, he passed away before many knew of his illness. His last desire was this, that he might have strength to record the experiences of a dying man, or at least, that some one might continue the study of this theme which had so long fascinated his adventurous thought. Tuos ne ego, mece spes inanes, labentes ocules tuum fugientem spirilum vidi ! Quintilian. (8) Clinical and Forensic Study of Trance. Medico-Legal Society. (9) Revue PhilosopJdque, Feb. 1888. (10) Medical Jurisprudence, Hamilton, p. 132. A CLINICAL AND FOBENSIC STUDY OF TRANCE. Read before the Medico-Legal Society, New York City, AprU 10, 1889. The battle-ground of science to-day is the Involun- tary Life, or, as another has phrased it, "the relation of Automatism to Responsibility." The theme opens a wide continent of thought. A few landmarks wilJ prove helpful. A new chapter of the militant history of human speculations is being written. A new arena of conflict is reached. New forces are mar- shalled. New weapons of warfare are demanded, and new strategic points are to be gained. Vast changes are seen in philosophic thought, in tra- ditional theology, in historic criticism and in scientific research. The limits of scientific inquiry are more clearly understood, and the essential unity of truth proved. The very perturbations of the human mind often herald the incoming of new light, just as the near approach of Neptune, through measureless space, was foretold by prophetic disturbances in the outermost orbit of our ever broadening solar system. 74 A Study of Trance. Let not ignorance and prejudice silence any Lever- rier of our day, who dares to widen the field of in- quiry, or force him to stand, as in ancient days, the propounder of a new law stood, with a halter about his neck, with which the populace might hang 1 him if displeased with the innovation. ^ We must not retard the progress of knowledge by looking at the phenomena of life " Through the dulled eyes of custom and traditional opinions/' but show "open- ness and simplicity of mind, readiness to entertain, willingness to accept, and enthusiasm to pursue a new idea," (2) remembering that " There are great truths that pitch their shining tents Outside our walls, and though but dimly seen In the grey dawn, they will be manifest When the light widens into perfect day." The facts of the Involuntary Life, of which the Trance is the supreme expression, have been ob- served for centuries. But not until recent years have biological and medical investigators classified and formulated the phenomena involved. Cerebro- physiology has latterly made rapid advance. The first medical book placed in my hands by my pre- ceptor, thirty-seven years ago, was Bichat's Anatomy. Professor Huxley calls this learned Frenchman "The acute founder of general Anatomy." Bichat laid down, for the first time, the distinction between the organic and animal, the conscious and unconscious life of the individual. He made life to be the unity Psychology and Medicine. 75 of separate lives of organic parts. This doctrine of synthesis he applied to pathology. Diseases were like the perturbations of the planet- ary system. Therapeutics must show how to elimi- nate them. The way was cleared for a closer unity between biology and medicine. " Science and Cul- ture," by Darwin, closes with the query, " How can medical education be so arranged as to give the stu- dent a firm grasp of biology ? Without it, he is but an empiric, notwithstanding all the progress of what is called " Scientific Medicine." Medicine, like agriculture, took its origin in the needs of man. As Chemistry and vegetable physi- ology gave agriculture a scientific basis, so psychology is to give to medicine a wider, richer development in the near future. In 1870, The American Medical Association adopted a resolution requesting medical colleges to establish chairs of psychology. It was then said, "Very few in the medical profession understand it. Here is an immense field to culti- vate, and it will yield a rich harvest. Books, peri- odicals and lectures give only a glimmer. One must patiently, persistently study his feelings, impressions and repulsions in various relations and conditions." He must also be an acute and accurate observer of these conditions in others. Then the sneer of Vol- taire will no longer have any basis in fact : " The doctor is one who pours drugs of which he knows little, into a body of which he knows less." Prof. 76 A Study of Trance. Tyndall says, that "Hitherto medicine has been a collection of empirical rules, interpreted according to the capacity of each physician." But we need to know the mind and soul as well as the liver and spleen. We need to treat the patient as well as the disease. Then will be realized the fullness of the Hippocratean beatitude, " That physician who is also a philosopher is godlike." PSYCHOLOGY AND LAW. The basis of litigation is continually found in alleged disorders of the mind and nervous system. The intelligent lawyer must study the neuropathic condition of criminals, with the immediate and remote factors involved, in order to determine the degree of responsibility, and so of guilt. Nowhere in the world, according to Ed- mund Burke, is law so generally studied as in this country. De Tocqueville made it one of the supreme tutelar forces of our Republic. Had he lived to see the completion of the first century of American law, he would have spoken with greater emphasis ; for, though "All rovernmental affairs travel in the path of precedence," (3 > there has been great advance in the line of procedure, evidence and competence of witnesses. Still, it is true that laws are changing. ''Leges humance nascuntur, vivunt et moriuntur : posteriores priores contrarias abrogant."^ Had our political system been less flexible, it never would have survived the strain to which the exigencies of its first century have subjected it. Ex- Judge Davis The Medical Expert. 77 points oilt the needs of still further changes, when he refers, in the line of this discussion, to tho Status Ebrietatis, and the place of the expert. He remarks: "It has long been evident that the State needs to give some systematic attention to the adequate pre- sentation, in criminal trials, of the light which science throws on the subject, when the prosecution is met by the defence of insanity." He suggests that " All expert testimony of a medical character be independ- ent of the selection of the parties, and placed, in re- spect to impartiality though perhaps not in control- ling authority upon the jury in position like that of the judge." Speaking on this point, one of the judges of the Supreme Court recently remarked to the writer: "You medical men instinctively look at the facts of a case from a purely scientific point of view, while the law looks at the matter in the light of the public welfare." So Thucydides says that Cleon urged the Athenians to execute the Mityl- cenean revolters as an act ef retaliation, while Diodotus argued that they were sitting in deliber- ation and not in judgment ; that expediency, and not naked justice, was to be considered; not what might be doae under the law, but what was ad- visable. The man of science should not be desti- tute of a judicial temper and the lawyer should not -lack a true, scientific spirit. But there are other lines in which these preliminary considerations point. All the learned professions are equally inter- 78 A Study of Trance. ested in the survey of this field of Automatism and Responsibility. PSYCHOLOGY AND THEOLOGY. The intelligent understanding of practical Psychology will help to rid religion of superstition, and give illumination to the teachings of Christianity, both as to the life that now is and that which is to come. There are prob- lems of an exegetical character which the theologian will find cleared of much of their difficulty by the facts which wait enunciation. There are historical and homiletical relations which would require ample space to unfold. The moral and religious bearings of the Involuntary Life have been elsewhere con- sidered.