Page:Bergson - Matter and Memory (1911).djvu/171

 Now, if memories are really deposited in the cortical cells, we should find in sensory aphasia, for instance, the irreparable loss of certain determined words, the integral conservation of others. But, as a matter of fact, things happen quite differently. Sometimes it is the whole set of memories that disappears, the faculty of mental hearing being purely and simply abolished; sometimes there is a general weakening of the function; but it is usually the function which is diminished and not the number of recollections. It seems as if the patient had no longer strength to grasp his acoustic memories, as if he turned round about the verbal image without being able to hit upon it. To enable him to recover a word it is often enough to put him on the track of it, by giving him its first syllable, or even by merely encouraging him. An emotion may produce the same effect. There are, however, cases in which it does indeed seem that definite groups of representations have disappeared from memory. I have passed in review a large number of these facts, and it has seemed that they could be referred