THE OLD AND THE NEW PHRENOLOGY. 



739 



Plato carries out the same figure to explain different degrees 

 of memory. When the wax is deep, abundant, smooth, and of the 

 right quality, the impressions are lasting. Such minds learn 

 easily, retain easily, and are not liable to confusion. But, on the 

 other hand, when the wax is very soft, one learns easily but for- 

 gets as easily ; if the wax is hard, one learns with difficulty, but 

 what is learned is retained.* 



In some way or other, we do not know exactly how, the sensa- 

 tions leave behind them impressions or memory pictures. 



And these separate memory pictures are associated together, 

 as they have all come from the same object ; so that, the associa- 

 tion being once made, any 

 one will bring to mind the 

 others, and hence if you 

 perceive the fragrance you 

 remember the appearance 

 of the flower from which it 

 comes — its color or its feel. 

 This association of separate 

 memory-pictures is secured 

 by means of fine nerve - 

 threads, which pass between 

 the various areas of the 

 brain and join the parts of 

 the mental image with each 

 other. This may be repre- 

 sented in the diagram (Fig. 

 5) by placing a circle for 

 each memory-picture in its 

 appropriate place and join- 

 ing the circles by lines. The 

 circles represent those little 

 round masses of brain sub- FlQ - 5.— diagram to illustrate the concept rose. 



<?+,an<-P Pflllpri tipt-vp rpTk Each memor y if » the relic of a past perception, ac- 



bbdiice odiieu nci ve ceiib, quired tnrough an organ of Bense These memorie8 are 



and the lines the aSSOCia- associated, forming together the concept. 

 ■ • £-1 ... The lines from the rose represent the channels of sen- 



LlOn nerve -UDerS Uniting sation; the lines between the circles the association 



the Cells (Fiff. 6). The dia- tracks - Tbe mouth and hand are the motor organs of 



- ,/* , . n speech and writing. 



gram shows the physical 



basis of the mental image of a rose — what has been called by Ro- 

 manes a " recept," since its elements have been received by the 

 senses.f What is true of the rose is true of every other object 

 which we have ever learned to know, for of every object we have 

 a recept, or a series of mental images in the brain. 



* " Memory Historically Considered," Burnham, " American Journal of Psychology," 

 ii, 41. 



f Romanes, " Mental Evolution in Man," p. 36, D. Appleton & Co., 1889. 



