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viii, 86 pp. Three folding engraved plates. (4to) modern marbled boards. First Edition.

“Soemmerring was a late believer in the ancient notion that man’s soul was housed in the cerebrospinal fluid. In his treatise on “the organ of the soul”, he speculated that the soul-force (Seelenkraft) exerted its action at the place where the fluid from the ventricles met the terminals of the nerves. This hypothesis, based on the ideas of Naturphilosophie did not find favor; however, the anatomical portion of Soemmering’s treatise--particularly his assertion that the cranial nerves originate (or terminate) in the ventricular wall--was well received.”--Norman Library 1973. “The first two plates represent an excellent, and even today (i.e., 1852) the best view of a profile cross-section of the brain utterly different from the one presented in (Soemmerring’s) inaugural dissertation.  The last plate represents the fourth ventricle of the brain opened from above and from behind.”--Choulant, p. 306. Blake, p. 424. Waller 9052.  Warda, Kant, 159. The work is dedicated to Immanuel Kant who provided the epilogue, pp. 81-86.