that form what we call conflitutions, are moisture, drynefs, heat, and cold, proceeding from the four elements. From these our Author derives the four principal conftitutions, the choleric, the phlegmatic, the fanguine, and the melancholic: in the firft of thefe, heat predominates, in the fecond, moisture, in the third, air, in the fourth, earth, i. e. according to his explication of the matter, the predominant element is that of which the moft ingredients enter into the mass of the blood and the nervous fluid, where they are converted into fubftances infinitely fubtile, and, as it were, volatile. M. LAVATER then proceeds to point out the contours and characteristic lines, whence may be deduced the general temperature of each individual, and the higheft and lowest degree of his irritability. A great number of heads, delineated in 24 plates, are exhibited here, to render more intelligible his obfervations, not only on the four principal temperaments, but alfo on their mixtures and modifications in different perfons. He concludes the article by propofing fome questions relative to this object, that may be of use in the conduct of life, to which he folicits the answers of men of wisdom and experience, and in the mean time gives his own, in which we find fentences that feem to mean fomething, and even something philofophical; but they will not ftand a tranflation. In English, both their meaning and philofophy evaporate, which fhews that they are very thin and volatile. We shall only obferve, that he confiders the phlegmatico-fanguine as the propereft conftitution for the conjugal bond, and the cholerico-melancholic as the mok adapted to friendship.

In the fecond chapter of this Fragment, he treats on the ftrength and weakness of conftitutions, the refpective marks of which are here enumerated, and illuftrated by feveral figures. The third chapter relates to the ftate of health, and of fickness, and is called an Effay on Semeiotics, or the fcience of medical figns and fymptoms. But this effay really is no more than an expreffion of our Author's wish, that we had a good effay on the subject, accompanied with fome paffages from Zimmerman's excellent Treatise on Experience, in which the nature and fymptoms of the different diseases produced by the paffions are accurately described. The next article on youth and old age is more interefting, though it abounds in those vague and arbitrary notions and decifions, that, by their uncertainty or obfcurity, dazzle and perplex much more than they enlighten and inftruét. The phyfiognomony of youth fhews what the perfon will be, and that of age what he has been. As the bones, whofe fyftem is M. LAVATER'S principal guide in his fcientific indications of fentiments and characters, are not fully formed nor consolidated in youth, this circumftance renders it much more difficult for him to interpret the countenance of a young perfon, than of

one

one who is advanced in years. He gets over this difficulty as well as he can. He prefents to the reader a series of heads, which reprefent man in all the ftages of his exiftence, from infancy to old age, and draws from them a multitude of remarks and conclufions, more or lefs perfpicuous and interefting. But the greatest part of the heads and profiles, that are defigned to express infancy, are very inaccurate representations of that period, and are evidently more expreffive of youth or adolefcence; and this has an inaufpicious influence on our Author's interpretations. His adolefcents' heads are much more conformable to the period they reprefent; but they are too fmall. They would have been fingularly pleafing on a larger fcale; but whether, on any scale, an attentive and intelligent, but un-initiated fpectator, would guess at the peculiar and dif tinctive lines of character attributed to each, is another queftion..

There are' (fays our Author) three claffes of children, and three claffes of men, in one of which every individual must be ranged. The human body is either fiff and tenfe, or lax and foft, or it holds the middle line between these two extremes, and, in this cafe, it exhibits the joint characters of ease and precifion. In our fpecies, the extremes are but half-men or monsters. On the contrary, the more that Nature is in her centre, the more are her forms accurate and eafy; they have precifion without stiffness, and ease without laxity. The fame distinction takes place in moral character. A tenfe character is oppreffive to others, while a lax one is easily crushed and overwhelmed; but the easy and accurate is burthenfome to none, and has a spring that can refift the weight of oppofition. The affemblage of a great number of right lines, or of lines that are nearly fuch, neceffarily fuppofes a pofitive and obftinate humour, and a turn of mind which is difficult to manage. On the other hand, a complete roundness of contours or outlines is the certain indication of fenfuality, laziness, and, in one word, of a conftitution that facrifices to the flesh at the expence of the spirit. But there will be neither undue tenfion nor relaxation of character in a form where right lines are gently blended with curves.'

