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202
Hereditary Genius
Bacon, Francis, continued—
N. (son of another brother). Nathaniel, antiquarian writer, Recorder of Bury, and
Admiralty Judge. He was M.P. for Cambridge, and a sturdy republican.
Bernoulli, Jacques. The first that rose to fame in a Swiss family that afterwards
comprised an extraordinary number of eminent mathematicians and men of
science. They were mostly quarrelsome and unamiable. Many were long-lived;
three of them exceeded eighty years of age. Jacques was destined for the
Church, but early devoted himself to mathematics, in which he had accidentally
become initiated. He had a bilious, melancholic temperament. Was sure but
slow. He taught his brother Jean, but adopted, too long, a tone of superiority
towards him; hence quarrels and rivalry. Jacques was a mathematician of the
highest order in originality and power. Member of French Academy.
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Jacques. Jean. X
|_________________ Nicholas.
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Nicholas. Daniel. Jean.
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Jean. Jacques.
B. Jean, destined for commerce, but left it for science and chemistry. Member of
French Academy. (“Eloge” by D'Alembert.) He was the ancestor of the five
following;
N. Nicholas, d. aet. 31. He was also a great mathematical genius. Died at St.
Petersburg, where he was one of the principal ornaments of the then young
Academy.
N. Daniel, physician, botanist, and anatomist, writer on hydrodynamics; very
precocious. Obtained ten prizes, for one of which his father had competed;
who never forgave him for his success. Member of the French Academy.
(Condorcet's “Eloge.”)
N. Jean, jurisconsult, mathematician and physicist. Obtained three prizes of the
Academy, of which he was a member. Professor of eloquence and an orator.
Would have been a great mathematician if he had not loved oratory more.
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