New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1911-06-14

Our Political Systsm-Hhy the Ne
gro 10 Slow 20 Rise.
Scientists Of today are declaring tia
the ANTAGONISTS Of the future are goin
to exert q profound influence on tn
political system Of the country. Thi
change IL to be brought about, It Is as
serted, by a more intimate knowledg
Of the structure and functions Of tn
human brain. of which less IL know
at present than Of a majority Of the vi
I tai organs.
An advocate of this theory. the ed
itor of American Medicine. urges al
men of intelligence to will their brain!
to science for purposes Of study. Then
he says, when additional knowledge OF
the brain is gained we may find a way
to keep the ballot out Of the hands OF
those who are unfit to use 1t.
Genius and insanity" says the writ
er, "seem to be linked together in the
popular mind. though no two things
could be more widely separated. A
few men-Lombroso, for instance
have made an extensive study Of the
psychic and nervous characteristics of
great men and have concluded that
genius is a neurosis allied to epilepsy,
while the few men of genius who have
developed insanity have given rise to a
widespread opinion that every genius
is insane.
Inheritance In Evidence.
1.-THE absurdity of all these specula-
tons arises from the failure to realize
that mental phenomena are the prod
vets of brain tissue and that when we
find extraordinary mental endowments
it invariably means that the man has
been born with an extraordinarily de-
veloped brain. There is almost always
some evidence of Inheritance. Indeed,
a study of British great men long ago
showed that almost every one Of them
appeared in family already noted for
achievements.
Those born to mediocre families are
so few in number as to have no weight
on this generalization, and even they
are generally of the type in which only
one brain center has been developed.
so that the mental greatness is strictly
limited to a very small sphere. Anato-
mists have been rarely able to secure
brains of great men to find out where
in they differ from the brains one finds
on the dissecting table. which are al
most invariably types of men who have
so utterly failed in the struggle for
existence that their bodies are con-
signed to the potter's field.
Besides, the brain is so difficult to
preserve and study that it has been
neglected in favor of those
organs coming within the sphere of
practical surgery and medicine. What
little has been found out so far leaves
no doubt whatever Of the material ba-
sis of intellectual greatness.
Spitzka's Discovery.
"Spitzka has already proved that |
such brains are endowed with Il very
highly developed system of fDrous con-
nections, which coordinate the brain
cells. This is the main characteristic
which distinguishes the human brain
from all others, and we should expect 1t |
to be most marked in the highest men.
"The nervous instability of the un-
usual man is an entirely different mat
ter from the neuroses. The highly de-
yeloped white matter makes each brain |
cell more efficient, and its activities |
must be greater than in the ordinary |
man, whose mental sluggishness is a
sign Of his lower organization. The |
instability of the great is therefore a
perfectly normal functioning Of per-
fectly healthy tissue and no more q
sign of disease than is the activity of |
a humming bird as compared with the
slowness of a buzzard.
"On the other hand, delicate and in
tricate machinery is easily disarrang-
ed. and this is the penalty of greatness,
for such men are annoyed or even |
disturbed by influences which are not |
even felt by the phlegmatic. 1t may
be true, therefore, that slightly high
er percentage Of great men do become |
or insane. but if they !
could have been saved from the injury
they would have remained healthy-a
rule which applies to the majority of
all cases of insanity.
Very Great Arc Abnormal.
"The very great are very abnormal
that is. they do not resemble the aver
age, and they must be expected to |