A complete guide to the improvement of the memory or the science of memory simplified : with practical applications to languages, history, geography, music, prose, poetry, shorthand, etc. / by J. H. Bacon.

  • Bacon, J. H.
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A complete guide to the improvement of the memory or the science of memory simplified : with practical applications to languages, history, geography, music, prose, poetry, shorthand, etc. / by J. H. Bacon. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

    15/136 (page 11)
    markable appears its similiarity to other well-known sys- tems. Mr Middleton, in his All about Mnemonics, arrives at a similar conclusion. The New Laws of Memory were designated inclusion, exclusion, and concurrence, but these are only the old laws of Aristotle under new names. The examples given of inclusion — Riches...wealth J oxygen...oxen j come under the law of ^' Similarity; for the first pair of words have a resemblance in meaning, and the second pair a resemblance in sound. Righteous...wicked; hot...coldj old...youngj given as ex- amples of exclusion belong to the law of Contrast, which, in the first edition of this work, was illustrated by— Virtue., vice—light., darkness—old., youiig. So, too, con- currence is but a new term for the old law of Co-exist- ence. Though the Professor repudiates links and associations, he employs, to a wearisome extent, cor- relations—-a distinction without a difference—as may be seen by the following example :—Bee—beeswax— sealing-wax—title-deeds—Attorney. The purpose of these correlations (which most persons would term lijtks or associations) is to connect by intermediate steps the two extremes—Bee—Attorney., which have no natural connection with each other. If the reader will compare this example with the following, given many years before by Dr. Hermann Kothe in his Lehrbuch der Mnemonik, published in 1848,— Wine-cellar—staircase—ladder— Jacob^'' he will be able to form his own opinion as to the value of the claim to the discovery of New Laws of Memory which had never been suspected before. A pupil of the system writes :— This idea, I afterwards found, had been used and recommended by Dr. Pick, and the Rev. J. H. Bacon, (and, he might have added, by Revent- low and Kothe) years ago. It will thus be seen that the classification of the Natural Laws of Memory, made long ages ago, has been substan- tially adopted by later writers; and it is mere presumption on the part of any modern teacher to represent himself as the discoverer of them. These laws are as old as Aristotle, and any claim made novv-a-days to the discovery of any system of Memory must be taken not with a grain, but with a bushel, of salt.—Appleby. In considering the Subject of Memory, and the means 2*