The Higher Usefulness of Science 79 



The concluding section will present a few special 

 cases of the fundamental interest of science in organic 

 individuals, even in unique individuals, and will at the 

 same time reveal the grip man's moral nature has on 

 his intellectual, his esthetic and his religious natures. 

 If nature's ability to produce men is really to be 

 judged by the men she has produced, then it must 

 follow that the exceptions, or, if there be such, the 

 wholly unique men must be just as important so far as 

 this criterion is concerned, as are the most common- 

 place men. If it be literally true that the world has 

 produced only one Napoleon, it nevertheless holds that 

 Napoleon is just as indubitable a proof of nature's 

 man-producing ability as are the thousands upon thou- 

 sands of the rank and file of soldiers who made up his 

 armies. And the same is true, of course, for any of 

 the other members of the human species who by reason 

 of their deeds stand as much alone among their kind as 

 does Everest among mountain peaks, the Pacific among 

 oceans, or giant redwoods among trees. 



One is familiar enough with the objections to view- 

 ing supreme geniuses in this way. They are not 

 natural products at all, in a strict sense, it is said. 

 This denial receives a show of defense by a variety of 

 more or less inept or loose or untrue assertions, an 

 examination of which would be profitless even had one 

 the time for it. There are, however, two types of view 

 given in support of the denial that geniuses are really 

 natural which demand attention. One holds them to be 



