Genius does
not herd with genius. The musk-deer and the civet-cat are never found
in company. They don't care for strange scents,--they like plain
animals better than perfumed ones. Nay, if you will have the kindness
to notice, Nature has not gifted my lady musk-deer with the personal
peculiarity by which her lord is so widely known.
Now when genius allies itself with character, the world is very apt to
think character has the best of the bargain. A brilliant woman marries
a plain, manly fellow, with a simple intellectual mechanism; we have
all seen such cases. The world often stares a good deal and wonders.
She should have taken that other, with a far more complex mental
machinery. She might have had a watch with the philosophical
compensation-balance, with the metaphysical index which can split a
second into tenths, with the musical chime which can turn every quarter
of an hour into melody. She has chosen a plain one, that keeps good
time, and that is all.
Let her alone! She knows what she is about. Genius has an infinitely
deeper reverence for character than character can have for genius.
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