Part 8

There are, however, certain facts which seem to prove that the mind does, at least, not altogether cease its activity while the body is asleep. How else could we explain the power many persons undoubtedly possess to awake at a fixed hour, and the success with which, more than once, great mental efforts have been made during profound sleep? Of the latter, Tartini's famous sonata is a striking instance. He had endeavored in vain to finish this great work; inspiration would not come, and he had abandoned the task in despair. During the night he had a dream in which he once more tried his best, but in vain; at the moment of despair, however, the Devil appeared to him and promised to finish the work in return for his soul. The composer, nothing loath, surrenders his soul and hears his magnificent work gloriously completed on the violin. He wakes up in perfect delight, goes to his desk, and at once writes down his "Devil's Sonata." Even children are known occasionally to be able to give intelligent answers while fast asleep; the questions, however, must be in accordance with the current of their thoughts, otherwise they are apt to be aroused. A case is quoted by Reil of two soldiers who used, at times, to keep up an uninterrupted conversation during a whole night, while they were to all appearances fast asleep. A lady, also, was unable to refuse answers to questions put to her at night, and had at last to lock herself in carefully whenever she went to sleep.

Hence it is that some of the most profound thinkers who have discussed the subject of dreams, like Descartes and Leibnitz, Jouffroy and Dugald Stewart, Richard and Carus, with a number of others, assert the uninterrupted wakefulness of the mind. Some authors believe that the spiritual part of man needs no sleep, but delights in the comfort of feeling that the body is in perfect repose, and of forgetting, by these means, for a time the troubles of daily life, and the responsibilities of our earthly existence. They base this view upon the fact, that, as far as we can judge, the mind is, during sleep, independent of the body and the outer world. Thinking is quite possible during sleep without dreaming, and certain bodily sensations, even, are correctly perceived, as when we turn over in our sleep, because lying on one side produces pain or uneasiness. We not only talk while we are asleep, but laugh or weep, sigh or groan. A slight noise, a whispered word, affect the course of our thoughts, and produce new images in our dreams, as certain affections and even the pressure upon certain organs are sure to produce invariably the same dreams. Space and time disappear, however, and naturally, because we can measure them only by the aid of our senses, and these are, for the time, inactive. Hence Dugald Stewart ascribes the manner in which a moment's dream often comprises a year, or a whole lifetime, to the fact that, when we are asleep, the images created by our imagination appear to be realities, while those which we form when we are awake are known to us to be mere fictions, and hence not subject to the laws of time.

It will not surprise us, therefore, to find that this activity of the mind, deprived of the usual means of making itself known to others by gesture, sound, or action, seeks frequently a symbolical utterance, and this is the grain of truth here also hid under the vast amount of rubbish, known as the interpretation of dreams. Troubles and difficulties may thus appear as storms; sorrow and grief as tears; troubled waters may represent pain, and smooth ice impending danger; a dry river-bed an approaching famine, and pretty flowers great joy to come, provided, always, we are disposed to admit a higher class of prophetic dreams. Such a view is supported by high authority, for since the days of Aristotle, great writers, divines as well as philosophers, have endeavored to classify dreams according to their nature and importance. The great reformer, Melanchthon, in his work on the soul, divided them into common dreams, void of importance; prophetic dreams, arising from the individual gifts of the sleeper; divine dreams, inspired by God either directly or through the agency of angels, and finally, demoniac dreams, such as the witches' sabbath. One great difficulty attending all such classification arises, however, from the well-known fact, already alluded to, that external sensations are by far the most frequent causes of dreams. Even these have been systematically arranged by some writers, most successfully, perhaps, in the work of Maine de Biran, but he overlooks again the numerous cases in which external noises and similar accidents produce a whole train of thoughts. Thus Pope dreamed of a Spaniard who impudently entered his library, ransacked the books on the shelves, and turned a deaf ear to all his remonstrances. The impression was so forcible that he questioned all his servants, and investigated the matter thoroughly, till he was finally forced to acknowledge that the whole transaction was a dream caused by the fall of a book in his library, which he heard in his sleep. A still more remarkable case occurred once in a hotel in Dantzic, where not one person only, but all the guests, without exception, dreamed of the sudden arrival of a number of travelers, who disturbed the whole house, and took possession of their rooms with unusual clatter and noise. Not one had arrived, but during the night a violent storm had arisen, causing doors to slam and window-shutters to flap against the house, noises which had aroused in more than fifty people precisely the same impressions.