^ We are now ready to look at the genesis and features of that form of the Involuntary Life known as TRANCE. GENESIS OF TRANCE. Trance, transit, "the passing over " from the voluntary, conscious state to the in- voluntary and automatic, is a condition or process which varies with the cause which originates it. It may be purely a pathological condition. It may be induced by suggestion, fixation, manipulation, or other means, as a scientific experiment. The initial and terminal bounds, with the intermediate phen- omena, change as these conditions change. There have been fourteen kinds of Trance described, ac- cording to clinical features, such as somnambulistic, intellectual (or reverie), emotional, ecstatic, alcoholic, mesmeric, epileptic and cataleptic. (6) These all have Strong Men Entranced. 79 some features in common, as in the hypertrophy and persistence of mental impressions, but vary in detail according to the origin of the condition and the in- dividual in whom Trance is induced. In passing, it should be understood that, so far from being a proof of mental weakness, Trance is a condition " into which many, if not most, of those who have left the stamp of their own character on the religious history of mankind have been liable to pass at times. The union of intense feeling, strong volition, long continued thought the conditions of all wide and lasting influence aided in many cases by the withdrawal from the lower life of the support which is needed to maintain a healthy equilibrium, appears to have been more than ' the earthen vessel' will bear. Ekstasis is the state in which a man has passed out of the usual order of his life, beyond the usual limits of consciousness and volition. Excessus, in like manner, became a synonyme for the condition of seeming death to the outer world, which we speak of as Trance. From the time of Hippocrates, who used it to describe the loss of conscious perception, it had probably borne the connotation which it has had, with shades of meaning for good or evil, ever since. " < 7 > CLINICAL FEATURES. St. Paul and other apostles and prophets give some hints as to the origin and characteristics of this state. Many other great men since have left important data, particularly the emi- 80 A Study of Trance. nent scientist, Professor Agassi z. He invited experi- ments on himself, and made a conscientious record of them over his own signature. (8) One feature of value in this clinical record is the triumph gained over a superior mind that resisted the operator, and his candid statement of the delight which followed his surrendry. The experimenter was Townshend, at Neufchatel, and Mons. Desor was witness. " The moment I saw him endeavoring to exert an action upon me, I silently addressed the Author of all things, beseeching Him to give me power to resist the in- fluence, and to be conscientious in regard to the facts." Ocular fixation induced weariness, and digital move- ments in front of the eyes deepened drowsiness. Other manipulations induced " an indescribable sen- sation of delight." Speech and vision were suspend- ed, but hearing remained. After an hour of help- lessness, Agassiz "wished to wake, but could not. It appeared to me that enough had been done with me." Though in a state of confused pleasure, he "was inwardly sorrowful to have it prolonged." Quick transverse movements, outward from the middle of the face, at once broke the spell. A word would have done as well. From my records of 140 cases of Trance, during the past six years, including the writ- ten statements of some very intelligent patients themselves, I could easily compile a large volume. Enough, however, has been said as to the experi- Exciting Causes. 81 mental or artificial Trance in its clinical features. If we attempt to explain the pathology of the uncon- scious, automatic life, we find ourselves involved in endless speculations. The alleged vis magnetica of ancient thaumaturgists we ignore. That this is a subjective phenomenon needs now no argument. Sudden and enrapturing emotions, continued fasting or overpowering fear, develop it. A man of pene, trating and commanding will by slow and seductive processes, or by swift assault that leaves no time to question or repel, startling and abrupt as the gong of the Salpetriere may capture both consenting and recalcitrant souls. Prof. Laycock thinks that the theory of reflex action in the cortex of the brain ex- plains the exaltation of perception and the dulling of self-consciousness. Another suggests cerebral an-* eemia, or analogous encephalic exhaustion at the expense of sensory ganglia. Dr. Mortimer Granville makes normal sleep the sum total of five factors, muscular, visceral, sensory, automatic and cerebral repose. He differentiates thirty-six varieties of disturbance, which it would be irrelevant now to name. Dr. Liebault assumes the fact of serene and restful repose in hypnosis, from not only the bodily ease and facial expression, but from the answer uniformly given by the entranced, when left alone to the query, "what are you think- ing of ?" He says, "nothing," whereas in ordinary sleep the brain is active. The tracings of the myo- S3 A Study of Trance. graph and pneumograph are helpful at this point, as well as in the exclusion of the possibility of simu- lation. From the days of Liebnitz, Mental Automatism has been studied with increasing attention. Its limit and condition is the personal equation which distinguish men. Braid, nearly half a century ago, laid the foundations on which Prof. Charcot, ten years ago, began to rear a scientific system. This accomplished French scholar began with the simplest clinical facts of hysteria as a basis, such as the reflex action of the cortex, a passive and plastic condition favorable to control. He noted also certain zones of cutaneous areas and hypnogenous pressure points, irregularly distributed over the body, the manipulation of which 'induces sleep, as the pressure of other points induces tetanic paroxysms in some epileptic patients. An- other fact proved, was the abortive treatment of hysterical attacks by hypnosis, A third, was the palliative and remedial effects, by the same agent, in muscular contractions and paresis, which compli- cated the original trouble. Indeed, the field is so large, and the clinical facts so abundant and enticing, there is danger of giving an undue space to them, rather than to the forensic relations of the whole subject. We pass at once to the ethical and legal bearings of Trance. LEGAL BEARINGS. Six questions will guide us. They have been all presented to, and answered by, Legal Questions. S3 one of our ablest judges, but his opinion and my own are withheld, as the aim of this paper is tenta- tive and suggestive, intended to elicit and not to close discussion. 