13
so also there appears to me a mind with quite peculiar mathematical insight. When Newton first read Euclid it seemed a well-known road to him; his apprehension of the demonstrations which ordinary men take so much time and trouble to learn, was so quick that the whole field of geometry unrolled before him almost as if he had a prior knowledge of it. But there was nothing in the nature of Newton’s mathematical insight which was different from that of other men; it was merely that the extent and power of that part of his mind (as well as other parts) was so wonderful.
In the same way it seems to me that there is a mind pre-eminent in its power of observation and in its recourse to experiment. When it exists it gives us the great naturalists, and chemists, and physiologists of the time. Let any one call up to his memory men whom he knows, and who are the acknowledged masters in Botany, or Zoology, or Chemistry, and I think he will admit that these have quite unusual powers
