Infant Prodiges
(By
“THE GADFLY.”)
Christmas is the one great season of the year that is given over to making children especially happy, and it would be safe to say that there is not one parent who has not made some effort, in anticipation of the coming festival to provide at least one gift that will bring a happy light into the eyes of the little ones. The shouts of delight as the Christmas stocking is emptied, and each new treasure brought to light, the pattering of hurrying little feet as the new toy, ball, or doll is taken, to, be admired by “Daddie” or " Mum, is, to the parent, as heart-warming an experience as any throughout the year. There is nothing so touches Jhe depths of parental affection as the sight of their children, joyously happy. MISERABLE MITES. But the purpose of this article is not to recall or recount the happy, carefree, joyous antics of delighted children. Its object, is to deal with that most pathetic of all human beings, the child prodigy. It was Robert Blatchford, the noted editor of the London Clarion, who once remarked he felt constrained to weep when he saw or was told of the astounding performances of any child prodigy, for he could not remain unmindful of the many happy things and the cheering experiences, which were the birthright of a child, of which they had been robbed. If there are any of our readers holding the same opinion, and likely to be so moved, it would be as well for them to refrain from reading further, for,, if Blatchford be right, there is enough, and more to make them weep. STUDYING GREEK AT THREE. In 1809, a little tot of a boy, just over three years of age, may have been seen toddling with his father in the streets of London. Those who may have passed the couple would have noticed that the child was in earnest conversation with the parent, and they may have put the two down as foreigners, for the child was certainly not speaking English. Had the passerby himself received a classical education in his youth he would have been astounded, for this little fellow, not yet four years old, was conversing fluently in Greek! He was John Stuart Mill, and ho would be undergoing his daily tuition at the hands of his father. Speaking Greek at three years! Nor was that all, for he was already a great reader, and had studied many historical works. Bv the age of . seven he had digested Plato in the original, while two years earlier he had had a lengthy discourse with Lady Spencer on the comparative merits of Marlborough and Wellington as generals. HISTORICAL AUTHOR AT SIX A History of Rome, which critics described as "an extraordinary production” was written when -Mills was six and a half, and at eight he was teaching Latin to a smaller pupil, and expounding Caeser’s Commentaries and the works of Corncli" , s T enos. In the same year, just to fill in spare time he mastered geometry and algebra, and six months later took up conic sections and spherics. He toyed with Newton’s mathematics, performing all the problems without the book and most o. them without any help from it. When he was eight, he had read Thucydides, Anacreon, Sophocles, EUripedes, Demosthenes, Aritophanes and Cicero, while at nine ’'ears he had - .mastered the Odyssey, Thoecritus, Pindar, Aeschines, and Livy. The next year, he passed on to the more difficult classical authors, universal history and English literature, including Shakes peare, Dryden, and Scott, and as a side line studied chemistry, and nhvsics. •In his eleventh year, Mill composed a scholarly history of Roman government • based on original sources, and in it he discussed abstruse points of interna tional law, vindicating the agrariar legislation and the principles of the Roman democratic party. He > alse began a continuation of the Iliad, o: which he completed one book. Mill’s tutor was his father, who wa;
so bent on giving him the most liberal education that, in case such would interfere with his studies, denied him any boy , friends, and forbade the indulgence in any holidays whatever. Just think of that! A boy of twelve, who had never had a toy, never played a game, and never had a friend! READ BEFORE HE COULD SPEAK. Here-is surely a case which -would have made Blatchford weep. A baby of twelve months which could point out all the capital letters in the alphabet,
and at eighteen months recognised the small ones too, and which at a little over two years was reading a book called “Cobwebs to Catch Flies.” At three years this child could sign its name. He was Francis Galton, who in later life became one of the most eminent of nineteenth century British scientists. ’ ' . At four years of age he wrote to his sister, who had been his tutor since his birth, the following letter:— “My Dear Adele: I am four years, old and can read any English book. I can say all the Latin substantives and active verbs besides 52 lines of Latin poetry, I can cast up any sum in addition and can multiply by 2,3, 4,5, 6,. 