The Man of Genius

If we now group these data according to seasons, which will allow us to include other data in which the exact month cannot be stated, we shall find that the maximum of artistic and literary creation falls in spring, 388; then comes summer, with 347; then autumn, 335; and lastly, winter, with 280.

The majority of great physical, chemical, and mathematical discoveries took place in spring, 22; then autumn, 15; very few in summer, 10; and only five in winter. I have separated astronomical discoveries from physical, and other discoveries, because their precise dates are less doubtful and therefore more important. We find 135 in autumn; 131 in spring; 120 in summer; and only 83 in winter. Taking these 1,871 great discoveries altogether, we find spring coming first, with 541; then autumn, with 485; with 477 in summer; and 368 in winter.

It is evident, then, that the first warm months distinctly predominate in the creations of genius, as well as in organic nature generally, although the question cannot be absolutely resolved on account of the scarcity of data, as regards both quantity and quality. It was, however, in the spring that the discovery of America was conceived, as well as galvanism, the barometer, the telescope, and the lightning conductor; in the spring, Michelangelo had the idea of his great cartoon, Dante of his Divina Commedia, Leonardo of his book on light, Goethe of his Faust; it was in the spring that Kepler discovered his law, that Milton conceived his great poem, Darwin his great theory, and Wagner the Fliegende Holländer, the first of his great music dramas.

It may be added that in the few cases in which we may follow, day by day, the traces of the works of great men, we usually find that their activity increases in the warm months and decreases in the cold months. Thus in Spallanzani’s journals, and especially during the years 1777-78 and 1780-81, in which he was undertaking his investigations into moulds, digestion, and fecundation, I found 50 days of observation in March, 65 in April, 143 in May, 41 in June, 33 in August, 24 in September; while there were only 17 in December, 10 in November, 18 in January, 17 in July, and 2 in February.

If we examine the curious journal of his own observations, which Malpighi kept day by day for thirty-four years, we find, grouping the observations according to months, July coming first with 71 days, followed by June with 66, May 42, October 40, January 36, September 34, April 33, March 31, August 28, November 20, December 13.[225 - Atti, Della Vita ed opere di Malpighi, Bologna, 1774.] Out of over four hundred observations less than a fifth took place in the winter months.

It appears from Galvani’s manuscripts, as examined by Gherardi, that between the years 1772 and 1781 his investigations on irritability, muscular movement, the structure of the ear, the tympanic bone, and the organ of hearing, all belong to the month of April, while his work on cataract belongs to March, and that on the hygiene of sight to January. There seems, therefore, to be here a remarkable predominance for April, though there is less certainty than in the preceding cases.

I imagine the objections that may be made against these conclusions; the scarcity of data, their doubtfulness, the boldness of bringing within the narrow circle of statistics those sublime phenomena of intellectual creation which seem the least susceptible of calculation. Such objections may have weight with those who believe that statistics can only deal with large numbers – perhaps more remarkable for quantity than for quality – and who thrust aside a priori all reasoning on the data, as though figures were not facts, subject like all other facts to synthesis, and had not their true value as materials for the thinker. The facts I have brought forward, though not large, are at all events to be preferred to mere hypotheses, or to the isolated statements of authors, the more so as they are in harmony with these latter, and may at least serve as an encouragement to a new series of fruitful psychometeoric researches.

It may be said also that the creations of genius cannot furnish great columns of figures.

It is very true, however, that in regard to many of them the chronological coincidence is connected with accidental circumstances entirely, independent of the psychic condition. Thus naturalists have greater facilities for observation and experiment in warm months; thus, also, the length and equability of equinoctial nights, the difficulty of making examinations on foggy days, the weariness and discomfort experienced on days that are very hot or very cold, largely account for the predominance of discoveries in spring and autumn.

Yet these are not the only determining circumstances. In the case of anatomists, for example, bodies may be had at all seasons, and principally in winter; and, again, the long and clear winter nights, in which the influence of refraction is less, ought to be as favourable to the astronomers of temperate climates as the warm summer nights of northern climates which give us, however, a greater number of astronomical discoveries.

