Memory, p.21
Memory, page 21
XXV: But whereabouts in my memory is thy residence, O Lord? Whereabouts there abidest thou? What kind of lodging hast thou there framed for thyself? What manner of shrine hast thou builded for thyself? Thou hast afforded this honour unto my memory, as to reside in it; but in what quarter of it, that am I now considering upon. For I have already passed beyond such parts of it as are common to me with the beasts, whilst I called thee to mind (for as much as I found not thee there amongst the images of corporeal things) and I proceeded to these parts of it, whither I had committed the affections of my mind: nor could I find thee there. Yea, I passed further into it, even to the very seat of my mind itself (which is there in my memory, as appears by the mind’s remembering of itself), neither wert thou there: for that as thou art not either any corporeal image, no more art thou any affection of a living man; like as when we rejoice, condole, desire, fear, remember, forget, or whatsoever else we do of the like kind; no, not yet art thou the mind itself, because thou art the Lord God of the mind; and all these are changed, whereas thou remainest unchangeable over all, who yet vouchsafest to dwell in my memory, ever since that first time that I learnt to know thee. But why seek I now in what particular place of my memory thou dwellest, as if there were any places at all in it? Sure I am, that in it thou dwellest: even for this reason, that I have preserved the memory of thee since the time that I first learnt thee, and for that I find thee in it, whensoever I call thee to remembrance.
From MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE, Essays (1580), translated by John Florio (1603)
Of Lyers
There is no man living, whom it may lesse beseeme to speake of memorie, than my selfe, for to say truth, I have none at all: and am fully perswaded that no mans can be so weake and forgetfull as mine. All other parts are in me common and vile, but touching memorie, I think to carrie the prise from all other, that have it weakest, nay and to gaine the reputation of it, besides the naturall want I endure (for truely considering the necessities of it, Plato hath reason to name it A great and mighty Goddesse). In my countrie, if a man will imply that one hath no sense, he will say, such a one hath no memorie: and when I complaine of mine, they reprove me, and will not beleeve me, as if I accused my selfe to be mad and senselesse. They make no difference betweene memorie and wit; which is an empairing of my market: But they doe me wrong, for contrariwise it is commonly seene by experience, that excellent memories do rather accompany weake judgements … For the Magazin of Memorie is peradventure more stored with matter, than is the store-house of Invention. Had it held out with me, I had ere this wearied all my friends with pratling: the subjects rouzing the meane facultie I have to manage and imploy them, strengthning and wresting my discourses. It is pitie; I have assayed by the trial of some of my private friends: according as their memory hath ministred them a whole and perfect matter, who recoile their narration so farre-backe, and stuff it with so many vaine circumstances, that if the story bee good, they smoother the goodness of it; if bad, you must needs either curse the good fortune of their memorie, or blame the misfortune of their judgement. And it is no easie matter, being in the midst of the cariere of a discourse, to stop cunningly, to make a sudden period, and to cut it off. And there is nothing whereby the cleane strength of a horse is more knowne, than to make a readie and cleane stop. Among the skilfull I see some, that strive, but cannot stay their race. Whilest they labour to finde the point to stop their course, they stagger and falter, as men that faint through weaknesse. Above all, old men are dangerous, who have onely the memorie of things past left them, and have lost the remembrance of their repetitions.
From ROBERT BURTON, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621)
Memory lays up all the species which the senses have brought in, and records them as a good register, that they may be forth-coming when they are called for by phantasy and reason.
From THOMAS HOBBES, Leviathan, I, ii (1651)
From whence it followeth, that the longer the time is, after the sight, or Sense of any object, the weaker is the Imagination. For the continuall change of mans body, destroyes in time the parts which in sense were moved: So that distance of time, and of place, hath one and the same effect in us. For as at a great distance of place, that which wee look at, appears dimme, and without distinction of the smaller parts; and as Voyces grow weak, and inarticulate: so also after great distance of time, our imagination of the Past is weak; and wee lose (for example) many particular Circumstances. This decaying sense, when wee would express the thing it self, (I mean fancy it selfe,) wee call Imagination, as I said before: But when we would express the decay, and signifie that the Sense is fading, old, and past, it is called Memory. So that Imagination and Memory, are but one thing, which for divers considerations hath divers names.
