September 1. 1832.
GREAT MINDS ANDROGYNOUS.—PHILOSOPHER'S ORDINARY LANGUAGE.
In chemistry and nosology, by extending the degree to a certain point, the constituent proportion may be destroyed, and a new kind produced.
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I have known strong minds with imposing, undoubting, Cobbett-like manners, but I have never met a great mind of this sort. And of the former, they are at least as often wrong as right. The truth is, a great mind must be androgynous. Great minds—Swedenborg's for instance—are never wrong but in consequence of being in the right, but imperfectly.
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A philosopher's ordinary language and admissions, in general conversation or writings ad populum, are as his watch compared with his astronomical timepiece. He sets the former by the town-clock, not because he believes it right, but because his neighbours and his cook go by it.
January 2. 1833.
JURIES.—BARRISTERS' AND PHYSICIANS' FEES.—QUACKS.—CAESAREAN OPERATION.— INHERITED DISEASE.
I certainly think that juries would be more conscientious, if they were allowed a larger discretion. But, after all, juries cannot be better than the mass out of which they are taken. And if juries are not honest and single-minded, they are the worst, because the least responsible, instruments of judicial or popular tyranny.