Our featured writer today is Thomas Love Peacock (October 18, 1785 to January 23, 1866.) His talent for close creative logic made him a fortune at the East India office. His ability to focus on the arguments themselves, rather than the facts behind them, also gained him a reputation as a novelist. His first was Headlong Hall (1816) and this story set the scheme for succeeding books, which all feature dinner table discussions as a setting for a satirical treatment of what were then modern ideas. We take up the story mid-mouthful:
.....A few brief sentences, perspicuously worded and scientifically arranged, will enumerate all the characteristics of a lion, or a tiger..
This is in the interests of
PHYSIOLOGISTS [who] have been much puzzled to account for the varieties of moral character in men, as well as for the remarkable similarity of habit and disposition in all the individual animals of every other respective species. A few brief sentences, perspicuously worded will enumerate all the characteristics of a ....wolf,... or a squirrel, or a goat, ...., or a rat, or a cat ....and whatever is physiologically predicted of any individual... tiger [say],.... will be found to hold true of all ....tigers, wolves, bears, squirrels, goats, horses, asses, hogs, and dogs, whatsoever.
Now, in man, the very reverse of this appears to be the case; for he has so few distinct and characteristic marks which hold true of all his species, that philosophers in all ages have found it a task of infinite difficulty to give him a definition. Hence one has defined him to be a featherless biped, a definition which is equally applicable to an unfledged fowl: another, to be an animal which forms opinions, than which nothing can be more inaccurate, for a very small number of the species form opinions, and the remainder take them upon trust, without investigation or inquiry.
"Again, man has been defined to be an animal that carries a stick: an attribute which undoubtedly belongs to man only, but not to all men always; though it uniformly characterizes some of the graver and more imposing varieties, such as physicians, oran-outangs, and lords in waiting.
"We cannot define man to be a reasoning animal, for we do not dispute that idiots are men; ....
"It appears to me that man may be correctly defined an animal which, without any peculiar or distinguishing faculty of its own, is, as it were, a bundle or compound of faculties of other animals, by a distinct enumeration of which any individual of the species may be satisfactorily described. ....
"Every particular faculty of the mind has its corresponding organ in the brain. In proportion as any particular faculty or propensity acquires paramount activity in any individual, these organs develop themselves, and their development becomes externally obvious by corresponding lumps and bumps, exuberances and protuberances, on ... the occiput and sinciput. In all animals but man the same organ is equally developed in every individual of the species: for instance, that of migration in the swallow, that of destruction in the tiger, that of architecture in the beaver, and that of paternal affection in the bear. The human brain, however, consists, as I have said, of a bundle or compound of all the faculties of all other animals; and, from the greater development of one or more of these, in the infinite varieties of combination, result all the peculiarities of individual character.
"Here is the skull of a beaver, and that of Sir Christopher Wren. You observe, in both these specimens, the prodigious development of the organ of constructiveness.
.....
"Here is the skull of a tiger. You observe the organ of carnage. Here is the skull of a fox. You observe the organ of plunder. Here is the skull of a peacock. You observe the organ of vanity..... Here is the skull of a conqueror, who, after overrunning several kingdoms, burning a number of cities, and causing the deaths of two or three millions of men, women, and children, was entombed with all the pageantry of public lamentation, and figured as the hero of several thousand odes and a round dozen of epics; while the poor highwayman [of similar animalistic character] was twice executed—
.... Born with the same faculties and the same propensities, these two men were formed by nature to run the same career: the different combinations of external circumstances decided the differences of their destinies.
"Here is the skull of a Newfoundland dog. You observe the organ of benevolence, and that of attachment. Here is a human skull, in which you may observe a very striking negation of both these organs; and an equally striking development of those of destruction, cunning, avarice, and self-love. This was one of the most illustrious statesmen that ever flourished in the page of history.
