depends. And nothing will contribute more to the recollection of things at any future period, than clear and distinct conceptions of them at the present; that is to say, when they first become objects of our attention; for vaguely formed and indefinite notions will leave no permanent traces on the mind. 2. When we read, therefore, let us labour to understand clearly and precisely our author's meaning; let us compare what goes before with what follows in his work; let us search for the characteristic features of his system, and compare his opinions with those of other authors who have treated of the same subject. By this means not only the faculties of Conception and Attention, but the Reasoning powers, will be usefully exercised; and the best provision will be made for a distinct recollection. 257. It has been much disputed, whether it be an useful exercise to write down those things which we are desirous to remember; but there can be little doubt, that, in some cases, this may be exceedingly proper; in others, not so. Illus. To write a great deal cannot be highly useful to the Memory; for the attention is but too apt to be diverted from the matter itself, to the mere manual operation; but it is surely useful to transcribe certain short passages which we select, on account of the importance or curiosity of the matters they contain, and to which we, by this means, can afterwards conveniently refer. It would likewise, no doubt, be very useful to write a short abridgment and character of any important book we have read; or at least to state the leading tenets of the work, and our opinion of its merits, in a few short paragraphs. We should thus come in time to think for ourselves we should form a sort of register of our studies, to which we might afterwards refer with the greatest advantage--and we would thus improve the faculties of Association and Attention. For without comparing together the different parts of an author's work, so as to form out of it one consistent whole, and comparing it also with the writings of others on the same subject, so as to digest the whole into a system, Association will not be promoted, Attention will not be increased, and all our reading will furnish nothing but a desultory collection of ideas scarcely applicable to any useful purpose. Professor Porson, who could at will recite any passage from the Greek poets, thus speaks: "I never remember any thing but what I transcribe thee times, or read over six times at the least; and if you will do the same you will have as good a memory;" and his memory was most excellent. 258. With respect to the mechanical expedients which have been proposed for aiding the Memory, it does not appear that much real advantage is to be expected from them. The loci of the ancients and the memorial lines of the moderns are the chief, of each of which we shall give a brief illustration. Illus. 1. The intention of the celebrated loci, or Topical Memory, of the ancient rhetoricians, was to facilitate the recollection of the various heads of an oration, by associating them in the mind with the different apartments of a house, or the various houses in a street, the precise succession of which had been previously rendered familiar to the mind. The subordinate parts of the discourse were to be associated with the furniture of the rooms, or the subdivisions of the houses; and thus the whole oration was to be suggested to the Memory with very little effort. The writings of Cicero and Quinctilian contain a full account of this mechanical contrivance, which, without doubt, is founded on nature. But Quinctilian candidly acknowledges that he never received any benefit from this artificial kind of Memory. The case was otherwise with Cicero. It has for ages fallen into disuse; but in allusion to it, the heads of a discourse are still called topics, and we continue to say-in the first place, in the second place, &c. Example. Mr. Stewart gives an instance of Topical Memory. It is this. A young woman, in a very low rank of life, contrived a method of committing to memory the sermons she was accustomed to hear, by fixing her attention during the different heads of the discourse, on different compartments of the roof of a church, in such a manner, as that when she afterwards saw the roof, or recollected the order in which its compartments were disposed, she recollected the method which the preacher had observed in treating his subject. Illus. 2. The memorial lines, or verses, are more useful than the method of loci, since by the substitution of the letters of the alphabet for the numeral characters, we can easily commit to Memory certain dates, measures, computations, and other things. Gray's Memoria Technica, a small volume on this artificial help, contains an ample collection of such memorial verses. There is also a small volume by Mr. Jackson, on "a new and improved system of Mnemonics, or the Art of Memory, applied to Figures, Chronology, Geography, Statistics, History, and Poetry, illustrated with many plates.' This is an ingenious little book, founded on Watts's Improvement of the Mind; and its brevity and perspicuity entitle it to notice in every work on intellectual philosophy. M. Feinagle, too, has published a new Art of Memory, adapted to the meanest capacity, and its application is rather a source of amusement than labour. It possesses all the advantages of the methods which preceded its developement, and, as a whole, is perhaps superior to any book on this art, that has yet appeared. But this important object, it would seem, can be accomplished only by cultivating those exertions of the mind on which the faculty of Memory depends-namely, Attention and the Association of Ideas. CHAPTER IX. OF IMAGINATION. 259. IMAGINATION is the faculty which makes a selection of qualities and circumstances from a variety of different objects, and by combining and disposing these, forms new creations of its own. (See Art. 97. No. IX.) Obs. 1. Thus, Imagination is distinguished from Abstraction, in which we endeavour to generalize. Imagination invests objects with all their qualities, real or fictitious: it exerts itself in matters which we know to be real, as well as in matters which we invent, or believe to be fictitious. (See Chapter VI. on Abstraction, Sections II. and III.) 2. The distinction between Imagination and Conception, was fully drawn in ARTICLE 141. and its Illustration and Note, to which, therefore, to avoid the tediousness of repetition, the reader is referred. I. Analysis of the Operations of Imagination. 