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Hereditary Genius
41
work for the sake of eminence, but to satisfy a natural craving for brain
work, just as athletes cannot endure repose on account of their muscular
irritability, which insists upon exercise. It is very unlikely that any
conjunction of circumstances, should supply a stimulus to brain work,
commensurate with what these men carry in their own constitutions. The
action of external stimuli must be uncertain and intermittent, owing to their
very nature; the disposition abides. It keeps a man ever employed—now
wrestling with his difficulties, now brooding over his immature ideas—and
renders him a quick and eager listener to innumerable, almost inaudible
teachings, that others less keenly on the watch, are sure to miss.
These considerations lead to my third argument. I have shown that social
hindrances cannot impede men of high ability, from becoming eminent. I
shall now maintain that social advantages are incompetent to give that
status, to a man of moderate ability. It would be easy to point out several
men of fair capacity, who have been pushed forward by all kinds of help,
who are ambitious, and exert themselves to the utmost, but who completely
fail in attaining eminence. If great peers, they may be lord-lieutenants of
counties; if they belong to great county families, they may become
influential members of parliament and local notabilities. When they die, they
leave a blank for awhile in a large circle, but there is no Westminster
Abbey and no public mourning for them—perhaps barely a biographical
notice in the columns of the daily papers.
It is difficult to specify two large classes of men, with equal social
advantages, in one of which they have high hereditary gifts, while in the
other they have not. I must not compare the sons of eminent men with
those of non--eminent, because much which I should ascribe to breed,
others might ascribe to parental encouragement and ex-.
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