hematical studies. That he should
not prosecute them with the diligence usual at Cambridge, was of
course to be expected; yet his clearness and acumen would
certainly have enabled him to master the principles of
geometrical reasoning; nor, in fact, did he so much find a
difficulty in apprehending demonstrations, as a want of
interest, and a consequent inability to retain them in his
memory. A little more practice in the strict logic of geometry,
a little more familiarity with the physical laws of the
universe, and the phenomena to which they relate, would possibly
have repressed the tendency to vague and mystical speculations
which he was too fond of indulging. In the philosophy of the
human mind, he was in no danger of the materializing theories of
some ancient and modern schools; but in shunning this extreme,
he might sometimes forget that, in the honest pursuit of truth,
we can shut our eyes to no real phenomena, and that the
physiology of man must always enter into any valid scheme of his
psychology.

"The comparative inferiority which he might show in the usual
trials of knowledge, sprung in a great measure from the want of
a prompt and accurate memory. It was the faculty wherein he
shone the least, according to ordinary observation; though his
very extensive reach of literature, and his rapidity in
acquiring languages, sufficed to prove that it was capable of
being largely exercised. He could remember anything, as a friend
observed to the Editor, that was associated with an idea. But he
seemed, at least after he reached manhood, to want almost wholly
the power, so common with inferior understandings, of retaining
with regularity and exactness, a number of unimportant
uninteresting particulars. It would have been nearly impossible
to make him recollect for three days the date of the battle of
Marathon, or the names in order of the Athenian months. Nor
could he repeat poetry, much as he loved it, with the
correctness often found in young men. It is not improbable, that
a more steady discipline in early life would have strengthened
this faculty, or that he might have supplied its deficiency by
some technical devices; but where the higher powers of intellect
were so extraordinarily manifested, it would have been
preposterous to complain of what may perhaps have been