Elements of the philosophy of the human mind. By Dugald Stewart. Rev. and abridged, with critical and explanatory notes, for the use of colleges and schools. By Francis Bowen ...

MEMIORY. 269
One old man, I have, myself, had the good fortune to know,
who, after a long, an active, and an honorable life, having begun
to feel some of the usual effects of advanced years, has been
able to find resources in his own sagacity, against most of the
inconveniences with which they are commonly attended; and
who, by watching his gradual decline with the cool eye of an
indifferent observer, and employing his ingenuity to retard its
progress, has converted even the infirmities of age into a source
of philosophical amusement.
II. Of tize varieties of ifemnory in different individuals. - It
is generally supposed, that, of all our faculties, Memory is that
which nature has bestowed in the most unequal degrees on different individuals; and it is far from being impossible, that this
opinion may be well founded. If, however, we consider, that
there is scarcely any man who has not Memory sufficient to
learn the use of language, and to learn to recognize, at the first
glance, the appearances of an infinite number of familiar objects;
besides acquiring such an acquaintance with the laws of nature,
and the ordinary course of human affairs, as is necessary for
directing his conduct in life; we shall be satisfied that the original disparities among men, in this respect, are by no means so
immense as they seem to be at first view; and that much is to
be ascribed to different habits of attention, and to a difference
fore represents certain veterans as fit subjects for the Comic Muse, he alludes only to those weak and credulous dotards, whose infirmities of mind
are not so much the natural effects of their years, as the consequence of
suffering their faculties to lie dormant and unexerted in a slothful and
spiritless inactivity." - llelmloth's Translation of Cicero on Old Age.
Among the practices to which Cato had recourse for exercising his
memory, he mentions his observance of the Pythagorean rule, in recalling
every night, all that he had said, or done, or heard the preceding day: —
And, perhaps, few rules could be prescribed of greater efficacy for fixing
in the mind the various ideas which pass under its review, or for giving it
a ready and practical command of them. Indeed, this habit of frequently
reviewing the information we possess, either in our solitary meditations, or
(which is still better) in our conversations with others, is the most effectual
of all the helps to memory that can possibly be suggested. But these
remarks properly belong to another branch of our subject.
a,