"Here is the skull of a turnspit, [A dog formerly used in a treadmill to turn a roasting spit] which, after a wretched life of dirty work, was turned out of doors to die on a dunghill. I have been induced to preserve it in consequence of its remarkable similarity to this, which belonged to a courtly poet, who having grown gray in flattering the great, was cast off in the same manner to perish by the same catastrophe."
"Again, man has been defined to be an animal that carries a stick: an attribute which undoubtedly belongs to man only, but not to all men always; though it uniformly characterizes some of the graver and more imposing varieties, such as physicians, oran-outangs, and lords in waiting.
"We cannot define man to be a reasoning animal, for we do not dispute that idiots are men; ....
"It appears to me that man may be correctly defined an animal which, without any peculiar or distinguishing faculty of its own, is, as it were, a bundle or compound of faculties of other animals, by a distinct enumeration of which any individual of the species may be satisfactorily described. ....
"Every particular faculty of the mind has its corresponding organ in the brain. In proportion as any particular faculty or propensity acquires paramount activity in any individual, these organs develop themselves, and their development becomes externally obvious by corresponding lumps and bumps, exuberances and protuberances, on ... the occiput and sinciput. In all animals but man the same organ is equally developed in every individual of the species: for instance, that of migration in the swallow, that of destruction in the tiger, that of architecture in the beaver, and that of paternal affection in the bear. The human brain, however, consists, as I have said, of a bundle or compound of all the faculties of all other animals; and, from the greater development of one or more of these, in the infinite varieties of combination, result all the peculiarities of individual character.
"Here is the skull of a beaver, and that of Sir Christopher Wren. You observe, in both these specimens, the prodigious development of the organ of constructiveness.
.....
"Here is the skull of a tiger. You observe the organ of carnage. Here is the skull of a fox. You observe the organ of plunder. Here is the skull of a peacock. You observe the organ of vanity..... Here is the skull of a conqueror, who, after overrunning several kingdoms, burning a number of cities, and causing the deaths of two or three millions of men, women, and children, was entombed with all the pageantry of public lamentation, and figured as the hero of several thousand odes and a round dozen of epics; while the poor highwayman [of similar animalistic character] was twice executed—
.... Born with the same faculties and the same propensities, these two men were formed by nature to run the same career: the different combinations of external circumstances decided the differences of their destinies.
"Here is the skull of a Newfoundland dog. You observe the organ of benevolence, and that of attachment. Here is a human skull, in which you may observe a very striking negation of both these organs; and an equally striking development of those of destruction, cunning, avarice, and self-love. This was one of the most illustrious statesmen that ever flourished in the page of history.
"Here is the skull of a turnspit, [A dog formerly used in a treadmill to turn a roasting spit] which, after a wretched life of dirty work, was turned out of doors to die on a dunghill. I have been induced to preserve it in consequence of its remarkable similarity to this, which belonged to a courtly poet, who having grown gray in flattering the great, was cast off in the same manner to perish by the same catastrophe."
After these, and several other illustrations, during which the skulls were handed round for the inspection of the company, Mr. Cranium proceeded thus:—
".....I would advise every parent who has the welfare of his son at heart, to procure as extensive a collection as possible of the skulls of animals, ...... If his skull bear a marked resemblance to that of a magpie, it cannot be doubted that he will prove an admirable lawyer; and if with this advantageous conformation be combined any similitude to that of an owl, very confident hopes may be formed of his becoming a judge."
A furious flourish of music was now heard from the ballroom, the Squire having secretly despatched the little butler to order it to strike up, by way of a hint to Mr. Cranium to finish his harangue. The company took the hint, and adjourned tumultuously, having just understood as much of the lecture as furnished them with amusement for the ensuing twelvemonth, in feeling the skulls of all their acquaintance.
A long excerpt yes, but of a writer who has been unjustly forgotten. The thesis of the whole novel Peacock poetically put on the title page:
All philosophers, who find
Some favorite system to their mind,
In every point to make it fit,
Will force all nature to submit.
A timeless reminder.
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