It is well known, also, that accidental circumstances influence even the phenomena of death, birth, murder, when closely considered statistically. If, however, all these phenomena conduce to the same result, we are led to infer a similar cause common to all, and this can only be found in meteorological influences.

I have grouped together æsthetic creations and scientific discoveries because they are associated by that moment of psychic excitation and extreme sensibility which brings together the most remote facts, the fecundating moment which has rightly been called generative, a moment at which poets and men of science are nearer than is generally supposed. Was there not an audacious imagination in Spallanzani’s experiments, in Herschel’s first attempts, in the great discoveries of Leverrier and Schiaparelli, born of hypothesis, which calculation and observation transformed into axioms? Littrow, speaking of the discovery of Vesta, observes that it was not the result of chance nor of genius alone, but of genius favoured by chance. The star discovered by Piazzi had glimmered in Zach’s eyes, but he, with less genius than Piazzi, or in a moment of less perspicacity, attached no importance to it. The discovery of the solar spots only needed time, patience, and good fortune, remarked Secchi; but it needed genius to discover their true theory. How many learned natural philosophers, observes Arago, in going down a river must have observed the fluttering of the vane at the mast-head, without discovering, like Bradley, the law of aberration. And how many artists, one might add, must have seen hideous heads of porters, without conceiving Leonardo’s Judas, or oranges without creating the cavatina of Mozart’s Don Giovanni.

There is, however, one last objection which seems more serious. Nearly all great intellectual creations, and all discoveries of modern physics, are the results of the slow and continuous meditations of men of science and their predecessors; so that they form a kind of compilation, the chronology of which is not easy to define, because the date at which we are arrested indicates the moment of birth rather than of conception. This objection, however, may be applied to nearly all human phenomena, even the most sudden. Thus, fecundation is a phenomenon which depends on the good nutrition of the organism, and on heredity; insanity, death itself, though apparently produced by sudden, even casual, circumstances, are yet related on one side to the weather and on the other to organic conditions; so that often, one may say, the precise date is fixed at birth.

CHAPTER II.

Climatic Influences on Genius

Influence of great centres – Race and hot climates – The distribution of great masters – Orographic influences – Influence of healthy race – Parallelism of high stature and genius – Explanations.

BUCKLE thought that most artists, unlike men of science, were produced in volcanic countries.[226 - History of Civilisation, i.] Jacoby, in an excellent monograph,[227 - Études sur la Selection, &c., Paris, 1881.] finds the greatest number of superior intelligences where the urban population is densest. It seems impossible to deny that race (the Latin and Greek races, for example, abound in great men), political and scientific struggles, wealth, literary centres have a great influence on the appearance of men of genius. Who would maintain that the political struggles and great liberty of Athens, Siena, and Florence have not contributed to produce in ancient times a more powerful display of genius than at other epochs and in other countries?

But when we recall the preponderating influence of meteorological phenomena on works of genius it becomes clear that a still more important place must be reserved for atmospheric and climatic conditions.

The Influence of Great Centres, of Race, and of Hot Climates.– It is worth while to study the distribution of great artists in Europe, and especially in Italy.

For musicians I have used the works of Fétis[228 - Biographie Universelle des Musiciens, Paris, 1868-80.] and Clément[229 - Histoire des Musiciens Célèbres, Paris, 1878.]; for painters and sculptors I have referred to Ticozzi’s two dictionaries.[230 - Dizionario dei Pittori, 1858.] Here are the results: —

Musicians in Europe.

The countries which have furnished the greatest number of musicians after Italy are Belgium, Germany, and France, the countries which have the greatest density of population; the poorest in musicians are Ireland, Russia, and Sweden, with a very slight density, especially the two last. The influence of volcanic soil and of Latin race does not clearly appear, when one notes the feeble proportions given by Spain and Greece compared to Germany.

