talent does what it can. Toward the end of his days Edward Robert Bulwer, first earl of Lytton (1831–91), grew to regard his life as a failure, despite the many volumes of poetry he wrote and his diplomatic service as viceroy of India. In his “Last Words of a Sensitive Second-Rate Poet” (1868) he gave us the now proverbial: Talk not of genius baffled. Genius is master of man. Genius does what it must, and Talent does what it can. |