My life : a record of events and opinions - Wallace-online.org

SELF-EDUCATION IN SCIENCE, ETC. 117it is not so injurious, for when I have time fordeliberate thought I can generally express myselfwith tolerable clearness and accuracy. I think, too,that the absence of the flow of words which so manywriters possess has caused me to avoid that extremediffuseness and verbosity which is so great a fault inmany scientific and philosophical works.Another important defect is in the power ofrapidly seeing analogies or hidden resemblances andincongruities, a deficiency which, in combination withthat of language, has produced the total absence ofwit or humour, paradox or brilliancy, in my writings,although no one can enjoy and admire these qualitiesmore than I do. The rhythm and pathos, as well asthe inimitable puns of Hood, were the delight of myyouth, as are the more recondite and fantastic humourof Mark Twain and Lewis Carroll in my old age. Thefaculty which gives to its possessor wit or humour isalso essential to the high mathematician, who isalmost always witty or poetical as well ; and I wastherefore debarred from any hope of success in thisdirection ;while my very limited power of drawing orperception of the intricacies of form were equallyantagonistic to much progress as an artist or ageometrician.Other deficiencies of great influence in my lifehave been my want of assertiveness and of physicalcourage, which, combined with delicacy of the nervoussystem and of bodily constitution, and a general disinclinationto much exertion, physical or mental, havecaused that shyness, reticence, and love of solitudewhich, though often misunderstood and leading tounpleasant results, have, perhaps, on the whole, beenbeneficial to me. They have helped to give me thoselong periods, both at home and abroad, when, alone and