most general, and most easily proved mark of a genius. If a common theory, especially popular with the philosophers of the coffee-house, be true, that productive men (because they are always covering new ground) have no memory, it is often because they are productive only from being on new ground.
The great extent and acuteness of the memory of men of genius, which I propose to lay down dogmatically as a necessary inference from my theory, without attempting to prove it further, is not incompatible with their rapid loss of the facts impressed on them in school, the tables of Greek verbs, and so forth. Their memory is of what they have experienced, not of what they have learned. Of all that was acquired for examination purposes only so much will be retained as was in harmony with the natural talent of the pupil. Thus a house-painter may have a better memory for colours than a great philosopher; the most narrow philologist may remember Greek aorists that he has learned by heart better than his teacher, who may none the less be a great poet. The uselessness of the experimental school of psychology (notwithstanding their marvellous arsenal of instruments of experimental precision) is shown by their expectation of getting results as to memory from tests with letters, unconnected words, long rows of figures. These experiments have so little bearing on the true memory of man, on the memory by which he recalls the experiences of his life, that one wonders if such psychologists have realised that such a thing as the mind exists. The customary experiments place the most different subjects under the same conditions, pay no attention to the individuality of these subjects, and treat them merely as good or bad registering apparatus. There is a parable in the fact that the two German words "bemerken" (take notice of) and "merken" (remember) come from the same root. Only what is harmonious with some inborn quality will be retained. When a man remembers a thing, it is because he was capable of taking some interest in the thing; when he forgets, it is because he was uninterested. The religious
