The Strengths and Weaknesses of Sir Isaac Newton
Newton was a genius, and in many ways, it’s hard to compare yourself to someone who had a mind far above what almost every other person has. Newton, though, recognized his gift and worked hard to use his intelligence to his advantage.
We see many people with great minds or many sportsmen with great talent not making the full use of their potential. Newton made full use of his as he worked from morning to night on his theories. He showed what could be achieved if you set your mind to it.
He used his intelligence to surround himself with people who would support him and defend him whenever he needed to. Newton also went about some of his likes in a way that he would try and crush his rivals, just like a ruthless businessman.
He also showed the values of not giving up. Many of his theories took a great deal of work and patience. You can imagine that there were many times when Newton would have been very frustrated with not being able to complete a theory. Newton never gave up though and persisted until he found his answers.
Regarding his weaknesses, Newton clearly didn’t have any when it came to his application of science as he never let anything get in the way of his work. There are no reports of Newton ever being a happy man though. He was reluctant to have any social engagements and didn’t ever find a woman and didn’t ever come close to having children.
It was clear that Newton would let the tragedy that he suffered in early life and the abandonment that he felt affect him for the rest of his life, although you can hardly blame him. This wasn’t a time when such thought could be discussed, but Newton was undoubtedly a complicated character to deal with.
The vindictive side of his personality was probably his worst trait as he relentlessly went after his rivals until he won. He could be nasty in many ways, but seemingly only cared about his work.
For the world that he left around him though, it didn’t care what type of personality he had, but what he achieved made us change our view of the world.
