New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1856-08-23
Infferi lance pf Ieaaf,

contemporary that great men iasaIIy inherit
their talents from The mother. This u popufar be-
lief but not the les erroneous The mistake has
arisen from attending only to those cases III which
the mother had superior nSind, neglect Of the
equally numerous examples where the Iatiea pos
sessed remarkable abilities. Everybody quotes Tile
fact that Napoleon derived his genfua from BIS mother
Nobody mentions that Burns owed his vast abisies
to his father. traveller W6Hld commit d similar
biunder Hhe should describe all americans as1 ght-
haired, or say that every Philadelp lpan was Quaker
The rale, for rule there i, lies deeper. Great ab
ties IN word arise from such fortunate union Of
the mental characteristics of the parents al renders
the progeny genius, though neither father nor
mother perhaps were saeh. The catalogue Of emil
nent men, carefully made up and honestly seru
ttnized with a view to eacidating the truth would
establish this, we have no doubt beEoad controversy.
For it Is already known that the child takes It'll mental
nature in about equal portions from Its parents and
this fact at snce leads To our wen as
explains why brilliant parents often have dnnces
among their offspring. Sf
Let ns illustrate this. A man has the purely intel
eetual in great force, but ID wanting
IN WIZ ne q consequently dreamy philosopher. or
visionary speculator. He marries q woman, who,
Wtn tsFi5 oTdnars has immense energy. One
chd Oh this pair may combine the weakness Of both
parent1 and viii be n that event an hrecaimable
tool Bnt another may inherit tie mother swiH with
the father intellect and child unless ruined By
a bad education, Is certain to become dstinerisfed
Or take another example II Ro1aan III % renaarka-s
#ble abilities, but with fine neral nature il married
to without principle nut possessing shining
abilities. One child of this pair may have Tiss geol
qualities of beth patents, and beeerne D. Tsnngaf A.
lNestdf even q s Bat hid dsSer YsaY i'll
heTit the deficiencies of both, and grew Up. miles
carefully guarded, to become brilliant villain On
take third instance. One parent may have much
imagination, but little else, and the other nothing
markabe, but great pereeptive faculties The union
of these two characteristics in child will nfoduee
poet. The transmission Of either, to excess unless
balancedby strong reasoning powers may make only
a human monkey or g romantic fool y
The law explains also why 50 few eminent men be-
long to one family. There have rarely been two dis
tinguished poets painters generals statesmen
who were father and son, even brothers. The elder
and younger Pitt, though both prime ministers and3
both famous speakers, were stTikingly dssinliar in
their mental constitution SO that this example which
seems at first to oppose our theory really susaiHs
In fact, wEenwe consider that the mind has 10 many
and so dissimilar ingredients, dealty, casualty,
benevoence, reverence destEuctTeness constructive
ness and that these combined III millions of va
rietes in many million persons, the wonder ID not
that two individuals eFen of the same family resem-
BILE each other 50 little. but that they resemble each
other so much. Given the score and odd of separate
bumps into which piirenology divides the BRAIN and
take the child Of any two persons Ehateyera who
shall say in what exact Ir0po out of the ten
Thousand possible ones, these qualities oaght to-
unite? 3s5 $i;s555ss5 5sEzzs3s #H-
There is too much falsity Taught for truth 81
this and similar subjects nat only newspapers but
even in elaborate books reason is that few per-
sons think soundly, dare to deny preconceWed or
popular ideas. We would have every man however
retiett for himself e Prove all things hold fast to
thesgopd.' II Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, s