THE SCIENTIST. 
123 
So marked an individuality eaiiiiot be 
witlioiit enemies to whom a warm, can- 
did and impulsive nature, almost reck- 
less of personal consequences, too often 
gives occasion for detraction and calum- 
ny. Ambitious he certainly is and must 
be; but to charge him with vanity would 
be a mistake only made by those who 
could not analyse the springs of feeling 
and action in such a character, whose 
radical defect is that lack of self-esteem 
which always makes one seem to seek 
file applause of others because dissatisfied 
with one's own achievements, and pain- 
fully conscious how far one falls short 
of realizing one's ideals. Yet Professor 
Ooues has every temtation to pride. Ho 
is the only contemporaneous scientist 
who has acquired world-wide fame in 
more than one branch of learning before 
turning fifty years of age, and whose 
reputation is as well assured amoi»g the 
people as among his peers in science. 
Although not past the prime of life he is 
already pre-eminent both in physical 
and psychical sciencees, recognized as an 
authority in the former, aiul as a daring 
pioneer in the latter. Before either of 
the two now famous schools of Hypnotism 
in France had announced their results and 
made their mark, Coues had made bold 
experiments on his own person, as well 
as with others, and perhaps the still 
bolder experiment of publicly speaking 
and writing upon these strange forbidden 
things, when loss of both social and 
scientific prestage seemed likely to be 
the price of his temerity. His hotly 
pressed claims of a scientific basis for 
religious truth, as well as of the religions 
element in science, and the dauntless 
resolution with which he set himself to 
apply scientific methods to the investi- 
gation of spiritualism and other psychic 
l)henomena, brought down upon his head 
a storm of criticism and denunciation, 
which only abated when the news of the 
respect entertained for his views abroad 
reached home, and the stand he took 
almost alone in this conntry was found 
to be that of some of the most disting- 
uished thinkers in England and other 
countries of Europe- 
"Nothing succeeds like success."" Pro- 
fessor Coues has overcome every ob- 
stacle, as well those created by his own 
temperament as those placed in his way 
by others, and may reasonably expect to 
find his position strongei'and his recog- 
nition greater as the years advance, and 
as increasing numbers of scientists culti- 
vate the fields of his pioneer exploration. 
In private life Professor Coues is easy 
and unassuming, and one of of the most 
accessi1)le of men. Though his literary 
labors oblige him to be miserly of his 
time, he seldom denies himself to any 
w^ho may call. He seldom alludes to 
himself or his work, except in the most 
casual manner, as if inclined to make 
light of it; though always ready for an 
animated discussion of the problems on 
which his interest is centered. For a man 
who declares that being bored is the 
greatest ill of life, his patience with 
bores is phenomenal. Some sny he has 
aquired a sort of double action of mind 
which enables him to talk affably and 
entertainingly with a stranger while 
carrying on an inward train of thought 
on quite another subject. Others some- 
times complain that he has grown out of 
sympathetic touch with minds which act 
more slowly and heavily than his own, 
and there is no doubt-some truth in this. 
Yet if there is anything which has mark- 
ed his whole career, it is his readiness to 
impart whatever he has to give to all 
who are able to receive it; many are the 
young scientists to whom he has held 
out the helping hand in private, apart 
from his public teaching, and numberless 
are those in whom contact with his 
mind has instilled new ideas, the source 
of which they do not always recognize. 
But he can well afford to wait for his full 
reward. If Professoi- Coues has a pet 
aversion, after his terror of being bored, 
