Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 13.djvu/234

222 by the gradual enlightenment of societies: 2. That in our scheme of education we give the means of it to all, and full play to individual gifts—not promoting a dull uniformity, nor pinching back the buds of mental growth; nor, on the other hand, forgetting that as great men often appear in unpromising times, so great gifts in the individual are often long in showing themselves. The early dunce often ripens into the later genius. I find this late unfolding of greater gifts, though by no means universal or perhaps even general, yet is so common that as a teacher I have schooled myself into much sympathy with dunces. An observant master may detect the pushing germs beneath the immobile surface of his pupil's mind, but such masters are rare, and perhaps nothing is lost by leaving their quickening to kindly time. Our duty is, meanwhile, not to harass or exhaust the brain prematurely by anxious culture, by stimulant or by systematic forcing. Few men can look back upon their early companionship without seeing, with a feeling akin to surprise, how the race has not always been to the swift, nor the battle to those who were strong:

Quality of brain, then, cannot be made nor forced; consisting, moreover, as it probably does, in added ganglionic and commissural structure, it, like all more complex growth, will be late in the bud and later in the bloom. And in pointing this out it must be remembered that we are speaking not only of the rarer forms of genius, but also of character—of that which gives to each person his individual color and value. Quality of brain may, however, be lost if it is not invigorated and impelled by a strong breeze of nervous energy; nay, as in the case of the late Sir James Simpson, dauntless and inexhaustible nerve-quantity may so elevate the spirit and so strengthen the hand as to clothe the individual with a power beside that of genius itself, and urge him to work which will win the undying gratitude of men. Now, happily quantity, unlike quality, of brain-force is much under the power of education. Quantity may be conceived as lying partly in the bulk of the nerve cells themselves, and partly in the volume of their vessels; partly also in the virtue of the blood itself. It cannot be forgotten that the health of the brain and nervous system, upon which the abundance of its fruit depends, is closely related to the tone and activity of the rest of the corporeal frame. The volume of force issuing from the brain is largely dependent, for example, upon the power of the stomach and allied viscera, upon the power of rapidly digesting and assimilating an abundance of food, and of breaking up and excreting spent material. A dyspeptic may well have nerve-force of high quality and of high tension; but I never met with a dyspeptic whose nerve-force welled continuously forth. Like Brougham and Cavour, men of great power of continuous work have usually been large as well as sound eaters. A "hardheaded" man is also a hard-bodied man, and the national history of