A promising way to this end is the inexhaustible association test which we mentioned when we discussed the contributions of the psychological laboratory to the medical diagnosis. A series of short words are spoken to the patient and, as soon as he hears one, he is to pronounce as quickly as possible the first word which comes to his mind. If we use fifty words, we should be able to learn something as to the inner states of the man and as to the working of his mind, if we analyze carefully his particular choices. But two further conditions ought to be fulfilled. The time of the association ought to be measured. Of course there will be wide differences. A word which is often in a certain connection will quickly bring the habitual association. Abstract words will call forth their associations more slowly than concrete words, familiar words more rapidly than unfamiliar words. To measure such association time with fullest accuracy, as it is necessary for the purpose of scientific investigations, delicate electrical instruments are needed that indicate thousandths parts of a second. For the purpose of the practical physician such accuracy would be superfluous. His examination will be perfectly successful if it is carefully done with a stop-watch which shows the fifth part of a second, like those which are used at races. He speaks a word, presses at the same time the button of the watch, and presses the stopper when he sees the lips of the patient moving. He is thus able to examine not only the involuntary choice of association but also the time of every associative process. But a second condition ought also to be fulfilled. After some indifferent words, others ought to be mixed into the series which touch in a tentative way on various spheres corresponding to the possible suspicions. The groups to which the hidden thoughts of psychasthenics, for instance, belong are not many. As soon as our series of words strikes such a group, the reaction of the mind may be discriminated. The effect may be a general perturbation resulting either in an unusual delay of the fitting association or in an effort to cover the sore spot by an unfitting association. Sometimes the dangerous association may rush forward even with unusual rapidity but, as soon as it is uttered, it gives a shock to the mental system, brings the whole associative process into disorder, and the result is that the next following associations are abnormally delayed. The skilled psychologist will quickly take such a change as a cue for the selection of the later words in his series. Of course, he will at first return to neutral words, but as soon as he has found a danger spot, he will approach it from various sides, perhaps in every fourth or fifth word, and may then find out which particular experiences are disquieting the patient. Words like women or money or career or family or disease are often sufficient to get the first inkling of a mental story.