in the following chapter to follow the lines of inquiry here briefly indicated further into detail, with the endeavour to deduce some practical suggestions. To make the matter as plain as possible, it will be necessary to pass more than once over the same ground; but the reader will forgive the repetition if the object is attained. To discover the secret of a good memory must be worth some trouble and pains.

* On glancing over the succeeding pages at the moment of going to press, I regret to find there is great need for this apology.-J. M. G.

CHAPTER II.

TAKING-IN AND STORING IDEAS.

THE fact that there is a practical difference between knowing a thing and being able to remember it is sure to be brought home to the student in any branch of science, or the man of business, very early in his career. What precisely is the nature of this difference, and how is it to be adjusted? Before we try to find answers to these homely but earnest questions, let us expose and put out of the way a source of misconception which often occasions trouble and disappointment to minds admirably fitted for intellectual work, but inexperienced in the exercise of their powers and faculties.

A man of acute and clear perception, endowed with a quick understanding, will comprehend a subject, take it in with a rapid mental glance, and seem to have made it his own. He "learns easily," but, alas! he forgets with even greater facility. The truth is that he has never learnt in any mnemonic sense. What he has done is to apprehend, and although the brain is undoubtedly

capable of a process analogous to instantaneous photographing, it rarely performs this function at the bidding of the will, unless it has been specially trained to do so; or when it does thus instantly receive an impression, the record is not permanent.

*

The faculty of instantaneous mental photography is more commonly the agent of the subconsciousness than of the supreme Consciousness, and it takes in the impressions we would gladly have effaced, while those it is desired to retain are obliterated almost as soon as they are registered. Apprehension, or the power of taking-in" ideas, is a function of the intellect which may be, and in the case of what are called clever persons often is, developed to a high degree of efficiency without any corresponding exercise of the "storing" or recording faculty.

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Just as a man may work out a problem, or perform an arithmetical calculation with perfect command of the data and processes involved, but in no way burden his mind with the details, or even the results of his work-if these do not personally concern him—so he may concentrate attention and bring his reasoning faculties to bear on a subject of study, mastering its details * See "Habit," in The Secret of a Clear Head.

and obtaining a clear comprehension of the whole, while he is not registering any impression to form the basis of 66 a memory."

It is a notable circumstance that in a large class of minds the faculty of apprehension is developed, as it were, at the cost of that of mental registering or memory, the force of the intellect being expended in understanding, while the storing of impressions is left to chance, which generally means that it is neglected.

It is therefore important to bear in mind that a quick understanding does not either involve or imply an aptitude for study. It is simply an effective power of perception, and is not uncommonly associated with a proneness to forget, which is in truth the effect of an absence or inefficiency of the faculty of mental recording.

The distinctness and almost antagonism of these two functions of the mind, “taking-in” and "storing" or understanding and memory-is curiously apparent in the fact, to which I have previously alluded, that some idiots exhibit extraordinary powers of retention and recollection,. while the most intelligent hearers and readers frequently find to their cost that they are the most forgetful. The intelligent student should not allow any consciousness he may have of posses

a quick understanding to encourage him in the neglect to cultivate his memory, or be misled by a "good memory" to assume that he is endowed with high intellectual capabilities.

It is, undoubtedly, possible that the mind may be duly charged with a record of any subject or information, and, nevertheless, be unable to recall it at will. This circumstance arises from the fact that memory concerns the method of recording rather than the record itself. A piece of knowledge—if I may use the term-is put away safely in the archives of memory, but no care has been taken to mark the place of deposit, or to leave a clue for its recovery when wanted. It may turn up at any moment, but cannot be reproduced by the will, for the simple reason that will has not been concerned in putting it away, or is not orderly in its action and trained for the special task of recollection.

The difference between knowing a thing and being able to remember it, is the difference between having property and knowing where to find it. The way to adjust this difference is to make the act of storing impressions a function as well as the processes of receiving and shaping them.

This is what some persons try to do by a recourse to what are known as "technical me