INTRODUCTION.
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deplorably deficient in this faculty; or, as Mr. Locke has beautifully expressed the same idea, "in some persons, the mind retains the characters drawn on it like marble, in others like freestone, and in others, little better than sand."[1] Themistocles, the Athenian, indeed, is said[2] to have been oppressed by the strength and tenacity of his memory, and to have wished for the possession of the faculty of oblivion, rather than an increase of the powers of remembrance; but it is
- ↑ Mr. Locke, speaking of the continual decay of our ideas, says, "The ideas, as well as children, of our youth, often die before us: and our minds represent those tombs, to which we are approaching; where though the brass and marble remain, yet the inscriptions are effaced by time, and the imagery moulders away. The pictures drawn in our minds are laid in fading colours, and if not sometimes refreshed, vanish and disappear. How much the constitution of our bodies, and the make of our animal spirits are concerned in this, and whether the temper of the brain makes this difference, that in some it retains the characters drawn on it like marble, in others like freestone, and in others, little better than sand; I shall not here inquire: though it may seem probable, that the constitution of the body does sometimes influence the memory; since we oftentimes find a disease quite strip the mind of all its ideas, and the flames of a fever in a few days calcine all those images to dust and confusion, which seemed to be as lasting as if graved in marble." Works, vol. i. p. 76. ed. 4to. 1777.
- ↑ Plutarch Apophth.
