Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-12-22
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aside from its population it is also the
great seat of learning of Western
Europe. Many large commercial cities
such Havre, Toulon Nantes, St.
Etienne Nice, rank very low in liter
airy productivity, while other relatively small ones
especially the fifteen university cities of France
have been exceptionally fertile in literary talent Of
these, Dion, Besancon, Grenoble and AK strk-
ing examples. All environments favorable to
the development of genius exactly in proportion
they educational in the full sense of the word
The thoughtful student of such facts as these
cannot fail to perceive that genius is something
that exists and only requires to be developed:
that the amount of native talent in society is prac
tically unlimited, and that its manifestation in the
furtherance of civilization is mainly question of
opportunity. All that is needed to bring it forth
in any required amount is that there be such
demand for it shall really develop it. Not merely
literary talent but talent of every kind artistic
scientific, practcallies latent in every land. wait
ing to be called forth.
Great establishment has been expressed at the
exuberant talent of the Greeks when that country
was at the zenith of its history: The galaxy of
statesmen (Lycurgus, Scion, Pericles, cimon
Themistocles). orators Demosthenes, Isocrates
Lysias), warriors (Mltiades, Nicias), sculptors
(zeuxis, Polygonotusj architects Mnesices Ictinus
Callicrates). philosophers socrates, Plato Aris-
totle) poets (Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes)
Grecian skies from the sixth to the fourth centuries
before the Christian has been the marvel of
modern writers, and has led many to maintain that
since
Must Be Reward
PUT the true explanation is not difficult to find
- 1t was simply due to the fact that Greece in
that day, than any other country at any later
age actually called out its talent and set to work
Genius like economic goods, is subject to the law of
demand and supply. If it is demanded, it is forth
coming, and in any required amount. But the de-
mand, in political economy, must be real, sub
stantlal demand and not mere velleity or vain
No and will he n1te6 mile #
cludes the wherewthal to labor and subsist In the
economic world the mere desire for or even the need
of commodity does not constitute demand An
economic demand involves not only the wish for the
thing demanded, but also the ability to obtain 1t in
the market. And so demand for the products of
genius must be accompanied by the assurance that
the man of genius shall be adequately remunerated
for his services. He must be enabled to throw him
self into his work without being haunted by the
specter of want. 1t this that Greece did, with
the result that this substantial demand was abun
in the Augustan age. The Renaissance was largely
product of serious demand on the part of both
Church and State for great works of art. Even in
medieval times and for several centuries later there
lack of architectural talent to build the
many great cathedrals and castles of Europe.
1t is the same to-day. Every kind of genius for
which there exists this real living demand is even
now at work. The supposed decline of literary and
artistic genius is due entirely to the fact that those
forms of genius no longer demanded in this
sense. But other forms of genius in demand.
and the demand is supplied. Genius is Protean
its nature. The inventiveness, which in the eight
zenith century expended upon fine figures of
rhetoric. is to-day expended upon practical prob
lens of life.
When the Department of Agriculture calls for
experts in the prevention of the diseases of do
mestic animals and cultivated plants in the
discovery of improved fertilizers, they come for
ward in great numbers, and when set to work
they display the highest genius, and soon devise
means of saving the nation millions of dollars.
They go beyond all that was expected of them.