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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 1809-1894

"The Professor at the Breakfast-Table"


At last comes along a case which is apparently a settler, for there is a
little brain with vast and varied powers,--a case like that of Byron, for
instance. Then comes out the grand reserve-reason which covers
everything and renders it simply impossible ever to corner a
Phrenologist. "It is not the size alone, but the quality of an organ,
which determines its degree of power."
Oh! oh! I see.--The argument may be briefly stated thus by the
Phrenologist: "Heads I win, tails you lose." Well, that's convenient.
It must be confessed that Phrenology has a certain resemblance to the
Pseudo-sciences. I did not say it was a Pseudo-science.
I have often met persons who have been altogether struck up and amazed at
the accuracy with which some wandering Professor of Phrenology had read
their characters written upon their skulls. Of course the Professor
acquires his information solely through his cranial inspections and
manipulations.--What are you laughing at? (to the boarders.)--But let us
just suppose, for a moment, that a tolerably cunning fellow, who did not
know or care anything about Phrenology, should open a shop and undertake
to read off people's characters at fifty cents or a dollar apiece.


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