Themistocles  

"Themistocles at all events, when Simonides or some one offered to teach him the art of memory, replied that he would prefer the art of forgetting; ‘for I remember,’ said he, ‘even things I do not wish to remember, but I cannot forget things I wish to forget.’--De finibus bonorum et malorum by Cicero (1st century BC)

"On such an occasion , the reply of Themistocles should be mine. One of the literati of Greece offered to communicate an elaborate and curious invention, by means of which his memory should be so wonderfully strengthened, as to retain whatever he read or heard. "My friend," replied the hero, you quite mistake the way to serve me. I want to learn the art, not of remembering, but of forgetting."--Theron and Aspasio (1755) by James Hervey