Practical Essays, Alexander Bain [reading e books .txt] 📗

to the general narrative. Even to imbibe the best qualities of the style of Thucydides would not require whole pages to be learnt _verbatim_; a much better way would readily occur to any intelligent man.

In fact, there is no case where it is profitable to load the memory with a whole book, or with large portions of a book. There are many small portions of every leading work that might be committed with advantage. Principal propositions ought to be retained to the letter. Passages, here and there, remarkable for compact force, for argumentative power, or elegant diction, might be read and re-read till they clung to the memory; but this should be the consummation of a thorough and critical estimate of their merits. To commit to memory without thinking of the meaning is a senseless act; and could not be ascribed to Demosthenes. At the stage when the young student is forming a style, he is assisted by laying up _memoriter_ a number of passages of great authors; but it is never necessary to go beyond select paragraphs. Detached sentences are valuable, and strain the memory least. Entire paragraphs have a farther value in impressing good paragraph connection; but, to string a number of paragraphs together, or to learn whole chapters by memory, has nothing to recommend it in the way of mental culture.

There is a memory in _extension_ that holds a long string of words and ideas together. Its value is to get readily at anything occurring in a certain train, as in a given book. It is the memory of easy reference. There is also a memory of _intension_, that takes a strong grasp of brief expressions and thoughts, and brings them out for use, on the slightest relevancy. The two modes interfere with each other's development; we cannot be great in both; while, for original force, the second is worth the most: it extracts and resets gems to tesselate our future structures; it constitutes depth as against fluency.

To commit poetical passages to memory is a valuable contribution to our stock of material for emotional resuscitation in after years. It also aids in adorning our style, even although we may not aspire to compose in poetry. But the burden of holding the connection of a long poem should be eschewed. Children can readily learn a short psalm or hymn, and can retain it in permanence; but to repeat the 119th psalm from the beginning is the mere _tour-de-force_ of a strong natural memory, and a waste of power; just as much as committing an entire book of the Aeneid or of Paradise Lost.

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[MAKING ABSTRACTS.]

3. Making Abstracts.--This is the plan of studying that most advances our intelligent comprehension of any work of difficulty, and also impresses it on the memory in the best form. But there are many ways of doing it; and beginners, from the very fact that they are beginners, are not competent to choose the best. If a book has an obvious and methodical plan in itself, the reader can follow that plan, taking down the leading positions, selecting some of the chief examples or illustrations, giving short headings of chapters and paragraphs, and thus making a synopsis, or full table of contents. All this is useful. The memory is much better impressed through the exertion of picking, choosing, and condensing, than by copying _verbatim_; and the plan or evolution of the whole is more fully comprehended. But, if a work does not easily lend itself to a methodical abstract, the task of the beginner is much harder. To abstract the treatises of Aristotle was fitting employment for Hobbes. The "Wealth of Nations" is not easy to abstract; but, at the present day, it would not be chosen as the Text-book-in-chief for Political Economy: as a third or fourth work to be perused at a reading pace, it would have its proper effect. The best studious exercise upon it would be to mark the agreements and disagreements with the newer authority, the weak and strong points of the exposition, and the perennial force of a certain number of the propositions and examples. Many parts could be skipped entirely as not even repaying historical study. Yet, as the work of a great and original mind, its interest is perennial.

To go back once more to the example of Thucydides. Setting aside, from intrinsic improbability, both the traditions--the copyings, and the committal to memory _verbatim_,--we can easily see what Demosthenes could find in the work, and how he could make the most of it. The narrative or story could be indelibly fixed in his memory by a few perusals, and, if need be, by a full chronology drawn up by his own hand. The speeches could be committed in whole or in part, for their arguments and language; and a minute study could be made of the turns of expression, as they seemed to be either meritorious or defective. The young orator had already studied the more finished styles of Isocrates, Lysias, Isanis, and Plato, and could make comparisons between their forms and the peculiarities of Thucydides, which belonged to an earlier age. This, however, was a discipline altogether apart, and had nothing to do with copying, committing, or abstracting. It involved one exercise more or less allied to the last, namely, _making changes upon an author, according to ones best ideal at the time_: changes, if possible, for the better, but perhaps not; still requiring, however, an effort of mind, and so far favourable to culture.

