And, if this be so, then memory must be very greatly improvable, since no mental power is susceptible of so much improvement as assimilative association.
A good memory, whether natural or acquired, belongs to quick and vivid associability and revivability rather than to mere inherent and perpetual physiological record making.
After a certain number of experiences the child learns the appearance of a square. All his future experiences, however varied, of squares become affiliated upon, or connected with the record of this original square. If each new square had to be separately impressed on the brain as a distinct and independent physiological record, it would take as much time and trouble to learn every new square as it did to learn the first square. But the instant recognition of every square after learning the first one shows that the old brain record is used in the case of each new experience of squares or that the new square is interpreted by the old or original record through the Laws of Association. Again: Taking the prefixes com., de., im., op., re., sup., &c., which are used in thousands of cases, and the suffixes ment, sion, ible, ibility, &c., also used in thousands of words, and using these in connexion with the root word “Press” we have compress, depress, impress, oppress, repress, suppress, and also compressible, depression, re-impress, suppression, impressment, &c.
Must a new physiological record be made for each form of the sixty or more words of which Press constitutes the base, and must a new record be also made for each of the prefixes and suffixes in the thousands of combinations in which they occur? No one believes any such absurdity.
If space permitted it would be easy to offer additional considerations tending to show that after infancy and early youth new acquisitions are mainly made by combinations and recombinations of ideas already possessed, and not by new and independent records physiologically reimpressed on each occasion.
RULES FOR MAKING CORRELATIONS.
1. Never make a correlation except in conformity to In., Ex., and Con. Carelessness here is fatal to success.
2. When the pupil reads a correlation of mine, he should indicate the relations between the words by writing in the figures 1, 2, or 3, and he should pursue the same course with his own correlations.
3. Ofttimes “extremes” are in different planes of thought, so occasionally three intermediates are necessary to cement them; two are often required; but after considerable practice in making correlations one usually suffices.
- What is fatal to success in making correlations?
- What do the figures 1, 2, and 3 indicate in Rule 2?
- How many intermediates should there be?