The next great step in memorizing is to _pick out the essentials of the

subject_, arrange them in order, and dwell upon them intently. Think clearly of

each essential, one after the other. _Thinking_ a thing--not allowing the mind

to wander to non-essentials--is really memorizing.

 

_Association of ideas_ is universally recognized as an essential in memory work;

indeed, whole systems of memory training have been founded on this principle.

 

Many speakers memorize only the outlines of their addresses, filling in the

words at the moment of speaking. Some have found it helpful to remember an

outline by associating the different points with objects in the room. Speaking

on "Peace," you may wish to dwell on the cost the cruelty, and the failure of

war, and so lead to the justice of arbitration. Before going on the platform if

you will associate four divisions of your outline with four objects in the room,

this association may help you to recall them. You may be prone to forget your

third point, but you remember that once when you were speaking the electric

lights failed, so arbitrarily the electric light globe will help you to remember

"failure." Such associations, being unique, tend to stick in the mind. While

recently speaking on the six kinds of imagination the present writer formed them

into an acrostic--_visual_, _auditory_, _motor_, _gustatory_, _olfactory_, and

_tactile_, furnished the nonsense word _vamgot_, but the six points were easily

remembered.

 

In the same way that children are taught to remember the spelling of teasing

words--_separate_ comes from _separ_--and as an automobile driver remembers that