If, however, we study the distribution of musicians in the various regions of Italy, we see immediately that the hot and non-insular districts stand first; then Emilia and Venetia; Piedmont, the Marches and Umbria stand low, and Sardinia is completely absent. We do not, however, obtain a sufficiently clear view of the orographic influences until we take the provinces separately.[231 - ]

We then see in a remarkable manner how the most populous centres come to the front, including nearly all the provinces containing large towns, except Piedmont, Sardinia, and Sicily. It is sufficient to mention Naples, Rome, Venice, Milan, Bologna, Florence, Lucca, Parma, and Genoa. Here, evidently, we see the influence of healthy, warm, maritime, and, above all, elevated regions; often this influence even struggles against that of civilization and of great centres. Large cities prevail in the proportion of 7 out of 9. In the second line we see other important towns emerge, or great maritime centres, especially if volcanic: Palermo, Bari, Catania, and especially mountainous countries, Bergamo, Brescia, Verona, Vicenza, Perugia, Siena. The racial influence is not clear here; the Berber and Semitic races do not, however, seem to favour art, especially in hot regions, and we may thus explain the paucity of musicians among the Sardinians, Calabrians, and Sicilians. The Greco-Roman and Etruscan races seem better endowed on the other hand, whence the predominance of Naples, Rome, Lucca, and Bologna. The action of earthquakes, which, according to Buckle, has a large part in artistic creation, is not very apparent. If Naples and Aversa are placed in the first rank (which could be explained by race and climate), it is not so with Calabria, where earthquakes are so numerous.

The Distribution of Great Masters.– It must be remarked that quantity does not always correspond to quality; it is sufficient to see that the regions that produced a Bellini and a Rossini appear to be the most sterile centres. Yet the appearance of a single great genius is more than equivalent to the birth of a hundred mediocrities.

If we take account of the proportion of great composers, we see that the most favoured regions are hot and maritime, especially Naples, closely followed by Rome, Parma, Milan, and Cremona. Here the influences of density and of the school come in the third line, after that of climate.

Thus, in searching Clément’s book, and Florimo’s,[232 - La Scuola Musicale di Napoli, 1883.] we find that out of 118 great composers, 44, or more than a third, belong to Italy; and that among these last, 27, or more than half, are supplied by Sicily (Scarlatti, Pacini, Bellini), and by Naples and neighbouring places, especially Aversa (Jomelli, Stradella, Piccinni, Leo, Feo, Vinci, Fenaroli, the inventor of opéra-bouffe, Speranza, Contumaci, Sala, Caffaro, Duni, Sacchini, Carafa, Paisiello, Cimarosa, Zingarelli, Mercadante, Durante, the two Ricci and Petrella), no doubt owing to the influence of Greek race and warm climate. Of the other 17, a few belong to Upper Italy: Donizetti, Verdi, Allegri, Frescobaldi, the two Monteverdi, Salieri, Marcello, Paganini (these last three to the sea-coast); and all the others to Central Italy; Palestrina and Clementi to Rome, and Spontini, Lulli, and Pergolese, to Perugia and Florence.[233 - See my Pensiero e Meteore, 1872, and Archivio di Psichiatria, 1880, p. 157.]

If we compare the regions which have produced the greatest composers and relatively few minor masters, we find that Pesaro, Catania, Arezzo, and Alessandria come first. The coincidence of musical geniuses and mediocrities, both in large numbers, is found at Naples, Rome, Parma, Florence, Milan, Cremona, and Venice, with an evident influence here also of warm maritime climate, of the Greco-Etruscan race and of great centres (5 out of 7).

In painting we find that the large towns predominate both for number and celebrity, with the exception of Sardinia and Sicily. Bologna, Florence, Venice, and Milan come first as regards number; Florence, and in the second line Verona, Naples, Rome, and Venice, both for number and celebrity; and we still find that, after large towns, mountainous countries give the highest figures as regards number. It is sufficient to name Perugia, Arezzo, Siena, Udine, Verona, Vicenza, Parma, Brescia.[234 - ]

Almost the same relations are observed in regard to sculptors and architects. We see the great centres of civilization and hilly regions in the first rank; Florence especially, then Milan, Venice, Naples, Como, Siena, Verona, Massa, and in the third line Arezzo, Perugia, Vicenza, Bergamo, Macerata, Catania, and Palermo.[235 - The difference with reference to painters is caused by the numerical weakness of Udine and the superiority of Catania and Palermo.]