So far the Author: but there is a grofs error, we think, in the plate, where this doctrine is illuftrated by three figures; for the figure which expreffes stiffness, or tenfion, is represented in a kind of action which requires effort, and here tenfion is proper, because it is the neceffary effect of the exertion that is employed. Such a figure as that of the prim gentleman who fays "Indeed!" in Mr. BUNBURY's admirable print, would have been a much properer illuftration of M. LAVATER's doctrine; and the little thick, fat, oily man, who fays " Heigh ho!" in the

66

* The Propagation of a Lie, one of the excellent productions of that admirable drawer of characters and caricaturas.

fame print, is not a bad example of the rounded outlines which exprefs relaxation and indolence.

We have given this paffage, as a fpecimen of the manner in which M. LAVATER continues to write and to reason.

The 3d FRAGMENT contains (what he calls) Remarkable Singularities. Of the five chapters that compose this Fragment, the fir prefents to us obfervations on new-born children, on dying and dead perfons. Singular, indeed, are thefe obfervations. M. LAVATER found in fome children; immediately after their birth, a furprising resemblance between their profiles and those of their fathers, which difappeared almost totally a few days after, and returned about twelve hours after their death. But this is not all; it is even nothing when compared with what follows:

As often,' says he, as I have feen dead perfons, I have made an obfervation, which has always held good. It is, that after an interval of 16 or 24 hours (and fometimes fooner, according to the nature of the preceding disease), the lines of the countenance become more prominent, and its features infinitely more beautiful, than they were during life; they acquired more precision and proportion, discovered more harmony and bomogeneity, appeared more noble and more fublime.'

From this fingular fact (if a fact it be, and there is no illufion in the cafe) M. LAVATER feems inclined to conclude, that every one of us has a primitive phyfiognomony, whofe origin and effence are divine; that this fundamental phyfiognomony is difordered, and, as it were, fubmerged by the ebb and flow of events and paffions; and that, in the calm of death, it recovers itfelf gradually, as a troubled water grows clear when it is no longer agitated. There is fomething fanciful and not difpleafing in this conclufion, however vague are the ideas which it conveys to us. We wish to know the precife meaning of the term Divine in the paffage now cited. But many vain wishes of this kind have we formed in reading the fingular book before us. The current of this ingenious and good man's ideas is more rapid than clear; he has more quick nefs and facility than he can manage, and his fancy often plays fairy tricks with his philofophy.

What M. LAVATER fays of the dying is not lefs pleafing than what he fays of the dead, and we have feldom or never feen thefe difmal objects exhibited under fuch an encouraging afpe&t, unless when combined with the views and profpects of a higher philofophy than phyfiognomonical science. With thefe, no doubt, our pious as well as ingenious Author combines them; but what is peculiar in the following paffage to him and his favourite fcience, is the physical anticipation of thefe views, as we here find it:

! I have,'

I have,' fays he, often had occafion to be prefent at the last hours of dying perfons. In fome of thefe, whofe countenances had always appeared to me ignoble, and deftitute of any thing that expreffed either elevation of mind or dignity of character, I have obferved a remarkable change, on the approach of their diffolution. A few hours (and in fome a few minutes) before death, their phyfiognomonics affumed vifibly a noble aspect. Every thing in the countenance, its colouring, defign, and expreffion, were palpably changed. A celestial dawn broke in upon it! another exiftence approached! Even the most careless obferver was ftruck with the phenomenonthe hardest heart was foftened into feeling, and the infidel was obliged to believe. Immortality feemed to pierce the cloud of mortality, and a ray of the Divine image difpelled the horrors of death. -I turned afide and adored in filence.-Yes, faid I to myfelf, the glory of God is manifefted even in the weakeft, the most imperfect among men.'

