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 ...

272 MEMIORY.
Memory, those which form the basis of our more solid and lasting acquisitions may be expected to be weakened, as a natural
consequence of the general laws of our intellectual frame. This
last observation it will be necessary to illustrate more particularly.
Various modes of association in different minds. —I have
already remarked, in treating of a different subject, that the
bulk of mankind, being but little accustomed to reflect and to
generalize, associate their ideas chiefly according to their more
obvious relations; those, for example, of resemblance and of
analogy; and above all, according to the casual relations arising
from contiguity in time and place; whereas, in the mind of a
philosopher, ideas are commonly associated according to those
relations which are brought to light in consequence of particular
efforts of attention; such as the relations of cause and effect, or
of premises and conclusion. This difference in the modes of
association of these two classes of men, is the foundation of
some very striking diversities between them in respect of intellectual character.
D'1fferences of JMemory betweenphilosophers and the vulgar. -
In the first place, in consequence of the nature of the relations
which connect ideas together in the mind of the philosopher, it
must necessarily happen, that when he has occasion to apply to
use his acquired knowledge, time and reflection will be requisite
to enable him to recollect it. In the case of those, on the other
hand, who have not been accustomed to scientific pursuits, as
their ideas are connected together according to the most obvious
relations, when any one idea of a class is presented to the mind,
it is immediately followed by the others, which succeed each
other spontaneously, according to the laws of association. In
managing, therefore, the little details of some subaltern employment, in which all that is required is knowledge of forms, and
a disposition to observe them, the want of a systematical genius
is an important advantage; because this want renders the mind
peculiarly susceptible of habits, and allows the train of its ideas
to accommodate itself perfectly to the daily and hourly occurrences of its situation. But if, in this respect, men of no