extravagant claims made by their enthusiastic followers. "Phrenological societies" developed so rapidly and so widely that the movement became relatively independent of the scientific investigations which should have served to qualify and criticize its doctrines. Its propaganda were so vigorous and the practical needs which it promised to satisfy were so insistent, that even today many people hold tenaciously to its dicta. Scores of professionals thrive on their lucrative practice of its dogmas, and university graduates smile in a guilty way when asked, "Do you believe in phrenology?"

The tenacious persistence of phrenology, the degree to which it is resorted to and paid for by inquiring and earnest seekers after satisfactory paths through life, make it seem worth while to present a brief statement of the numerous errors and flagrant stupidities on which the practice of phrenology is based. It may also be worth while to suggest some of the rather interesting subsidiary reasons for its persistence as a cherished popular delusion and even as a topic for current scientific discussions and papers.

THE ASSUMPTIONS AND ERRORS OF PHRENOLOGY

Underlying all of the various phrenological systems were four common assumptions which briefly stated, were:

1. That such cerebral localization as exists is of fundamental and specific traits of character or types of ability, such as secretiveness, circumspection, love of babies, generosity, veneration, constructiveness, etc.

2. That the more developed any one of these given traits is, the larger will be the supposed area of the brain which contains its supposed organ.

3. That, since the skull fits fairly closely to the brain surface, the relative development of a given portion of the brain will be indicated by the relative prominence or size of the different parts of the cranium, so that the degree of possession of the trait may be judged from an examination of the exterior of the skull.

4. That the occasional casual observation of coincidence between particularly marked mental qualities and particular cranial characteristics is a sufficient basis for inferring universal and necessary connection between these two features.

Each of these assumptions involves obvious error and misapprehension in the light of what is now known concerning the nature of the human mind and the structure and functions of the brain. In order that these fallacies may be clearly disclosed the four main assumptions will be examined independently in the order in which we have here presented them.

1. In the first place, the only sort of localization of functions that has been authentically established is the projection, upon the brain structure, of the other parts of the organism, and the localization of sensory-motor centers which function in the connection of these various organs. Thus it is known that each of the principal groups of muscles of the body has its so-called center in the brain. From this part of the brain to the muscles concerned run bundles of motor-nerve fibers, so that activity in that particular part of the brain may result in the conduction of nervous impulses to these muscles, and in their consequent contraction. Thus the hand, the foot, the eyes, the speech-organs, etc., may be said to be functionally represented, and in this sense localized, in particular regions of the brain. The same thing is true of the sense-organs, as the eye, ear, etc. Each incoming sensory nerve tract runs to or through some portion of the brain. Injury to this part of the brain results in functional incapacity of the corresponding sense-organ. The cortex, or outer surface of the brain, may thus be conceived as a sort of terminal station for nerves from other portions of the organism, a sort of projection-center which enables them all to take part in a functional unity of action. The functions which can be said in this sense to be localized in the brain are such sensory-motor capacities as the ability to raise the right arm, the ability to balance the body when standing erect with eyes closed, the ability to see, the ability to move the eyeball, the ability to feel pain in a certain area of the skin, the ability to articulate words, to understand spoken or written language, to call up a visual memory of a particular thing previously seen, etc.

The integrity of various parts of the brain is essential to the proper coördination of all the sensibilities and responses of the individual. Traits of character and types of ability, however, depend on the characteristic modes of reaction of the organism as a whole to the factors of its environment. Thus generosity as a human trait does not depend on the massiveness of any set of muscles, nor on the keenness of any sense-organ, but upon the characteristic type of reaction and motivation which the individual as a whole displays. Jealousy, love of children, destructiveness, etc., are characteristic modes of behavior of the whole organism, and depend upon reactions which the given situation evokes, and not upon some special organ.

2. As to the supposed correspondence between size and functional capacity, no evidence has been presented which demonstrates that even the strength of a muscle or the keenness of a sense-organ depends in any way on the absolute size of the brain-area concerned with it. Nor has evidence been presented to prove the existence, within any given species, of correlation between volume, shape, or weight of the brain-tissues and even the more general traits of character or ability. In the absence of such evidence we are led to believe that functional capacity depends on complexity of structure, chemical, molecular, and functional, rather than on the factors of mass or shape. But even the nature of these correlations is as yet largely unknown. The persistence of the faith in the significance of mass and shape probably rests in part on the apparent existence of such correlation when different species are roughly compared with one another. Thus, among the higher vertebrates there seems to be a relation between what we may call the general intelligence of the species and the erect carriage of the body. From the quadrupeds, with their horizontal position, through the apes, with their semiperpendicular mode of life, to the human being, with his erect carriage, there is also a progression in prominence of the forehead, opposition of thumb and finger, relatively greater development of the cerebral mass, and also in mental capacity. The intelligent human being walks in a more erect posture than does the stupid ape. But no one has ventured to assert that a relation exists between erectness of carriage and mental ability when human beings are compared with one another, or when apes are compared with one another. Similarly in the case of the physical features of the brain, the crude relationships which exist empirically, as between different species, seem to be quite slight in significance when compared with the differences in chemical, molecular and functional complexity which are found among members of the same species. Attempts to discover correlations between mental and moral characteristics and various brain constants we may expect to continue for a long time. What discoveries may be in store for us we do not know. But the important point in the present connection is that, for the purposes of vocational psychology, the practices of phrenology are based on evidence no more relevant to its pretensions than were the "proofs" pointed to by palmistry, horoscopy, and prenatal magic. Through cranial measurements alone it is impossible to determine with certainty the race, age, or