Even the nails, the teeth, and the hair have the sense of touch in a slight degree.  When the scarf skin is removed, the part is not more sensitive to sense of contact.  In fact, direct contact with the unprotected true skin occasions pain, which effectually masks the feeling of touch.  The sense of touch is capable of education, and is generally developed to an extraordinary degree in persons who are deprived of some other special sense, as sight or hearing.  We read of the famous blind sculptor who was said to model excellent likenesses, guided entirely by the sense of touch.  An eminent authority on botany was a blind man, able to distinguish rare plants by the fingers, and by the tip of the tongue.  The blind learn to read with facility by passing their fingers over raised letters of a coarse type.  It is impossible to contemplate, even for a moment, the prominence assigned to the sense of touch in the physical organism, without being impressed with the manifestations of design—­the work of an all-wise Creator.

316.  Muscular Sense; Sense of Temperature; Pain.  When a heavy object is laid upon certain parts of the body, it produces a sensation of pressure.  By it we are enabled to estimate differences of weight.  If an attempt be made to raise this object, it offers resistance which the muscles must overcome.  This is known as the muscular sense.  It depends on sensory nerves originating in the muscles and carrying impressions from them to the nerve centers.

The skin also judges, to a certain extent, of heat and cold.  These sensations can be felt only by the skin.  Direct irritation of a nerve does not give rise to them.  Thus, the exposed pulp of a diseased tooth, when irritated by cold fluids, gives rise to pain, and not to a sensation of temperature.  Various portions of the body have different degrees of sensibility in this respect.  The hand will bear a degree of heat which would cause pain to some other parts of the body.  Then, again, the sensibility of the outer skin seems to affect the sensibility to heat, for parts with a thin skin can bear less heat than portions with a thick cuticle.

Experiment 139. To illustrate how the sense of touch is a matter of habit or education.  Shut both eyes, and let a friend run the tips of your fingers first lightly over a hard plane surface; then press hard, then lightly again, and the surface will seem to be concave.

Experiment 140.  Cross the middle over the index finger, roll a small marble between the fingers; one has a distinct impression of two marbles.  Cross the fingers in the same way, and rub them against the point of the nose.  A similar illusion is experienced.

  Experiment 141. To test the sense of locality.  Ask a person to
  shut his eyes, touch some part of his body lightly with the point of a
  pin, and ask him to indicate the part touched.

As to the general temperature, this sense is relative and is much modified by habit, for what is cold to an inhabitant of the torrid zone would be warm to one accustomed to a very cold climate.