To copy Thucydides eight times, as the tradition respecting Demosthenes goes, would be about the same as copying Gibbon three times: and who would undertake that? [COMMITTING TO MEMORY WORD FOR WORD.] 2. Committing to memory _verbatim_, or nearly so. This too belongs to the same tradition regarding Demosthenes, and is probably as inaccurate as the other. Certainly the eight copyings would not suffice for having the whole by heart. Excepting a professional rhapsodist, or some one gifted with extraordinary powers of memory that would hardly be compatible with a great understanding, nobody would think of committing Thucydides to memory. That Demosthenes should be a perfect master both of the narrated facts, and of the sagacious theorisings of Thucydides in those facts, we may take for granted. And, farther, the orations delivered by opposing speakers in the great critical debates, might very well have been committed _verbatim_ by a young orator; many of them are masterpieces of oratory in every point of view. But the reason for getting them by heart does not apply to the general narrative. Even to imbibe the best qualities of the style of Thucydides would not require whole pages to be learnt _verbatim_; a much better way would readily occur to any intelligent man. In fact, there is no case where it is profitable to load the memory with a whole book, or with large portions of a book. There are many small portions of every leading work that might be committed with advantage. Principal propositions ought to be retained to the letter. Passages, here and there, remarkable for compact force, for argumentative power, or elegant diction, might be read and re-read till they clung to the memory; but this should be the consummation of a thorough and critical estimate of their merits. To commit to memory without thinking of the meaning is a senseless act; and could not be ascribed to Demosthenes. At the stage when the young student is forming a style, he is assisted by laying up _memoriter_ a number of passages of great authors; but it is never necessary to go beyond select paragraphs. Detached sentences are valuable, and strain the memory least. Entire paragraphs have a farther value in impressing good paragraph connection; but, to string a number of paragraphs together, or to learn whole chapters by memory, has nothing to recommend it in the way of mental culture.