But then Mr.
Greenwood appeared to omit from his calculations the circumstance
that Will MAY have been, not merely "a sharp boy" but a boy of great
parts; and not without a love of stories and poetry: a passion
which, in a bookless region, could only be gratified through folk-
song, folk-tale, and such easy Latin as he might take the trouble to
read. If we add to these very unusual but not wholly impossible
tastes and abilities, that Will MAY have been a lad of genius, there
is no more "miracle" in his case than in other supreme examples of
genius. "But genius cannot work miracles, cannot do what is
impossible." Do what is impossible to whom? To the critics, the men
of common sense.
Alas, all this way of talking about "miracles," and "the impossible,"
and "genius" is quite vague and popular. What do we mean by
"genius"? The Latin term originally designates, not a man's everyday
intellect, but a spirit from without which inspires him, like the
"Daemon," or, in Latin, "Genius" of Socrates, or the lutin which rode
the pen of Moliere. "Genius" is claimed for Shakespeare in an
inscription on his Stratford monument, erected at latest some six
years after his death. Following this path of thought we come to
"inspiration": the notion of it, as familiar to Australian savages
as to any modern minds, is that, to the poet, what he produces is
GIVEN by some power greater than himself, by the Boilyas (spirits) or
Pundjel, the Father of all.
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