1. Is any reconstruction of the laws of Evidence needed in view of these facts of the Involuntary Life? Allusion has been made to perversions of the senses, to the hypertrophy and continuity of mental impressions. To this might be added a second, the moral as well as sensory hallucinations which have been unquestionably created by external suggestion. A third point, which, if ever alluded to in the copious literature of the subject, has escaped my notice, is sexual erethism, an occasional sequel of this form of induced unconsciousness, as it frequently is a result of the inhalation of nitrous oxide gas, or sulphuric ether in surgical clinics. A glance at each of these suggestions is all that the limits of the discussion allow. As to the testimony of the senses. It has been said that seeing is believing, and if the testimony of the senses is not to be received, our courts of justice might as well be closed at once. There is truth in this, but not the whole truth. John Stuart Mill believed, with his father, in the sensuous origin of all knowledge, saying, " Nihil in intellectum quod non prius in sensu." Dr. Beard went to the other extreme, and said that " Only fools trust the 84 A Study of Trance. sight. Seeing is n ot believing, but doubting, for what is all human science but a correcting of the errors, and a supplementing of the defects, of the senses ?" In 1884, while questioning a sensitive, in Boston, as to certain illusion s created by my suggestion, and made real on returning to the normal state, I re marked, " Would you take your oath in a court of justice that you had seen these objects and experi- enced these sensation s ?" " Certainly, I would," was the reply. " You see the value of some human testi- mony," I remarked to bystanders. One of them chanced to be Prof. William Jones, M. D., of Harvard College. This accomplished psychologist has re- cently made valuable contri butions to physiological optics and showed by diagrams how illusory certain spatial distances are, even to one in the normal state. He says, that the " facts of vision form a jungle of intricacy." Only culture, experience and a sound cerebrum are trustworthy witnesses of visual facts. " The whole education of the artist consists in his learning to see the presented signs as well as the re- presented things." (9) Helmholtz shows that the vitre- ous humor always holds the muscce voliantes, but they are not noticed till some lesion is suffered and the attention drawn to them as to a new discovery. The fact that one eye has become blind has not been noticed for some time, till the accidental closure of one eye, the sound one, reveals the fact. Volk- mann says that the excitement of one set of ret- Trance Testimony Worthless. 85 inal fibres will inhibit the function of another set and prevent discrimination. Still further retinal stimulation may restore normal vision. " Fallacies innumerable exist until optical discrimination is educated and the verdict of certain chaotic primitive sensations is corrected by a larger knowledge." Prof. James adds, "In the matter of taste it seems to me that more men are normally nearer the Trance state than in respect of their other sensations. Sugges- tion as to tasting, influences them more easily. The peculiarity of the trance subject is that all emotions are falsified and overpowered by the imagination. In all men some sensations are. As we approach the sense of hearing, deceptions abound." In experi- ments with university men, students of his, I illus- trated, several years ago, some of these conclusions most satisfactorily, as he thought. The argument is this : If there may be a sympa- thetic reproduction of ideas in another while he is presumably in a normal condition, may there not be a far more vivid duplication or perversion in the mind of the entranced ? If optical errors deceive men in ordinary experience, may not psychological suggestions mislead when extraordinary influences bind as with a spell ? And what is the value of the testimony of those who are thus readily thrown out of mental equilibrium ? Still more serious is the query when it is moral ac- curacy, rather than the certitude of visual or gusta- 86 A Study of Trance. tory experiences, which is ;to be determined. Visual errors are common and often vexatious and embar- rassing, but perversions of the moral sense are more perilous to the individual and to society. A letter from Paris to a New York periodical, records the con- fession of a French gendarme, who said that he had committed murder. His language was, " Arrest me ! I am a coward and murderer. I have soiled an un- spotted life by an odious and stupid crime." " Why?" he was asked. "I do not know. He looked at me with a defiant air. I did not know him. I held a knife in my hand and drove it into his heart ! I heard it scrape against his ribs mercy ! mercy ! " The stalwart officer fainted. The man was the sub- ject of an experiment. One of the professors of the Academy of Medicine had hypnotized him, given him a wooden spatula, calling it a dagger, and point- ed out a tree which was made to him to appear as an offensive intruder. He was told to stab him and re- turn and report the details, which he did, as just nar- rated. The stealthy approach to his supposed victim, his wary, anxious, furtive glances to see if he was watched, the ghastly pallor of face and agony of tone shown in the confession and the physical col- lapse, as well as the difficulty with which he was afterward ridden of the impression that still haunted him like the nightmare, attested the genuineness of the experiment. Similar cases might here be given where persons, laboring under delusions, have need- The Medical Expert. 87 lessly inculpated themselves. Grave accusations against others, also, are made of acts that have no existence outside their own disordered fancy. Inci- dents could be given to illustrate the erotic as well as erratic whims which are created by hypnotism in neurotic females, identical with the aberrations at- tendant on the use of anaesthetics. Their subjective sensations are to them objective realities. Their statement is intended to be truthful, but as legiti- mate evidence it is worthless. ai) Their dominant idea is well called by Carlyle, "diluted Insanity." It was this spectral testimony that sent thousands to death as witches, " In courts where ghosts appedr as witnesses, And swear men's lives away," on the principle stated in Fatinitza, "Flog first! explanations afterwards." Shall this verruchtheit always prevail ? 2. Is the training of the medical expert complete without a better understanding of this subject ? To state the question is to answer it. There are, indeed, few who are alike familiar with the principles of legal and medical science. One man rarely masters two professions in all their details. But may not the training in each, law and medicine, be so broadened as to embrace a fuller knowledge of the profound truths of psychology ? Can the perplexing questions which arise, as well in our civil courts as in the 88 A Study of Trance. higher, be fairly met without a better acquaintance with the border-land of Insanity in which so many live ? Is not the prevailing ignorance on this sub- ject the frequent cause of popular and professional jealousy and dislike with reference to expert testi- mony ? An English judge has recently suppressed the expression of a medical man's opinion, about to be offered in evidence on an insanity plea, and given notice that in every future case he will deal with all medical and scientific experts in the same way. They may simply say what they saw and heard, but give 110 opinion. " For a man to have close and intimate practical knowledge of some part of the field of science is, in some quarters, apparently a reason why his deliberately formed opinion on a sub- ject within the sphere of his studies should be sup- pressed in a court of law, and the point of issue be decided by untrained minds. Carry this to its logical conclusion, and we must set up ignorance as a chief qualification of those fitted to decide scientific ques- tions." < K > It is not strange that the editor quoted, calls for some public authority outside to initiate a change, in view of such inexplicable ruling. 