4 HUMAN PHYSIOGNOMY. character by the cast of the countenance, and rarely do these impressions beguile us. We cannot attribute this wholly to experience, for even “ the lovely miniatures of life,” ere falsified hopes have taught them that men deceive, or the pleasures of friendly communion have proved to them that there are hearts which may be fearlessly trusted,—welcome with outstretched arms, or avert with nestling fear, the stranger to whom they are presented. We will not stop to theorize upon this “freemasonry of nature.” Neither is it our present purpose alone to unfold the science of a pouting lip, (we would not, ladies, for the universe, term it an art!)—or to translate the language of a speaking eye—or to record the poetry of a sentimental nose, which the great Slaukenbergius, in Sterne, has so pathetically achieved before us; but it is our object to afford a systematic exposition of Corporeal and Emotive Physiognomy, giving a correct distribution of its principles, and to trace their physical and moral foundations in the laws of our earthly fabric. “Physiognomy” is a compound Greek word, signifying “ the law of,” or “an index to, nature so that in its strict literal sense it means an indication of nature generally. But in its limited acceptation with us, it is applied to the indication of human nature. We may broadly define it, as the science which professes to tell the mental character from the external appearances of the body. It is a branch of knowledge which must have been recognised almost as early as human passions embellished and disfigured this beauteous world of ours. We find some shrewd and truthful allusions to it in the earliest writings of the Hebrew, Greek, and Roman poets and philosophers : but it is only within the last century or so, that it can be said to have been so fixed on a philosophical basis as to be entitled to the rank of a science. The very celebrated Swiss clergyman, Lavater, devoted a lifetime of no ordinary talent to its pursuit; and he has been the chief means of gaining it the attention of the moderns. He was a good man, an ornament to humanity, possessed of ’ subtle, observing and discriminating faculties, and of a wonderful eloquence ; which have afforded great notoriety to his voluminous writings, and more authority than they philosophically merit. For, being but slightly acquainted with the principles of physiology, he was unable, in many instances, to impute the facts which his acute penetration observed, to their natural causes ; he was consequently led into some whimsical vagaries, and his unbounded enthusiasm for the subject occasionally beclouded his reasonings. His exposition of Corporeal Physiognomy, however, is so true to nature, as has since been tested by the science of the art, that we shall here give a literal translation of it verbatim.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM4ODY=