Complete. From the “Holy State.”
IT is the treasure-house of the mind, wherein the monuments thereof are kept and preserved. Plato makes it the mother of the Muses; Aristotle sets it one degree further, making experience the mother of arts, memory the parent of experience. Philosophers place it in the rear of the head; and it seems the mine of memory lies there, because there naturally men dig for it, scratching it when they are at a loss. This again is twofold: one, the simple retention of things; the other, a regaining them when forgotten.
Brute creatures equal, if not exceed, men in a bare retentive memory. Through how many labyrinths of woods, without other clue of thread than natural instinct, doth the hunted hare return to her muce! How doth the little bee, flying into several meadows and gardens, sipping of many cups, yet never intoxicated, through an ocean (as I may say) of air, steadily steer herself home, without help of card or compass! But these cannot play an aftergame, and recover what they have forgotten, which is done by the meditation of discourse.
Artificial memory is rather a trick than an art, and more for the gain of the teacher than profit of the learners; like the tossing of a pike, which is no part of the postures and motions thereof, and is rather for ostentation than use, to show the strength and nimbleness of the arm, and is often used by wandering soldiers as an introduction to beg. Understand it of the artificial rules which at this day are delivered by memory mountebanks; for, sure, an art thereof may be made (wherein as yet the world is defective), and that no more destructive to natural memory than spectacles are to eyes, which girls in Holland wear from twelve years of age. But till this be found out, let us observe these plain rules:—
First, soundly infix in thy mind what thou desirest to remember. What wonder is it if agitation of business jog that out of thy head which was there rather tacked than fastened? Whereas those notions which get in by violenta possessio will abide there till ejectio firma, sickness, or extreme age dispossesses them. It is best knocking in the nail over-night, and clinching it the next morning.
Overburden not thy memory to make so faithful a servant a slave! Remember Atlas was weary. Have as much reason as a camel, to rise when thou hast thy full load. Memory, like a purse, if it be overfull that it cannot shut, all will drop out of it: take heed of a gluttonous curiosity to feed on many things, lest the greediness of the appetite of thy memory spoil the digestion thereof. Beza’s case was peculiar and memorable; being above fourscore years of age, he perfectly could say by heart any Greek chapter in St. Paul’s Epistles, or anything else which he had learned long before, but forgot whatsoever was newly told him,—his memory, like an inn, retaining old guests, but having no room to entertain new.
Spoil not thy memory with thine own jealousy, nor make it bad by suspecting it. How canst thou find that true which thou wilt not trust? St. Augustine tells of his friend Simplicius, who, being asked, could tell all Virgil’s verses backward and forward, and yet the same party avowed to God that he knew not that he could do it till they did try him. Sure there is concealed strength in men’s memories, which they take no notice of.
Marshal thy notions into a handsome method. One will carry twice more weight trussed and packed up in bundles, than when it lies untoward flapping and hanging about his shoulders. Things orderly fardled up under heads are most portable.
Adventure not all thy learning in one bottom, but divide it betwixt thy memory and thy notebooks. He that with Bias carries all his learning about him in his head will utterly be beggared and bankrupt if a violent disease, a merciless thief, should rob and strip him. I know some have a commonplace against commonplace books, and yet, perchance, will privately make use of what publicly they declaim against. A commonplace book contains many notions in garrison, whence the owner may draw out an army into the field on competent warning.
Moderate diet and good air preserve memory; but what air is best I dare not define, when such great ones differ. Some say a pure and subtle air is best, another commends a thick and foggy air. For the Pisans, sited in the fens and marshes of Arnus, have excellent memories, as if the foggy air were a cap for their heads.
Thankfulness to God for it continues the memory, whereas some proud people have been visited with such oblivion that they have forgotten their own names. Staupitius, tutor to Luther, and a godly man, in a vain ostentation of his memory, repeated Christ’s genealogy (Matt, i.) by heart in his sermon, but being out about the captivity of Babylon, “I see,” saith he, “God resisteth the proud,” and so betook himself to his book.
Abuse not thy memory to be sin’s register, nor make advantage thereof for wickedness. Excellently Augustine,—Quidam vero pessimi memoria sunt mirabili, qui tanto pejores sunt, quanto minus possunt, quæ male cogitant, oblivisci.