From SIR THOMAS BROWNE, Hydrotaphia (1658)
Darknesse and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares with memory, a great part even of our living beings; we slightly remember our felicities, and the smartest stroaks of affliction leave but short smart upon us … To be ignorant of evils to come, and forgetful of evils past, is merciful provision in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few and evil dayes, and, our delivered senses not relapsing into cutting remembrances, our sorrows are not kept raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part of Antiquity contented their hopes of subsistency with a transmigration of their souls: a good way to continue their memories …
From JOHN LOCKE, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690)
Suppose I wholly lose the memory of some parts of my life, beyond a possibility of retrieving them, so that perhaps I shall never be conscious of them again; yet am I not the same person that did those actions, had those thoughts that I once was conscious of, though I have now forgot them? To which I answer, that we must here take notice what the word I is applied to; which, in this case, is the man only. And the same man being presumed to be the same person, I is easily here supposed to stand also for the same person. But if it be possible for the same man to have distinct incommunicable consciousness at different times, it is past doubt the same man would at different times make different persons; which, we see, is the sense of mankind in the solemnest declaration of their opinions, human laws not punishing the mad man for the sober man’s actions, nor the sober man for what the mad man did, – thereby making them two persons: which is somewhat explained by our way of speaking in English when we say such an one is ‘not himself,’ or is ‘beside himself’; in which phrases it is insinuated, as if those who now, or at least first used them, thought that self was changed; the self-same person was no longer in that man.
From BARUCH SPINOZA, Ethics (1677)
Memory … is nothing else than a certain concatenation of ideas, involving the nature of things which are outside the human body, a concatenation which corresponds in the mind to the order and concatenations of the affections of the human body. I say, firstly, that it is a concatenation of those ideas only which involve the nature of things which are outside the human body, and not of those ideas which explain the nature of those things, for there are in truth ideas of the affections of the human body, which involve its nature as well as the nature of external bodies. I say, in the second place, that this concatenation takes place according to the order and concatenation of the affections of the human body, that I may distinguish it from the concatenation of ideas which takes place according to the order of the intellect, and enables the mind to perceive things through their first causes, and is the same in all men. Hence we can clearly understand how it is that the mind from the thought of one thing at once turns to the thought of another thing which is not in any way like the first … In this manner each person will turn from one thought to another according to the manner in which the habit of each has arranged the images of things in the body. The soldier, for instance, if he sees the footsteps of a horse in the sand, will immediately turn from the thought of a horse to the thought of a horseman, and so to the thought of war. The countryman, on the other hand, from the thought of a horse will turn to the thought of his plough, his field, etc.; and thus each person will turn from one thought to this or that thought, according to the manner in which he has been accustomed to connect and bind together the images of things in his mind.
From DAVID HUME, A Treatise on Human Nature (1739)
A painter, who intended to represent a passion or emotion of any kind, wou’d endeavour to get a sight of a person actuated by a like emotion, in order to enliven his ideas, and give them a force and vivacity superior to what is found in those, which are mere fictions of the imagination. The more recent this memory is, the clearer the idea; and when after a long interval he would return to the contemplation of his object, he always finds its idea to be much decay’d, if not wholly obliterated. We are frequently in doubt concerning the ideas of the memory, as they become very weak and feeble; and are at a loss to determine whether any image proceeds from the fancy or the memory, when it is not drawn in such lively colours as distinguish that latter faculty. I think, I remember such an event, says one; but am not sure. A long tract of time has almost worn it out of my memory, and leaves me uncertain whether or not it be the pure offspring of my fancy.
And as an idea of the memory, by losing its force and vivacity, may degenerate to such a degree, as to be taken for an idea of the imagination; so on the other hand an idea of the imagination may acquire such a force and vivacity as to pass for an idea of the memory, and counterfeit its effects on the belief and judgment. This is noted in the case of liars; who by the frequent repetition of their lies, come at last to believe and remember them, as realities; custom and habit having in this case, as in many others, the same influence on the mind as nature, and infixing the idea with equal force and vigour.
Thus it appears, that the belief or assent, which always attends the memory and senses, is nothing but the vivacity of those perceptions they present; and that this alone distinguishes them from the imagination. To believe is in this case to feel an immediate impression of the senses, or a repetition of that impression in the memory. ’Tis merely the force and liveliness of the perception, which constitutes the first act of the judgment, and lays the foundation of that reasoning, which we build upon it, when we trace the relation of cause and effect.
From SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, Biographia Literaria (1817)
The IMAGINATION then, I consider either as primary, or secondary. The primary IMAGINATION I hold to be the living Power and prime Agent of all human Perception, and as a repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I AM. The secondary Imagination I consider as an echo of the former, co-existing with the conscious will, yet still as identical with the primary in the kind of its agency, and differing only in degree, and in the mode of operation. It dissolves, diffuses, dissipates, in order to recreate; or where this process is rendered impossible, yet still at all events it struggles to idealise and unify. It is essentially vital, even as all objects (as objects) are essentially fixed and dead.
FANCY, on the contrary, has no other counters to play with, but fixities and definites. The Fancy is indeed no other than a mode of Memory emancipated from the order of time and space; while it is blended with, and modified by that empirical phenomenon of the will, which we express by the word CHOICE. But equally with the ordinary memory the Fancy must receive all its materials ready made from the law of association.
