in
three hours, or in half of that time. The difficulty in his case is to
induce him to exert his willpower long enough to practise my methods in
learning not a few detached sentences, but an entire poem of 50 or 200
lines; but if he does this in one instance, he effectually breaks down
the old bad habit of endless unassimilating repetition and introduces a
good habit instead. He will then learn Poe's "Bells" by my methods in
one-tenth, if not one-fiftieth, part of the time it would take him to do
it by the _rote_ method.

11. I here produce the poem in the hope that every one who studies my
System will learn it by the Analytic-Synthetic method, and when he has
learned the first stanza he should then glance at my Analysis of it
which follows the poem and compare his work with mine. Let him then
learn the rest of the poem--and thereafter, as a genuine exercise of
his _reviving_ power and as a training in attention, let him recall it
as often as once a week for as many weeks as his desire for improvement
continues, or until the recital of it becomes merely automatic.

THE BELLS.

Hear the sledges with the bells--silver bells--
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, in the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens seem to twinkle with a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time, in a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells--
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Hear the mellow wedding-bells, golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells--
Through the balmy air of night how they ring out their delight!
From the molten-golden notes, and all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats on the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells! how it dwells
On the Future! how it tells of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing of the bells, bells, bells--
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells--
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

Hear the loud alarum bells--brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!