To summarize: We see that the chief part is played by warm climate, great centres of civilization, mountainous and maritime regions; some influence must also be attributed to the influence of the Greek and Etruscan races. There is no constant relation between the regions which have produced great geniuses and those which have yielded second-rate geniuses, with the exception of Naples and Florence. For the last city we must bear in mind the influence of its commune, which excited and nourished individual energies, and to this chief cause we must add artistic disposition, race, and beauty of climate, as with Athens. Certainly, Florence enjoyed unquestioned supremacy in painting and sculpture; it is enough to recall the names of Donatello, Michelangelo, Verrochio, Baldinelli, Coccini, Cellini, Giotto, Masaccio, Andrea del Sarto, Salviati, Allori, Bronzino, Pollaiolo, Fra Angelico.

Orographic influence.– After the influence of heat and of great centres, comes that of the slighter pressure of the air in hilly but not too mountainous regions.

This climatic influence alone can explain why we find so many poets, and especially improvvisatori, even women, among the shepherds and peasants of the Tuscan hills, especially about Pistoja, Buti, Valdontani. It is enough to recall the shepherdess mentioned by Giuliani in his book Sulla Lingua parlata in Toscana, and that singular Frediani family with a father, grandfathers, and sons, who were poets; one of them is still alive and composes verses worthy of the poets of ancient Tuscany. Yet peasants of the same race, inhabiting the plain, so far as I know, offer nothing similar.

All flat countries – Belgium, Holland, Egypt – are deficient in men of genius; so also with those, like Switzerland and Savoy, which, being enclosed between very high mountains, are endemically afflicted with cretinism and goître; marshy countries are still poorer in genius. The few men of genius possessed by Switzerland were born when the race had conquered the goitrous influence through admixture of French and Italian immigrants – Bonnet, Rousseau, Tronchin, Tissot, De Candolle, Burlamagni, Pestalozzi, Sismondi. Urbino Pesaro, Forlì, Como, Parma, have produced men of genius in greater number and of greater fame than Pisa, Padua, and Pavia, three of the most ancient and important university towns of Italy; it is enough to name Raphael, Bramante, Rossini, Morgagni, Spallanzani, Muratori, Falloppio, Volta.

But, to come to more definite examples, we find that Florence, enjoying a mild temperature and in special degree a city of the hills, has furnished Italy with her most splendid cohort of great men: Dante, Giotto, Machiavelli, Lulli, Leonardo, Brunellesco, Guicciardini, Cellini, Fra Angelico, Andrea del Sarto, Nicolini, Capponi, Vespucci, Viviani, Lippi, Boccaccio, Alberti, Dati, Alamanni, Rucellai, Ghirlandajo, Donati; Pisa, on the other hand, with scientific conditions at least as favourable as Florence, being the seat of a flourishing university, only offers us – if we except a few soldiers and statesmen of no great number and worth who were unable, even with powerful allies, to prevent her fall – Pisa only offers us Nicola Pisano, Giunta, and Galileo who, although born there, was of Florentine parentage. Now Pisa only differs from Florence by being situated on a plain.

In Lombardy, the regions of mountain and lake, like Bergamo, Brescia, and Como, have produced more great men than the flat regions. I will mention Bernardo Tasso, Mascheroni, Donizetti, Tartaglia, Ugoni, Volta, Parini, Appiani, Mai, Cagnola; while Lower Lombardy can only bring forward Alciato, Beccaria, Oriani, Cavalleri, Aselli, and Bocaccini. Verona, a town of the hills, has produced Maffei, Paolo Veronese, Catullus, Pliny, Fracastoro, Bianchini, Sammicheli, Cagnola, Tiraboschi, Brusasorsi, Lorgna, Pindemonte; and not to speak of artists, economists, and thinkers of the first order (it is enough to name Trezza), I note that, in a very accurate document,[236 - Il Censimento dei Poeti Veronesi, Dec. 31, 1881.] it appears that in 1881, there were 160 poets at Verona, many rising considerably above mediocrity. On the other hand, the wealthy and learned Padua has only given to Italy Livy, Cesarotti, Pietro d’Abano, and a few others.

