a profound error. It is an inexcusable error. The daily papers
are constantly reporting cases of the lapse and restoration of memory
that contain all the elements of underlying truth on this subject.

[Sidenote: _Causes of Forgetfulness_]

It is plain enough that the memory _seems_ decidedly limited in its
scope. This is because our power of voluntary recall is decidedly
limited.

But it does not follow simply because we are without the power to
deliberately recall certain experiences that all mental trace of those
experiences is lost to us.

_Those experiences that we are unable to recall are those that we
disregarded when they occurred because they possessed no special
interest for us. They are there, but no mental associations or
connections with power to awaken them have arisen in consciousness._

[Sidenote: _Seeing with "Half an Eye"_]

Things are continually happening all around us that we see with but
"half an eye." They are in the "fringe" of consciousness, and we
deliberately ignore them. Many more things come to us in the form of
sense-impressions that clamorously assail our sense-organs, but no
effort of the will is needed to ignore them. We are absolutely
impervious to them and unconscious of them because by the selection of
our life interests we have closed the doors against them.

In either case, whether in the "fringe" of consciousness or entirely
outside of consciousness, these unperceived sensations will be found to
be sensory images that have no connection with the present subject of
thought. They therefore attract, and we spare them, no part of our
attention.

Just as each of our individual sense-organs selects from the multitude
of ether vibrations constantly beating upon the surface of the body only
those waves to the velocity of which it is attuned, so each one of us as
an integral personality selects from the stream of sensory experiences
only those particular objects of attention that are in some way related
to the present or habitual trend of thought.

[Sidenote: _The Man on Broadway_]

Just consider for a moment the countless number and variety of
impressions that assail the eye and ear of the New Yorker who walks down
Broadway in a busy hour of the day. Yet to how few of these does he pay
the slightest attention. He is in the midst of a cataclysm of sound
almost equal to the roar of Niagara and he does not know it.

Observe how many objects are right now in the corner of your min