THE MENTAL TREASURE VAULT AND ITS LOST COMBINATION
[Sidenote: _What Everyone Thinks_]
Almost everyone seems to think that we retain in the mind _only_ those
things that we can voluntarily recall; that memory, in other words, is
limited to the power of voluntary reproduction.
This is a profound error. It is an inexcusable error. The daily papers
are constantly reporting cases of the lapse and restoration of memory
that contain all the elements of underlying truth on this subject.
[Sidenote: _Causes of Forgetfulness_]
It is plain enough that the memory _seems_ decidedly limited in its
scope. This is because our power of voluntary recall is decidedly
limited.
But it does not follow simply because we are without the power to
deliberately recall certain experiences that all mental trace of those
experiences is lost to us.
_Those experiences that we are unable to recall are those that we
disregarded when they occurred because they possessed no special
interest for us. They are there, but no mental associations or
connections with power to awaken them have arisen in consciousness._
[Sidenote: _Seeing with "Half an Eye"_]
Things are continually happening all around us that we see with but
"half an eye." They are in the "fringe" of consciousness, and we
deliberately ignore them. Many more things come to us in the form of
sense-impressions that clamorously assail our sense-organs, but no
effort of the will is needed to ignore them. We are absolutely
impervious to them and unconscious of them because by the selection of
our life interests we have closed the doors against them.
In either case, whether in the "fringe" of consciousness or entirely
outside of consciousness, these unperceived sensations will be found to
be sensory images that have no connection with the present subject of
thought. They therefore attract, and we spare them, no part of our
attention.
Just as each of our individual sense-organs selects from the multitude
of ether vibrations constantly beating upon the surface of the body only
those waves to the velocity of which it is attuned, so each one of us as
an integral personality selects from the stream of sensory experiences
only those particular objects of attention that are in some way related
to the present or habitual trend of thought.
[Sidenote: _The Man on Broadway_]
Just consider for a moment the countless number and variety of
impressions that assail the eye and ear of the New Yorker who walks down
Broadway in a busy hour of the day. Yet to how few of these does he pay
the slightest attention. He is in the midst of a cataclysm of sound
almost equal to the roar of Niagara and he does not know it.
Observe how many objects are right now in the corner of your mind's eye
as being within the scope of your vision while your entire attention is
apparently absorbed in these lines. You see these other things, and you
can look back and realize that you have seen them, but you were not
aware of them at the time.
Let two individuals of contrary tastes take a day's outing together.
Both may have during the day practically identical sensory images; but
each one will come back with an entirely different tale to tell of the
day's adventures.
[Sidenote: _Waxen Tablets_]
_All sensory impressions, somehow or other, leave their faint impress on
the waxen tablets of the mind. Few are or can be voluntarily recalled._
Just where and how memories are retained is a mystery. There are
theories that represent sensory experiences as actual physiological
"impressions" on the cells of the brain. They are, however, nothing but
theories, and the manner in which the brain, as the organ of the mind,
keeps its record of sensory experiences has never been discovered.
Microscopic anatomy has never reached the point where it could identify
a particular "idea" with any one "cell" or other part of the brain.
[Sidenote: _Not How, but How Much_]
For us, the important question is not _how_, but _how much_; _not the
manner in which, but the extent to which_, sensory impressions are
preserved. Now, all the evidences indicate that _absolutely every
impression received upon the sensorium is indelibly recorded in the
mind's substance_. A few instances will serve to illustrate the
remarkable power of retention of the human mind.
Sir William Hamilton quotes the following from Coleridge's "Literaria
Biographia": "A young woman of four- or five-and-twenty, who could
neither read nor write, was seized with a nervous fever, during which,
according to the asseverations of all the priests and monks of the
neighborhood, she became 'possessed,' and, as it appeared, by a very
learned devil. She continued incessantly talking Latin, Greek and Hebrew
in very pompous tones, and with most distinct enunciation. Sheets full
of her ravings were taken down from her own mouth, and were found to
consist of sentences coherent and intelligible each for itself but with
little or no connection with each other. Of the Hebrew, a small portion
only could be traced to the Bible; the remainder seemed to be in the
Rabbinical dialect."
[Sidenote: _Remembering the Unperceived_]
The case was investigated by a physician, who learned that the girl had
been a waif and had been taken in charge by a Protestant clergyman when
she was nine years old and brought up as his servant. This clergyman had
for years been in the habit of walking up and down a passage of his
house into which the kitchen door opened and at the same time reading to
himself in a loud voice from his favorite book. A considerable number of
these books were still in the possession of his niece, who told the
physician that her uncle had been a very learned man and an accomplished
student of Hebrew. Among the books were found a collection of Rabbinical
writings, together with several of the Greek and Latin fathers; and the
physician succeeded in identifying so many passages in these books with
those taken down at the bed-side of the young woman that there could be
no doubt as to the true origin of her learned ravings.
Now, the striking feature of all this, it will be observed, is the fact
that the subject was an illiterate servant-girl to whom the Greek, Latin
and Hebrew quotations were _utterly unintelligible,_ that _normally she
had no recollection of them, that she had no idea of their meaning_,
and finally that they had been impressed upon her mind _without her
knowledge_ while she was engaged in her duties in her master's kitchen.
