TEMPERAMENTS

From Agepedia

TEMPERAMENTS ; those individual peculiarities of organization, by which the manner of acting, feeling and thinking of each person is permanently affected. The differences of sex, race, nation, family, and individual organization, operate upon the character of every individual from the moment of his birth ; and the last mentioned is by no means the least important. The ancients distinguished four temperamentsthe choleric or bilious, the phlegmatic, the melancholic, and the sanguineous, which derived their names from the supposed excess of one or other of the principal fluids of the human bodybile {x°^v)i phlegm, black bile (peXaivn, black, and #0X77), and blood (sanguis). Modern writers have added the athletic temperament and the nervous temperament. The bilious or choleric temperament is accompanied with great susceptibility of feeling, quickness of perception, and vigor of action, and therefore indicates an tlevated state of the organization: rapidity and strength, a lively imagination, violent passions, quickness of decision, combined with perseverance and inflexibility of purpose, with a tendency to ambition, pride, and anger, but also to magnanimity and generosity of sentiment, characterize the bilious man. These moral characteristics are combined with a form more remarkable for firmness than grace, a dark or sallow complexion, sparkling eyes, and great muscular force. " These men," says an ingenious writer (Am. Quarterly Rev. for March, 1829), " are urged by a constant restlessness to action; a habitual sentiment of disquietude allows them no peace but in the tumult of business; the hours of crowded life are the only ones they value ; they are to be found wherever hardiness of resolution, prompt decision, and permanence of enterprise, are required." The phlegmatic, lymphatic or coldblooded temperament is the reverse of that last ilescribed: with little propensity to action, *md little sensibility; no great, bodily strength or dexterity; rather a heavy look; the feelings calm; the understanding clear in a certain range, but never soaring into new regions, or penetrating deeply beneath the mysteries of the universe ; and a disposition to repose or to moderate exertion,the phlegmatic man is free from excesses, and his virtues and vices are stamped with mediocrity. The sanguineous temperament indicates a lively susceptibility, with little proneness to action ; promptnessjwithout perseverance; a ready fancy; little depth of feeling, or thought; changeable, but not violent feelings and passions; and a tendency to voluptuousness, levity, fickleness of purpose, and fondness of admiration. The sanguineous are distinguished for beauty and grace, and the whole organization is characterized by the vigor and facility of its functions : they are the witty, the elegant, the gay, the ornaments of society. The melancholic temperament is characterized by little susceptibility, but great energy of action, reserve, firmness of purpose, perseverance, deep reflection, constancy of feeling, and an inclination to gloominess, to ascetic practices, and to misanthropy. The athletic temperament possesses, in some degree, the qualities of the sanguineous; but it is distinguished by superior strength and size of body, indicating the excess of the muscular force over the sensitive. The athletic man has less playfulness of mind, less activity of spirit, little elevation of purpose or fixedness of character ; he is good natured, but if excited, ferocious. The nervous temperament admits of the most various modifications ; it is characterized by the predominance of the sensitive part of the system, and the powerful action of the nerves. The mind is active and volatile, though not from fickleness, but from the rapidity of its associations, the quickness of its resolutions, and the readiness of its combinations. The temperaments are rarely found unmixed, as we have described them; but one or the other is usually predominant. Each has its advantages and pleasures, attended with some corresponding drawback. (See Kant's Anthropology, or Schulze's A^Vopology, both in German.)