IV.

VISIONS.

Concipiendis visionibus quas phantasias vocant.

--QUINTILIAN.

Visions, that is, the perception of apparently tangible objects in the outer world, which only exist in our imagination, have been known from time immemorial among all nations on earth. They are, in themselves, perfectly natural, and can frequently be traced back without difficulty to bodily affections or a disordered state of the mind, so that many eminent physicians dispose of them curtly as mere incidental symptoms of congestion or neuralgia. They may present real men and things, known beforehand, and now reproduced in such a manner as to appear objectively; or they may be ideal forms, the product of the moment, and incompatible with the laws of actual life. Persons who have visions and know nothing of their true nature, are apt to become intensely excited, as if they had been transferred into another world. The images they behold seem to them of supernatural origin, and may inspire them with lofty thoughts and noble impulses, but only too frequently they disturb their peace of mind and lead them to crime or despair.

When visions extend to other senses besides sight, and the peculiar state of mind by which they are caused affects different parts of the body at once, they are called hallucinations; most frequent among insane people, of whom, according to Esquirol, eighty in a hundred are thus affected, they are generally quite insignificant; while visions through the eye, are often accompanied by very remarkable magic phenomena. Thus the visions which great men like Cromwell and Descartes, Byron or Goethe, record of their own experience, were evidently signs of the great energy of their mental life, while in others they are as clearly symptoms of disease. Ascribed by the ancients to divine influence, Christianity has invariably denounced them--when not indubitably inspired by God, as in the case of the martyr Stephen and the apostle St. John--as works of the Devil. At all times they have been communicated to others, either by contagion or, in rare cases, by the imposition of hands, as they have been artificially produced. Thus extreme bodily fatigue and utter prostration after long illness are apt to cause hallucinations. Albert Smith, for instance, while ascending Mont Blanc, and feeling utterly exhausted, saw all his surroundings clearly with his eyes, and yet, at the same time, beheld marvelous things with the so-called inner sense. A Swiss who, in 1848, during a severe cold, crossed from Wallis to Kandersteg by the famous Gemmi Pass, eight thousand feet high, saw on his way a number of men shoveling the snow from his path, fellow-travelers climbing up on all sides, and rolling masses of snow which changed into dogs; he heard the blows of axes and the laughing and singing of distant shepherds, while his road was utterly deserted, and not a human soul within many miles. His hands and feet were found frozen when he arrived at last at his quarters for the night, and ten days later he died from the effects of his exposure. During the retreat of the French from Russia the poor sufferers, frozen and famished, were continually tormented by similar hallucinations, which increased their sufferings at times to such a degree as to lead them to commit suicide. Another frequent cause of visions is long-continued fasting combined with more or less ascetic devotion. This is said to explain why the prophets of the Old Testament were so vigorously forbidden to indulge in wine or rich fare. Thus Aaron was told: "Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle" (Levit. x. 9); Moses remained forty days, and "neither did eat bread nor drink wine," when he was on Mount Sinai (Deuter. ix. 9); the Nazarites were ordered not to "drink any liquor of grapes, nor to eat moist grapes or dried," and even to abstain from vinegar (Numbers vi. 3), and Daniel and his companions had nothing but "pulse to eat and water to drink" (Dan. i. 12), in order to prepare them for receiving "wisdom and knowledge and the understanding of dreams and visions."

Narcotics also, and, in our day, most of the anæsthetics can produce visions and hallucinations, but the result is in all such cases much less interesting than when they are produced spontaneously. Tobacco and opium, betel, hasheesh, and coca are the principal means employed; but Siberia has besides its narcotic mushrooms, Polynesia its ava, New Granada and the Himalaya the thorn-apple, Florida its emetic apalachine, and the northern regions of America and Europe have their ledum. The most effective among these narcotics seems to be the Indian hemp, since the visions it produces surpass even the marvelous effects of opium, as has been recently again most graphically described by Bayard Taylor. Laughing-gas, also, has frequently similar effects, and affords, besides, the precious privilege of freedom from the painful, often excruciating consequences of other narcotics. When perfumes are employed for the express purpose of producing visions, it is difficult to ascertain how much is due to their influence, and how much to the over-excited mind of the seer. Benvenuto Cellini describes--though probably not in the most trustworthy manner--the amazing effect produced upon himself and a boy by his side, by the perfumes which a priest burnt in the Coliseum. The whole vast building seemed to him filled with demons, and the boy saw thousands of threatening men, four huge giants, and fire bursting out in countless places. The great artist was told, at the same time, that a great danger was threatening him, and that he would surely lose his beloved Angelica within the month; both events occurred as predicted, and thus proved that in this case at least magic phenomena had accompanied the visions. (_Goethe, B. Cellini_, l. iv. ch. 2.)