[VARIOUS MODES OF ABSTRACTING.]

Every one's first attempts at abstracting must be very bad. There is no more opportune occasion for the assistance of a tutor or intelligent monitor, than to revise an abstract. The weaknesses of a beginner are apparent at a glance; even better than by a _viva voce_ interrogation. Useful abstracting comes at a late stage of study, when one or two subjects have been pretty well mastered. It is then that the pupil can best overtake more advanced works on the subjects already commenced, or can enter upon an entirely new department, in the light of previous acquisitions.

Any work that deserves thorough study deserves the labour of making an abstract; without which, indeed, the study is not thorough. It is quite possible to read so as to comprehend the drift of a book, and yet forget it entirely. The point for us to consider is--Are we likely to want any portion of it afterwards? If we can fix upon the parts most likely to be useful, we either copy or abstract these, or preserve a reference so as to turn them up when wanted. In the case of a work, containing a mass of new and valuable materials, such as we wish to incorporate with our intellectual structure, we must act the part of the beginner in a new field, and make an abstract on the most approved plan: that is, by such changes as shall at once preserve the author's ideas, and intersperse them with our own. There is an ideal balance of two opposing tendencies: one to take down the writer too literally, which fails to impress the meaning; the other to accommodate him too much to our own language and thinking, in which case, we shall remember more, but it will be remembering ourselves and not him. He that can hit the just mean between these extremes is the perfect student.

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There are easier modes of abstracting, such as serve many useful purposes, although not sufficient for the mastery of a leading Text-book, or even of a second or third in a new subject. We may pencil on the margin, or underscore, all the leading propositions, and the typical examples. In a well-composed scientific manual, the proceeding is too obvious to be impressive. Very often, however, the main points are not given in the most methodical way, but have to be searched out by carefully scanning each paragraph. This is an exercise that both instructs and impresses us; it is the kind of change that calls our faculties into play, and gives us a better hold of an author, without superseding him.

A Table of Contents carefully examined is favourable to a comprehensive view of the whole; and, this attained, the details are remembered in the best possible way, that is, by taking their place in the scheme. Any other form of recollection is of the desultory kind.

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[LOCKE'S RECOMMENDATIONS.]

4. Let us next glance at Locke's method of reading, which is unique and original, like the man himself. It is given with much iteration in his Conduct of the Understanding, but comes in substance to this:--

We are to fix in the mind the author's ideas, stripped of his words; to distinguish between such ideas as are pertinent to the subject, and such as are not; to keep the precise question steadily before our minds; to appreciate the bearing of the arguments; and, finally, to see what the question bottoms upon, or what are the fundamental verities or assumptions underneath.

All this is very thorough in its way; but, in the first place, it applies chiefly to argumentative works, and, in the second place, it is entirely beyond the powers of ordinary students. Such an examination of an author as Locke contemplates is not seen many times in a generation. His own controversies give but indifferent examples of it; several of Bentham's works and a few of John Mill's polemical articles also give an idea of thorough handling; but it is not so properly a studious effort, as the consummated product of a highly logical discipline, and is within the reach of only a small elect number.

Locke would have been more intelligible, if, instead of telling us to strip an author's meaning of the words, he had impressed strongly the necessity of _defining all leading terms_; and of making sure that each was always used in the same meaning. While, in order to veracious conclusions, it is necessary that every matter of fact should be truly given, it is equally necessary that the language should be free from ambiguity. If an author uses the word "law," at one time as an enactment: by some authority, and at another time, as a sequence in the order of nature, he is sure to land us in fallacy and confusion, as Butler did in explaining the Divine government. The remedy is, not to perform the operation of separating the meaning entirely from the language, but to vary the language, so as to substitute terms that have no ambiguity. "Law" is equivocal; "social enactment," and "order of nature," are both unequivocal; and when one is chosen, and adhered to, the confusion is at an end.

The mere art of study is no preparation for such a task. It demands a very advanced condition of knowledge on the particular subject, as well as a logical habit of mind, however acquired; and to include it in a practical essay on the Conduct of the Understanding is to overstep the limits of the subject.

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