The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1907-01-24

Paper Read Before the ChGotduquG Circle.
IN ATTEMPTING to unveil the
mysteries of mans psychic elements
we are confronted by many insur-
mountable barriers-character
tics of NatGre-chief among them the
mind itself. In other words, our intel
lectual faculties. and their physical
tributaries have not yet attained
state of development perfect enough
to know their own source. We cannot
grasp the meaning of anything in it's
entirety, because the subjective faculty
of orientatiOn, or higher discerDment,
is curbed by the physical senses. 1t is
incapable of transcendency except thru
the agency of trance or dreams, but in
either of these it haunts diapnanous
realms that reason, as yet, has failed
to penetrate.
Normally, the subjective mind re-
tains only such impressions as have, in
their natural aspect, become manifest
to the objective senses; therefore, we
comprehend things, time and place ad-
umbratively, empirically, if may use
the words. Inability to thoroughly
understand subject is not, however, a
mental deficiency, but rather physical
defect arising from the retardation of
nerve-energy thru both normal and
pathological causes. The brain, uni
versally accepted as the material seat
of thought, is really only the rheostat,
the refining center of vastly compli-
Gated system of nerves that attract, as
simulate and transmit the Impressions
received by the various senses
Roughly estimated, one-fourth Of
these embryo thoughts or thought
waves entering the cerebellum, or
organ controlling combined muscular
activity, produce voluntary actions
stimulated in intensity by the external
excitation of the nerve receiving the
impression. On the other hand, vibra-
tiOns attracting the nerves and enter
ing the nerve centers by psychomotor
processes pass into and thru the brain
unperceived and are termed reflex acts.
Reflex acts, unless meeting with re-
active energy in their passage along q
nerve, are transmitted and recorded
unconsciously, because they encounter
no resistance ip either the objective
mind or the corpus callosum. They
may lie dormant for days, months and
even years, materializing in thought or
action and becoming conscious volun-
tary acts by a duplicate irritation of
the nerve receiving. the first impress
sion, or, thru the agency of dreams.
Personal experience with nightmare
has convinced me that dormant reflex
acts, like limburger cheese, accumulate
strength as their age increases.
The wealth of phantasmogoria pass
ing in dreams is due, probably, to a
slight pressure on the corpus calIosum,
or nerve fibers jntersecting the two
hemispheres of the brain, and can be
accounted for only by the increased
flow of blood as it passes thru the
sleeping muscular section of the cere-
bellum and enters the doubly active
cerebrum. This, Of course, is theory:
but am, nevertheless, positive that
an action of this nature would release
the reflex matter and cause it to run
riot with the conscious thoughts pre-
viOusly stored in the recording cells of
memory and instinct, the mind proper.
The number of impressions daily
recorded in the cerebrum is incompre-
hensible, and the time consumed in
attracting and transmitting them in
conceivable. Prof. Betchereff, a Rus
sian psychologist, states that: "The
speed of association in consciousness
varies, generally between one-fourth
and one-eighth of second which is
an enormously long time compared
with the rapidity of reflex acts" He,
evidently, arrives at this conclusion by
estimating the number of vibrations
constantly coming in contact with the
external nerve diaphragms of the five
or more senses.
Theorematically, we hear hundred
different sounds per minute, altho we
cannot distinguish them; while in one
sweep of the eye the retina will photo
graph 9 thousand and be conscious of