Dripread - Book

who
can recall, with an itching sense of vivid impression, the 144 lickings
which were said to go with the multiplication table.

In default of a thrashing, however, the student must cultivate as best
he can an intense fixity of perception upon every fact or word or date
that he wishes to make permanently his own. It is easy. It is a matter
of habit. If you will, you can photograph an idea upon your cerebral
gelatine so that neither years nor events will blot it out or overlay
it. You must be clearly and distinctly aware of the thing you are
putting into your mental treasure-house, and drastically certain of the
cord by which you have tied it to some other thing of which you are
sure. Unless it is worth your while to do this, you might as well
abandon any hope of mnemonic improvement, which will not come without
the hardest kind of hard work, although it is work that will grow
constantly easier with practice and reiteration. You need, then:

1. Methodic suggestion.

2. Methodic attention.

3. Methodic reiteration.

And this is all there is to Loisette, and a great deal it is. Two of
them will not do without the third. You do not know how many steps there
are from your hall door to your bedroom, though you have attended to and
often reiterated the journey. But if there are twenty of them, and you
have once bound the word "nice," or "nose," or "news" or "hyenas," to
the fact of the stairway, you can never forget it.

The Professor makes a point, and very wisely, of the importance of
working through some established chain, so that the whole may be carried
away in the mind--not alone for the value of the facts so bound
together, but for the mental discipline so afforded.

Here, then, is the "President Series," which contains the name and date
of inauguration of each President from Washington to Cleveland. The
manner in which it is to be mastered is this: Beginning at the top, try
to find in your mind some connection between each word and the one
following it. See how you can at some future time make one suggest the
next, either by suggestion of sound or sense, or by mental
juxtaposition. When you have found this dwell on it attentively for a
moment or two. Pass it backward and forward before you, and then go on
to the next step.

The chain runs thus, the names of the President being in capitals, the
date words or date phrases being inclosed in parentheses:

President� Chosen for the first word as the one most apt to occur to the
�� mind of anyone wishing to repeat the names of the Presidents.

Dentist�� President and dentist.

Draw�� What does a dentist do?

(To give up)� When something is drawn from one it is given up.
�� This is a date phrase meaning 1789.

WASHINGTON.�� Associate the quality of self-sacrifice with
�� Washington's character.

Morning wash�� Washington and wash.

Dew�� Early wetness and dew.

Flower beds�� Dew and flowers.

(Took a bouquet)� Flowers and bouquet. Date phrase (1797),

Garden�� Bouquet and garden.

Eden�� The first garden.

Adam�� Juxtaposition of thought.

ADAMS�� Suggestion by sound.

Fall�� Juxtaposition of thought.

Failure�� Fall and failure.

(Deficit)�� Upon failure there is usually a deficit
�� Date word (1801).

Debt�� The consequence of a deficit.

Confederate bonds�� Suggestion by meaning.

Jefferson Davis�� Juxtaposition of thought.

JEFFERSON.

Now follow out the rest for yourself, taking about ten at a time, and
binding those you do last to those you have done before, each time,
before attacking the next bunch.

JEFFERSON
Judge Jeffreys
(bloody assize)
bereavement
(too heavy a sob)
parental grief
mad son
MADISON
Maderia
frustrating
first-rate wine
(defeating)
feet
toe the line
row
MONROE
row
boat
steamer
side-splitting
(divert)
annoy
harassing
HARRISON
Old Harry
the tempter
(the fraud)
painted clay
baked clay
tiles
TYLER
Wat Tyler
poll tax
compulsory
(free will)
free offering
burnt offering
poker
POLK
end of dance
termination "ly"
(adverb)
part of speech
part of a man
TAYLOR
measurer
theodoilte
(Theophilus)
fill us
FILLMORE
more fuel
the flame
flambeau
bow
arrow
PIERCE
hurt

The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing / A Manual of Ready Reference