The  chief  faults  of  beginners  in  this  respect  are  :  that  they
trust  too  much  to  memory ;  they  fail  to  note  the  sources  of
their  information  for  future  reference  and  verification ;  they
copy  slavishly  from  others  instead  of  digesting  material  to
get  its  vital  points ;  and  they  are  then  satisfied  to  leave  their
notes  in  such  a  disorganized  form  that  soon  the  debaters,
themselves,  cannot  make  use  of  them.
The  first  principles  of  note-taking  are,  therefore,  that  the
debater  should  always  approach  his  work  of  investigation  with
note-paper  and  pencil  in  hand ;  he  should  allow  no  material
to  pass  without  a  note  if  it  has  any  possible  value ;  he  should
always  record  against  material  the  exact  source  from  which
it  is  taken ;  i.  e.,  for  example,  the  author,  book,  volume,  and
page ;  and  then  instead  of  writing  out  in  full  the  information
he  has  obtained,  he  should  condense  it,  without  altering  its
meaning,  to  get  only  the  part  that  is  valuable.
At  first,  notes  should  be  taken  in  scrap  form,  but  they
should  never  be  allowed  to  remain  in  this  shape ;  for  many
notes,  no  matter  how  valuable  they  are  in  themselves,  if  they
are  left  in  a  state  of  confusion,  are  often  more  of  a  hindrance
than  a  help  to  the  debater.
A  convenient  and  systematic  method  of  keeping  notes  is  to
employ  a  loose-leaf  notebook  or  card-index  with  appropriate


Assembling  the  Proof  29

headings   for   each   page,    or  each    card,    to    catalogue   the
material.
