The Spanish Fork press. [volume] (Spanish Fork, Utah) 1902-current, 1908-03-26

| category OF the Seml-lnSane VINO are
termed originals At eight years OF
age he was seized with an irresistible
desire TO fly. This idea haunted him
to such a degree that he decided to
put II into practice. He shut himself /
up in his study room, climbed up to
the window and made the movements |
for flying in the air. He fell from /
height of more than 16 feet and was |
sick for some time following"
Tolstol's Peculiar Mania.
Later Tolstois particular brand OF
!. insanity prompted him to fall in love,
not once, but threefold, for, having
met the three daughters of DIR. Berce,
he began by being very much taken
by the oldest, then he thought he was
in love with the second, and finally
fell in love with the third" The triple
romance ended abruptly, for Tolstoi
suddenly decided that instead of get
ting married he would NOW hay with
the moujiks in peasants blouse.
Ossip Lourie, who made a psyche
logical study of many of the great Rus
sian novelists of the nineteenth cen
fury, summed M Tolstoi's case in the
following way:
"Tolstoi is one of those rare men to
whom the English aphorism, They
are certainly cracked, but the crack
let's in light might apply In word
Tolstoi was semiinsane genius"
Even Socrates must have had
streak of insanity In him, for he went
into ecstacies which were almost cata-
; leptic fits. AT table, or in the streets
of Athens, or in the camps, he would
suddenly stop short, sometimes with
; out motive. AT other times, on the oc-
: casion of sneeze either by himself
or one of his neighbors, he would act,
: or would not act, according to whether
the sneeze had taken place on his
right hand or on his left
) Insanity of Some Great Men.
l. Prof. Grasset cites the cases of
l. many other great men of past and
present times whose brands of in
l, sanity were manifested in various
ways. Pascal, for instance, could not
y stand seeing water without falling into
a perfect fit of passion" Then Au-
l. guste Comte who has exerted vast
> and lasting influence on the philo-
{ sophical position of the savants of the
u nineteenth century, was undoubtedly
!, semi-insane when he was not wholly
insane. He wrote incoherent letters.
While he was taking a walk one day
e he wanted to drag his wife with him
t. into the Lake d'Enghein. During his
IS meals he would try to drive his knife
l' into the table, like Walter SCOTS
Highlander, and he would order the
Is succulent back of pig and recite bits
~ of Homer"
at OF Cork, Prof. Grasset writes that
w he made an attempt to commit sui
Up eide at the age of Is and belongs tc
Is the category of the semi.insane who
DIT have been termed vagabonds or wan
es derers."
H. Guy de Maupassant died insane. He
oy had often confessed to Paul Bourge
that he frequently saw his double Ii
going into his own room he would Sc,
himself seated upon his own sofa TIL,
be roots of his disease seemed to b,
"a, confused with the very qualities of hi
els talent" Villemain had ideas of perse
OK cution. Jean Jacques Rousseau wa
successfully clockmaker mountebank
cs' music master. painter and servant
OK and then followed the paths of med
Oh cine, music, theology and botany. H
De- used to mediate bareheaded in tn
en- sun at midday. He fell in love at II
py He would suddenly depart from a
inn, leaving his trunk behind hin
lty Gerard de Nerval, the political write
TO and poet, was subject to hallucinf
Ia tons. He would be found on the stree
ue- corner, his hat in his hand, lost in
JUS sort of ecstacy. In the Tuileries h
MS saw the goldfish in the big fountai
ISL putting their heads out of the waite
We trying to entice him to follow them [
&C. the bottom. The queen of Sheba wa
waiting for him, they said. He wa
ON found at the Palais Royal dragging
ND live lobster along at the end of a blu
sm- ribbon. He tried to fly like the bird
OK and one day at a moment, in one
ma the streets of Paris, when he waite
me with his arms spread out for his so,
VS. to mount to a star, he was gathered /
md by a gendarme because he had pr
len pared for this ascension by taking O
nm his terrestrial garments"
iue Freaks, of Men of Genius.
WY. .ni Baudelaire dyed his hair green. +
'ou was an epicure of odors. and used
say that his soul scared upon perfume
VI as the souls of other men scared upC
~ music. One day after throwing
i. travelling gla2ier downstairs and brea
80 ing every pane of glass Baudelaire e
~ claimed: The beauty of life, TT
beauty of life" He declared later tn
he experienced at that moment an 81
low finite joy because he was not yet /
ter sane, at least, not officially so.
rof. The case of Alfred de Musset, wi
uld was restless visionary and slight
one maniacal," is most interesting. In Il
Pc Cafe de la Regence it was his habit
yle order plate of cigars and a fright
of mixture of beer and absinthe, viii,
or he would swallow in a gulp. Then /