Among other external causes which are apt to produce visions, must be mentioned violent motions, especially when they are revolving, as is the case with the Shamans of the Laplanders and the dancing Dervishes of the East; self-inflicted wounds, such as the priests of Baal caused in order to excite their power of divination, and long-continued imprisonment, as illustrated in the well-known cases of Benvenuto Cellini and Silvio Pellico. The latter was constantly tormented by sighs or suppressed laughter which he heard in his dungeon; then by invisible hands pulling at his dress, knocking down his books or trying to put out his light, till he began seriously to suspect that he might be the victim of invisible malignant powers. Fortunately all these phenomena disappeared at break of day, and thus his vigorous mind, supported by true piety, was enabled to keep his judgment uninjured.

Diseases of every kind are a fruitful source of visions and some are rarely without them; but the character of visions differs according to the nature of the affections. Persons who suffer with the liver have melancholy, consumptive patients have cheerful visions. Epileptics often see fearful spectres during their paroxysms, and persons bitten by mad dogs see the animal that has caused their sufferings. The case of the bookseller Nicolai in Berlin is well known; the disease of which he suffered, is not only very common in some parts of Russia, but productive of precisely the same symptoms. The patients experience first a sensation of great despondency, followed by a period of profound melancholy, during which they see themselves surrounded by a number of persons, with whom they converse and quarrel, half conscious of their own delusion and yet not able to master it wholly. They are generally bled, whereupon the images become transparent and shrink into smaller and smaller space, till they finally disappear entirely. Affections of the heart and the subsequent unequal distribution of the blood through the system are apt to produce peculiar sounds, which at times fashion themselves into loud and harmonious pieces. The excitement usually attendant upon specially fatal plagues and contagious diseases increases the tendency which the latter naturally have to cause hallucinations. During a plague in the reign of Justinian, men were seen walking through the crowd and touching here and there a person; the latter were at once attacked by the disease and invariably succumbed. Upon another such occasion marks and spots appeared on the clothing of those who had caught the contagion, as if made by invisible hands, the sufferers began next to see a number of spectres and died in a short time. The same symptoms have accompanied the cholera in modern times, and more than once strange, utterly unknown persons were not only seen but heard, as they were conversing with others; what they said was written down in many cases, and proved to be predictions of approaching visits of the dread disease to neighboring houses. A magic power of foresight seems in these cases to be developed by the extreme excitement or deep anxiety, but the unconscious clairvoyance assumes the form of persons outside of their own mental sphere, within which they alone existed.

By far the most frequent causes of visions are, however, those of psychical nature, like fixed ideas, intense passions, or deep-rooted prejudices, and concealed misdeeds. When they are produced by such causes they have often the appearance of having led to the commission of great crimes. Thus Julian the Apostate, who had caused the image of his guardian angel to be put upon all his coins and banners, naturally had this form deeply impressed upon his mind. In the night before a decisive battle, he saw, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, this protecting genius in the act of turning away from him, and this vision made so deep an impression upon his mind that he interpreted it as an omen of his impending death. On the following day he fell in battle. The fearful penalty inflicted upon Charles IX. by his own conscience is well known; after the massacre of St. Bartholomew he saw, by day and by night, the forms of his victims around him, till death made an end to his sufferings. On our own continent, one of the early conquerors gave a striking instance of the manner in which such visions are produced. He was one of the adventurers who had reached Darien, and was on the point of plundering a temple; but, a few days before, an Indian woman had told him that the treasures it held were guarded by evil spirits, and if he entered it the earth would open and swallow up the temple and the conquerors alike. Nothing daunted, he led his men to the attack; but, as they came in sight, he suddenly saw, in the evening light, how the colossal building rocked to and fro as in a tempest, and thoroughly intimidated he rode away with his followers, leaving the temple and its treasures unharmed. That visions are apt to precede atrocious crimes is quite natural, since they are in such cases nothing but the product of the intense excitement under which murders are often committed; but, it would be absurd to look upon them as motive causes. Ravaillac had constant visions of angels, saints, and demons, while preparing his mind for the assassination of Henry IV., and the young student who attempted the murder of Napoleon at Schönbrunn repeatedly saw the genius of Germany, which appeared to him and encouraged him to free his country from the usurper. Persons who attempt to summon ghosts are very apt to see them, because their mind is highly wrought up by their proceedings and they confidently expect to have visions. But some men possess a similar power without making any special effort or peculiar preparations, their firm volition sufficing for the purpose. Thus Talma could at all times force himself to see, in the place of the actual audience before whom he was acting, an assembly of skeletons, and he is said never to have acted better than when he gave himself up to this hallucination. Painters, also, frequently have the power to summon before their mind's eye the features of those whose portrait they are painting; Blake, for instance, was able actually to finish likenesses from images he saw sitting in the chair where the real persons had been seated.

