Institutio Oratoria

For passages intended as an exercise should be somewhat difficult in character if they are to make it easy to achieve the end for which the exercise is designed; just as athletes train the muscles of their hands by carrying weights of lead, although in the actual contests their hands will be empty and free. Further, I must not omit the fact, the truth of which our daily practice will teach us, that in the case of the slower type of mind the memory of recent events is far from being exact.

It is a curious fact, of which the reason is not obvious, that the interval of a single night will greatly increase the strength of the memory, whether this be due to the fact that it has rested from the labour, the fatigue of which constituted the obstacle to success, or whether it be that the power of recollection, which is the most important element of memory, undergoes a process of ripening and maturing during the time which intervenes. Whatever the cause, things which could not be recalled on the spot are easily co-ordinated the next day, and time itself, which is generally accounted one of the causes of forgetfulness, actually serves to strengthen the memory.

On the other hand, the abnormally rapid memory fails as a rule to last and takes its leave as though, its immediate task accomplished, it had no further duties to perform. And indeed there is