Two Discourses Concerning Different Wits by Charleton William (1 results)

Hardcover. Condition: Very Good+. 8vo. Contemporary calf; modern spine. Charleton's thought-provoking discourse on the differences between men, their temperaments, thought processes, actions, etc. In the author's time it was known that the brain was the organ of the mind, but comparative anatomy had shown that the fabric of men's brains is not different from that of beasts. This was contradictory to Charleton and he attempted to find all the uses of the parts of the brain and soul. "Charleton foresaw that the answer to these problems would eventually come from future research 'to find the true uses of all the several parts of the Brain' and 'what she [the Soul] made use of in her several Functions' - a pointer to Gall's great discovery almost a century and a half later that the cortex is the seat of the higher mental and moral faculties and that the gradual growth of its surface area through the animal kingdom is what made man different from 'Brutes' and accounted for his superior intellectual endowment . " - Hunter and Macalpine. 300 Years of Psychiatry. pp. 193-5. Wing: C-3695. Simon, Bibliotheca Gastronomica: 336.…