THE GENIUS OF SCIENCE 397 



go about to do precisely the thing which was done to him — to 

 punish their benefactors. But then, they say that these bene- 

 factors are mad ; or that their work was really done by others, 

 or that it was useless, or injurious, or contrary to religion, or 

 even to science ! And cases of this kind have occurred recently 

 and will continue to occur. The kink is really in the mind, not 

 of the man of genius, but of the public. 



Of course these are also some of the troubles of all good 

 workers, not only of those of genius ; but men of science are 

 perhaps the greatest sufferers, because science brings no material 

 reward to them. Science is not protected by copyright or 

 patent ; and their labours are therefore not counterbalanced by 

 any hope of payment except the consciousness of their own good 

 works. They are exploited by all and paid by no one ; and few 

 are found to face the prospect. 



Hitherto the world has done nothing for the most wonderful 

 of its products, the higher genius. It has regarded only the 

 leaves of the tree of life— not the flowers and the fruit ; and, 

 with a strange obtuseness, has indeed often cut the flowers or 

 pulled the fruit before it was ripe. It has left all to nature, and 

 nature has often responded according to her wont — by barren- 

 ness. Where this has occurred — where the higher genius has 

 died out — the whole intellectual life of the people has tended to 

 fall to the lower and sordid level at which it stands among some 

 nations to-day ; and it is the duty and interest of mankind to 

 work for the prevention of this calamity in the future. 