Genoa and Naples, which unite the advantages of a climate at once warm, maritime, and hilly, have produced men of genius at least as remarkable as those yielded by Florence, if not in such great number; such are Columbus, Doria, Mazzini, Paganini, Vico, Caracciolo, Pergolese, Genovesi, Cirillo, Filangeri.

In Spain, the influence of a warm climate is evident. The whole of Catalonia, including Barcelona, though inhabited by a serious race, has not produced artists, having yielded only a single poet, an imitator of Petrarch. Seville, on the contrary, has produced Cervantes, Velasquez and Murillo; Cordova has yielded many men of genius, such as Seneca, Lucan, Morales, Mina, Gongora and Céspedes, at once painter, sculptor, and poet.

In the United States, Beard remarks,[237 - American Nervousness.] the influence of a dry and changeable climate favours in the North a remarkable spirit of progress, the love of knowledge, the agitation of public life and a great desire for novelty; while in the South, the moist and but slightly varying climate develops eminently conservative tendencies, so that manufacturers in Georgia have great difficulty in finding a market there for new stuffs or machines; these are refused, not because they are not good or useful, but because they are new.

In Germany it has been observed that regions enjoying a mild and healthy climate, by reason of protecting mountains, have produced the greatest poets and in greatest number. The regions of the Main and the Neckar are renowned for their mild climate, luxuriant vegetation, and fertility, and the greatest German poets come from these regions. The Main gave us the greatest of German poets, Goethe, and many other dii minorum gentium, genial and noteworthy poets, although beneath that giant, men such as Klinger, Börne, Rückert, Bettina von Arnim (née Brentano), &c. In the favoured region of the Neckar were born Schiller and Victor von Scheffel, and throughout the Swabian land, we meet with many other great poets and thinkers, such as Wieland, Uhland, Justinus Kerner, Hauff, Schubart, Mörike, G. Schwab,

DIAGRAM OF THE RELATION OF GENIUS TO STATURE IN FRANCE.

Schelling, Müller, Hölderlin, and others. That hilly regions are richer than others in poets is shown in Germany by Hanover (Klopstock, Stolberg, Iffland, Bürger, Leisewitz, Bodenstedt, Hoffmann von Fallersleben, the two Schlegels, &c.); by the Rhine province (Heine, Jacobi, J. Müller, Brentano); Saxony, one of the districts possessing a mild climate, which has yielded the largest number of poets (Körner, Gellert, Kästner, Rabener, and, above all, Lessing); and Thuringia (Kotzebue, Rückert, G. Freytag, Heinse, Musäus, Gotter). On the other hand, the flat regions of Germany or those with a severe climate, have produced few poets.[238 - See Sternberg, Archivio di Psichiatria, vol. x. 1889, p. 389.] As exceptions must be mentioned, Herder (Mohrungen in East Prussia), M. von Schenkendorf (Tilsit), E. M. Arndt (Rügen), Luther (Eisleben), Paul Gerhardt (Gräfenhainichen), the two Humboldts, Paul Heyse, Tieck, Gutzkow (Berlin), Immermann (Magdeburg), Wilhelm Müller, Max Müller, Moses Mendelssohn (Dessau). Westphalia, again, is mountainous, but poor in poets.

The Influence of Healthy Race and High Stature.– The regions which have furnished few artists, or none, are those which suffer from malaria or goître: Calabria, Sassari, Grosseto, Aosta, Sondrio, Avellino, Caltanisetta, Chieti, Syracuse, Lecce. If we compare the distribution of great artists in Italy with the distribution of high stature, we find a singular coincidence of maximum and minimum points. The stature is very low in the regions I have just mentioned, and very tall at Florence, Lucca, Rome, Venice, Naples, Siena, and Arezzo, not because there is any direct correspondence of intelligence to stature, but because, as I have elsewhere shown,[239 - Statura degli Italiani, 1874; Della Influenza orografica nella Statura, 1878.] although stature reveals ethnic influences, it is also the surest index of public health, while mortality statistics have no exact relation to health, because they do not sufficiently show the results of morbid influences, such as goître and cretinism, which, although they arrest the physical and mental growth, do not increase the mortality.