The fubject of the fecond chapter of this Fragment is the influence of imagination on the formation of man, on his phyfiognomony, and on his character. This is a curious fubject; but our Author, inftead of treating it with a certain depth and extent, tells us candidly, that he has neither leifure nor knowlege fufficient for this; and he therefore confines himself to fome hafty obfervations, in which there is a great abundance of mystical words and phrafes, but few rays of light, with little, if any, folid information. His general hypothefis is, that imagination, animated by love, or with any other lively paffion whatever, operates not only on ourfelves and on the objects that are before our eyes, but alfo on those that are absent and at a great diftance. He even thinks it probable that futurity is comprehended within the circle of its inexplicable activity, and that the imagination of a dying man, concentrated in the focus of a warm affection, may act upon the fenfes and visual faculty of another, at any distance, in such a manner as to produce his apparition after death. Hence the phenomena of ghofts and spectres. We would advise both the head mafter and the difciples of this phyfiognomonical school, who are all (fi Deo placet) metaphyficians, to perufe, night and day, Profeffor Reid's Elay on the Intellectual Faculties, that they may learn to appreciate the use of common sense, fobriety, and temperance, in philofophical investigation and analyfis.

The third chapter contains Obfervations on the Marks which Children bring with them into the World; on Monsters, Giants, and Dwarfs.' Inftead of Obfervations, we find nothing here but a few filly ftories, and an hypothetical idea, that marks, monfters, dwarfs, and giants, owe their uncommon forms to a concentrated look of the mothers in a moment of emotion. There is fomething much more ingenious and interefting in the following chapter, in which our Author treats of the reciprocal

Pp 4

influence

influence of phyfiognomonics on each other, and difcuffes the pleafing fubject with fobriety as well as fenfibility. It is an undeniable fact, that certain countenances are mutually attracted, while others produce a contrary and reciprocal effect, The conformity of lines of character between two individuals, who fympathie together and frequent each other, keeps (fays he) conftant pace with the developement of their qualities, and eftablifhes between them a reciprocal communication of their refpective, particular, and perfonal fenfations. The countenance preferves a kind of ray, reflected from a beloved object. Sometimes this relation or connexion depends on a fingle line of moral character, or a fingle feature of phyfiognomony, and fometimes it refults from fingularities that are inexplicable, and reject all definition. M. LAVATER thinks (and fo do we) that it would be very defirable to know precisely the character of physiognomonics which affimilate each other with the greatest facility. We wish he had not treated this fubject with fuch brevity; for the little he has faid upon it is good and fenfible. His addreís on this occafion to the young man entering upon life, to be circumspect in his connexions, and to guard against the feduction of false appearances, of fympathy and conformity of character, is highly judicious, and happily expreffed; and the application he makes of two texts of Scripture to this pleasing subject, is clegant and ingenious..

The 4th Fragment, which relates to (what our Author calls) the exterior of man, treats, in fix chapters, of the ftature and proportions of the body-of attitudes, movements, and posture

of geftures-of language and voice-of ftyle-of drawing, colouring, and hand-writing-of drefs. That the adept in phyfiognomonical Science has a large field for deep investigation in the objects of this Fragment, is not to be denied. We cannot, indeed, fee in any figure the tenth part of what M. LAVATER difcovers in it, nor can we bring ourselves to believe that all variations in the ftature and proportions of the human body have fuch an intimate connexion, and are in fuch perfect harmony with the tate of the mental faculties and affections, as to determine the moral and intellectual character of every individual. We, however, acknowlege that almost all the objects of this Fragment may be ftrongly indicative of mind, manners, and both intellectual and moral character. We do not even exclude totally from this acknowlegement the wonderful phenomenon of diverfified hand-writing, and the article of dress, though we look upon the former rather as a mechanical arrangement of Providence, to prevent confufion and fraud in civil and commercial tranfactions, than as always an effect of variety of mo

2 Corinth. iii. 18.-1 John iii. 2.

ral