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ASSUAN DAM

is almost never determined solely by a single isolated perception or idea. The entire contents of the mind, both that which is clearly attended to and that of which one is vaguely conscious, that which is rapidly disappearing from consciousness, and that which is just rising into the mental field, feelings, images and ideas; all are more or less influential in determining what is to come by association. If the suggested ideas are related to all or most of the contents of the mind, we have what Professor James calls total recall. If, however, owing to special interest in one phase of this content the mind attends so closely to it as to call up associates suggested by it but unconnected with the other elements in consciousness, we have partial recall. When this special interesting topic is the thought of a quality, it may suggest some new object known to possess that quality. We may be thinking of the sequoia or big trees of California. Our attention may concentrate on the thought of their extraordinary size, and this* may lead us to think of elephants. Big trees may never have been thought of in connection with elephants before. We seem to have departed from the law of habit. However, the quality of great size is habitually connected with both objects. Thus the fundamental law of association, when supplemented by the law of the special influence of interesting items, is seen to explain association by similarity, where the mind seems to be taking an utterly original course.

Finally it should be noted that while the English associationists treated the ideas as if they were comparatively distinct and unchanging elements recurring frequently in thought, modern psychologists hold that all mental elements are what they are because of the other elements that accompany them. This new is practically involved in the notion of apperception, for apperception means that the associated ideas suggested by any thought apperceive, interpret and so modify it. After the thought of sequoia has suggested the thought of elephants, it can never recur as it was at first. It will henceforth always be the thought of tree? that are like elephants in a certain respect,

See  APPERCEPTION,   MEMORIZING,   PSYCHOLOGY FOR TEACHERS. Consult Principles of Psychology by James, pub. by Holt & Co. E. N. HENDERSON.

Assuan Dam (ds-swdn), The. A part of an extensive system of irrigation undertaken by the British government in Egypt. Assuan is about six hundred miles up the Nile and is below the first cataract. By building dams across the Nile at Assuan and Assiut, it is proposed to form two great reservoirs in which to store the water during the annual overflow of the river. By this means a much greater area can be irrigated and brought under cultivation, and the productiveness of Egypt greatly increased. The dam at Assuan is a mile and a quarter long. It consists of a solid wall of granite rising ninety feet above the level of low Nile, and is about sixty feet in width at the top. The plans include a roadway across the top, so that there may be communication between the two sides of the river. There are one hundred and eighty sluices in the dam, each equipped with heavy steel doors which are readily opened and closed by means of levers. It is expected that this dam will form a lake one hundred and forty miles long. The stored up water partially submerges the island of Philae with its interesting ruins.

Assyr'ia was the northernmost of the three great countries which occupied the Mesopotamian plain. The Niphates Mountains of Armenia were on the north, Susiana and Babylonia on the south, Media on the east and the watershed of the Euphrates on the west. It was about 280 miles long from north to south, and about 150 broad from east to west. There are mountain chains in the north and east, and the country is watered by the Tigris. It is a very fertile region and supported in ancient times a large population. That its people reached a high degree of wealth and civilization is shown by the ruins of mighty cities, by canals and means of irrigation, by inscriptions and carefully kept records of its history—especially the Eponym canon, as it is called, which has been found to agree closely with what is said in the Bible about the Assyrians.

The Babylonian monarchy was already growing old before the Assyrian began. The early rulers were mere governors appointed by the Babylonian kings. Little by little Assyria became independent. She began to be powerful about 1320 B. C., but Tiglath-Pileser I (about 1140 B. C.) was the real founder of the first Assyrian empire. He spread the dominion of Assyria over all western Asia, from Elam to the Mediterranean and from the Armenian Mountains to the Persian Gulf. Under his son the empire decayed as rapidly as it had grown, and for two centuries Assyria played no part in history. It was during this time of decay that the Hebrew kingdom arose and was developed under David and Solomon. In 930 B. C., Assyria began once more to become important. Shalmaneser II began to reign in 858 B. C., and for thirty years engaged in wars that established the power of Assyria over all western Asia. It was this king who in 854 B, C. fought against the king of Hamath, Benhadad of Damascus and Ahab of Israel. In 745 B. C., the throne was usurped by a powerful