206 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



cuses we make for our want of this individualism ! We are so 

 dreadfully afraid of being thought bumptious, we are so delight- 

 fully humble, we really do not wish to intrude our opinion, and 

 yet all the brightest lights of our profession have been men of 

 strong individualism. Harvey thought for himself, planned by 

 patient investigation his theory of the circulation of the blood, 

 and then, in the face of an opposition which cost him for a time 

 his position, his reputation, and even his practice, dared to assert 

 and stand by those views which we hold now as the fundamental 

 principles of our art. Sir Joseph Lister stood very much alone, 

 when, after deep research and careful experiment, he first promul- 

 gated his theory of antiseptic operating and paved the way for 

 fresh and undreamed-of triumphs in the domains of abdominal and 

 cerebral surgery. Ovariotomy had such a fearful death-rate at 

 one time that its performance was held to be almost criminal ; yet 

 Sir Spencer Wells came forward, almost unsupported, and taught 

 us that the operation was not only justifiable, but capable of being 

 made the most successful of all the triumphs of surgical skill. 



Names such as those I have just referred to may perhaps sug- 

 gest the thought that individualism is another name for genius. 

 The descriptions of genius have been many ; thus Dr. Maudsley 

 says, in his work on the Physiology of the Mind : " He who has 

 what is called genius is in harmony with and assimilates the best 

 thought of his own epoch and of preceding epochs, and carries it 

 forward to a higher evolution. An age which lacks that impulse 

 of evolution which the genius embodies is apt to harden in ob- 

 structive formula." For myself, however, I will define genius as 

 the highest product of individualism, and I will add that, while 

 few human beings reach genius, no human unit is without his 

 share of individualism. Moreover, the more I study the life of a 

 so-called genius such as Hunter or Newton, Faraday or Darwin, 

 the more I am struck with the enormous amount of work which 

 they contrived to compress into one short life. Longfellow 

 probably had the same thought in his mind when he wrote : 



The heights by great men reached and kept 



Were not attained by sudden flight, 

 But they, while their companions slept, 



"Were toiling upward in the night. 



I have stated that no human unit is without his share of the 

 quality which we are considering ; it needs only that he should be 

 true to himself, and develop it. I have supported my argument 

 by examples drawn from the highly educated classes, but I can 

 with equal truth quote men engaged in what are termed the 

 humbler walks of life. It is well known that for many of the 

 great improvements in modern machinery we are indebted to 

 working mechanics, men who, with no advantage save the educa- 



