^YOBK AND REST: GENIUS AND STUPIDITY. 419 



such things. But, far from proving the abnormality of genius, they are 

 one of the proofs of its general sanity and inherent humanness. The 

 common man does not focus upoli himself the glare of investigation 

 or his 'peculiarities' would stand forth in their kinship with those of 

 the genius who is the cynosure of all. Genius, by virtue of its hu- 

 manity, has a right to be stupid here and there. Talent, which is so 

 largely artificial, abhors stupidity, as nature is said to abhor a vacuum, 

 or the Devil to hate holy water, but genius proves its naturalness by 

 its occasional stupidity. The keenest eye has its blind-spot, the most 

 highly evolved brain its non-responsive cells. Says Lombroso:* " When 

 the moment of inspiration is over, the man of genius becomes an or- 

 dinary man, if he does not descend lower; in the same way, personal 

 inequalities, or, according to modern terminology, double, or even con- 

 trary, personality, is one of the characters of genius. Our greatest 

 poets, Isaac Disraeli remarked (in Curiosities of Literature), Shakes- 

 peare and Dryden, are those who have produced the worst lines. It 

 was said of Tintoretto that sometimes he surpassed Tintoretto, and 

 sometimes was inferior to Caracci." 



The Criminal. — Says Havelock Ellis :f 'While he is essentially 

 lazy . . . the criminal is capable of moments of violent activity.' The 

 vacuous lives of criminals, with whom inertia is practically normal and 

 continuous for long periods, have their brief epoch of excitement, ex- 

 plosion, diversion, uproar, intoxication, exhilaration and 'breaking 

 out.' Indulgence in alcohol, gambling, sexual orgies, spasmodic and 

 emotional manifestations of personality, and the like, are the sharp 

 peaks that rise, few in number so often, from long low stretches of com- 

 monplace inertia and quiescence, or from the imprisonment that seems 

 the normal condition of so many of them. The monotonous lapse of 

 prison life is dotted with those outbreaks to which the German crim- 

 inologists and psychiatrists have given the name of 'Zuchthausknall.' 

 The French thief, in his jargon, calls himself ' pegre,' or ' idler,' and a 

 pickpocket said to Lombroso, "You see in these 'moments of inspira- 

 tion' we cannot restrain ourselves; we have to steal." In the execution 

 of many of those acts denominated crimes the offender exhibits the phe- 

 nomenon of a brief period of violent activity, extreme impulsivity, great 

 emotionality, remarkable cunning, wide-awake personality, preceded 

 and followed by longer (often very long) periods of inertness, quies- 

 cence, impassivity, obtuseness, subdued individuality. 



The Savage. — That the savage hates work has been a favorite theory 

 with travelers and philosophers, and the et}Tnologists, by pointing out 

 the real significance of flie terms for ' work,' which in so many languages 



* Loc. cit., p. 74. 



t ' The Criminal ' (London, 1890), p. 143. See also pp. 144-152. 



