Was he smart? No, not exceptionally. Instead, he was a genius.

Was he smart? No, not exceptionally. Instead, he was a genius. His imaginative leaps were instinctive,
unexpected, and at times magical. He was, indeed, an example of what the mathematician Mark Kac called a magician genius, someone whose insights come out of the blue and require intuition more than mere mental processing power. Like a pathfinder, he could absorb information, sniff the winds, and sense what lay ahead.

He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which.

He was very clever, he gave the impression of being tolerant and kind, while actually being very dark, very cunning.

The true Genius is a mind of large general powers, accidentally determined to some particular direction.

A genius is the man who can do the average thing when
everyone else around him is losing his mind.

Genius is talent exercised with courage.

It is difficult to paint the light, the various, the inconstant character of Gallienus, which he displayed without constraint, as soon as he became sole possessor of the empire. In every art that he attempted, his lively genius enabled him to succeed; and as his genius was destitute of judgment, he attempted every art, except the important ones of war and government. He was a master of several curious, but useless sciences, a ready orator, an elegant poet, a skilful gardener, an excellent cook, and most contemptible prince... There were, however, a few short moments in the life of Gallienus, when, exasperated by some recent injury, he suddenly appeared the intrepid soldier and the cruel tyrant; till, satiated with blood, or fatigued by resistance, he insensibly sunk into the natural mildness and indolence of his character.

Knowledge was his forte and omniscience his foible.

Hayek possessed a towering intellect. At the same time, his intelligence was as much brittle as it was powerful.

Genius is the ability to put into effect what is on your mind.

He thought others were small; that was his greatness.

He seemed to feel something like indulgent contempt for the rest of the world. It was all right, I suppose. Nobody had better reason. The man was a genius.

Now, these men weren’t idiots. They were geniuses who paid a high price for their genius because the rest of their thinking was other-world. A genius is someone who travels to truth by an unexpected path. Unfortunately, unexpected paths lead to disaster in everyday life.