Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-02-06
GENIUS AND SUICIDE.
"Great Wits Are Sure to Madness Near
Allied"

GENIUS AND SUICIDE.
Great Wits Are Sure to Madness Near
Allied"
CharlesW Pilgrim NJ D. in Popular Science Monthly.
Winslow. in his Anatomy of Science. SAYS: "a
! person who accustoms himself tolive in a world
created by his own fancy, who surrounds him
self with fimsy localities, will, in the course of
time, cease to sympathize with the gross realities
OF LIE. and any one who will take the trouble
! to read the biographies of men of genius will
see that this statement is borne out to a remark
able degree. Perhaps the most striking ex-
ample of this doctrine. as well as the most pa
thetic instance of suicide in the annals of
literature, is found in the records of Chatter
tons short life. From the beginning. shadows
lowered over him. He was the posthumous
child of a rough, drunken fellow. and singer
and subchanter in the cathedral choir of Bris-
! toll who left his widow to support herself by
dressmakIng in one of the back streets of the
old town. and the boy WAS able to gain only the
rudlments of an education in the charity school.
/ His bIographer tells us that he was of peculiar
temper, sullen and silent. So much Of his time
was spent in solitude and he seemed to have so
few of the characteristics of children that MANY
regarded him weak in intellect His after
! life Is well known. Failure met him at every
hand and by degrees he sank lower and lower into
the depths Of despair until finally, with his last
penny, he purchased sufficient arsenic to end
his unhappy life
Another example of Winslow's doctrine is
Hugh Miller, the self-taught Scottish genius,
who, as a boy. chose the calling of a stonemason
| that he might be unemployed during the hard
frosts of winter and thus have opportunity to
educate himself. His career successful
but the night following the completion of his
greatest work, The Testimony of the Rocks"
he yielded to the strain to which his oyerworked
brain had been subjected and sent a bullet
| through his heart.
Another similar case is that of Robert Tanna-
hill, the Paisley weaver poet who wrote "Jesse,
the Flower of Dunblane." He was shy, sensi-
| tive and awkward, and uncomt ortable in the
presence OF any but his humble friends The
one memorable day in all his life was that on
! which he received a visit from James Hogg. the
Ettrick Shepherd. The meeting was proionged
far into the night and the parting was painful
and pathetic. Tannahili Prasping the hand of
his poet brother, said. while tears suffused his
eyes: Farewell We shall never meet again -
! Shortly afterward his body was found stark
and stiff, in pool near the house.
| 10 come down to more recent times we have
a familiar example in Richard Realf an English
| peasant, who became intimate with John Brown,
and was with him at Harper's Ferry, and mar
rowly escaped lynching. The next we hear of
| him he was writing a remarkable series of
! pOtIuS lOT TIE hOcucsteF Union. domestic
troubles oppressed HIM beyond endurance, and
he committed suicide by poison He made two
attempts before success resulted. and between
them composed the poem beginning 'De NOR
tuis nil nisi bonum."
Haydon, the celebrated historical painter and
writer, overcome by debt, disappointment and
ingratitude. laid down the brush with which he
! was at work upon his last great effort, ALFRED
and the Trial by jury wrote with steady
hand. .'Stretch me no longer upon this rough
world, and them with pistol shot. put an
end to his unhappy existence.
Richard Payne knight, the poet, Greek
scholar and antiquary. a victim of melan-
cholia. and ended his life with poison.
Burton the vivacious author of the Anatomy
of Melancholy, who had the reputation of be-
ing able to raise laughter IN any company, was
In reality constitutonallv depressed. and finally
/ ended his life in a fit of melancholy.
Sir Samuel Romilly. man of brilliant genius
| by whose efforts the criminal laws of England
were remodeled-a man loved for his sweet
nature and upright manliness-while overcome
/ by grief at the death of his wife, with his own
| hand sought rest beyond.
| Michael Angelo. after receiving painful in
/ jury to his leg by a fall from a scaffold while
painting his Last Judgment" became 80
| melancholy that he shut himself in his own
| room and resolved to let himself die For
| tunately his intentions were frustrated by the
celebrated physician Bacio Routini, who accI-
dentally heard of his condition.
| Nittoria Alfieri, of whom it has been said
that every event in his life is either factor of
disease or a symptom of mental alienation,
attempted suicide in Holland in the course of
| one of his restless trips through Europe in
search of change.
kotzebte, who at last met tragic death at
the hand OF an assassin at one time 80
melancholy that he meditated self-destruction
Cowper. when bowed down by religious
melancholy, made two unsuccessful attempts
upon his life. and the list Of distinguished men
who either attempted or admitted that they
contemplated suicide includes Chateaubriand,
the brilliant representative of French Literature;
Dupinghen, the distinguished anatomist and
| surgeon; Cavour, the Regeneration of italy;
Lincoln, the martyr President; George Sand,
Goethe, Comte, Shelley and Byron.
Evidence is not lacking to warrant the as
sumption that genius is a special condition.
Centuries ago Seneca taught that there was no
great genius without tincture of madness,
| and more than century ago Diderot ex-
claimed: "Oh. how close the insane and men Of
genius touch!" Lamartne speaks Of the
mental disease called genius; Pascal SAYS that
| extreme mind is akin to madness, and every
body is familiar with Drydens couplet:
Great wits sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide
But, be this as it may be, if We take into con-
sideration the fact that the poet lives in an
| ideal world, surrounded by creatures Of his own
| imagination, to whom he attributes the most
exaggerated sentiments. it seems to me reason
able to believe that sooner or later unhealthy
introspection must be awakened and followed.
not infrequently, by the development Of NOR
bid tendencies.
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