PHILOSOPHY, MENTAL; 
This is particularly the case when, in con- 
sequence of disease, the system is peculiarly 
susceptible of excitement; and sometimes 
when the mind is very much absorbed in 
contemplating its own ideas, so that the im- 
pressions from external objects produce lit- 
tle effect upon it. It is a fertile source 
of those ideas respecting apparitions which 
are so prevalent among persons of physical 
sensibility, without that culture of the intel- 
lect, which would enable them to attend to 
their own thoughts and manner of thinkingi 
Such lively recollections of past impressions 
may, however, be usually distinguished from 
sensations, by allowing the attention to re- 
lax, so that they may cease to be forcibly 
detained as objects of consciousness ; when it 
will, in general, be easily perceived that the 
mind loses sight of them, whereas it can 
lose sight of impressions from external ob- 
jects only by fixing the attention upon ideas, 
or by corporeal motion of some kind or 
other. — These remarks might perhaps, with 
greater propriety, have been made under 
the head of imagination ; because it is sel- 
dom that in such cases the vivid concep- 
tions recur in the exact (or nearly exact) 
order of actual impression, which is the es- 
sential difference between the trains of 
imagination and those of memory: they 
are, however, referable to either class of 
phenomena. 
109. Ideas of recollection differ from 
those of the imagination, principally in the 
readiness and strength of the associations ; 
but partly, and in many cases almost en- 
tirely, by the connection of the former 
with known and allowed facts, by various 
methods of reasoning appropriate to the pe- 
culiar circumstances of the case, and by re- 
collecting that we had before considered 
them as recollections, &c. Great difficulty, 
however, often exists, especially in the 
minds of persons with vigorous conceptions, 
who have not been habitually careful to 
cultivate accuracy of perceptions, and in 
the relation of recollections, to know whe- 
ther the trains of ideas presented by the as- 
sociative power ate to be referred to the 
memory or to the imagination. Such per- 
sons seizing only the outline of a fact or se- 
ries of occurrences, from habitual inatten- 
tion to their sensations, are, from readiness 
of association, able to fill up the transcript, 
so as to make it appear plausible to them- 
selves ; and by once or twice detailing it 
without minute regard to accuracy except 
in those leading features, they give a vigour 
to the ideas and closeness to the association 
VOL. V, 
of them, which leads at last to the full con- 
viction, that the whole is recollected. Cases 
of this sort are very frequent ; and they 
often leave upon the minds of others, the be- 
lief, that sucli persons intentionally depart 
from truth, whereas sometimes the fact is, 
that part of their error arises from a desire 
to give the whole truth when they hare 
only the materials for a portion of it in their 
minds. However the fault is one which 
should be carefidly guarded against ; parti- 
cularly in the early part of life, by making 
young people of lively imaginations habi- 
lually attentive to the minute as well as the 
leading parts of their impressions. — All 
persons are at one time or other at a loss to 
know whether trains of vivid ideds, suc- 
ceeding each other readily and rapidly, are 
ideas of recollection or of imagination, that 
is mere reveries : and the more they agitate 
the matter in their minds, the more does the 
reverie appear like a recollection. Persons 
of irritable nervous systems are more sub- 
ject to such fallacies than others ; and in- 
sane persons often impose upon tliemselves 
in this way, viz. by the vividness of their 
ideas and associations, produced by bodily 
causes. The same things often happens in 
dreams. 
110. The vividness and readiness of re- 
collected trains, is also one grand means of 
ascertaining the dates of facts ; for as this 
diminishes, (other things being equal), in 
proportion to the period which has elapsed 
since the reception of the ideas, and tlie 
formation of the associations, if the vigour 
of these be diminished, we refer them to 
a more remote period in proportion to that 
diminution ; and if by any cause it be kept 
up, the distance of time appears diminished. 
Thus it is, that if any interesting event, the 
death of a friend, for instance, havte been 
often recollected and related, till we come 
to make oral or mental calculations, it ap- 
pears to have happened but yesterday, as we 
term it. However, from this circumstance 
we are often apt to confound events, as 
to the order of time, referring them to 
more recent or remote periods, according 
to the strength and vigour of the ideas and 
associations, or the contrary. In general 
we judge of the period of events by a.sso- 
ciated circumstances, particularly by visible 
permanent memorials. And hence it hap. 
pens that illiterate persons have often great 
difficulty in assigning periods to events 
with any tolerable accuracy. Our readers, 
when they take s\ich things into account, 
and consider how difficult it must in most 
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