CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 



Great men 

 and their 

 environment 



CAROLUS LINNJEUS 



i. THERE are some 

 who maintain that 

 great men are purely 

 the product of their en- 

 vironment ; that they 

 are made by opportu- 

 nity, and always arise 

 out of a normal popu- 

 lation to meet a need. 

 Biology lends no sup- 

 port to such opinions ; 

 nor does history, which 

 abounds with situa- 

 tions in which disaster 

 resulted from incapac- 

 ity. On the other 

 hand, both biology and 

 history show that ca- FlG ' 3S ' Carolus Linn * us ' 



pacity is sterile without opportunity, that the meeting 

 ground of these factors is the place where significant 

 progress arises. So it happened to Linnaeus, that being 

 a genius, he came into the world at a time when it was 

 possible to apply his powers to fundamental reforms in 

 natural history. In the eighteenth century, under- 

 neath a great deal of superficial slowness and stupidity, 

 the ideas which we still regard as modern were develop- 

 ing and coming to the surface. Their expression was 

 often crude, as in the political and social excesses of the 

 French Revolution, the educational fantasies of Rous- 

 seau. The liberators of America, with their doctrine of 

 the equality of men, were in some respects ill-informed, 



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