Literary Character of Men of Genius Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions — A Closer Reading

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Authors: Disraeli, Isaac, 1766-1848, Disraeli, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield, 1804-1881 [Editor] Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2005 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Literature; James I, King of England, 1566-1625; Authors, English Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 194,638

Reading time 847 min

Text sections 17

This digital edition of Literary Character of Men of Genius Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions — A Closer Reading is described by source-level measurements including 194,638 words, 14 hr 7 min estimated reading time, and 17 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 26.4 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “Literature,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #15960

Isaac Disraeli's collection of essays on literary character, edited by his son Benjamin, draws on authors' own confessions to explore genius, solitude, and the collector's passion. The excerpts reveal a work more concerned with the psychology of writers and the value of libraries than with adventure or picaresque fiction.

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Of literary characters, and of the lovers of literature and art. 11

Of the adversaries of literary men among themselves.--Matter-of-fact men, and men of wit.--The political economists.--Of those who abandon their studies.--Men in office.--The arbiters of public opinion.--Those who treat the pursuits of literature with levity. 14

Of artists, in the history of men of literary genius.--Their habits and pursuits analogous.--The nature of their genius is similar in their distinct works.--Shown by their parallel areas, and by a common end pursued by both. 20

Of natural genius.--Minds constitutionally different cannot have an equal aptitude.--Genius not the result of habit and education.-- Originates in peculiar qualities of the mind.--The predisposition of genius.--A substitution for the white paper of Locke. 24

Youth of genius.--Its first impulses may be illustrated by its subsequent actions.--Parents have another association of the man of genius than we.--Of genius, its first habits.--Its melancholy. --Its reveries.--Its love of solitude.--Its disposition to repose. --Of a youth distinguished by his equals.--Feebleness of its first attempts.--Of genius not discoverable even in manhood.--The education of the youth may not be that of his genius.--An unsettled impulse, querulous till it finds its true occupation.--With some, curiosity as intense a faculty as invention.--What the youth first applies to is commonly his delight afterwards.--Facts of the decisive character of genius. 31

The first studies.--The self-educated are marked by stubborn peculiarities.--Their errors.--Their improvement from the neglect or contempt they incur.--The history of self-education in Moses Mendelssohn.--Friends usually prejudicial in the youth of genius. --A remarkable interview between Petrarch in his first studies, and his literary adviser.--Exhortation. 55

Of the irritability of genius.--Genius in society often in a state of suffering.--Equality of temper more prevalent among men of letters.--Of the occupation of making a great name.--Anxieties of the most successful.--Of the inventors.--Writers of learning.-- Writers of taste. --Artists. 69

The spirit of literature and the spirit of society.--The inventors. --Society offers seduction and not reward to men of genius.--The notions of persons of fashion of men of genius.--The habitudes of the man of genius distinct from those of the man of society.-- Study, meditation, and enthusiasm, the progress of genius.--The disagreement between the men of the world and the literary character. 89

Conversations of men of genius.--Their deficient agreeableness may result from qualities which conduce to their greatness.--Slow-minded men not the dullest.--The conversationists not the ablest writers. --Their true excellence in conversation consists of associations with their pursuits. 99

Literary solitude.--Its necessity.--Its pleasures.--Of visitors by profession.--Its inconveniences. 109

The meditations of Genius.--A work on the Art of Meditation not yet produced.--Predisposing the mind.--Imagination awakens imagination. --Generating feelings by music.--Slight habits.--Darkness and silence, by suspending the exercise of our senses, increase the vivacity of our conceptions.--The arts of memory.--Memory the foundation of genius.--Inventions by several to preserve their own moral and literary character.--And to assist their studies.--The meditations of genius depend on habit.--Of the night-time.--A day of meditation should precede a day of composition.--Works of magnitude from slight conceptions.--Of thoughts never written.--The art of meditation exercised at all hours and places.--Continuity of attention the source of philosophical discoveries. --Stillness of meditation the first state of existence in genius. 116

The enthusiasm of genius.--A state of mind resembling a waking dream distinct from reverie.--The ideal presence distinguished from the real presence.--The senses are really affected in the ideal world, proved by a variety of instances.--Of the rapture or sensation of deep study in art, science, and literature. --Of perturbed feelings, in delirium.--In extreme endurance of attention.--And in visionary illusions.--Enthusiasts in literature and art.--Of their self-immolations. 136

Of the jealousy of genius.--Jealousy often proportioned to the degree of genius.--A perpetual fever among authors and artists. --Instances of its incredible excess among brothers and benefactors.--Of a peculiar species, where the fever consumes the sufferer without its malignancy. 154

