CHAPTER V.

THE EDUCATION OF THE MEMORY.

WHAT a fortune would that man make who could sell to people, Memories; this is the universal desideratum. Wherever we go we hear complaints of bad memories, and how is this? and where are we to find a remedy for this? for if the memory does not retain, how vain are all the achievements of the Mind. Memory is the storehouse, and if Time, like a thief, takes out of the storehouse whatever he places there, how useless is the effort to accumulate. With the Ancients, Memory was the mother of the Muses. All the presiding spirits of Science, History, Music, and Poetry, were born of Memory; thus the great framers of the Grecian Mythology indicated their conception of the importance of this faculty of the Mind. But what is Memory? For, perhaps we shall obtain some assistance in giving vitality to it, if we remember the nature of it. Memory, then, it should be remembered, depends upon Attention and Suggestion.

Attention places the jewel in the casket, seizes upon and preserves the thing desirable to be remembered; and Suggestion is the Secret Spring touching the lock and presenting the jewel, when it is needed by the possessor. Dr. Thomas Brown cleared up much of the mystery attaching to the powers of Memory. when he declared that, much of the confusion in which Memory has always been involved, resulted from the usual method of speaking. Each faculty of the mind seems to possess the power of recollection; but then there must be something to recollect. A bad memory means very generally an empty cupboard. It is very frequently the case, that years pass along, and no attempt is made to store the mind; suddenly person bethinks himself, "I have a bad me

the

mory

!" He does not condemn his own carelessness, but throws the blame on Nature.

But learn to prize this Power, this wonderful power, Memory, which teaches us our individuality and Identity; memory, by which we know ourselves the same beings we were twenty years since, although time has changed our body; thus preaching to us the indivisibility of our mind. Memory, so ready when practised in all emergencies; wielding a wand of power in all professions; pouring upon us like a flood the tears of past emotions, or bowing our spirits with the recollection of old joys; Memory, unseen recorder, the traces of whose in

visible ink, when shone upon by the fires of Likeness and Association, come forth to the mental eye vivid and legible, although written a generation ago. The Egyptians had their sarcophagus with its wondrous and secret hieroglyphics; the Mexicans had their knotted cords; and Babylon of old, and China, in all ages, have alike employed letters of strange and mystic significance; but what are these letters compared with that wonderful power within every one of us-that bridge between the present and the past for ever thronged with wierd and beautiful shapes and sounds, and surrounded with the scenery of terror and of beauty.

TENTION.

I. In order to the Education of Memory it is very necessary in the first place to FIX THE AtStudents devote themselves for long years to intellectual habits, and sometimes never do this; unless the Attention is fixed, it will not be engaged; that is not attention which is arrested by every passing object and sound; that is not Attention which skims like a butterfly over a subject, and never penetrates, nor seeks to penetrate beneath the surface. The real evidence of things is frequently never perceived by the person who supposes that he is talking very learnedly and profoundly upon a matter: and the reason is obvious; his attention has never been enlisted: Mental Dissipation is a cause of impoverished memories; a course of study chains the mind and prevents its vagrancy.

There will be a sharpening of all the powers, an absorption of the energies in the pursuit of the one subject which will give system, consistency, and stability to the mental character. In order to this fixing of the attention, too, it may be recommended to learn to love the study in which you have engaged; attempt to realise it in its most friendly aspects, and in its most familiar relations; if it deals in narrative, acquaint yourself with it; if with diagrams, acquaint yourself with them. Sensible images and corporeal things illustrate frequently notions in themselves; very abstract concatenation, too, fixes the attention. Writers who speak in fragments, in suggestions, hints, and intuitions, are not easily remembered. How different in this respect the Esthetics of Schiller and Coleridge; from those, Emerson in the first, we have the long drawn and clearly linked chain; in the other we have a diamond necklace broken into shivers. So also the place has much to do with fixing the attention Fine scenery, or fluctuating life, the busy city, or the bright and shining vestments of Nature, these are unfavourable to the repose of the thought. Be content, too, to be ignorant for a time, until Knowledge shall have ripened and brought forth fruit; be not too hasty to come to a conclusion, and watch the dominion of the senses; be not enslaved by them; passions, and appetite, interfere with the sceptred attention of thought.

These directions are worthy of being remembered, and acted upon; for in order to ensure a good memory, let there be before all things a fixed and steady attention.

We remember most vividly what we have seen; paint your ideas therefore, or at any rate acquire distinct and clear perceptions of them; one great cause of our confused recollection, is our very confused perception. If the eye beholds objects through a mist, how can we be expected to give any clear account of them; on the contrary, objects distinctly beheld are longest retained in the mind, and most vividly recalled; thus also it is with mental perception, and the reflection of the objects upon the understanding.

Thirdly, argument, or method, greatly assists the understanding and the memory. Sir James Mackintosh is said by Mr. Hall to have had so wonderful a memory, that it appeared as if everything in his mind was arranged upon pegs ;-an Historical peg, a Natural History peg, a peg for Natural Philosophy, another for Poetry, another for Theology; and he only had to lift his hand, and take down the illustration he most needed: this seems very convenient, and there must have been in the man capable of this, originally great power of retention; but it resulted also from habitvigorous habit of arrangement. How can there be in that mind selection and compact and various