For this reason, then, and also because his
external parts and their forms are more familiar to us than those of
other animals, we must speak of man first; and this the more fitly,
because in him alone do the natural parts hold the natural position;
his upper part being turned towards that which is upper in the
universe. For, of all animals, man alone stands erect.
In man, then, the head is destitute of flesh; this being the
necessary consequence of what has already been stated concerning the
brain. There are, indeed, some who hold that the life of man-would
be longer than it is, were his head more abundantly furnished with
flesh; and they account for the absence of this substance by saying
that it is intended to add to the perfection of sensation. For the
brain they assert to be the organ of sensation; and sensation, they
say, cannot penetrate to parts that are too thickly covered with
flesh. But neither part of this statement is true. On the contrary,
were the region of the brain thickly covered with flesh, the very
purpose for which animals are provided with a brain would be
directly contravened. For the brain would itself be heated to excess
and so unable to cool any other part; and, as to the other half of
their statement, the brain cannot be the cause of any of the
sensations, seeing that it is itself as utterly without feeling as any
one of the excretions.
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