The Foundations of Personality | Page 6

of mind and character, but this, of course, proves nothing,
since it might well be that the body was a lever for the expression of
mind and character, and with its disappearance as a functioning agent
such expression was no longer possible.
It is convenient to divide our exposition into two parts, the first the
dependence upon proper brain function and structure, and the second

the dependence upon the proper health of other organs. For it is not true
that mind and character are functions of the brain alone; they are
functions of the entire organism. The brain is simply the largest and
most active of the organs upon which the mental life depends; but there
are minute organs, as we shall see, upon whose activity the brain
absolutely depends.
Any injury to the brain may destroy or seriously impair the mentality of
the individual. This is too well known to need detailed exposition. Yet
some cases of this type are fundamental in the exquisite way they prove
(if anything can be proven) the dependence of mind upon bodily
structure.
In some cases of fracture of the skull, a piece of bone pressing upon the
brain may profoundly alter memory, mood and character. Removal of
the piece of bone restores the mind to normality. This is also true of
brain tumor of certain types, for example, frontal endotheliomata,
where early removal of the growth demonstrates first that a "physical"
agent changes mind and character, and second that a "physical" agent,
such as the knife of the surgeon, may act to reestablish mentality.
In cases of hydrocephalus (or water on the brain), where there is an
abnormal secretion of cerebro-spinal fluid acting to increase the
pressure on the brain, the simple expedient of withdrawing the fluid by
lumbar puncture brings about normal mental life. As the fluid again
collects, the mental life becomes cloudy, and the character alters
(irritability, depressed mood, changed purpose, lowered will); another
lumbar puncture and presto!--the individual is for a time made over
more completely than conversion changes a sinner,--and more easily.
Take the case of the disease known as General Paresis, officially called
Dementia Paralytica. This disease is caused by syphilis and is one of its
late results. The pathological changes are widespread throughout the
brain but may at the onset be confined mostly to the frontal lobes. The
very first change may be--and usually is--a change in character! The
man hitherto kind and gentle becomes irritable, perhaps even brutal.
One whose sex morals have been of the most conventional kind, a loyal
husband, suddenly becomes a profligate, reckless and debauched,

perhaps even perverted. The man of firm purposes and indefatigable
industry may lose his grip upon the ambitions and strivings of his
lifetime and become an inert slacker, to the amazement of his
associates. Many a fine character, many a splendid mind, has reached a
lofty height and then crumbled before the assaults of this disease upon
the brain. Philosopher, poet, artist, statesman, captain of industry,
handicraftsman, peasant, courtesan and housewife,--all are lowered to
the same level of dementia and destroyed character by the
consequences of the thickened meninges, the altered blood vessels and
the injured nerve cells.
Now and then one is fortunate enough to treat with success an early
case of General Paresis. And then the reversed miracle takes place,
unfortunately too rarely! The disordered mind, the altered character,
leaps upward to its old place,--after being dosed by the marvelous drug
Salvarsan, created by the German Jewish scientist, Paul Ehrlich.
Of extraordinary interest are the rare cases of loss of personal identity
seen after brain injury, say in war. A man is knocked unconscious by a
blow and upon restoration of consciousness is separated from that past
in which his ego resides. He does not know his history or his name, and
that continuity of the "self" so deeply prized and held by all religions to
be part of his immortality is gone. Then after a little while, a few days
or weeks, the disarranged neuronic pathways reestablish themselves as
usual,--and the ego comes back to the man.
One might cite the feeble-mindedness that results from meningitis,
brain tumor, brain abscess, brain wounds, etc., as further evidence of
the dependence of mind upon brain, of its status as a function of brain.
No philosopher seriously doubts that equilibrium and movement are
functions of the brain, and yet to prove this there is no evidence of any
other kind than that cited to prove the relationship of mind to brain.[1]
And what applies to the intelligence applies as forcibly to character, for
purpose, emotion, mood, instinct and will are altered with these
diseases.
[1] Except that equilibrium does not itself judge of its relationship to
brain, whereas mind is the sole judge of its relationship and