3. May not malingering among the insane be sooner detected by the application of the facts of the Involuntary Life ? The simulation of diseases and disabilities is a The Malingerer. 89 common occurrence, met with by all who have their fellow-men in durance. Subjective symptoms are very misleading, as the testimony of officers of pri- sons and asylums will show. A military deserter to escape punishment remained apparently unconsci- ous for more than two months. < J3 > Beck and Gavin tell of others whose pretended in- sensibility was not detected by aloes in the mouth, shower-bath or electricity. Only the actual cautery intimidated. Somnambulism has been feigned to cover crime, or to excite pity ; so, also, deaf -mutism, paralysis, contractures, heemorrhagic and cutaneous changes. Recent experiments on himself by Dr. Ossip Feldman of Russia, before the Medico-Legal Society, demonstrate the power of acceleration and retardation of the heart's action within wide bounds, possessed by some skilful experimenters. The sphy- mograph alone is an insufficient guide or test in de- tecting the malingerer. The myograph, as used by Charcot, is more satisfactory, particularly in hys- terical traumatic contractures. But mechanical ap- pliances are only decisive in the hands of those who understand the normal and aberrant features of human thought and feeling. Science demands the severest scrutiny of all phenomena, and the elimina- tion of every possible element of fraud, deliberate or unconscious. Six sources of error have been signalized into which investigators are likely to fall. < u > The first, 90 A Study of Trance. the overlooking of those interactions of mind and body below the plane of volition and consciousness. Secondly, the innocent self-deception, of the subject experimented on. A knowledge of Trance is indis- pensable to detect self-imposition. Counter-decep- tion is advised ; that is, doing nothing when some- thing is expected : doing something when nothing is expected, and doing something different from what the sensitive believes is being done. Deliberate de- ception, the third source of error, is to be met in the same way. Intended and unintentional collusion of third parties forms two more sources, and the over- looking of the element of chance and coincidence is the sixth. The question of the detection of malingering is really a corollary of the previous one, the training of medical experts as witnesses in legal trials. This brief allusion is sufficient to show its commanding importance. Reviewing the clinical and forensic facts considered in reference to Trance we now ask : 4. Is there need of any legal surveillance in private experiments or public exhibitions ? Civil authorities have, in foreign cities, occasionally re- stricted or prohibited them, and the British Medical Journal for March 3, speaking of the artificial Trance, while crediting it with curative results in hysteria, adds, "a far more serious and thorny question is that which bears on the medico-legal aspect. The impairment of volition which results An Inquisitorial Agent. 91 from repeated induction of this condition is a factor of which the law ought to take cognizance. " Tem- porary insanity has sometimes followed injudicious experiments and exciting concomitants, particularly where an unskilled operator loses his own self-pos- session. Q As Trance has been invoked, and used successfully, in the control, if not eradication, of vicious appetites, it is quite possible to impart permanent tastes for persons, objects and indulgencies, good or evil, and to intensify the same by repetition. This is but a hint of the amazing perils and possibilities of a de- veloping science. It also gives emphasis to the query as to any special custody in which parties should be held who are related as experimenter and subject. " He touches heaven who lays his hand upon a human frame," says an enthusiastic German writer; but he gets near to the Creator who knows how to evoke, direct, control and utilize these marvelous psychic phenomena in the service of humanity. 5. Is it justifiable to use this condition as an in- quisitorial agent ? The revivication of memory in the exaltation of Trance, constitutes what has been called "an artificial Day of Judgment." Through inquiry and suggestion the mind is steered along a labyrinth of bygone events, names, places and dates. ''Crimes are revealed in this condition, even dating back to early childhood. We have absolute control of the subject, and absolutely demonstrative experi- 92 A Study of Trance. ments of the genuineness of these Trance-Confessions can be made." Detectives have availed themselves of the confessions of the intoxicated, and alienists have profitably studied the insane while asleep. The query suggested by these facts is this: Is it justifiable to take advantage of a person in this abnormal state and lead him to inculpate himself, if suspected of wrong doing ? 6. A final question remains: Is any revision of the Penal Code desirable in view of the facts which the present scientific study of this matter has elicit- ed ? This carries us back to the initial and germinal idea of the whole discussion, the relation of Auto- matism to Responsibility. It is an ethical as well as a physiological question. It is related to the pro- found problem of Criminal Anthropology; and so comes within the scope of legislation. Is man only an automaton ? Has consciousness the self -recog- nition of the ego any causative relation to physical action ? Have volitions any power, or was Emerson mistaken in saying that " Thoughts rule the world ?" We all admit the fact of an acquired automatism, the product of habit, a second nature as it is called, but is there, or is there not, a self -determining power of the will ? Do the phenomena of the Involuntary Life show man to be irresponsible ? It is believed that the bulk of men, if not all, are susceptible ; that is, they would or could enter Trance under favorable conditions. Does this assuming it to be a fact A Copious Theme. 93 militate against the freedom of the will ? And are those who recognize their special susceptibility and admit their frequent surrendry of consciousness and volition, in experimental tests, to be regarded with any more favor or consideration before the law than are the victims of strong drink ? Is this suscepti- bility to Trance strictly a disease, or akin to In- sanity ? If so, the acts of the entranced come to be, in some sense, those of irresponsible agents. The subject is copious, but it is time to say with Virgil's shepherd, " Claudite jam rivos pueri ; sat prata biberunt." The further we explore this wonder- land, the more abundant and alluring does the wealth of material become. This paper is but a hint of what is left unsaid. As Columbus caught sight of the Orinoco, he ex- claimed: "This river flows not from an island, but from a continent ! " He was right. That stream drains 650,000 square miles, and receives the water of nearly three thousand tributaries. It is a fit sym- bol of the opulence of that vast and comparatively unknown continent of truth which Psychology has begun to explore. We have hardly passed the port- als. " A great and effectual door is opened to us and there are many adversaries," with not a few diffi- culties to overcome. But Science is unabashed. Slowly, yet surely onward she makes her solemn journey into this land of maze and mystery. 