Genius all over the world stands hand in hand, and one shock of recognition runs the whole circle round.

Melville imagines “genius” as a transnational fraternity: exceptional minds, though separated by geography, language, and era, recognize one another through a sudden, almost electrical sympathy. The “hand in hand” image suggests solidarity rather than rivalry, while the “shock of recognition” implies that true originality is legible to those capable of it—an instant mutual comprehension that bypasses ordinary social boundaries. The line also reflects a Romantic-era faith in the universality of artistic and intellectual insight, proposing that great work participates in a shared human circuit. In a broader Melvillean key, it hints at the loneliness of genius among the many, relieved only by rare moments of kinship with its equals.