Note 53 — Chapter II
George Godfrey Berry translation
What exactly are we to understand by this "incommunicable knowledge," of which we speak? When a specialist is very familiar with the documents of a given class or period, associations of ideas are formed in his brain; and when he examines a new document of the same class or species, analogies suddenly dawn upon him which would escape any one of less experience, however well furnished he might be with the most perfect repertories. The fact is, that not all the peculiarities of documents can be isolated; there are some which cannot be classified under any intelligible head, and which, therefore, cannot be found in any tabulated list. But the human memory, when it is good, retains the impression of these peculiarities, and even a faint and distant stimulus suffices to revive the apprehension of them.