94 A Study of Trance. (1) Medical Legal Soc. Papers, Vol. III., p. 360. (2) Duke of Argyle, Chap. VII., Reign of Law. (3) Joel Prentiss Bishop. (4) Coke, VIII., 25. (5) Thwing's Handbook of Anthropology. Proceedings Am When we look at the neat sandals and smoothly laid curl on the cheek of the rough fisher- man that had toiled all night in the slimy shallop, as represented in Raphael's "Charge to Peter," or gaze on the insipid languor of some of Fra Angelico's "fleshless angels, boneless saints and bloodless vir- gins," though painted by the "St. John of art," we see how the greatest genius may sometimes repeat Unmanliness in Art. 161 the folly which Shakespeare signalizes in King John, Act IV., Sc. 2 and attempt "To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume on the violet, To smooth the ice, or add another hue Unto the rainbow, or with taper light To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish. " Sometimes this prettiness is proof of inanity, some- times of ambition, but often of an unworthy condes- cension to uncultivated judgments, such as a popular preacher once confessed to, when his methods were criticised by a friend, " We should doubtless agree in the matter of taste, but then, I know my crowd!" Canova's "Hebe" at Berlin and "Psyche" at Milan are among his best works. They show his skill in modelling and fineness of touch; the felicity and grace of motion and gesture, and the refinement of nature of which these forms are indices. The celes- tial Psyche and the languid softness of Cupid are finely contrasted in the erect attitude of the one and the yielding inclination of the other. The drapery of Hebe, pressed against her person, suggests more of delicate beauty than the nude figure. It calls to mind the sonnet of Ippolito Pindemonte : "Whither, celestial Hebe, dost thou stray, Leaving the banquet of eternal Jove ? Deign 'st thou to change the radiant fields above To tread earth's dark and ignoble way ? Immortal sculptor ! who do'st yet outvie ftalian art and readiest Attic grace, Life's soft and breathing aspect thou couldst trace ; 162 The Works of Canova. In sculptured motion cheat the wond'ring eye. Back from that form on which entranced we gaze, Her vestments seem to natter in the wind, Buoyant in many a graceful fold behind ; While Nature's self, whose law the world obeys, Deceived by mimic art, believes a stone With motion gifted, swiftly passing on. ' ' The statue of Palamades tells another story of Grecian life and art. Socrates is said to have singled out this hero and martyr as one whom he hoped to meet in the future life, for he was a man of wisdom, rectitude and purity, a man whom his country un- justly condemned to death. These virtues seem to speak forth in the serene repose and dignity of his erect and pliant form. Soon after the completion of the statue, while Canova stood by it, its support gave way. The marble figure fell and was broken in many pieces, very nearly involving the artist himself in destruction. A fine engraving by Henry Moses is preserved in Canova's life by Count Cicognara [H. G. Bohn, 1849, London.] In executing this work he anticipated what Dr. Knox of the French Academy has since said, speak- ing of schools of art, "There is but one, that of Nature, though to read her volume profitably one must study Greek and Italian art, and so learn to wisely follow nature in inward structure and outward form ; in her intentions as well as in her forthcom- ings. Merely to imitate the highest art is mannerism, while to attempt to improve on it is sure to result in caricature and failure." A Reformer of Art. 163 The Bernini style of a previous century showed a lack of conscientiousness ; it was naturalistic, sensa- tional, passionate and ostentatious. Jesuitism sought to attract the gaze of the curious by the glowing ecstacy, shown in their altar pieces, and by other forms of spectacular seduction. In the beautiful forms of Correggio, there are seen germs of this de- generacy. Canova did much to reform plastic art from the maudlin and sensual temper which had, be- fore his day, so widely prevailed. That he should occasionally fall into the theatric mannerism of his predecessors is not to be wondered at. But viewing him as a reformer, whose aim seemed to be to intro- duce a purer and more healthful life, we can overlook his blemishes and at least commend his purpose. In his "Clement XIV." he "touches a genuinely plastic key," says Liibke, and shows "earnestness and dig- nity. Clement XIII. is nobly conceived, with serious simplicity and solemn repose. We are transported to a purer atmosphere." His fertile fancy and his graceful touch are seen in the accessories of this last named tomb in St. Peter's. The crouching lions that guard the entrance are admirably executed. His ' ' Religion" and " Pieta," wrought for the church he built for Possagno, show him not only "Instinct with active thought and moved Parnassian dreams," but filled with something of Christian sentiment as well, although it is easy to find fault with the some- what pretentious robes and halo about "Religion." 164 The Works of Canova. It awakens the same feeling when we look at Can- ova's "Washington" sitting as a Greek hero. The Stuttgart professor, Dr. Liibke, justly says that men of our time should wear our garb and not an antique. They should in marble appear in the form and attire in which they have moved before in. The "Graces" of Canova are praised by those who delight in naked, languishing female beauty, but they cannot be expected to command general admira- tion. Tastes divide here. Some statues secure almost unanimous applause, for "they denote a foregone conclusion," as some one has said of the pictures of Nicolas Poussin, "the Milton of painters," as Hazlitt regarded him. Every one is charmed, excepting now and then an imbecile, such as strayed into the British Museum one day. Seeing the interest that the re- mains of tte Greek Parthenon were exciting in the minds of beholders, he ventured to ask a gentleman what there was remarkable in those marbles. The enraptured admirer of the Elgin marbles, as if uncon- scious of the interruption, and only thinking aloud- exclaimed ' ' Lifelike ! " " Lifelike well what of that?" drawled out the booby in broadcloth. The goddess Vesta was once saved by the braying of an ass, and so, for a long time, that animal was solemnly crowned by the Komans. These long-eared critics are still at large, and the voice of their braying is heard in the land. It is needless to say, as did Deborah, "Speak! ye that ride on white asses, ye His Popularity. 165 that sit in judgment," for they give their unasked criticisms. We are forced to stay their noise, as King Charles stayed the loud voice of a donkey that suddenly broke in upon the speech of the Mayor of Rochester, ' ' One at a time ! one at a time, gentle- men!" We were saying that some works of art denote a "foregone conclusion." To see them is to admire them. There is no dissonance of criticism, at least among those of ordinary intelligence. The consensus of feeling is marked. This is an irritating fact to meet. Ruskin has encountered such a judgment of the works of Canova on the part of the educated English of the present century. He says that "the admiration of Canova is one of the most deadly symptoms of the civilization of the upper classes." Here we have the opinion of the critic versus that of the community. He is entitled to his, and they to theirs. But we recall Hilliard's remark, "Art can- not endure a commentary. It must be its own interpreter or else it cannot be understood." Least of all, we may add, can it endure a prejudiced com- mentator, who seems to dwell on the blemish and ignore the beauty, indulging sometimes in a severity that is libelous. Judgment went against Ruskin in 1878, when, in an English court, he was fined, though but a farthing, for abusing Whistler's "Nocturnes," in these words, "I never expected to hear a coxcomb ask 200 guineas for flinging a pot of paint in the pub- 166 The Works of Canova lie's face." Such bitterness is apt to be proof of weak- ness, and