196

CHRONOLOGICAL MNEMONICS.

I KNOW not whether you are a friend to technical systems of facilitating the remembrance of points in chronology. The use of them has been much combated: but since they have received the sanction of some men of talent and knowledge, it would be unwise to condemn them altogether. Dr. Grey's system seems the most prevalent: and yet the grating sound of his chronological verses cannot but be thought detrimental to its success. I beg leave to offer to your readers a system, which, though much indebted to Dr. Grey's, is, I presume, free from some of its defects.

1

Let the following vowels represent the numbers:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

The numerical representation by consonants will not be quite so easily remembered, but will cause little trouble.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

b c d f g 1 m 11 p t

The above consonants proceed in alphabetical order: except that h, j, q, are omitted for the sake of euphony: k and s are omitted, that they may produce no confusion with c; and ris omitted, as the roughest letter.

By way of experiment, suppose the dates of the following events, which occurred in close conjunction, be required: The death of Philip the destruction of Thebes by Alexander-the battles of Granicus, Issus, and Arbela. We may form the following spondaic :

Philip slain-Thebes-del, Gran-def, Iss-ded, Arbel-deb.

The similarity of the pronunciation in these fictitious syllables has a peculiar tendency to facilitate the memorial process. And if the chronological order be accurately preserved, as in the line. before us, the facility is greatly increased, in consequence of the alphabetical arrangement: 1, f, d, b. However, it is admitted that this similarity cannot occur in dates of events very far distant in time.

The fictitious terminations should occupy the whole of the last syllable, and that syllable only.

In recommending, however, this system, I cannot but express my concern that so much time is spent on the date of minute events at our Universities. Surely the division of History into certain grand epochs, well established in the memory, and the

reference of dates of a less important nature to those epochs,: without the exact knowledge of their particular year, must answer every purpose of polite education-and must manifestly coincide with the necessity which that education imposes on us to attend not merely to the histories of Greece and Rome-and those unfortunately are too generally supposed to end with the death of Alexander and of the Cæsars-but to the extensive range of the whole of ancient and modern history.

Technical memory is of considerable utility in other respects. There are many circumstances, which, offering in their nature no spontaneous assistance to the memory, leave a very slight impression, and are lost immediately.

I read that Apollonius Tyaneus lived in the reign of Domitiau. A few weeks may erase this fact from my mind, if I suffer it to be presented to it without some artificial assistance. If, however, I bear in mind the similarity of sound in Tyaneus and Domitian, how difficult is it to forget the fact?-Again: the TETαAouds among the Syracusians was inflicted for the space of five years. How easy is the association between the Teraλioμòs and TéνTE. If the Romans pollicem presserunt, the gladiator's life was spared; if they pollicem verterunt, it was destroyed. The pressure then of the hand preserved the life. I will admit that, if any passage, especially from poetry, can be obtained, which mentions the fact, this is a better method: and, if we cannot obtain a verse made ready at our hands, it will be useful to turn versifiers on the occasion. Even parts of verses are efficacious: and those measures should be adopted, which are most easy of impressing themselves on the mind. For this reason the hexameters and the pentameters will be usefully employed. Our blank verse is not at all fitted for this purpose: we must employ rhyme, if we use our common metres. In cases which admit of it, derivation should always be called to our aid. Attention to the nature of things will often facilitate our memorial operations. It is better to tell a boy that a spondee by its very name leads to a knowledge of it, than to tell him it is composed of two long syllables. The same thing may be said of an iamb. and of an anapest. And how much easier would boys find it to remember the quantity of a tribrach, if they would have sense enough to attend to its derivation! Instead of this they simply read that a tribrach is composed of three short syllables and in a little while they are quite at a loss to remember whether the syllables are two, three, or four. I have already spoken of committing verses to memory. How apt are boys to turn over the Gradus, and hastily look at the quantity of

a word, without even reading the verse which is set down, to see whether the quantity is wrongly marked by the error of the printer! so far are they from steadily committing the line to

memory.

The technical associations will be found of peculiar use in scientific terms. What extreme difficulty does the memory feel in impressing on itself the meaning of the plants and the animals in the Georgics and in Theocritus. At the same time I confess that it sometimes is of little use and really worse than useless, to annoy ourselves with too nice a recollection of such English terms as are equivalent to the Greek and the Latin, in these subjects: especially if we consider how little we know of their real nature, and how little satisfaction can be obtained as to an exact equivalence.

Our associations should be made as simple and rapid as possible. In this, care must be used, otherwise we shall be at as great a loss for recollection as if we had never made an associa tion. And let me finally observe, that, though the invention of such associations may occupy some time, yet in the end we must meet with an ample reward: for, when they are once made, they are not easily forgotten: and the very labor, which we spend in making them, serves to make our acquisition of the knowledge we derive from them, more certain and permanent. S. Y.

CLASSICAL CRITICISM.

THE three Correspondents, as X. affirms in your last No., p. 358, D. B. H.-J. W.-and M., having written "much on the difficult passage in Livy iii. 5., but, like most writers of the present day, thrown little light on critical subjects," it is much to be regretted that your pages have not oftener received his more luminous contributions. In the passage under our notice, he breaks up the Latinity of Livy, and substitutes his own. The MSS. and Editions read-"Interim in castris Furius Consul, cum primo quietus obsidionem passus esset, in incautum hostem decumana porta erupit; et cum persequi posset, metu substitit, ne qua ex parte altera in castra vis fieret. Furium Legatum (frater idem Consulis erat) longius extulit cursus, nec suos ille redeuntes, persequendi studio, neque hostium ab tergo incursum vidit; ita, exclusus, multis sæpe et frustra conatibus captis ut viam sibi ad castra faceret; acriter dimicans cecidit.

Et Consul, nuncio circumventi fratris, conversus ad pugnam, dum se temere magis quam satis caute in mediam dimicationem infert, vulnere accepto ægre ab circumstantibus ereptus, et suorum animos turbavit, et ferociores hostes fecit: qui, cæde Legati et Consulis vulnere accensi, nulla deinde vi sustineri potuere; cum compulsi in castra Romani, rursus obsiderentur, nec spe nec viribus pares: venissetque in periculum summa rerum ni T. Quinctius peregrinis copiis cum Latino Hernicoque exercitu subvenisset."

For, et quum persequi-conversus ad pugnam, dum-cum compulsi, mistated "quum compulsi," read-at quum, &c.— reversus ad pugnandum-quin compulsi. But for peregrinis copiis, mistated "peregrinus copiis," we are instructed to read "peregrè nec opinus!"-The acme of critical presumption.

As to pugnandum for pugnam dum, your correspondent, with his pretensions and qualifications, should have known and noticed, that it is the property of a preceding scholar, perhaps of Livy himself. X. therefore, is very cautious in his Nota Bene, requesting, that if any of his emendations be found to be the property of his predecessors, he may be added to the plagiarists of the present day.

I do not see where his conjectural alterations can be adopted with any other effect than deformity to the historian.

What application has nec opinus either to Quinctius, who, perhaps X. will allow, was aware of his own march; or to the Consul, who, on being repulsed to his camp had made signal to this same Quinctius of the dilemma?-ergo, Quinctius Consuli inopinus haud potuit subvenire.

To your adventurous innovator may be recommended the opinion of your learned correspondent Mr. Barker, who, in p. 346 of your last No. says, "Explanation is at all times a wiser and safer plan of criticism than emendation." In which sentence Mr. B. means "attempts at emendation :" for emendation itself confirmed and admitted, cannot but be both wise and safe.

Liverpool, Aug. 1822.

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