great business of the fenfes being to make us take notice of what hurts or advantages the body, it is wifely ordered by nature (as has been shown) that pain should accompany the reception of feveral ideas, which fupplying the place of confideration and reasoning in children, and acting quicker than confideration in grown men, makes both the old and young avoid painful objects with that hafte which is neceflary for their preservation, and in both fettles in the memory a caution for the future.

4. Ideas fade in the Memory. CONCERNING the feveral degrees of lafting, wherewith ideas are imprinted on the memory, we may obferve, that fome of them have been produced in the undertanding by an object affecting the fenfes once only, and no more than once; others that have more than once offered themselves to the fenfes, have yet been little taken notice of; the mind either heedlefs, as in children, or otherwife employed, as in men, intent only on one thing, not fettling the ftamp deep into itself; and in fome, where they are fet on with care and repeated impreffions, either through the temper of the body, or fome other default, the memory is very weak. In all these cafes, ideas in the mind quickly fade, and often vanish quite out of the understanding, leaving no more footsteps or remaining characters of themfelves than fhadows do flying over fields of corn, and the mind is as void of them as if they never had been there.

§ 5.

THUS many of thofe ideas which were produced in the minds of children in the beginning of their fenfation (fome of which perhaps, as of fome pleasures and pains, were before they were born, and others in their infancy), if in the future courfe of their lives. they are not repeated again, are quite loft, without the leaft glimpse remaining of them. This may be obferved in those who by fome mifchance have loft their fight when they were very young, in whom the ideas of colours having been but flightly taken notice of,

123 and ceafing to be repeated, do quite wear out, so that fome years after there is no more notion nor memory of colours left in their minds than in thofe of people born blind. The memory in fome men, it is true, is very tenacious, even to a miracle; but yet there feems to be a conftant decay of all our ideas, even of those which are struck deepest, and in minds the most retentive; fo that if they be not fometimes renewed by repeated exercise of the fenfes, or reflection on those kinds of objects which at firft occafioned them, the print wears out, and at laft there remains nothing to be feen. Thus the ideas, as well as children of our youth, often die before us; and our minds represent to us thofe tombs to which we are approaching, where, though the brass and marble remain, yet the infcriptions are effaced by time, and the imagery moulders away. The pictures drawn in our minds are laid in fading colours, and, if not fometimes refreshed, vanish and difappear. How much the conftitution of our bodies and the make of our animal fpirits are concerned in this, and whether the temper of the brain make this difference, that in fome it retains the characters drawn on it like marble, in others like freeftone, and in others little better than fand, I fhall not here inquire; though it may seem probable that the conftitution of the body does fometimes influence the memory, fince we oftentimes find a difeafe quite ftrip the mind of all its ideas, and the flames of a fever in a few days calcine all those images to duft and confufion, which feemed to be as lafting as if graved in marble.

6. Conftantly repeated Ideas can scarce be loft. BUT concerning the ideas themfelves, it is eafy to remark, that those that are ofteneft refreshed (amongst which are those that are conveyed into the mind by more ways than one) by a frequent return of the objects or actions that produced them, fix themselves beft in the memory, and remain cleareft and longest there; and therefore thofe which are of the original qualities of bodies, viz. folidity, extenfion, figure, motion, and reft; and thofe that almost conftantly affect

our bodies, as heat and cold; and thefe which are the affections of all kinds of beings, as existence, duration, and number, which almoft every object that affects our fenfes, every thought which employs our minds, bring along with them; thefe, I fay, and the like ideas, are feldom quite loft whilft the mind retains any ideas at

all.

§ 7. In remembering, the Mind is often active. In this fecondary perception, as I may fo call it, or viewing again the ideas that are lodged in the memory, the mind is oftentimes more than barely paffive, the appearances of thofe dormant pictures depending fometimes on the will. The mind very often fets itself on work in fearch of fome hidden idea, and turns as it were the eye of the foul upon it; though fometimes too they ftart up in our minds of their own accord, and offer themselves to the understanding, and very often are roused and tumbled out of their dark cells into open day-light by fome turbulent and tempeftuous paffions, our affections bringing ideas to our memory, which had otherwife lain quiet and unregarded. This farther is to be obferved concerning ideas lodged in the memory, and upon occafion revived by the mind, that they are not only (as the word revive imports) none of them new ones, but also that the mind takes notice of them as of a former impreffion, and renews its acquaintance with them as with ideas it had known before; fo that though ideas formerly imprinted are not all conftantly in view, yet in remembrance they are conftantly known to be fuch as have been formerly imprinted, i. e. in view, and taken notice of before by the understanding.