260. The operations of the faculty of Imagination are general, extending to the representation of notions or combinations of thought, as well as of sensible impressions originally made on the external organs; and, if we establish this, we shall have proved that the province of Imagination is not barely limited to objects of sight. Illus. 1. Although the greater part of the materials which Ima gination combines, be supplied by the sense of sight, it is nevertheless indisputable, that our other perceptive faculties also contribute their share. How many pleasing images, says Mr. Stewart, have been borrowed from the fragrance of the fields and the melody of the groves; not to mention that sister art, whose magical influence over the human frame, it has been, in all ages the highest boast of poetry to celebrate! In the following passage, even the more gross sensations of taste form the subject of an ideal repast, on which it is impossible not to dwell with some complacency; particularly after the perusal of the preceding lines, in which the poet describes "the wonders of the torrid zone." Bear me, Pomona! to thy citron groves; To where the lemon and the piercing lime, Quick let me strip thee of thy spicy coat, Spread thy ambrosial stores, and feast with Jove. Corol. This quotation shews how inadequate a notion of the province of Imagination, (considered even in its reference to the sensible world,) we must entertain, if we would limit its operations to objects of sight merely. 261. But the sensible world, in its widest range, is not the only field in which Imagination exerts her powers. All the objects of human knowledge supply materials to her forming hand; diversifying infinitely the works she produces, while the mode of her operation remains essentially uniform. Illus. 1. Thus the Imagination becomes a bond of association for those intellectual processes, which are constantly going on in the mind, and acts a principal part in those creations of Fancy, which, derived from an union of Abstraction, Generalization, and Taste, constitutes works of genius in the fine arts. The Imagination does not abstract nor generalize, but it reproduces and supplies materials for these several processes, according to the laws of association, which regulate the procedure of the mind, in its recollections and combinations. 2. As it is the same power of reasoning which enables us to carry on our investigations with respect to individual objects, and with respect to classes and genera; so it was by the same processes of analysis and combination, that the genius of Milton produced the Garden of Eden, (Illus. 2. Art. 264.) that of Harrington, the Commonwealth of Oceana, (Art. 187. Illus. 1.) and that of Shakespeare, the characters of Hamlet and Sir John Falstaff. Corol. The difference between these several efforts of invention, consists only in the manner in which the original materials were acquired; as far as the power of Imagination is concerned, the processes appear, to my mind, to be perfectly analogous. 262. The mind, however, has a greater facility, and, of consequence, a greater delight in recalling the perceptions of the sense of sight, than those of any of the other senses, while, at the same time, the variety of the qualities perceived by it is incomparably greater. Illus. It is this sense, accordingly, which supplies the painter and the statuary with all the subjects on which their genius is exercised. It is this sense, too, which furnishes to the descriptive poet, the largest and the most valuable portion of the materials which he combines. It is observed by Mr. Stewart, that in that absurd species of prose composition also, which borders upon poetry, nothing is more remarkable than the predominance of phrases that recal to the memory, glaring colours, and those splendid appearances of nature, which make a strong impression on the eye. Thus, in the oriental style, the greater part of the metaphors are taken from the celestial luminaries; and the works of the Persians, as is observed The by Voltaire, are like the titles of their kings, in which we are per. petually dazzled with the sun, and the moon, and the stars. juvenile productions of every author, possessed of a warm Imagination, partake of this characteristic; and the compositions of every people, among whom a cultivated and philosophical taste has not established a sufficiently marked distinction between the appropriate styles of poetry and prose, partake sufficiently of the infantine reveries of poetic genius, to show why the word Imagination, in its most ordinary acceptation, should be applied to cases where our conceptions are derived from the sense of sight; although the province of this power be, in fact, as unlimited as the sphere of human enjoyment and of human thought. But in these illustrations we may clearly trace the origin of the word Imagination: the etymology of which implies manifestly a reference to visible objects. 263. The mind forms combinations out of the materials supplied by the power of Conception; and these combinations recommend themselves strongly to our constitution, both by their simplicity, and by the interesting nature of the discussions to which they lead. Obs. The arts of poetry and painting furnish the most pleasing and instructive illustrations of the operations and intellectual processes of Imagination. In those analogous exemplifications of this faculty, which fall under the observation of the moralist, the mind deviates from the models presented to it by experience, and forms to itself new and untried objects of pursuit. And how little soever such processes may be attended to, they are habitually passing in the thoughts of all men; and it is in consequence of these processes that human affairs exhibit so busy and so various a scene; tending in one case to improvement, and, in another, to decline; according as our notions of excellence and happiness are just or erroneous. 264. But besides Conception, or simple Apprehension, which enables us to form a notion of those former objects of perception or of knowledge, out of which we are to make a selection; Imagination includes Abstraction, which separates the selected materials from the qualities and circumstances which are connected with them in nature; and Judgment, or Taste, too, which selects the materials and directs their combination. Nor does this complex power include only those powers we have just enumerated, and to which, under Conception and Abstraction, we have shewn their alliance; but that particular habit of association also, to which we gave the name of Fancy, when illustrating the pleasing effect of simile, poetical allusion, and allegory. (See Article 208.) Illus. 1. FANCY collects materials for the Imagination, (Corol. 2. Art. 208.) and though her principal stores are commonly suppo |