Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1889-01-09
TRAINING THE MEMORY.
THE FACULTY FOR PRESERVING
DATES, NAMES AND EVENTS.

Useful Practice for Whist Players-Con-
slant Peru sai of q Slowly Enlarged List
of Dates-Neak Points Should be Trained
Separately
In order to attain the highest form of
memory it is necessary to cultivate the
faculty of in agination, or the power of hold
ing up TO the mind past sensations or i'm
rressons as t they were again actually pres
ent. We retain the impression of an
OBJECT in the mind for some time after the
object itself has passed away, by allowing
the mind to dwell upon it, and we can after
wards readily recall it. Lay an object, say
your watch, on the table, and look at it in
tently for few seconds; you will fiud on
shutting yoIr eyes that you still retain a
more or less distinct image of it. Even after
ii considerable time You may recall the imag
OF the watch and the exact spot where it
lay So if in place of one object, two or
three arc placed on the table, after conteu
plating them short while their images may
be reproduced in the brain and afterwards
recalled with great distinctness
no REMEMBER CARDS.
In this We V one may soon learn to re,nem-
game of Whist, which mere playing for life
time may fail to teach him. Let him begin
by throwing down four cards, one by one,
upon the taole, observing each by itself and
the order in which 1t is laid down, as well as
the whole together, till he feels that he has
learned them. Let him then take them up
and after time replace them as they were
before from memory, and this till he feels
that he has thoroughly mastered them. For
| a second lesson let him take four cards and
treat them N this way, and then other four
| and let him proceed in this way, always in
| creasing the number till he can take in the
| whole pack, and tell of each card when and
where 1t WAS thrown down. That mere play
| ing may nev YER teach a man this is owing tc
| the attention being taken up with the play
and not sufficiently directed to this operation
| Attention is the remedy for weak mem
| ory and the tonic for ono that requires i'm
| provement First impressions made upon
the mind must be strong and complete to bt
| lasting. The usual image carried to tht
mind must be as complete almost as the orig
| inal objecl itself, and to obtain a perfect
| image und yided attention must be given tt
| the subject. One thing at time, and thai
| thing hoToughly. William T. Harris in
| dorses this precept and he adds persona
| reminiscence to illustrate his point that the
| true method of cultivating and siren ngthenins
a defective memory is to practice it ON the
kind Of items it easily forgets.
The writer, when in his 18th year, was EN-
barrassed by the feebleneSs OF his memory
for dates. He commenced learning a list o.
| the dates of accession of English kings
| William the Conqueror in 1866, William
Rufus in 1857, etc.-three or four dates the
first day; two new ones added the second
day; one rev one added the third day; there
| after less often Constant review by and BY
made the entire list familiar 1t had to b.
| learned anew year after, and once agair
| after some years of neglect. But the memory
| for dates grew steadily, and, without con
scious effort, dates and numbers soon CAM
to be seized with a firmer grasp than before
| This kind of memory still increases with th'
| writer from year to year, and, although it i
! not by am means a phenomenal memory, i
| Is very seIviceable. A similar cultivation O
the specia. memory for proper names twhicl
| in the wr tiers case had become very veal
and threa tened to so altogetherl has proved
| servceabe.