New-York tribune., 1921-04-03
Provision Should r.
Made for Extra
Talented

bright children by M. P. E. Cra.. a..s
man makes the following divisions
First, children with good rner.s" s'
second, those whose physical =,
mental growth is generally mors as
rapid than that Of the ora;~ ''e
child, without pathological preco.
ity; third, children of one-sided 49,. y.
velopment, having one facultr "
group of related faculties develoDsd
out of proportion to the other f.s~' M
ties; fourth, children in whom IN.
clal or general excellency is assne;
ated with neuropathic and nsvos.
pathic tension.
DR.. Groszman makes two =.
groups outside these which he csr,
the artistic type" and the "mstha
matlcal genius" These two ars =.
a matter Of fact, quite the bs..
known types of child prodigies m.
@ .e"so" gwen 1or this by Professor
Ihorndlke is that neither music n.-
mathematics demands p knovl.,S
OF life for its expansion. If q cb;Id
has any tendency along either r.
these lines it is not surprising tbs.
such tendency should show itself
quite early in life. Wonder cbi)drer
OF these types may be creative. and
often are. In practically all casss
they turn out as artists in later l;ss
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wa.
musical genius Of this sort. r.
showed ability at three years of ssa
and, although his father tried n
keep him from too intensive st,,d,
of music at such an early age, he
did precocious things before he was
seven years of age.
DR.. Francis Cation, VINO is know,
IN connection with the study and
use of fingerprints, says:
EARLY manifestations Of penius
are not incompatible with prolonged
and even late Development" Havdn
Beethoven, Michael Angelo, Milton
Goethe, Voltaire and Newton are
cited to illustrate the truth of this
statement.
John Stuart Mill was very highly
trained as a little boy by his father
He had to meet tasks of concentra-
ton and use CRITICAL judgment when
he was only six years old.
Julius Caesar and Confucius are
known to have been exceptional chill.
dren. John Milton wrote Latin
verse at the age Of four years and
Alexander Pope wrote Greek stanzas
at the same age.
Thomas Darlington Macaulay is
another famous child prodigy. lie
could read English and had a knowl-
edge of Latin at the age of three. At
seven he composed a compendium Of
universal history from the Creation
down to 1900. At eight he wrote
treatise designed to convert natives
of Malabar to Christianity.
Karl Friedrich Gauss, the famous
German mathematician, was known
as mathematical genius at three
years of age.
Hofmann's Introduction
One of the most famous child
prodigies New York has ever known
was Josef Hofmann when he played
here in 1887. He showed musical tai
ent when he was two and a hall
years old. AS an eleven-year-old boy
he came to this country with his
father. Ambitious managers signed
father and son up for contract and
then proceeded to. exploit the child
pianist. After various protests and
complaints the Society for Proven
ton of Cruelty to Children, the presi-
dent of which was then Commodore
Elbridge Gerry, interfered. The
managers for the child artist were
ordered not to let him play more than
four times a week.
Later it was found that these gen
tlemen were getting around this
order by having the boy give out-of-
town performances. Physicians
warned the father of the little artist
that the child was on the edge Of q
nervous breakdown. The elder Hof
mann then took his talented son back
to Germany.
There is one explanation of the
child genius which has been believed
by certain peoples at certain times
This is the reincarnation theory.
Phenomenal ability is explained
easily by saying that the child is
the reincarnation of some genius
long dead. This theory does not :
stand the scientific test, BIZ :. IA.
nevertheless, at times received cfe'
dence.
This more or less shaky explana'
tion of the exceptional child is COM