If we examine the results furnished by the conscription in Italy, we find that those regions which, from the excellence of their climate, and apart from ethnic influences, yield the greatest number of individuals of high stature, and the smallest number of rejected individuals, are the most fruitful in men of genius; such are Tuscany, Liguria, and Romagna. On the other hand, the regions which are poorest in men of high stature and men fit for military service – Sardinia, Basilicata, and the valley of Aosta – yield a smaller number of men of genius. It is necessary to except Calabria and Valtellina where many are found, notwithstanding shortness of stature, but they appear in parts of the country which, from their exposed or elevated position, escape miasmatic influences and are proofs of the rule rather than exceptions to it.

This influence can be very well shown in France if we compare the list of men of genius produced in the eighteenth century (as brought together by Jacoby) with the statistics of stature given by Broca and Topinard,[240 - Étude sur la Taille.] and with the mortality of each province as furnished by Bertillon.[241 - Démographie de la France, 1878.]

We observe at once an evident parallelism between genius and height, with only 11 exceptions out of 85, and some of these 11 may be explained by the agglomerated population of great capitals (Seine, Rhône, Bouches-du-Rhône) which favour the development, or rather the manifestation, of genius, as we have already seen to be the case in Italy; thus the exceptions in Var, Hérault, Bouches-du-Rhône may be explained by relatively great density of population, and by the southern climate, which favours genius in spite of miasmatic influences. At the same time, if we may agree with Jacoby concerning the favourable influence of great urban agglomerations, such as Paris, Lyons, Marseilles, it must be added that it does not appear so clearly in other centres; thus Nord, Haut-Rhin, Pas-de-Calais, Loire, although possessing a dense population, do not yield a corresponding number of men of genius, standing only in the third rank, the Loire, indeed, only in the fourth.[242 - Inhabitants to the square kilomètre: —]

If we compare the geographical distribution of men of genius with that of mortality, we note more numerous failures of correspondence (27) with the height; this is because the statistics of mortality do not indicate the influence of cretinism which exists in Ariège, the Basses and Hautes-Alpes, Puy-de-Dôme, the Pyrénées, and the Ardennes, clearly showing itself in short stature and military exemption for goître, and, as in Valtellina in Italy, accompanied by a scarcity of intellect. At the same time, all the regions showing high mortality, especially such as are malarious – the Landes, Sologne, Morbihan, Corrèze – offer a feebler proportion of men of genius, with the exception of the great centres; the contrary is found in more healthy districts.

Orographic conditions appear to have great influence. The sunny and fertile land of Languedoc, all mountainous regions not too much affected by goître– Doubs, Côte-d’Or, Ardennes – or those in which it has not succeeded in depressing the stature, that is to say, has been unable to produce endemic cretinism (Jura) give us, when we have put aside all influence of density, race, and temperature, a most notable proportion of men of genius. This may be clearly seen in the table on the following page in which the high figures of goître, stammering, and deaf-mutism, correspond with low stature in Corrèze, Puy-de-Dôme, Ardèche, Ariège, the Basses-Alpes, and the Pyrénées.

We have seen in Var, Vaucluse, and Hérault that a southern climate, perhaps on account of its greater fertility, produces a great number of men of genius; but countries that are cold, but at the same time healthy and mountainous – Jura, Doubs, Meurthe – give still

higher figures, and the same isothermal line passes through the Seine-Inférieure and the Seine-et-Oise, both rich in men of genius; and the Vosges, in which they are almost entirely absent, the same line, again, passes through Calvados and Ain, which are very rich in genius, and Saône-et-Loire and Cher, which are deficient in genius.