Prescott journal. [volume] (Prescott, Wis.) 1861-1871, 1871-01-04
The Personal Appearance OF Great
Men.

The Personal Appearance OF Great
Men.
In nothing, perhaps, are We so fire.
quently disappointed as in the bodily ap-
pearance of some notorious parsonage
with whose actions and character we have
been long acquainted, but whose image
in the mind s eye was wholly OF our own
creation. At first we refuse to substitute
the strange reality for our long cherished
IDEAL, for the mind cannot think of per-
sons or things without creating picture
of them. Generally we magnify the
size of our heroes and enfold them with
.uperhuman beauty, or if they are hate
full we conceive of them as ugly and de
formed.
When man of gigantic stature is re-
markable also for extraordinary intellect
ual aud moral ability-when be has
power to govern, or magnetic eloquence,
CT occupies conspicous station,-there
can be no question that be derives great
additional influence from the size of his
body. Constantine, giant in body. at
the head of bis army or on the throne
provided for him in the great Ecumeni
cal Council at Nice; Charlemague, tow
ering above others in height, and able
to command and reconstruct The broken
elements of Europe into pew empire;
Peter the Great, who introduced Russia
in to the sisierhood of civilized nations;
Washington, the Father Of bis Country;
all satisfied that instinct which loves
to see an imposing appearance associated
with intellectual power aud personal au
thority.
But facts will not allow us to accept
the materialistic hypothesis that there is
any connection between the shape or
weight of the body aud power of mind.
Soul, whatever it may be, is not depend
ent on the size, nor on any known quail
ity, of the engine with which it is con
nected, for either amount or intensity of
action.
Byron informs his readers that he was
exactly five feet eight and one-half IT,
cbes in height, slight" and muscular
about two inches taller inln the average
of his eountrymen. and about three IN
ches taller than English lunatics; for DIR.
Bsddoe has ascertained that the adult
male inmates of Iunatc asylums IN Eng
land are one inch shorter than their IA
tional neutrality-suspicious. because little
men have more nervous Temperament,
or perhaps because the larger men outside
outvots AMI oyerpower their smaller
brethren, and put them into lunalic asy
lums for safety.
MISUNDERSTANDING the most re
markable of all the characters who figur
I'd in the great French Revolution, and
in some respects one of the strongest men
the world has ever seen, seemingly an
incarnation of wiIl-was only five feet
and two or three inches in height, his
complex on liyid and bilious. bis eyeli9s
constantly blinking. and bis shoulders and
neck subject to frequent spasmodic mo
tons. And yet he swasyed both. the
multitude and the Assembly by bis logic
and sloquence, and by the sheer force of
inteIIec. mastered the storm longer and
more ces.fully than any other man.
Marat, his rival, was not even five feet
higb, bis SAGE hideous. AID his head
monstrous for size. Danton, on the 9th
or hand, whose tremendous eloquence
nsrved the new republic successfully
against foreign aggression. was of large
and powerful frame, and had an extraor-
diDarily loud voice.
Peter the Hermit, whose eloquenee
stirred all Europe to the Crusades,-ac
cording to Berington, in his edition oil
Abelard and Heloise,- was tail, thin