hurts the critic far more than the artist. Eaton says that Canova regarded his statue of the Princess Borghese as one of his best works. The prince allowed few to look upon it, being more jeal- ous of the statue of his wife than of her own person. He kept the marble locked up in the palace, and he alone held the key of the apartment. The sculptor Chantry was admitted one night to see it and held the taper so as to best bring out the beauties of the figure. This incident suggested the lines of Moore: "When he, thy peer in art and fame, Hung o'er the marble with delight, And while his lingering hand would steal O'er every grace the taper's rays, Gave thee, with all the generous zeal Such master spirits only feel, The best of fame, a rival's praise ! " It has been called a miracle of manipulation in its exquisite finish. It also has a history which invests it with a still higher value, even, than it has as a work of art. The kneeling figure of Pius VI. at St. Peter's has a purer sentiment, and that of Clement XIII. , already noticed, is called by Hare the greatest work ever executed by Canova. Forsyth pronounces the lions ki unrivalled," and he is not one who is lavish in praise, or in any such danger as Sidney Smith said Gifford was in, so generously distributing reputation as to leave no reputation to himself as a judge. Forsyth Mausoleum of Christina. 167 was not a blind optimist, but rather sharp and severe, at times. He said of Canova, " He draws beauty even from expedients and throws mind into every trifle." The group of English kings under the dome of St. Peters is well termed by Lord Mahon "a stately monument" before which one may stand meditating "in thoughtful silence on the mockery of human greatness and the last record of ruined hopes." Higher than either of these works, however, we may place the Mausoleum at Vienna, in the church of the Augustines, in memory of Christina. "That excessively clever carver, Canova," as a recent maga- zine patronizingly calls him has presented here not only an elaborate but unique and meritorious work It is wrought in greyish marble and in a pyramidal form. There are two groups at the base, embracing seven figures besides a crouching lion, a favorite custodian of tombs. An allegorical figure of Virtue is represented as a noble matron bearing a funeral urn. She is followed by female attendants and by Beneficence, another queenly form, with a blind and feeble old man clinging to her, and a little girl, hold- ing folded hands to praying lips. These all are delin- eated with marvellous pathos and delicacy of feeling, not less than with historic fidelity, as all admit who recall the sweet humanities illustrated by the Duchess. The details of this work are harmonious and vividly suggestive, as seen, for example, in the loosened and dishevelled tresses of the females, indicative of grief, 168 The Works of Canova. their simple unstudied attire, the torches they carry to illume the shadowy portals, the attitude and ex- pression of each figure. The genius of the place sits leaning against the lion, looking with pensive and sympathetic gaze at the procession, while his right hand guards the shield of the House of Saxony. Above the door is held a medallion of Christina in the hands of Felicity. It is encircled by the emblem of eternity, and a winged cherub bears a palm of victory. The poetic sensibility of Canova's nature and the chivalric sympathy he had with that which was pure and noble have ample scope in the composition and execution of this celebrated piece of sculpture. The genius of Canova is also shown in the field of historical composition. "Socrates and his Judges" is an illustration. This basso relievo contains about a score of figures. The Athenian sage confronts his accusers and denies that he has questioned the exist- ence of the gods. His right hand and his eyes are lifted heavenward. His left hand lies on his breast, half concealed by his mantle. Plato stands behind in serene majesty, erect and unmoved, but Xenophon bends forward with something of sullen wrath in his eye, as if he would like to try weightier arguments than words. Alcibiades hardly carries himself with the martial prowess we should expect, and his face is too feminine for a soldier. The faces of the judges show no mercy, but Anytus, one of the accusers, seems to be abashed before the challenge The Nude in Art. 169 of Socrates, and is about drawing the tapestry across his face. A more joyous scene is described in another fine basso relievo called the "Return of Telemachus." The "Death of Priam" is full of the tragic element, even to the verge of sensationalism. The gesticula- tions of the terrified females, the prone, limp body of the dead Polytes and the crouching figures of the fugitives, flying from the palace, are presented with ghastly and appalling fidelity, not unlike some of the figures in Michael Angelo's "Last Judgment." The anatomical accuracy of this and other groups is noticeable, and yet not offensively prominent, as in some of Angelo's works. Like Da Vinci, the inventor of iconographic anatomy, Canova subordinated de- tails to the conventional and theoretic. During the authentic historic period of Greek art the dissection of the human body was forbidden by the Roman government. This is a necessary part of the study of a physiologist or a surgeon, but its importance to the artist has been greatly overestimated. Why seek the living among the dead ? As to the nude in art, also, the writer believes that it has reached its limit. Whatever may have been its value in the days of Canova, or Angelo, or Praxi- teles, in Italy or Greece the unveiled figure is rarely to be chosen to-day among us. The author of " Marble Faun" says that these unclothed bodies, male and female, not only now awaken shame, but weary an 170 The Works of Canova. eye of taste. Greek sculptors made nude statues "modest as violets and sufficiently draped in their own beauty," but the modern sculptor cannot work with a pure heart, he says, for he must gaze on hired models, and " the marble inevitably loses its chastity under such circumstances." "To the pure all things are pure," but men are not pure, and that is just the trouble. Art nowadays not only incidentally but purposely ministers to lust, as photograph, painting and picture prove, as well as the confessions of many who have been depraved with this form of seductive art. (4 > The present is a formative period in this land. Materialistic influences debase our tastes. Purity and refinement are lacking. We need not paint as dark a picture as Jarves, who seems to imitate Ruskin in exaggeration, and say that " in America the pre- sent is an epoch of monstrous plaster figures daubed with crazy paint ; of shoddy portrait statues and in - sane ideal ones ; of ornaments, pictures and sculpture made to gull and sell ; of rude, though not unkindly manners and speech; lakes of tobacco-spittle and heels higher than heads, where ladies pass ; of pollut- ing the balmiest airs of heaven with fumes of filthy pipes, and of the thousand and one sins of commission by the selfish and thoughtless that make life tenfold less enjoyable than it needs be." We do not overlook the brighter side of the picture, the nameless and numberless influences for good which are at work to counteract these erotic and erratic elements in art Purity of Thought. 