William Atkinson - The Essential Works of William Walker Atkinson - 50+ Books in One Edition

If you have not the time to devote to the full carrying out of this system, as herein laid down, you may vary it by learning short poems by this method, and after thoroughly mastering one, so that it may easily be reviewed at any time, pass on to another, devoting all your time and attention to the new one when learned. But when the second one is learned, go back to the first one and review it. Continue reviewing the ones you have learned, at odd times, or occasionally, and devote your daily review work to the one on hand until it too is thoroughly learned. Exercise the faculty of recollection by frequently recalling things which you have learned in the past, as each time you give yourself this exercise you strengthen the faculty.

If you lose interest in the particular thing you are memorizing, lay it aside for a while, and take something of a different character by way of a change, not forgetting to occasionally review the one laid aside.

You will probably find that some verses of a poem are more easily remembered than others. But do not slight the difficult ones, in fact you should bestow upon them more time and attention than upon the favorite ones. There is some reason for the trouble with the difficult verses, and by keeping at the work until you conquer, you will be strengthening some weak spot in the faculty of memorizing or recollection, and will be gaining additional will­power besides.

After you have been practicing this system for a number of months, you will find that you will be able to retain any particular thing in your memory with less frequent reviews, and you may vary your plan to accommodate yourself to your increased powers, and review well learned subjects only once in a while. But it is well to review a little of something every day in order to give the faculty something upon which to work.

You will also come to a point, sometime, where you will realize that you have reached your limit in the matter of the number of lines or verses to be memorized at any one time. You cannot go on forever increasing your limit at the rate of one additional daily verse each month. When this time is reached, stop the monthly increase, and rest on your oars so far as the increase of the daily work is concerned. Keep on with the work of memorizing and reviewing, but limit your lines or verses to the highest easily memorized number. Remember that the main purpose of the exercises is not to see how much you can do, but simply to give you training and development. After stopping for a time, without any attempt to increase, you may find, all of a sudden, that you are able to master a much heavier daily memory task. But whether you do or do not, matters little. And in any event you will find that your power of recollecting steadily increases, apparently having no limit.

Learn a thing thoroughly before going to the next. It is better to know one thing thoroughly, than ten things partially. Do not pass on to another verse until you have mastered the one upon which you have been working.

Do not attempt to “rush” matters. Take your time. And do not attempt too much at first. The average student is too eager. He starts off with a rush, and is apt to tire before he has gone very far. Better hold yourself in a little, and develop naturally as does the plant which grows from seed to shoot; from shoot to stalk; from stalk to leaves; from leaves to flower.

Do not attempt to do this work when you are tired or worn out. In such condition you will fail to receive clear impressions or to recall clearly and distinctly. Many find the morning the best time in which to practice.

Table of Content

Treating of a novel and rational method of bringing forth from the subconscious store­house the miscellaneous assortment of information, which every person has stored away regarding various subjects, but which knowledge is unavailable and unused because of the lack of system in the storing away, and the absence of knowledge of a method whereby this scattered knowledge may be brought together—This system, if mastered and practiced, will immensely increase the available information at the disposal of one, and will render one “well informed” upon subjects of which he apparently knows but little—It is an eye opener, and will produce remarkable results—This chapter also contains an explanation of “Analytical Memorizing.”

EVERY MAN has in his subconscious storehouse a vast assortment of general information or knowledge. He knows something about every object or subject which has ever attracted his attention or interest in the faintest degree. The character and amount of such knowledge of course depends largely upon the degree of attention he has bestowed upon it, and upon the opportunities for observation he may have had in the past. But even the man of the most limited opportunities and the most careless observation has stored away much valuable material of whose existence he is almost unaware. The information has been stored away mechanically, and no attempt to resurrect it has been made, as no demand for the stored away knowledge has been apparent in the man’s every day life.

If we would by intelligent practice occasionally bring forth to the light of day the stored away knowledge we would give our minds beneficial practice; increase our powers of recollection, broaden our field of available knowledge; develop our powers of reasoning, comparison, etc., and make ourselves “better informed” regarding a variety of subjects. The bringing forth of these stored­up memories will compel us to classify them, arrange them in their proper order, make comparisons, note associations, draw conclusions, and make use of a variety of our mental faculties, which will result in mental development and culture. Many of us are like misers who have hoarded away precious metal, which we never again see or make use of.

The writer has heard of prisoners, and men compelled to live away from congenial companions, compelled to look to themselves for company, who turned their vision inward and evolved from their inner consciousness the knowledge which had been stored there, and directed their mental processes to the same, with the result that when they emerged from their seclusion they had attained a degree of mental development far in advance of that possessed by them when they entered it. There are cases of record where political prisoners have written the most interesting books during their confinement, without having a single reference book, their information being drawn from that great storehouse, the subconscious mentality. Men sometimes live in a community taking casual notes regarding the people and things around them, with no special object in view. Years afterward, these men find themselves writers, and draw upon their old, almost forgotten, impressions of the past, and putting them on paper give to the world a vivid picture of the life of the town or city of their former abode. Dumas has given us an example of this subsequent use of stored­up knowledge in his well known novel “The Count of Monte Cristo.” He shows us the old political prisoner, the Abbe Faria, who has been shut out from the sight of men for years, resurrecting his old fund of information for the benefit and instruction of his fellow prisoner, Edmond Dantes, and exciting the interest and concentrated attention of the latter he develops him from a bright but uneducated fisherman­sailor into a well­informed and educated man of the world. The old Abbe has stored away in his mind the learning of a lifetime, and draws from it for the benefit of Dantes. The story is, of course, pure fiction, but given the circumstances and the men, there is no reason why the result could not be obtained.

This resurrecting of stored­away impressions has another good result. It awakens in one an interest in the subject or object under consideration, and the mind thereafter will be awake to impressions concerning the object or subject, and one’s fund of information regarding that particular thing, and things associated with it, will be greatly augmented. The mere directing of the attention upon the subject or object, after placing oneself where he will not be distracted by outside impressions, or after shutting out impressions if he has the power, will bring into the field of consciousness many interesting impressions and important information. But if one pursues a systematic plan for bringing out the impressions, his power of recollection will be greatly increased, and at the same time his mind will be developed along the lines of systematic thinking, classification, analysis, etc.