in general fuch as had, at first, an averfion to the study. The reafon probably is, that to a mind fond of general principles, every ftudy must be at first disgusting, which presents to it a chaos of facts apparently unconnected with each other. But this love of arrangement, if united with perfevering industry, will at laft conquer every difficulty; will introduce order into what feemed on a fuperficial view a mafs of confufion, and reduce the dry and uninteresting detail of positive statutes into a system comparatively luminous and beautiful. The obfervation, I believe, may be made more general, and may be applied to every fcience in which there is a great multiplicity of facts to be remembered. A man deftitute of genius may, with little effort, treasure up in his memory a number of particulars in chemistry or natural history, which he refers to no principle, and from which he deduces no conclufion; and from his facility in acquiring this ftock of information, may flatter himself with the belief that he poffeffes a natural tafte for these branches of knowledge. But they who are really deftined to extend the boundaries of fcience, when they first enter on new purfuits, feel their attention distracted, and their memory overloaded with facts among which they can trace no relation, and are fome. times apt to despair entirely of their future progrefs. In due time, however, their fuperiority appears, and arifes in part from that very diffatisfaction which they at first experienced, and which does not cease to stimulate their inquiries, till they are enabled to trace, amidst a chaos of apparently unconnected materials, that fimplicity and beauty which always characterise the operations of nature. There Chap. VI. There are, befides, other circumftances which retard the progrefs of a man of genius, when he enters on a new purfuit, and which fometimes render him apparently inferior to those who are poffeffed of ordinary capacity. A want of curiofity, and of invention, facilitates greatly the acquifition of knowledge. It renders the mind paffive, in receiving the ideas of others, and faves all the time which might be employed in examining their foundation, or in tracing their confequences. They who are possessed of much acuteness and originality, enter with difficulty into the views of others; not from any defect in their power of apprehenfion, but because they cannot adopt opinions which they have not examined; and because their attention is often feduced by their own fpeculations. It is not merely in the acquifition of knowledge that a man of genius is likely to find himself surpassed by others he has commonly his information much less at command, than those who are poffeffed of an inferior degree of originality; and, what is fomewhat remarkable, he has it least of all at command on thofe fubjects on which he has found his invention moft fertile. Sir Ifaac Newton, as we are told by Dr. Pemberton, was often at a lofs, when the converfation turned on his own discoveries t. It is probable that they made but a flight impreffion on his mind, and that a confciousness of his inventive powers prevented him from * I mean a want of curiofity about truth. There are many men," fays Dr. Butler," who have a strong curiofity to know "what is faid, who have little or no curiofity to know what is "true." + See Note [T]. 7 taking ing much pains to treasure them up in his memory. Men of little ingenuity feldom forget the ideas they acquire; because they know that when an occafion occurs for applying their knowledge to use, they must trust to memory and not to invention. Explain an arithmetical rule to a perfon of common understanding, who is unacquainted with the principles of the science; he will foon get the rule by heart, and become dexterous in the application of it. Another, of more ingenuity, will examine the principle of the rule before he applies it to use, and will scarcely take the trouble to commit to memory a procefs which he knows he can, at any time, with a little reflexion, recover. The confequence will be, that, in the practice of calculation, he will appear more flow and hesitating, than if he followed the received rules of arithmetic without reflexion or reafoning. Something of the fame kind happens every day in converfation. By far the greater part of the opinions we announce in it, are not the immediate refult of reafoning on the spot, but have been previously formed in the closet, or perhaps have been adopted implicitly on the authority of others. The promptitude, therefore, with which a man decides in ordinary difcourfe, is not a certain teft of the quickness of his apprehenfion; as it may perhaps arife from thofe uncommon efforts to furnish the memory with acquired knowledge, by which men of flow parts endeavour to compensate for their want of invention; while, on the other hand, it * Memoria facit prompti ingenii famam, ut illa quæ dicimus, son domo attuliffe, fed ibi protinus fumpfiffe videamur. QUINCTIL. Inf. Orat. lib. xi. cap. 2. is poffible that a consciousness of originality may give rife to a manner apparently embarraffed, by leading the person who feels it, to trust too much to extempore exertions *. In general, I believe, it may be laid down as a rule, that those who carry about with them a great degree of acquired information, which they have always at command, or who have rendered their own discoveries fo familiar to them, as always to be in a condition to explain them, without recollection, are very feldom poffeffed of much invention, or even of much quickness of apprehenfion. A man of original genius, who is fond of exercising his reasoning powers anew on every point as it occurs to him, and who cannot fubmit to rehearse the ideas of others, or to repeat by rote the conclufions which he has deduced from previous reflexion, often appears, to fuperficial obfervers, to fall below the level of ordinary understandings; while another, deftitute both of quickness and invention, is admired for that * In the foregoing observations it is not meant to be implied, that originality of genius is incompatible with a ready recollection of acquired knowledge; but only that it has a tendency unfavourable to it, and that more time and practice will commonly be neceffary to familiarize the mind of a man of invention to the ideas of others, or even to the conclufions of his own understanding, than are requifite in ordinary cafes. Habits of literary conversation, and, ftill more, habits of extempore difcuffion in a popular affembly, are peculiarly useful in giving us a ready and practical command of our knowledge. There is much good fenfe in the following aphorifm of Bacon: "Reading makes a full man, writing a correct man, and « speaking a ready man." See a commentary on this aphorism in one of the Numbers of the Adventurer. promptitude in his decifions, which arifes from the inferiority of his intellectual abilities. It must indeed be acknowledged in favour of the last description of men, that in ordinary converfation they form the most agreeable, and perhaps the most inftructive, companions. How inexhauftible foever the invention of an individual may be, the variety of his own peculiar ideas can bear no proportion to the whole mass of useful and curious information of which the world is already poffeffed. The converfation, accordingly, of men of genius, is fometimes extremely limited; and is interesting to the few alone, who know the value, and who can distinguish the marks of originality. In confequence too of that partiality which every man feels for his own fpeculations, they are more in danger of being dogmatical and difputatious, than thofe who have no system which they are interested to defend. The fame obfervations may be applied to authors. A book which contains the difcoveries of one individual only, may be admired by a few, who are intimately acquainted with the hiftory of the fcience to which it relates, but it has little chance for popularity with the multitude. An author who poffeffes induftry fufficient to collect the ideas of others, and judgment fufficient to arrange them skilfully, is the most likely perfon to acquire a high degree of literary fame and although, in the opinion of enlightened judges, invention forms the chief characteristic of genius, yet it commonly happens that the objects of public admiration are men who are much lefs diftinguifhed by this quality, than by extenfive learning and cultivated tafte. Perhaps too, for the multi tude, |