Several cases are reported by Dr. Abercrombie, and quoted by Professor
Hyslop, in which mental impressions long since forgotten beyond the
power of voluntary recall have been revived by the shock of accident or
disease. "A man," he says, "mentioned by Mr. Abernethy, had been born in
France, but had spent the greater part of his life in England, and, for
many years, had entirely lost the habit of speaking French. But when
under the care of Mr. Abernethy, on account of the effects of an injury
to the head, he always spoke French."
[Sidenote: _Speaking a Forgotten Tongue_]
"A similar case occurred in St. Thomas Hospital, of a man who was in a
state of stupor in consequence of an injury to the head. On his partial
recovery he spoke a language which nobody in the hospital understood but
which was soon ascertained to be Welsh. It was then discovered that he
had been thirty years absent from Wales, and, before the accident, had
entirely forgotten his native language.
"A lady mentioned by Dr. Pritchard, when in a state of delirium, spoke a
language which nobody about her understood, but which was afterward
discovered to be Welsh. None of her friends could form any conception of
the manner in which she had become acquainted with that language; but,
after much inquiry, it was discovered that in her childhood she had a
nurse, a native of a district on the coast of Brittany, the dialect of
which is closely analogous to Welsh. The lady at that time learned a
good deal of this dialect but had entirely forgotten it for many years
before this attack of fever."
[Sidenote: _Living Past Experiences Over Again_]
Dr. Carpenter relates the following incident in his "Mental Physiology":
"Several years ago, the Rev. S. Mansard, now rector of Bethnal Green,
was doing clerical duty for a time at Hurstmonceaux, in Sussex; and
while there he one day went over with a party of friends to Pevensey
Castle, which he did not remember to have ever previously visited. As he
approached the gateway he became conscious of a very vivid impression
of having seen it before; and he 'seemed to himself to see' not only the
gateway itself, but donkeys beneath the arch and people on top of it.
His conviction that he must have visited the castle on some former
occasion--although he had neither the slightest remembrance of such a
visit nor any knowledge of having ever been in the neighborhood
previously to his residence at Hurstmonceaux--made him inquire from his
mother if she could throw any light on the matter. She at once informed
him that being in that part of the country, when he was but _eighteen
months old_, she had gone over with a large party and had taken him in
the pannier of a donkey; that the elders of the party, having brought
lunch with them, had eaten it on the roof of the gateway, where they
would have been seen from below, whilst he had been left on the ground
with the attendants and donkeys."
"An Italian gentleman," says Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, "who died of
yellow fever in New York, in the beginning of his illness spoke English,
in the middle of it French, but on the day of his death only Italian."
Striking as these instances are, they are not unusual. Everyone on
reflection can supply similar instances. Who among us has not at one
time or another been impressed with a mysterious feeling of having at
some time in the past gone through the identical experience which he is
living now?
[Sidenote: _The "Flash of Inspiration"_]
On such occasions the sense of familiarity is sometimes so persistent as
to fill one with a strange feeling of the supernatural and to incline
our minds to the belief in a reincarnation.
The "flash of inspiration" which, for the lawyer, solves a novel legal
issue arising in the trial of a case, or, for the surgeon, sees him
successfully through the emergencies of a delicate operation, has its
origin in the forgotten learning of past experience and study.
[Sidenote: _The Totality of Retention_]
Succeeding books in this _Course_ will bring to light numerous other
facts less commonly observed, drawn indeed from the study of abnormal
mental states, indicating that we retain a great volume of
sense-impressions of whose very recording we are at the time unaware.
In other words, all the evidences point to the absolute totality of our
retention of all sensory experiences. They indicate that every
sense-impression you ever received, whether you actually perceived and
were conscious of it or not, has been retained and preserved in your
memory, and can be "brought to mind" when you understand the proper
method of calling it into service.
A vast wealth of facts is stored in the treasure vaults of your mind,
but there are certain inner compartments to which you have lost the
combination.
[Sidenote: _Possibilities of Self-Discovery_]
The author of "Thoughts on Business" says: "It is a great day in a man's
life when he truly begins to discover himself. The latent capacities of
every man are greater than he realizes, and he may find them if he
diligently seeks for them. A man may own a tract of land for many years
without knowing its value. He may think of it as merely a pasture. But
one day he discovers evidences of coal and finds a rich vein beneath his
land. While mining and prospecting for coal he discovers deposits of
granite. In boring for water he strikes oil. Later he discovers a vein
of copper ore, and after that silver and gold. These things were there
all the time--even when he thought of his land merely as a pasture. But
they have a value only when they are discovered and utilized."
"Not every pasture contains deposits of silver and gold, neither oil
nor granite, nor even coal. But beneath the surface of every man there
must be, in the nature of things, a latent capacity greater than has yet
been discovered. And one discovery must lead to another until the man
finds the deep wealth of his own possibilities. History is full of the
acts of men who discovered somewhat of their own capacity; but history
has yet to record the man who fully discovered all that he might have
been."
[Sidenote: _"Acres of Diamonds"_]
You who are a bit vain of your visits to other lands, your wide reading,
your experience of men and things; you who secretly lament that so
little of what you have seen and read remains with you, behold, your
"acres of diamonds" are within you, needing but the mystic formula that
shall reveal the treasure!
THE MECHANISM OF RECALL
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