171 and vulgarity in manners. Still, there is a time for stern reproof and alarm. " The sentinel is not to sleep at his post," and the complaining critics we have quoted are not altogether wrong. Refinement of taste is absolutely essential, not only to the creation of new works of art, but to the enjoyment of those of earlier days. Christian art once shared the disgrace of paganism, and it is now our province to release it again from the debasing influences of a sordid civiliza- tion. As Homer was the Bible of ancient art, and Dante of medieval, the guide and guard of Culture to-day of which art is one form of expression- should be the gospel of Jesus Christ. This motto should be written over the studio of the painter and sculptor as the law and the inspiration of their work, "Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are PURE, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, THINK on these things."- Philippians 4, 8. Sir Joshua Reynolds says that oftentimes a single essay by an artist may be of more value to us in prac- tical information than a thousand volumes of theory. We cannot take our leave of Canova and his works without listening for a moment to his own ideas of the sculptor's vocation, the spirit which animated, and the method which directed him, as expressed in his own language. We shall then be the better prepared 172 The Works of Canova. to test the correctness of our views of him and to judge of the true place to which he is to be assigned among the world's great masters. Listen to these words: "Art, being the minister of virtue, of beauty and ideal excellence, should always ennoble its sub- jects. How unworthy are they to be called true artists who, slighting the true purposes of art, are content to take low and imperfect models for imita- tion." As poetry chooses not only words proper and perspicuous, but choice and felicitous, so, says Canova, the sculptor should only create those forms that ex- press grace and nobleness ; " objects, in short, that are at once rare, true and beautiful." As one can always trust his own judgment in all things, Canova recommends his pupils or associates to avail them- selves of the criticisms of others, and cites the example of Phidias, who hid himself in the temple to hear the opinions which his Olympian Jupiter elicited, and then reconsidered his work agreeable to public taste. Canova acted on this principle himself, and, disguised as a ragged monk, entered St. Peter's with the crowd that came to see his " Clement XIII." when first un_ veiled. He was undiscovered. The very prince who had ordered the work did not recognize him, but, thinking him a bold beggar, put him one side and told him to keep at a distance. "There is one noble means of avenging ourselves for unjust criticism; it is by doing still better and silencing it solely by the increasing excellence of our Personal Character. 173 works. If you undertake to dispute, to defend, or to criticise, by way of reprisal, you involve yourself in endless troubles and disquietudes ; disturb that tran- quility which is so necessary to the successful exer- cise of your pursuit, and waste in harassing contests that precious time which you should consecrate to your art." The good sense and candor reflected in these utter- ances commend them to the thoughtful regard of per- sons in every calling. They also give us an exalted idea of the moral excellence of the man who ex- pressed them. Canova touches a vital theme when he speaks of personal character of the artist as re- vealed in his works. He shows himself fully in ac- cord with that canon of art contained in the verse of a sweet singer: " 1 Tis first the good and then the beautiful, Not first the beautiful and then the good, First the rough seed sown in the rougher soil, Then the flower blossom or the branching wood." It was Akenside who said that true beauty came from heaven as a priestess of truth in this dark world, "For Truth and God are one, And Beauty dwells in them and they in her With like participation." Lady Eastlake speaks of the "sculptured grandeur" of Handel's music as a fit channel of God's thought to men, and in sublime majesty unrivalled by any- thing ever heard in human flesh. But it was the devotional character and not the mere musical skill 174 The Works of Canova. of Handel that gave the world the "Messiah." He wept and prayed as he composed. So Haydn wrote over his "Creation" "Soli Deo Gloria," and at the end "Laus Deo"; meanwhile, he says, "praying to God with earnestness that He would enable me to praise Him worthily." The sculptor, as truly as the poet or musician, is the historian and interpreter of life. As his own character is rich, ample, full and symmetrical, responsive to the good, the beautiful and true ; he speaks to our deepest sensibilities and makes the speechless marble eloquent with unspoken thought. Referring to the character of the artist, Canova says, " Purity of heart and ingenuousness of mind have a great influence to ennoble the conception of the artist, and even his style and powers of execu- tion. Impurity never can be really beautiful. I my- self detest all immodest subjects and think that an artist never should sully his mind by treating such. If you are unable to give to nudity itself an air of perfect modesty, quit the fine arts by all means for some other pursuit !" He condemns severely the habits of dissipation into which some sculptors have fallen, late hours, the dance and the debauch, and says that he pities them in their vain attempt to unite a life of amusement with the work of a noble profession. Mediocrity or failure will be the sure result. On the other hand, zeal without discretion is fruitless." Mere enthusiasm Working Methods. 175 and warmth of fancy are little better than delirium, unless joined with soundness of judgment and fine powers of execution. The judgment is to be satisfied only by what is just and true, and the heart by the fine expression of natural feelings. First of all, in chiselling a statue, he began with and finished the head before the other parts, that he might be inspired, " enamoured" with it, otherwise the three or four months' intercourse with the subject would be "work against the grain." "I have always found it necessary to imagine as lovely a face as I possibly can in order that I may proceed with spirit and devo- tion to the rest of the work. I say within myself, 'this lovely face ought to have every other part beau- tiful to correspond with it ; the attitude must be beau- tiful ; she must also be clothed and adorned suitably with her beauty/ and thus the first idea guides and inspires me throughout the work. This is science which is, I think, founded on the human heart." Whatever diversity of opinions existed as to the comparative excellence of his works, wrought out on the principles thus stated, all the contemporaries of Canova were ready to admit the sincerity of his pur- pose and the purity of his life. When he passed away, we are told that throughout Italy was heard the ejaculation "uttered by every one with the deep- est emotion, 'The good Canova is dead !'"' The vir- tues he commended to others he had practiced him- self. His chisel had wrought on marble and his life 176 The Works of Canova. had wrought on men. Hence these tears. His "works" followed him. His memory has lived in grateful hearts, for he who had never known domestic joys, who had lived a simple, frugal, single life, made many homes bright with his princely bounty. All through one winter's famine he fed the poor of his native Venetian village from his own private purse. To the father of another starving household he offered four hundred scudi, $500, not as a gift f or the man was a painter, poor in merit as in money, and as proud as he was poor but as a nominal sum for a picture ordered by Canova, to save the man's self respect. These memorabilia might be multiplied to show that Canova's ideas of personal character as related to the aims of art were not visionary, theoretical and unpractical, but were realized in his own life of five and sixty years. It has been the aim of this thesis not only to char- acterize the features of Canova's works, but to show some of the principles which were their inspiration and their guide. With respect to a final judgment as to the place he justly occupies as a sculptor, little need be said in addition. The high position to which the educated classes of England have raised him has been referred to in the remark quoted from Ruskin. In the present survey we have not hidden the faults that are apparent, but have chosen to attribute them largely to the vicious His True Position. 