The St. Charles herald. [volume] (Hahnville, La.) 1873-1993, 1885-01-10
what Dreams Arc Made OF.


Impressions on some special sense
will produce very characteristic dreams,
the origin Of which may take such trou-
BILE in its determination that we might
well be tempted to deny the material
origin of the vision. DR.. Reid had q
blister applied to his head, and dreamt
accordingly that he had been scalped
by Indians. Here the connection be-
tween the dream and the outward inn
preston, manipulated so to speak by
the brain, was clear. But that connec-
ton may be anything but patent Ia
cases where person dreams OF being
frozen to death, the exciting cause hay
ing been merely deficiency of bed
clothes on a chilly night. In case re-
lated by DIR. Carpenter, where an emil
nent judge dreamt of being tormented
by crowd of lizards which were crawl
ing over him, the origin of the dream
was still more difficult to trace. The
cause of his reptilian visitation was
readily explicable, however, on enter
ing the department in which he had
spent the previous evening, when he
saw on the base of the clock number
of carved lizards. A similar instance
Is afforded by personal experience OF
the writer in which he dreamt that he
was walking in forest in which lizards
of every hue and kind were engaged in
combat with humming-birds. Puz-
cling himself over the origin of his
dream, it at last dawned upon his recol-
lection that some time previously he
had travelled in railway carriage hav
Ing for its vis-a-vis lady whose hat
WAS decorated with humming- birds
plumage, fastened by q brooch accu-
rately representing lizard. BY the same
kind of association revived by memory,
and often projecting forgotten reminis-
cences into the mental foreground,
dreams are suggested which deal with
events at first sight apt to be mistaken
for those of utterly spontaneous nature.
Maury relates that in early life he Wis
,, tied village on the Marine named Tril-
: port His father had built bridge at
this spot. The subject of his dream was
that his childhood days were being
spent at Trilport, and that man in
uniform, on being asked his name, told
Maury that he was the bridge-keeper
and mentioned his name, which Maury
distinctly remembered when he woke.
OF this name he had no recollection
= whatever, but inquiring of an old SER
want of his fathers If person of the
name in question was once gate-keepeT
at Trilport bridge. she replied in the
] affirmative, and mentioned that the
y man kept the gate when the bridge was
T built.
Thus does memory play strange tricks
with our imagination, especially wher
y the latter faculty runs riot in the absence
Q of will and consciousness, and relates
}. itself to the world of dreams. The
L supernatural theory of dreams ant
warnings recently revived in our mids
is. after all, but sop to the Cerberu:
Q of ignorance. 1t is easy-far too easy
9 for the peace and comfort of many
minds-to convert a mere coincidence
u between dream and an event into I
Q close relationship which seems in thu
y dream foreshadowing of the event il
; question. But in science, as in healthy
y common-sense, there is no justification
3 for the continuance of such super
stition. If certain dreams are warn
ings and portents, what shall WI
% say of those to which no such function
d can be attachedp And if of certain
II trivial events we are forewarned, wha
7, is the explanation of the striking anon
Ie ally, that of the grave disasters of lif
we usually receive no warning at alp
t. DIR. Maudsley says, '1thas been justl
I" remarked that if we were actually +
Il do in sleep all the strange things W
If dream we do, it would be necessary t
rs put every man in restraint before h
II went to bed; for, as Cicero said, dream
Ia ers would do more strange things tina
madmen. A dream put into actio
N must indeed look very much like in
le sanity &c. e. the ordinary sleep-yigiI
g as insanity hes at times the look of
ID waking dream"
ne Poets without number have inyariabl
re treated dreams as the best type of tn
fe unrealities of life and nature. Th
p Psychologist, on the contrary, sees ]
of the visions of the night no trifiing oil
i'd jects unworthy of serious study and re
us Election, but indications and clues to tn
h better understanding of the mysterie
IS, which beset our waking lives. eth
be grave portents'' of the night in TIL
re view cast no shadow over the future
h and exercise no sway over the destinit
ne of the modern mind. They serve. how
r. ever, nobler purpose, as aids, throug
IT. their revelations of the leisure-fancit
ee of the brain, towards q knowledge
We the boundaries which separate the real
ng of body from that of -boundari,
No which, in truth, ''divide our being."-
nut GeratlenGfl's Magazine.