Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 59.djvu/389

Rh have anything whatever to do with them or their work and the active infliction of physical torture and death. There is, however, at least one form of persecution, very definite in character, which it is easy to estimate, since the national biographers have probably in few cases passed it over. I refer to imprisonment. I find that over 14 per cent, of these 902 eminent persons were imprisoned, once or oftener, for periods of varying length, while many others only escaped imprisonment by voluntary exile. It is true that the causes of imprisonment were various, but even imprisonment for debt may usually be taken to indicate an anomalous lack of adjustment to the social environment. The man of genius is an abnormal being, thus arousing the instinctive hostility of society, which by every means seeks to put him out of the way.

It will be seen that the various personal traits noted in this section, while completing our picture of British persons of genius, may be linked on at various points to other traits we have previously noted. It only remains to gather together the various threads we have traced and to ascertain how far they may be harmoniously woven into a complete whole.