104 ENGLISH MEN OF SCIENCE. [CHAP.
industry. A willing mind and determination to persevere is, in my opinion, the most direct road to success ; we must, however, exercise a sound judgment in the selection of subjects on which to exercise our thoughts."
I do not think it necessary to quote the instances where either parent is also spoken of as being remarkably persevering ; these may be taken for granted. I find that the father is referred to in strong terms eight times, and the mother only twice.
As a set-off to the above, Impulsiveness is not confessed to by a single physicist, chemist, or mechanician. It is equally absent in their parents, with the exception of the mother of one of them. Among the remaining men of science, I only find 5 cases, but these are mostly combined with some tenacity of purpose, and they are all inherited.
PRACTICAL BUSINESS HABITS.
Some prevalence of practical business habits might also have been anticipated, but they prove
