[Literary Character of Men of Genius by Isaac Disraeli]@TWC D-Link bookLiterary Character of Men of Genius CHAPTER II 4/10
182.] [Footnote B: Since this murmur has been uttered against the degrading views of some of those theorists, it afforded me pleasure to observe that Mr.Malthus has fully sanctioned its justness.
On this head, at least, Mr. Malthus has amply confuted his stubborn and tasteless brothers.
Alluding to the productions of genius, this writer observes, that, "to estimate the value of NEWTON'S discoveries, or the delight communicated by SHAKSPEAKE and MILTON, by the _price_ at which their works have sold, would be but a poor measure of the degree in which they have elevated and enchanted their country."-- _Principles of Pol.
Econ._ p.48.And hence he acknowledges, that "_some unproductive labour is of much more use and importance_ than productive labour, but is incapable of being the subject of the gross calculations which relate to national wealth; contributing to _other sources of happiness_ besides those which are derived from matter." Political economists would have smiled with contempt on the querulous PORSON, who once observed, that "it seemed to him very hard, that with all his critical knowledge of Greek, he could not get a hundred pounds." They would have demonstrated to the learned Grecian, that this was just as it ought to be; the same occurrence had even happened to HOMER in his own country, where Greek ought to have fetched a higher price than in England; but, that both might have obtained this hundred pounds, had the Grecian bard and the Greek professor been employed at the same stocking-frame together, instead of the "Iliad."] There is a more formidable class of men of genius who are heartless to the interests of literature.
Like CORNELIUS AGRIPPA, who wrote on "the vanity of the arts and sciences," many of these are only tracing in the arts which they have abandoned their own inconstant tempers, their feeble tastes, and their disordered judgments.
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