LANGUAGE AND BRAIN DISEASE. 785 



ices of a good teacher is at a great disadvantage ; but he may 

 still, if he has had a fair start, do much toward the cultivation of 

 the auditory and motor memories of the foreign words with their 

 proper associations, and thus greatly improve his ability to read. 

 He should attend carefully to pronunciation, and practice reading 

 aloud. When a new word occurs, the first thing is to get its cor- 

 rect sound, and the next to associate it with some actual experi- 

 ence, if possible ; if not, then with as vivid an idea as can be 

 recalled. The English equivalent must be dropped from con- 

 sciousness as soon as the idea is present, so that the association 

 may be a direct one. It is an advantage to use a dictionary with 

 words and definitions in the same language. Reading on subjects 

 in which one is specially interested is much better than general 

 reading. The memorizing and frequent repetition of interesting- 

 passages will pay abundantly for the time and trouble. 



The great difficulty in working alone is to hear enough of the 

 language to keep the auditory center familiar with its correct 

 sounds. To this end, every opportunity should be taken to con- 

 verse, or to hear a sermon or a play, in the foreign tongue. In 

 many American cities such opportunities are not rare, especially 

 as to German. 



For this purpose the phonograph will no doubt be made of 

 great service. With its aid choice passages in literature or scien- 

 tific exposition, as rendered by a good reader, can be repeatedly 

 heard and pronunciation and accent imitated at the pupil's con- 

 venience. I have no doubt that some process of cheaply multi- 

 plying the phonographic cylinders or ribbons will, before very 

 long, enable us to enjoy whole books in this way, thus saving 

 our weary eyes and economizing the energy of the brain, while 

 giving a greater pleasure. 



I see no reason why Latin and Greek may not be taught to 

 advantage by some such method as the one that has been out- 

 lined. The uncertainty as to what the original sounds were, 

 though embarrassing, is not nearly so great as one would natu- 

 rally suppose. Philological science has reached such perfection 

 that at least a close approximation to the correct sounds could be 

 agreed upon and registered by the phonograph. 



As Hamerton suggests, a phrase-book could doubtless be 

 made for teaching each language by the natural method. A stu- 

 dent once fairly started in this way could not fail to make greater 

 progress in grammatical and philological knowledge, as well as to 

 find the classical authors more interesting. 



In conclusion, it may safely be said that the reader who has 

 given his assent to the deductions here made from the facts of 

 disease will not hesitate to go further and concur in the opin- 

 ion that pedagogy will in the future find a scientific basis in a 



