after the first impression you refrain from introducing anything
immediately into the mind that might disturb it. After you have
impressed the poem you are memorizing, do not immediately follow it by
another poem. Let the brain rest for three or four minutes until after
the first impressions have had a chance to "set."

Now that we have regarded this "unconscious memorizing" from the
neurological standpoint, let us consider it from the psychological
standpoint. How are the ideas being modified during the intervals
between impressions? Modern psychology has discovered that much
memorizing goes on without our knowing it, paradoxical as that may
seem. The processes may be described in terms of the doctrine of
association, which is that whenever two things have once been
associated together in the mind, there is a tendency thereafter "if the
first of them recurs, for the other to come with it." After the poem of
our illustration has once been repeated, there is a tendency for events
in everyday experience that are like it to associate themselves with
it. For example, in the course of a day or week many things might arise
and recall to you the line, "Life is real, life is earnest", and it
would become, by that fact, more firmly fixed in the mind. This
valuable semi-conscious recall requires that you must make the first
impression as early as possible before the time for ultimate recall.
This persistence of ideas in the mind means "that the process of
learning does not cease with the actual work of learning, but that, if
not disturbed, this process runs on of itself for a time, and adds a
little to the result of our labors. It also means that, if it is to our
advantage to stand in readiness with some word or thought, we shall be
able to do so, if only this word or thought recur to us but once, some
time before the critical moment. So we remember to keep a promise to
pay a call, to make a remark at the proper time, even though we turn