An inaugural essay on genius and its diseases : submitted to the examination of Samuel Bard ... President, and the Trustees and professors of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the University of the State of New-York : and publicly defended for the degree of Doctor of Medicine, on the sixth day of April, 1819 / by Thomas Middleton Stuart.

  • Stuart, Thomas Middleton.
Date:
1819
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An inaugural essay on genius and its diseases : submitted to the examination of Samuel Bard ... President, and the Trustees and professors of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the University of the State of New-York : and publicly defended for the degree of Doctor of Medicine, on the sixth day of April, 1819 / by Thomas Middleton Stuart. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    nate that Genius, in which, however, there are some imperfections—some disproportion in the parts which compose it. Its occasion- ally great atchievements, when circumstan- ces have conspired to repress that power whose action is inordinate, or stimulate that which is languid, establish its claim to this distinction. These imperfections are sometimes causes of disease. We may consider them as circum- stantial or essential. Circumstantial imper- fections, are those arising from a peculiar con- stitution of the man of genius, but not implying any deficiency or disproportion in the powers of mind which constitute Genius. Essential imperfections, are those which imply some de- ficiency or disproportion in those powers, as when the action of Judgment is not able always to control that of Imagination. Among the Circumstantial imperfections of Genius, we notice Timidity and Want of Per- severance. In attempting any work, Genius will generally have an extensive view of the difficulties to be encountered : it will measure the region to be explored, will mark what rocks are to be levelled, what vallies are to be raised, what wilds are to be explored. After such a view, constitutional Timidity, alarmed by the obsta-