§8. The Defects in the Memory, Oblivion and Slowness. MEMORY, in an intellectual creature, is neceflary in the next degree to perception. It is of fo great moment, that where it is wanting, all the rest of our faculties are in a great measure ufelefs; and we in our thoughts, reasonings, and knowledge, could not proceed beyond prefent objects, were it not for the allift

ance of our memories, wherein there may be two defects.

Firft, That it lofes the idea quite, and fo far it produces perfect ignorance; for fince we can know nothing farther than we have the idea of it, when that is gone, we are in perfect ignorance.

Secondly, That it moves flowly, and retrieves not the ideas that it has, and are laid up in ftore, quick enough to serve the mind upon occafions. This, if it be to a great degree, is ftupidity; and he who, through this default in his memory, has not the ideas that are really preferved there ready at hand when need and occafion calls for them, were almost as good be without them quite, fince they ferve him to little purpose. The dull man, who lofes the opportunity whilft he is feeking in his mind for thofe ideas that fhould ferve his turn, is not much more happy in his knowledge than one that is perfectly ignorant. It is the bufinefs therefore of the memory to furnish to the mind those dormant ideas which it has prefent occafion for; in the having them ready at hand on all occafions, confifts that which we call invention, fancy, and quickness of

parts.

§ 9.

THESE are defects, we may obferve, in the memory of one man compared with another. There is another defect which we may conceive to be in the memory of man in general, compared with fome fuperior created intellectual beings, which in this faculty may fo far excel man, that they may have conftantly in view the whole scene of all their former actions, wherein no. one of the thoughts they have ever had may flip out of their fight. The omnifcience of God, who knows all things past, prefent, and to come, and to whom the thoughts of mens hearts always lie open, may fatisfy us of the poffibility of this; for who can doubt but God may communicate to thofe glorious fpirits, his immediate attendants, any of his perfections, in what proportion he pleafes, as far as created finite beings can be capable? It is reported of that prodigy of parts,

Monfieur Pascal, that, till the decay of his health had impaired his memory, he forgot nothing of what he had done, read, or thought, in any part of his rational age. This is a privilege fo little known to moft men, that it feems almost incredible to those who, after the ordinary way, measure all others by themselves, but yet, when confidered, may help us to enlarge our thoughts towards greater perfections of it in fuperior ranks of fpirits; for this of Mr. Pascal was ftill with a narrownefs that human minds are confined to here, of having great variety of ideas only by fucceflion, not all at once; whereas the feveral degrees of angels may probably have larger views, and fome of them be endowed with. capacities able to retain together, and conftantly fet before them, as in one picture, all their past knowledge at once. This, we may conceive, would be no smalladvantage to the knowledge of a thinking man, if all his past thoughts and reasonings could be always prefent to him; and therefore we may fuppofe it one of those ways wherein the knowledge of feparate fpirits. may exceedingly furpafs ours.

10. Brutes have Memory. THIS faculty of laying up and retaining the ideas that are brought into the mind, feveral other animals seem to have to a great degree as well as man. For to pass by other inftances, birds learning of tunes, and the endeavours one may obferve in them to hit the notes right, put it past doubt with me that they have perception, and retain ideas in their memories, and use them for patterns; for it seems to me impoffible that they fhould endeavour to conform their voices to notes (as it.is plain they do) of which they had no ideas. For though I fhould grant found may mechanically caufe a certain motion of the animal fpirits in the brains of those birds whilft the tune is actually playing, and that motion may be continued on to the mufcles of the wings, and fo the bird mechanically be driven away by certain noises, because this may tend to the bird's prefervation, yet that can never be supposed a reason why it fhould caufe mechanically, either whilft the tune was playing,.