DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18825#0133
LECT. V.] PROPORTIONS OF THE HEAD. 107
that some persons who possess only that attraction
which belongs to this feature, when directed by
complacency and good-nature, are thought more
amiable than the completest beauties. I need not
enlarge on the utility of this part ; its use in
receiving our food is obvious; and though some-
times, as has been said, it receives poison too, yet I
must own myself of opinion that the poisons of life
are more usually received at the eye, or the ear. I
will not indeed vindicate the use sometimes made of
its member the tongue (for this member, though the
glory of our frame, lies under the imputation of be-
ing an unruly evil). " The tongue has neither bones
nor joint, yet fashions itself with the utmost volubi-
lity into every shape, and every posture, which can
express sentiment, or constitute harmony." The
communication of our ideas by means of the tongue,
is an evident instance of our superiority above the
brute creation ; had they minds, they would cer-
tainly impart their reasonings to each other ; whereas
their exertions of voice appear to express nothing
more than bodily sensation, without any combination
of mental ideas.
Of the Ears we observe that their proportion is
usually somewhat more than one-fourth parr the
height of the head ; in width about half their height;
the head in turning itself round very much changes
their appearance; as we sometimes see them in front,
sometimes obliquely, sometimes behin i.
The sense of hearing, like that of sight, is a sub-
ject, full of wonders ; that the undulations of the air,
so gentle, so faint as to be imperceptible by any other
that some persons who possess only that attraction
which belongs to this feature, when directed by
complacency and good-nature, are thought more
amiable than the completest beauties. I need not
enlarge on the utility of this part ; its use in
receiving our food is obvious; and though some-
times, as has been said, it receives poison too, yet I
must own myself of opinion that the poisons of life
are more usually received at the eye, or the ear. I
will not indeed vindicate the use sometimes made of
its member the tongue (for this member, though the
glory of our frame, lies under the imputation of be-
ing an unruly evil). " The tongue has neither bones
nor joint, yet fashions itself with the utmost volubi-
lity into every shape, and every posture, which can
express sentiment, or constitute harmony." The
communication of our ideas by means of the tongue,
is an evident instance of our superiority above the
brute creation ; had they minds, they would cer-
tainly impart their reasonings to each other ; whereas
their exertions of voice appear to express nothing
more than bodily sensation, without any combination
of mental ideas.
Of the Ears we observe that their proportion is
usually somewhat more than one-fourth parr the
height of the head ; in width about half their height;
the head in turning itself round very much changes
their appearance; as we sometimes see them in front,
sometimes obliquely, sometimes behin i.
The sense of hearing, like that of sight, is a sub-
ject, full of wonders ; that the undulations of the air,
so gentle, so faint as to be imperceptible by any other