(1) Like marble to receive and like marble to retain.
(2) Like wax to receive and like wax to retain.
(3) Like marble to receive and like wax to retain.
(4) Like wax to receive and like marble to retain.
The first type gives us those who memorize slowly and with much heroic effort,
but who keep well what they have committed. The second type represents the
ones who learn in a flash, who can cram up a lesson in a few minutes, but who
forget as easily and as quickly as they learn. The third type characterizes the
unfortunates who must labor hard and long for what they memorize, only to see
it quickly slipping from their grasp. The fourth type is a rare boon to its
possessor, enabling him easily to stock his memory with valuable material,
which is readily available to him upon demand.
The particular type of brain we possess is given us through heredity, and we can
do little or nothing to change the type. Whatever our type of brain, however, we
can do much to improve our memory by obeying the laws upon which all good
memory depends.
2. THE FOUR FACTORS INVOLVED IN MEMORY
Nothing is more obvious than that memory cannot return to us what has never
been given into its keeping, what has not been retained, or what for any reason
cannot be recalled. Further, if the facts given back by memory are not
recognized as belonging to our past, memory would be incomplete. Memory,
therefore, involves the following four factors: (1) registration, (2) retention, (3)
recall, (4) recognition.
Registration.—By registration we mean the learning or committing of the
matter to be remembered. On the brain side this involves producing in the
appropriate neurones the activities which, when repeated again later, cause the
fact to be recalled. It is this process that constitutes what we call "impressing the
facts upon the brain."
Nothing is more fatal to good memory than partial or faulty registration. A thing
but half learned is sure to be forgotten. We often stop in the mastery of a lesson
just short of the full impression needed for permanent retention and sure recall.
We sometimes say to our teachers, "I cannot remember," when, as a matter of
fact, we have never learned the thing we seek to recall.