The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-11-23
WAXING AT WILL.
How It Is That People Can Set Them
selves for Certain hour in Sleep.
From the London Spectator.

How 1t Is That People Can Set Them
selves for Certain aour in Sleep.
From the London Spectator.
A discussion has been going on In the
Society for Psyohical Research as to the
existence and the nature of the power by
which so many people manage to wake
themselves precisely at the hour at which
they have resolved to wake themselves the
previous night. There is no question as to
the fact. 1t is matter on which probably
the greater number of people can convince
themselves You may ok time wnen no
clock strikes, so that it cannot be a half
heard sound which wakes you.
You may fix five minutes before the hour
in "a house in which no CLOCK strikes the
quarters, or even in house in which there
is no striking clock at all, and no church
clock within a couple of miles, and yet
not one person only, but great many-we
| might perhaps say the majority of persons
past middle AEGEAN wake themselves at
the right hour If on the previous night they
| go TO bed with the resolve TO do 50 strong
on their minds. 1t is power which belongs
| to all sorts OF perSons-not only persons
who have been In the habit OF getting up at
given hours, but to persons who have not.
Most nurses have it, most servants, most
| laborers, most professional men. Yet it is
| very difficult to account for, for when you
wake you have no distinct, nor, indeed.
indistinct. recognition of the time on you.
You only know at what time you ought to
have been awake, bat not in the least con-
sciously that this time has arrived, though,
when you look at your watch in fright
you find as a matter of fact that IL has
arrived, and only Just arrived. We believe
that the same power would apply to the day
time under the same conditions, namely.
that you fix firmly in your mind some
| earlier, that you are TO do someLhingispecihc,
| and to be reused to sense of the time at q
| specific minute; only people notice this less &,
| since there are so many things In the day
time which warn US, and thus put US on the
watch as to how time is flying.
The curious thing is that, though you can
arrest your own attention and wake up at
the required time, you never seem to have
the least assurance that il is the right time
! without consulting your watch. If you do
really "divine" the time, you have no power
of recognizing that you have "divinedn it,
You feel as If you had merely guessed it,
and very probably guessed it wrong, until
your watch confirms the guess.
1t is not by a keen sense Of duration that
you compute the hour, for that would
imply that you knew at what time you
made the resolve-at what time you
went to sleep with the resolve on your mind.
And this Is often just what you do not know
If you measured time by the organic proc
esses which go on within you, by a general
sense of the number Of pulsations Of your
heart, or the number OF breaths drawn, then
you would require to know accurately
what the time WAS when you first resolved
TO awake, and you would measure only by
the length OF the thread subsequently drawn
out. Not only would that be a very COM
plicated process, bus 1t is almost certainly
not the actual process, fer you may be quite
nhAk AnN1w
resolve is formed. IL seems to be a sense of
time, as quite distinct from sense OF the
duration Of your sleep, or of the length OF
any organic process which has gone on since
the resolve was made Yetit is extremely
difficult TO imagine that the individual mind
can be so closely identified in feeling with
the revolution of the earth on its axis as
would enable it to say at what hour am.
or p. m. you have arrived. The mind
measures duration chiefly by the succession
of its own thoughts; as we have seen, it is
not duration. but something quite different
from duration, OF which 1t appears to be
conscious; thus it can wake the body ut
any given hour without even knowing
consciously, at least how much time has
elapsed since the resolve to wake was first
formed. In the Journal of the Society of
Psychological Research for August we are
told Of lady, "well known TO the editor, :"
who chronicled her experiments in this man
ner during part of last July, and for July
she makes the following entry:
July 5-Order given, again casually, with
none Of the seriousness Of intention which
should have associated with it had been
going to act upon the sequence, instead of
merely experimenting upon it. This time
l said, Wake me to take journey at 4
O'clock meaning, wake me at 4. but not
saying SO. was awakened with struggle OF
consciousness, could not remember where
1, k,,k al fNk -
in deep place, like we'll, and heard an
inner voice say: Wake and get up, it's
lust o'clock you need an hour to prepare
for journey at A. Still vas but half
conscious, when the words were repeated,
1T Is 3, not 4: but you said, "Wake me for
a journey at A." By that time l awoke
completely, and the clock struck 8.
Tne editor regards this power of discern
ing the time as due to what he calls the
subliminal consciOusnessn-ia other words
the consciousness which lies below all the
acts of mere superficial consciousness OF our
life, and connects them when they are at
variance with each other, by its survey
over all alike. We have never thought Tia Il
Mr. Myers has explained anything by thi4
assumption, aud in the present case he la
II be can fully trust his witness acouracJ
only invented a new difficulty for himse
by 1t.
For IL Is quite evident that either Il
''subliminal consciousness" in this case w.
not subliminal, and was no party to o.,
trick which the lady had played upon tn
agency commissioned to awake her L.
speaking of fabulous journey which was
be begun at 4, when she really only wish,
to be awakened at 4-or else, if the ''sub
liminal Consciousness" was aware that4 We
the time intended for waking, and not $
It determined to play a trick upon itself To-
taking the lady's words and rejecting be
meaning. This is a highly improbable OK
PLANTATION, 80 improbable that far from bel
an elucidation, 1t is complication of TIL
problem. The agency which awoke tn
lady at the wrong hour because her word
had been inaccurate either had a grudg
sgains. her and took advantage of her slip