177 influences in that period of art, out of which Canova's age was coming and against which he nobly strove. Estimated by the standard of perfection to which Hudson brings Shakespeare, "Solidarity, Originality, Completeness and Disinterestedness," in other words, organic unity, individuality, truthfulness and self- forgetfulness, the Italian in his art would sink below the bard of Avon in his. But judged by the times in which he wrought, and by the general atmosphere of grace and beauty that envelope his works, we are constrained to give him a high place among the artists of the world. Not only do his productions command our admiration, but the ideal he presented. No one was more painfully sensible than himself of the fact that that ideal was unreached, but the whole- some spirit it imparted may well be commended to the attention of some who style themselves founders of modern sestheticism, "a compound of fatalism, pantheism and pessimism, the prevailing material- ism or 'dirt philosophy' of the day. Life is reduced to a serio-comic farce, or an utterly cheerless struggle for profitless objects ; the world is either a playground for thoughtless merriment, or a theater for lawless riot." From such a " Renaissance," Good Lord deliver us! It was only in this 19th century that Baumgarten gave men the word "^Esthetics," though the science of the beautiful had been studied from the times of Plato to those of Cousin. Now, men of the Swine- 178 The Works of Canova. burne sta'mp, or disciples of Oscar Wilde, have chris- tened their insipid yet poisonous teachings on art "Modern JEstheticism," a euphemism that illustrates what Archbishop Trench terms " degeneracy of words." Over against their twaddle about beauty it is refresh- ing to set the sentences quoted from Canova, extol- ling purity of heart and nobility of aim as prerequi- sites in any department of the fine arts. A study of the life and times of this eminent Italian sculptor is an alluring and remunerative exercise. Guided by the canons of criticism already stated, with an eye open to his excellencies as well as to his defects, to his purpose as well as to its realization, we cannot fail to see the value of the work he accom- plished, or hesitate to concede to him the exalted position which he fairly won. High on the roll of those who, from the earliest centuries till now have adorned and enriched the temple of Beauty by their imperishable productions, the impartial historian of art will write the name of ANTONIO CANOVA. NOTE 1. Of Polybius, Anthon says a history has never been writ- ten by a man of more good sense, perspicacity, sounder judgment or more free from all manner of prejudices," while Tacitus is called the "Father of Philosophical History. " 2. Roubiliac used linen dipped in warm starch water. When the shape pleased him he left it to diy. Like Canova he polished the sur- face of the marble to a waxen smoothness to prevent stains, which do not easily penetrate a glossy surface. Chantry says that Roubiliac exe- cuted "the noblest of all English statues "that of Sir Isaac Newton, Notes. 179 and that he cherished a most hearty regard for merit in others. Stand- ing before the canopy which surrounds the figure of Sir Francis Vere in Westminster Abbey, lost in admiration, he was accosted by a friend. Laying his hand on his friend's arm, Roubiliac, entranced, exclaimed, pointing to the figure, "Hush ! he will speak soon ! " 3. The icy gloss gives one a chill that the ordinary marble does not. Of the drapery of "Handel" by Roubiliac, "Every button seems to have set for its likeness." When we see Albert Durer's angel in flounced petticoats driving the naked pair from Paradise, or Cigoli's "Simeon "with modern spectacles astride his nose, we cannot but smile. 4. In Wuttke's "Christian Ethics" we read that it is a false notion that clothing conceals beauty. It heightens it when it expresses the spiritual. A bathing place, he says, with naked bathers, though each be an Apollo, would not be a beautiful spectacle. Why exhibit in the gallery, or before the footlights, what would shame ua elsewhere? Mendelssohn would not prostitute his art to the service of vice. He writes of a certain opera. "In this opera a young girl divests herself of her garments and sings a song to the eff ect that she wfll be married the next day. / have no music for such things ! I consider it ignoble ! " If all painters, sculptors and musicians took this ground, cleaner work would be done in all departments of art. A successful play-writer of whom Augustus Daly says that he "has most distinctively portrayed American life in the drama," says in Harper's Weekly: "Within the memory of theater-goers, the nude was almost un- known, and anything savoring of immorality was tabooed. At present no light opera or spectacular performance can be a success without a superabundant display of corporeal charms, and the number of plays whose corner stones are unchastity and vice, is constantly on the increase." 180 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE. "The "Works of Canova," with three other papers, " Windows of Character," "The Works of Landseer'' and "Rome an Art Center," were read in a course of Lectures given by the author in New York city, at the close of which the following resolution presented by PROFESSOR W. C. JARVIS, M.D. of New York University, was adopted : ' ' Having listened to the Lectures of DR. THWING on Art and Char- acter for the past month with vivid and increasing interest, week by week, we desire to record our grateful appreciation of these lectures scholarly in statement and delivered in a most engaging style and also to express the hope that they may find a wider audience and a permanent place, ere long, in a printed form. " Some of the scientific essays of this volume, read from advance sheets, have elicited kindly criticism from eminent writers. REV. DR. CHARLES F. THWING of Minneapolis, expresses his warm approval, and adds, "The author is working along a line of greatest promise for the reformation and regeneration of fallen humanity." REV. DR. E. PAYSON INGERSOLL of Brooklyn, an honored member of the Cleveland Bar before he entered the pulpit, writes : "I have read PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES AND MENTAL AUTOMATISM with profound admiration. DR. THWING 's work is really grand. There is constant evidence of scholarly investigation. There is also graphic reasoning. His sentences are bright and ongoing. Beyond this, he convinces as well as pleases. " The Essay which was read before the Medico-Legal Society received "Honorable Mention " from the Committee on Prizes, and appears in the Transactions of the Society, also, in a separate volume issued by the Society. Orders for the same may be addressed to the Author, loG St. Mark's Avenue, Brooklyn, N. Y. HOME USE CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT MAIN LIBRARY This book is due on the last date stamped below kTfc^. b vll wed b /. ca 'l'ne 642-3405. Renewals and recharges may be made 4 days prior to due date. DAYS CLA RARY LOAN DEC 2 6 1974 LD21 A-40m-5 '74 (R8191L) General Library University of California Berkeley 2261