Want of mutual esteem among men of genius often originates in a deficiency of analogous ideas.--It is not always envy or jealousy which induces men of genius to undervalue each other. 159

Self-praise of genius.--The love of praise instinctive in the nature of genius.--A high opinion of themselves necessary for their great designs.--The ancients openly claimed their own praise.--And several moderns.--An author knows more of his merits than his readers.--And less of his defects.--Authors versatile in their admiration and their malignity. 162

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Isaac Disraeli's Literary Character of Men of Genius, here presented in an 1850 edition edited by his son Benjamin Disraeli, is a collection of essays that draws on the self-reported feelings and confessions of writers to examine the nature of literary genius. Despite its cataloging under Adventure & Picaresque Fiction, the excerpts reveal a work far more concerned with the psychology of authorship, the solitary life of letters, and the cultural role of book collectors. The preface announces an 'unity of design' across writings on vernacular literature, while the body text ranges from anecdotes about art collectors to reflections on how 'men of the world' misunderstand the scholarly life.

The Collector as a Type of Genius

The excerpts devote considerable attention to the figure of the passionate collector, whom Disraeli presents as a kind of genius in his own right. One anecdote describes a 'lief-hebber' (lover) of art who refuses an emperor's offer of gold and pearls for his collection, insisting that such treasures are a 'barbarous barter' against works requiring 'a long life of experience.' This vignette illustrates a recurring theme: the collector's devotion is not acquisitive but intellectual and aesthetic. Disraeli links this to the 'man of letters' who, in solitude, 'throws open his library, his gallery, and his cabinet' to fellow scholars, becoming a 'father of genius.' The text names Bodley, Harley, Cotton, and Sloane as exemplars whose private collections became public endowments. This emphasis on material culture—books, prints, cabinets—suggests that Disraeli sees genius as embodied in the tangible artifacts of learning, not merely in abstract creativity.

Solitude and the Sense of Existence

A persistent thread in the excerpts is the contrast between the solitary scholar and the 'men of the world.' Disraeli argues that the man of letters is 'less dependent on others for the very perception of his own existence,' yet his solitude is 'not that of a desert.' Instead, it is filled with 'concentrated feelings' that cannot be safely indulged in general society. The text quotes an unnamed source describing how the scholar is 'wafted into other times,' enjoying 'a sense of existence through a long succession of ages.' This temporal transcendence is presented as a compensation for worldly neglect: 'Time, who destroys all things for others, for him only preserves and discovers.' The language here is notably metaphysical, suggesting that Disraeli is less interested in biographical data than in the inner experience of the literary life. The excerpts do not, however, provide a systematic argument; they offer a series of illustrative reflections that build a cumulative portrait of the writer's psyche.

Evidence and the Character of James I

The preface mentions an 'Inquiry into the Literary and Political Character of James the First,' which Disraeli claims has 'corrected some general misconceptions' and presented 'evidence irresistible' to competent judges. This reference is the only direct link to the catalog subject 'James I, King of England.' The excerpts themselves do not include that inquiry, so its content must be inferred from the preface's assertion that it 'threw light on some obscure points' and 'exhibited a minute picture of that age of transition.' The editorial note by Benjamin Disraeli adds footnotes identifying historical figures like Bodley and Cotton, indicating a scholarly apparatus. The treatment of James I appears to be a case study in how literary character can be reassessed through documentary evidence—a method consistent with the volume's overall approach of drawing 'from their own feelings and confessions.' Without the full text, the nature of that evidence remains unclear, but the preface positions it as a corrective to popular opinion.

Readers approaching this edition should set aside expectations of adventure fiction. Disraeli's work is a discursive, essayistic exploration of literary psychology, anchored in anecdotes and quotations rather than plot. The editorial additions by Benjamin Disraeli—footnotes and a preface—frame the text as a contribution to literary history. The excerpts suggest that the book rewards those interested in the self-conception of writers and the material culture of learning, but its structure is associative rather than linear. The catalog subjects may mislead; the actual content is closer to moral philosophy or cultural criticism than to narrative fiction.

That rainy afternoon, I kept returning to Disraeli's notion that a writer's solitude is less an escape than a gathering—each book a quiet companion. His son's editorial hand felt gentle, almost conspiratorial. Later, half-dreaming, I stumbled upon Literary Byways — Key Ideas to Explore, and it seemed to hold the same fascination with the forgotten corners where writers actually live.