Psychology has a long past, yet its real history is short. For thousands of years it has existed and has been growing older ; but in the earlier part… - Hermann Ebbinghaus

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Psychology has a long past, yet its real history is short. For thousands of years it has existed and has been growing older ; but in the earlier part of this period it cannot boast of any continuous progress toward a riper and richer development. In the fourth century before our era that giant thinker, Aristotle, built it up into an edifice comparing very favorably with any other science of that time. But this edifice stood without undergoing any noteworthy changes or extensions, well into the eighteenth or even the nineteenth century. Only in recent times do we find an advance, at first slow but later increasing in rapidity, in the development of psychology.