Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/201

Rh acceptation, of course, and reckoning such a choice inexpedient in one of a family of seventeen children, his father chose for him the medical profession, into which the apathetic youth was to be inducted without further delay. Accordingly, in spite of all his struggles, Andrew was forced into a new suit of clothes, carried out of the house, and trotted along, by dint of pulling and pushing, to the dwelling of his future master, where he was bound and left—to an apprenticeship which he had no subsequent cause to regret.

After finishing his apprenticeship, during which he attended the usual medical course at the university and the public hospital, Andrew Combe, when he had entered upon his twentieth year, took the diploma of surgeon. Previous to this event his intellectual habits had received not only a fresh impulse, but also a new direction from the study of phrenology, which was introduced into Edinburgh through the arrival and lectures of Dr. Spurzheim. Of this science Mr. George Combe, afterwards its distinguished advocate, became an earnest student, and his younger brother Andrew was not long in following the example. The latter, however, when he had little more than commenced his inquiries in earnest upon the subject, went to Paris in 1817 to perfect himself in his professional studies. The Continent was now opened to Britain by the general peace, and our medical students were eager to avail themselves of the opportunity by completing their education in the French capital. Among the Parisian lecturers on the various departments of science whom Andrew Combe attended for this purpose, he was so fortunate as to be a pupil of Professor Dupuytren, to whose lessons so many of our most eminent physicians have been so deeply indebted. He also frequently associated in Paris with Dr. Spurzheim, by whom he was completely converted to a belief in that science by whose rules all his future habits of investigation were more or less directed. As this was a most important event in his life, it may be proper to give his own account of it:—"My attention was first seriously turned to the examination of these doctrines during my residence at Paris, in the autumn of 1818, when Dr. Spurzheim's 'Observations sur la Phrenologie,' then just published, were happily put into my hands at a time when, from there being no lectures in any of the Parisian schools, I had ample leisure to peruse that work deliberately. I had not proceeded far before I became impressed with the acuteness and profundity of many of the author's remarks on the varied phenomena of human nature, and with the simplicity of the principles by which he explained what had previously seemed contradictory and unintelligible; and in proportion as I advanced, the scrupulousness of statement, sobriety of judgment, and moral earnestness with which he advocated his views and inculcated their importance, made me begin to apprehend that to condemn without inquiry was not the way to ascertain the truth of phrenology, or to become qualified to decide in a matter of medicine or of philosophy. I therefore resolved to pause, in order to make myself acquainted with the principles of the new physiology, and to resort, as he [Dr. Spurzheim] recommended, to observation and experience for the means of verifying or disproving their accuracy, before again hazarding an opinion on the subject." Thus prepared for examination and conviction, he examined and was convinced. After two years of such study the following conclusion was the result:—"Actuated by the natural feeling of improbability that so much should have been discovered in so short time by only two individuals, however eminent their talents and felicitous their opportunities, I still expected to meet with some important errors of detail; and, so far from being disposed to adopt implicitly all the