=A CONTRAST.=--When unconnected ideas have to be united in the memory so that hereafter one will recall the other, the teachers of other Memory Systems say: "What can I invent to tie them together--what story can I contrive--what foreign extraneous matter can I introduce--what mental picture can I imagine, no matter how unnatural or false the juxtaposition may be, or what argument or comparison can I originate--no matter how far-fetched and fanciful it may be, to help hold these 'Extremes' together?" They do not reflect that all these mnemonical outside and imported schemes must _also_ be remembered, and that being in the form of sentences expressing loose relation of mere physical juxtapositions or the complex relations invented by constructive imagination or subtle intellect, they are, to most, more difficult to recollect than the extremes would be without these ponderous aids. Hence, in their professed attempt to aid the memory, they really impose a _new_ and _additional burden_ upon it.
1. Are you required to make any original correlations? 2. How many? 3. Between what extremes? 4. Do you find it difficult? 5. Have you any evidence given here that others have experienced any difficulty in making them? 6. Did they finally succeed? 7. What question is frequently asked by other memory teachers?
On the other hand, I simply ask the memory what it _already knows_ about the "Extremes." The first intermediate of a correlation is _directly_ connected through In., Ex., or Con., with the first "Extreme," and the last intermediate with the last "Extreme," and the intervening intermediate (if there be one) with the other two, and thus, the _intermediates being already in the memory_, and not the result of invention or ingenuity, my Method of Correlation is purely and solely a MEMORY process. In this way, I use the MEMORY TO HELP THE MEMORY, I use the _reviving_ power of the memory to make a vivid FIRST IMPRESSION between two hitherto unconnected "Extremes." I add nothing to the "Extremes," import nothing from abroad in regard to them, invent nothing. I simply _arouse_, _re-waken_ to consciousness, _what is already stored away_ in the memory in regard to those "Extremes," and, by reciting the Correlation a few times forwards and backwards, cement the "Extremes" themselves so vividly together, that henceforth one "Extreme" revives the other "Extreme" without the recall of the intermediates.