EXCURSIONS OF AN EVOLUTIONIST 



working with a kind of sacred fury to seize and 

 secure the sudden glimpses of the fairyland of 

 scientific truth or literary beauty ere drowsy 

 memory shall let them slip and fade away. I 

 think it very likely that in many such cases a 

 systematic self-repression, in deference to hygi- 

 enic considerations, might be just enough to clip 

 down the brilliant discoverer or original thinker 

 into a mere scientific or literary prig. The secrets 

 of Nature and of Art are not to be won with- 

 out struggles ; and in the serene regions of phil- 

 osophic meditation, no less than in the turmoil 

 of practical life, the highest results are often 

 accomplished by those who work with desperate 

 energy quite regardless of self. Generous feel- 

 ings of this sort have no doubt frequently urged 

 great thinkers, like Clifford, fatally to overtask 

 their physical resources ; and such mistakes are 

 peculiarly facilitated by the accommodating dis- 

 position of that faithful servant the brain, which 

 in men of highly strung nervous temperament 

 is but too ready to keep at its work without 

 protest, as a thoroughbred horse will run till it 

 drops. 



In Clifford's case this prodigious enthusiasm 

 for work, joined with an inherited weakness of 

 constitution, has robbed the world of one of its 

 most valuable lives. But though his life was 

 brief, it was wonderfully rich in achievement no 

 less than in promise. He had discerned more, 

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