I cannot name a more important means of benefiting young people than encouraging them to commit favorite pieces to memory and recite them often.

Anything which pleased me I could learn with a rapidity which surprised partial friends.

I could memorize anything whether it pleased me or not, but if it did not impress me strongly it passed away in a few hours.
One of the trials of my boy's life at school in Dunfermline was committing to memory two double verses of the Psalms which I had to recite daily.

My plan was not to look at the psalm until I had started for school.

It was not more than five or six minutes' slow walk, but I could readily master the task in that time, and, as the psalm was the first lesson, I was prepared and passed through the ordeal successfully.