From JAMES MILL, Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind (1829)
There is a state of mind familiar to all men, in which we are said to remember. In this state it is certain we have not in the mind the idea which we are trying to have in it. How is it, then, that we proceed in the course of our endeavour, to procure its introduction into the mind? If we have not the idea itself, we have certain ideas connected with it. We run over those ideas, one after another, in hopes that some one of them will suggest the idea we are in quest of; and if any one of them does, it is always one so connected with it as to call it up in the way of association. I meet an old acquaintance, whose name I do not remember, and wish to recollect. I run over a number of names, in hopes that some of them may be associated with the idea of the individual. I think of all the circumstances in which I have seen him engaged; the time when I knew him, the persons along with whom I knew him, the things he did, or the things he suffered; and if I chance upon any idea with which the name is associated, then immediately I have the recollection; if not, my pursuit of it is vain. There is another set of cases, very familiar, but affording very important evidence on the subject. It frequently happens that there are matters which we desire not to forget. What is the contrivance to which we have recourse for preserving the memory – that is, for making sure that it will be called into existence, when it is our wish that it should? All men invariably employ the same expedient. They endeavour to form an association between the idea of the thing to be remembered, and some sensation, or some idea, which they know beforehand will occur at or near the time when they wish the remembrance to be in their minds. If this association is formed, and the association or idea with which it has been formed occurs, the sensation, or idea, calls up the remembrance; and the object of him who formed the association is attained. To use a vulgar instance: a man receives a commission from his friend, and, that he may not forget it, ties a knot in his handkerchief. How is this fact to be explained? First of all, the idea of the commission is associated with the making of the knot. Next, the handkerchief is a thing which it is known beforehand will be frequently seen, and of course at no great distance of time from the occasion on which the memory is desired. The handkerchief being seen, the knot is seen, and this sensation recalls the idea of the commission, between which and itself the association had been purposely formed.
From JOHN STUART MILL, Letter to Dr W.G. Ward (28 November 1859)
[Remembering, trusting to memory, and judging that memory is to be trusted] seem to me to be all three the same act, just as when I press my hand against an object – feeling resistance, trusting the feeling, & judging that it is to be trusted are all one.fn1 We cannot remember what which did not happen; no more can we see or feel what does not happen. When I feel so & so, I cannot doubt that I do feel so & so, & when I remember to have felt so & so I cannot doubt that I did feel so & so. Memory I take to be the present consciousness of a past sensation. It is strange that such consciousness can exist, but the facts denoted by was, is and is to come, are perhaps the most mysterious part of our mysterious existence, as is strikingly expressed in the well-known saying of St Augustine.fn2
From RALPH WALDO EMERSON, Natural History of the Intellect and Other Papers (Written 1857, published 1894)
Memory is a primary and fundamental faculty, without which none other can work; the cement, the bitumen, the matrix in which the other faculties are imbedded; or it is the thread on which the beads of man are strung, making the personal identity which is necessary to moral action. Without it all life and thought were an unrelated succession. As gravity holds matter from flying off into space, so memory gives stability to knowledge; it is the cohesion which keeps things from falling into a lump, or flowing in waves.
We like longevity, we like signs of riches and extent of nature in an individual. And most of all we like a great memory. The lowest life remembers. The sparrow, the ant, the worm, have the same memory as we. If you bar their path, or offer them somewhat disagreeable to their senses, they make one or two trials, and then once for all avoid it.
Every machine must be perfect of its sort. It is essential to a locomotive that it can reverse its movement, and run backward and forward with equal celerity. The builder of the mind found it not less needful that it should have retroaction, and command its past act and deed. Perception, though it were immense and could pierce through the universe, was not sufficient …
The Past has a new value every moment to the active mind, through the incessant purification and better method of its memory. Once it joined its facts by color and form and sensuous relations. Some fact that had a childish significance to your childhood and was a type in the nursery, when riper intelligence recalls it means more and serves you better as an illustration; and perhaps in your age has new meaning. What was an isolated, unrelated belief or conjecture, our later experience instructs us how to place in just connection with other views which confirm and expand it. The old whim or perception was an augury of a broader insight, at which we arrive later with securer conviction. This is the companion, this the tutor, the poet, the library, with which you travel …
As every creature is furnished with teeth to seize and eat, and with stomach to digest its food, so the memory is furnished with a perfect apparatus. There is no book like the memory, none with such a good index, and that of every kind, alphabetic, systematic, arranged by names of persons, by colors, tastes, smells, shapes, likeness, unlikeness, by all sorts of mysterious hooks and eyes to catch and hold, and contrivances for giving a hint.
The memory collects and re-collects. We figure it as if the mind were a kind of looking-glass, which being carried through the street of time receives on its clear plate every image that passes; only with this difference that our plate is iodized so that every image sinks into it, and is held there. But in addition to this property it has one more, this, namely, that of all the million images that are imprinted, the very one we want reappears in the centre of the plate in the moment when we want it.