While visions are quite common, delusions of the other senses are less frequent. The insane alone hear strange conversations. Hallucinations of the taste cause patients to enjoy delightful dishes, or to partake of spoiled meat and other unpalatable viands, which have no existence. Sweet smells and incense are often perceived, bad odors much less frequently. The touch is of all senses the least likely to be deceived; still deranged people occasionally feel a slight touch as a severe blow, and persons suffering from certain diseases are convinced that ants, spiders, or other insects are running over their bodies.

The favorite season of visions is night--mainly the hour about midnight--and in the whole year, the time of Advent, but also the nights from Christmas to New Year. This is, of course, not a feature of supernatural life, but the simple effect of the greater quiet and the more thoughtful, inward life, which these seasons are apt to bring to busy men. The reality of our surroundings disappears with the setting sun, and in deep night we are rendered almost wholly independent of the influence exercised in the day by friends, family, and even furniture. All standards of measurement, moreover, disappear, and we lose the correct estimate of both space and time. Turning our thoughts at such times with greater energy and perseverance inward, our imagination has free scope, and countless images appear before our mind's eye which are not subject to the laws of real life. Darkness, stillness, and solitude, the three great features of midnight seasons, all favor the full activity of our fancy, and set criticism at defiance by denying us all means of comparison with real sounds or sights. At the same time, it is asserted, that under such circumstances men are also better qualified to perceive manifestations which, during the _turba_ of daily life, are carelessly ignored or really imperceptible to the common senses. So long as the intercourse with the world and its exigencies occupy all our thoughts, and self-interest makes us look fixedly only at some one great purpose of life, we are deaf and blind to all that does not clearly belong to this world. But when these demands are no longer made upon us, and especially when, as in the time of Advent, our thoughts are somewhat drawn from earthly natures, and our eyes are lifted heavenward, then we are enabled to give free scope to our instincts, or, if we prefer the real name, to the additional sense by which we perceive intangible things. A comparison has often been drawn between the ability to see visions and our power to distinguish the stars. In the day, the brilliancy of the sun so far outshines the latter, that we see not a single one; at night they step forth, as it were, from the dark, and the deeper the blackness of the sky, the greater their own brightness. Are they, on that account, nothing more than creatures of our imagination, set free by night and darkness?

As for the favorite places where visions most frequently are seen, it seems that solitudes have already in ancient times always been looked upon as special resorts for evil spirits. The deserts of Asia, with their deep gullies and numerous caves, suggested a population of shy and weird beings, whom few saw and no one knew fully. Hence the fearful description of Babylon in her overthrow, when "Their houses shall be full of doleful creatures, and owls shall dwell there and satyrs shall dance there." (Isaiah xiii. 21). The New Testament speaks in like manner of the deserts of Palestine as the abode of evil spirits, and in later days the Faroe Islands were constantly referred to as peopled with weird and unearthly beings. The deserts of Africa are full of Djinns, and the vast plains of the East are peopled with weird apparitions. The solitudes of Norwegian mountain districts abound with gnomes and sprites, and waste places everywhere are no sooner abandoned by men than they are occupied by evil spirits and become the scenes of wild and gruesome visions.