FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128  
129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   >>   >|  
As for that certain, very thin, subtle and very fragrant juice which Coglionissimo Borri, the great Milaneze physician affirms, in a letter to Bartholine, to have discovered in the cellulae of the occipital parts of the cerebellum, and which he likewise affirms to be the principal seat of the reasonable soul, (for, you must know, in these latter and more enlightened ages, there are two souls in every man living,--the one, according to the great Metheglingius, being called the Animus, the other, the Anima;)--as for the opinion, I say of Borri,--my father could never subscribe to it by any means; the very idea of so noble, so refined, so immaterial, and so exalted a being as the Anima, or even the Animus, taking up her residence, and sitting dabbling, like a tad-pole all day long, both summer and winter, in a puddle,--or in a liquid of any kind, how thick or thin soever, he would say, shocked his imagination; he would scarce give the doctrine a hearing. What, therefore, seemed the least liable to objections of any, was that the chief sensorium, or head-quarters of the soul, and to which place all intelligences were referred, and from whence all her mandates were issued,--was in, or near, the cerebellum,--or rather somewhere about the medulla oblongata, wherein it was generally agreed by Dutch anatomists, that all the minute nerves from all the organs of the seven senses concentered, like streets and winding alleys, into a square. So far there was nothing singular in my father's opinion,--he had the best of philosophers, of all ages and climates, to go along with him.--But here he took a road of his own, setting up another Shandean hypothesis upon these corner-stones they had laid for him;--and which said hypothesis equally stood its ground; whether the subtilty and fineness of the soul depended upon the temperature and clearness of the said liquor, or of the finer net-work and texture in the cerebellum itself; which opinion he favoured. He maintained, that next to the due care to be taken in the act of propagation of each individual, which required all the thought in the world, as it laid the foundation of this incomprehensible contexture, in which wit, memory, fancy, eloquence, and what is usually meant by the name of good natural parts, do consist;--that next to this and his Christian-name, which were the two original and most efficacious causes of all;--that the third cause, or rather what logicians call the Cau
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128  
129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

opinion

 

cerebellum

 

father

 

affirms

 

hypothesis

 

Animus

 

corner

 
stones
 

streets

 

winding


ground

 

Shandean

 

alleys

 

concentered

 

equally

 

senses

 
organs
 

subtilty

 

singular

 

philosophers


climates

 

square

 

setting

 

texture

 

natural

 

eloquence

 
contexture
 

memory

 

consist

 

logicians


Christian

 

original

 

efficacious

 

incomprehensible

 

foundation

 

nerves

 

favoured

 

depended

 
temperature
 

clearness


liquor
 
maintained
 

individual

 
required
 

thought

 
propagation
 

fineness

 

subscribe

 

physician

 

Milaneze