Page:Memory; how to develop, train, and use it - Atkinson - 1919.djvu/66

60 seems thus necessary to every exertion of consciousness, as a certain contraction of the pupil is requisite to every exertion of vision. Attention, then, is to consciousness what the contraction of the pupil is to sight, or to the eye of the mind what the microscope or telescope is to the bodily eye. It constitutes the better half of all intellectual power.”

We have quoted from the above authorities at considerable length, for the purpose of impressing upon your mind the importance of this subject of Attention. The subconscious regions of the mind are the great storehouses of the mental records of impressions from within and without. Its great systems of filing, recording and indexing these records constitute that which we call memory. But before any of this work is possible, impressions must first have been received. And, as you may see from the quotations just given, these impressions depend upon the power of attention given to the things making the impressions. If there has been given great attention, there will be clear and deep impressions; if there has been given but average attention,