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It sometimes happens that we wish to quickly learn five or twenty Proper Names, the whole or part of which are entirely new to us, as a list of members of a committee, a series of facts in science, &c. We can usually do this by Analysis.

Recollective Analysis, or Analysis for the purpose of helping to learn by heart, is not an originating or manufacturing process. It simply finds relation already existing between the words or the ideas which the words suggest or evoke. But where there is no existing relation between the words or ideas, it is a case for Synthesis, to be taught hereafter.

The highest Analysis relates to objects, or rather to the ideas we have of them, and the lowest to mere words, to‌ mere articulated sounds, or their written or printed representatives. The great body of examples and illustrations in my lessons pertain to ideas; but in the list of twenty-four Presidents I deal with the proper Names as words only, as words or articulated sounds—words which are nearly devoid of meaning except as marks or sounds for naming persons, or as words containing syllables which may have a general meaning in other applications. I need scarcely add that the Laws of In., Ex., and Con. apply to words merely as well as to the ideas which are, of course, suggested by the words. Let me illustrate: Ulysses S. Grant was succeeded by Rutherford B. Hayes. The initial syllables of Ulysses and of Rutherford make an inclusion by sound. The “U” of Ulysses is pronounced as if spelled “You.” We then have in effect “You” and “Ru,” or “You” and “Ruth”—when we are supposed to pronounce the “u” in Ruth as a long “u;” but if it be considered to be a short sound of “u,” it is only a weak case of In. by s. But if the pupil shuts his eyes, such inclusions will not be observed. It is true that such application is not so high or grand as when they govern ideas, but it is equally genuine. It is only a lower stratum, but still it is a part of terra firma, and on no account is it to be ignored.

Ideas are never words nor are words ever ideas, but words become so associated with ideas by habit, or by the Law of Concurrence, that they arouse certain ideas whenever they are used. They are used as signs of ideas—as the means of communicating them. There is rarely, if ever, any necessary connection that we can discover between a particular idea and the word used to stand for it. Not only do different nations use different words or sounds to arouse the same thought, but different words in the same language are sometimes used to portray practically the same idea, as in the case of Mariner, Sailor, Seaman, Jack Tar, Navigator, Skipper, &c., &c. Nor is this all—the same sound may awaken different ideas, as “I” and “Eye.” In the first case “I” stands for the person using it, and in the last case it means the organ of sight. To the eyesight they are obviously unlike. It may be well to remark that in imposing a name in the first place, a reason may exist why‌ that name is given, as Albus (white) was given to the mountains, now more euphoniously called Alps, because they were white or snow-crowned; but Alps does not mean white to the moderns. The word now merely indicates or points out the mountains so called. A word may survive and take a new meaning after its original meaning is no longer ascertainable.

The context helps us to know which meaning of the word was intended when the word is spoken, and the context and spelling tell the same thing when writing or print is used. Take the words “Hounds, Bark.” Here Bark means the cry or yelp of the dogs. But in “Tree, Bark,” the Bark of the tree is suggested. Yet the word Bark is spelled precisely the same in both cases. The word spelled “Bark” is really used to express two different things and the context generally tells which is meant in any particular case.

Individual letters become so strongly associated with a particular meaning that although the vocal value is exactly the same, yet the one spelling goes to one man and the other to a different man. “Spenser” would never suggest to a learned man the author of the “Philosophy of Evolution,” nor would “Spencer” ever suggest the author of the “Fairie Queen.” “Mr. Mil” would never mean “John Stuart Mill,” although the words “Mil” and “Mill” are pronounced exactly alike. We sometimes cannot recall a Proper Name, yet we feel sure that it begins or ends with S or K or L, or that a certain other letter is in the middle of the word. We usually find that we were right. In these cases our clue to the entire word was found in only one letter of it.

Noticing that the same letter is in common to two words, although all the other letters may be different, is one case of Inclusion by spelling. Take an example: President John Tyler was followed by President James K. Polk. Analyse the two names—Tyler and Polk. The letter “l” alone is common to the two names. Here is one letter found in totally unlike contexts. If this fact is noticed, it cannot but help hold those two names together. The exercise of learning the names of the twenty-four Presidents is a good one for this purpose. It has a training value entirely apart‌ from its practical value in that case. And I give it for its training value alone.

It is infinitely better for him to learn by analysis the order of the Presidents than to learn that order by the only other method the pupil has heretofore known, viz., endless repetition. When the pupil thinks a relation may be weak, let him consider that a weak relation thought about is a hundred-fold stronger than mere repetition without any thinking at all. It is either thoughtless repetition, or thoughtful Analysis that he must use. ←ToC