Page:Memory; how to develop, train, and use it - Atkinson - 1919.djvu/112

106 the message; and, in some cases, the mood or temper of the person transmitting it. Trainmen and steamboat men recognize the differences between every engine or boat on their line, or river, as the case may be. A skilled physician will detect the faint sounds denoting a respiratory trouble or a “heart murmur” in the patients. And yet these very people who are able to detect the faint differences in sound, above mentioned, are often known as “poor hearers” in other things. Why? Simply because they hear only that in which they are interested, and to which their attention has been directed. That is the whole secret, and in it is also to be found the secret of training of the ear-perception. It is all a matter of interest and attention—the details depend upon these principles.

In view of the facts just stated, it will be seen that the remedy for “poor hearing,” and poor memory of things heard is to be found in the use of the will in the direction of voluntary attention and interest. So true is this that some authorities go so far as to claim that many cases of supposed slight deafness are really but the result of lack of attention