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Hereditary Genius
ix
genius does. The reader will find a studious abstinence throughout the
work from speaking of genius as a special quality. It is freely used as an
equivalent for natural ability, in the opening of the chapter on “Comparison
of the Two Classifications.” In the only place, so far as I have noticed on
reading the book again, where any distinction is made between them, the
uncertainty that still clings to the meaning of the word genius in its technical
sense is emphatically dwelt upon (p. 320). There is no confusion of ideas in
this respect in the book, but its title seems apt to mislead, and if it could be
altered now, it should appear as Hereditary Ability.
The relation between genius in its technical sense (whatever its precise
definition may be) and insanity, has been much insisted upon by Lombroso
and others, whose views of the closeness of the connection between the
two are so pronounced, that it would hardly be surprising if one of their
more enthusiastic followers were to remark that So-and-So cannot be a
genius, because he has never been mad nor is there a single lunatic in his
family. 1 cannot go nearly so far as they, nor accept a moiety of their data,
on which the connection between ability of a very high order and insanity is
supposed to be established. Still, there is a large residuum of evidence
which points to a painfully close relation between the two, and I must add
that my own later observations have tended in the same direction, for I
have been surprised at finding how often insanity or idiocy has appeared
among the near relatives of exceptionally able men. Those who are over
eager and extremely active in mind must often possess brains that are more
excitable and peculiar than is consistent with soundness. They are likely to
become crazy at times,
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