Full Idea
We often need to use a sign with which we associate a very complex sense. Such a sign seems a receptacle for the sense, so that we can carry it with us, while being always aware that we can open this receptacle should we need what it contains.
Gist of Idea
We use signs to mark receptacles for complex senses
Source
Gottlob Frege (Logic in Mathematics [1914], p.209)
Book Reference
Frege,Gottlob: 'Posthumous Writings', ed/tr. Hermes/Long/White etc [Blackwell 1979], p.209
A Reaction
This exactly the concept of a mental file, which I enthusiastically endorse. Frege even talks of 'opening the receptacle'. For Frege a definition (which he has been discussing) is the assigment of a label (the 'definiendum') to the file (the 'definiens').
Related Idea
Idea 16876 We need definitions to cram retrievable sense into a signed receptacle [Frege]