7 8,9, 10, 11. I can also say the pence table. I read French a little, and I know the clock.” Wishing to be most exact, and fearing that he may have over-stated his ability in so far as his mastery of the multiplication tables were concerned, he later eliminated the 9 and 11 from the foregoing list. By the time he was six, Galton was thoroughly familiar with the Iliad and the Odyssey. At that age he was reading the works of the English poets, including Shakespeare, for pleasure, and so remarkable was his memory that after reading a page twice over he could recite it by heart. LEARNED GREEK AT FATHER’S KNEE. Jeremy Bentham, who in later life became a great English jurist and philosopher, learned Greek while sitting on his father’s knee, and wrote Greek and Latin when only four years of age. He knew his letters before ■ he could talk, and it is told of him that when he was only three, he found his parents conversation so boring one day while he was out walking with them, that he ran home, and when they returned they found him absorbed in Rapin’s History of England. He had undertaken a study of Voltaire at five years of age and at six his passion for reading was so intense that his parents found it almost impossible to meet his demand for books. He passed the university examinations at ten, and was, at that age corresponding with equal facility in Latin and Greek as he was in English. He entered Oxford when twelve, and devoted himself to the study of higher mathematics without a tutor. “LISPED IN NUMBERS’’ From his very infancy , Alexander Pope was considered a prodigy, and he, himself said that “he lisped in numbers, -for the number came.” He began writing poetry at an earlier age than he could remember, and at twelve had written a play. It was in that year that he wrote his famous "Ode to Solitude,” which begins “Happy the man, whose wish and care, a few paternal acres bound.”, I . 1 ■- PRODUCED PLAYS WHEN ONLY SIX. / Goethe’s greatness is universal, and , he, too was an infant prodigy, for at ; four and a-half years of age he had I written plays, besides reading Gott- -• fried’s Universal History and Heid- ; dogger’s Acerra Philolagica. Even at that tender age, he was ini tensely interested in religion, and had , discarded orthodoxy, and had founded • a faith of his own, performing rites - which he considered necessary to the i direct approach of God. 3 He had written much poetry when he ) I was eight, and was familiar with the f older German poets of the eighteenth century, as well as the classical Latin s and Italian poets, while he had also
(studied works on Roman antiquities and jurisprudence, books of travel, historical and philosophical treatises, and miscellaneous encyclopedias. Before he was nine, he was composing verses in German, Greek and Latin. He learned French from hearing’ a French commandant talking, while he was a guest at his father’s house. Thomas Babbington Macauley was another of the amazing children of his time. Even at the age of two he was questioning his mother regarding the doctrine of eternal punishment, while at three he had become an omniverous reader, and it is said that he could repeat the exact working of anything he read. At four, he paid a visit to Oxford, and made a mental catalogue of the books there which he never forgot. That he was unduly precocious was emphasised, when replying to the anxious inquiry of a servant who had spilled some hot coffee over his little legs, he said: “Thank you, madam, the agony is abated.” At six he had composed a poem in six cantos, and at seven he composed an epic called “Olaus, the Great, or The Conquest of Mona,” in imitation of Virgil. Throughout his childhood he despised toys, eschewed games and preferred sedate walks for exercise. An exposition of Christian theology stood to his credit before he was eight, and with this he stated that he hoped
to convert the Hindus to Christianity. Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow was commemorated by him by a "Pindaric Ode” when he was no more than twelve, but at that age he was a "veteran author” for at six he had written a compendium of,. Universal History. GAVE A PUBLIC CONCERT AT SEVEN. Beethoven, the musical genius, gave a public concert when he was a little under seven, for he was quite accomplished at that age, having practised on the piano and violin from his earliest years. ’ • At ten he went on tour to Holland where he played to packed houses. It was at that age that he composed his first original work, this being a funeral cantata in honour of the British ambassador who had just died. A two-part fugue in D for the organ, a rondo in C for the piano, a song and three sonatas for the piano were composed by him when he was twelve. He was a marvel at sight reading and could play the most difficult scores without hesitation.
MINUET IN HALF AN HOUR. To learn completely a minuet in half an hour could well be considered a feat for a mature man, and well worth boasting about, but Mozart did so when he was an infant of but four years. At five he had several compositions to his name, and was so fastidious, and critical of his audience, that he refused to play for any but connoisseurs. Before he was six he had three orignnal works to his credit. These were: 1. A minuet and trio for clavier (Op. 1). 2. A minuet (Op. 2). 3. An allegro (Op. 3). Other infant prodigies were Voltaire, who disputed learnedly with his tutors at three, Samuel Taylor Coleridge who made a study of the Bible when he was three, and Thomas Chatterton, but in tire latter case, there is some conflict of evidence, his sister declaring that he was dull, ‘' not knowing his letters at four years of age.”
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Bibliographic details
Observation Post, Volume 1, Issue 32, 24 December 1942, Page 2
Word Count
1,892Infant Prodiges Observation Post, Volume 1, Issue 32, 24 December 1942, Page 2
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