Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-08-21

retnal surfaces have been most recently excited
But especially in moonlight, or in early morning
when the depth OF sleep is Least. the hight shining
suggester of visual dreams. Not few dreams OF
CONGREGATIONS, or of absent and dead friends seen
in sleep, or of glorihed saints, have originated IN
this way. Thus Maury saw in his dream the figure
of female clothed in shining robe and seated in
chair near him; the sensation stimulus beng due
to the reflection of lamp upon the polished back
of the same chair Another author tells how similar
led him in dream to see the image OF
loved one. to whom he stretched out his arms; and,
again, the form of suicide in white, shining shirt
and moving with tottering steps.
The artificial excitement of dreams tends to Illus
trate and enforce this theory of the sensuous origin
of many of dreams Thus the sleeper in whose
ears some steel shears made to vibrate heard
church bells. and then the tocsn of alarm: and
finally he dreamed of the days of June, 1S4S in the
CITY of Paris. Another who was made to smell
eau de Cologne, was transported in his dream to
perfumers shop in Cairo. Nudow tells OF man
made to initiate the movements OF one swimming
by pouring a little water into his open mouth. And
indeed in all this experimenting with the dreamer
in normal sleep and with the dreamer in hypnosis
yields quite analogous results
Between the dreams of the normal sleeper and
those of the hypnotic subject and between the latter
and the dream life of the waking insane, there are
no perfectly fixed distinctions to be made
Whsre Individuality Comes in
DIFFERENCE has already been made to the mar
weaves out Of and about the few threads of sensory
stimuli that reach the brain: Here IS where the SO
called laws of association and indeed all the mental
habits of the individual come into account. Out OF
the same or very similar stuff of sensation, differ
ent dreamers make widely different and characters
tcaly individual dreams. These differences depend
upon age SEX temperament, and state OF the health
education and indeed, upon all that goes to make
up the complex person in waking life
Distinctions in personality-f we may use the
word in this connection-are, however, less sig
nificant in dream life than when the different in
dividuas in the fullest exercise of all their waking
powers In dreams we are all prominently chill
may be stated in more technical way by calling
attention to the inferior obectivity of the self IN
dream life. That organization of the mental ee.
meats which experience and culture and acquired
self control have succeeded in producing is relaxed
and for the time being fall back into the lower
and more primal conditions OF elemental and un-
formed sefhood. The imperfect organization OF the
self that shows itself in dream life is due to certain
curtalment of the sensuous elements, such as give
US practical grasp upon the nature OF our physical
and social environment; to lack OF clear, self
conscious memory; to the speed and hurly-burly
of the associated ideas; the absence of the more
rational feelings and sentiments; to the lowering OF
the painful energies of the will; and to the removal
of the restraints that consciousness OF the prev
alent opinions to what is and true and right
imposes upon
From the physical point of view the dream life
of man becomes more like the life of lower ami
mails. even of plants. From the point of view OF
cerebral physiology, it is more decentrahZed, as
it were. From the psychological point of view we
are less rational and self controlled. We perform
the impossible with the utmost and with bonn
bastic appreciat ion of our own importance, or we
become unspeakabe towards in our dream. Thus
Macnish succeeded without difficulty in riding
his own back, as Baron Mnnchhausen pulled himself
out of the swamp by his own pigtail On the con-
trary, friend of mine was awakened in veritable
cold sweat of terror because of fall from roof to
the pavement in the shape of an iccle.
Real Concepts Topsyturvy
THE conceptions Of time, space, and causality.
which steady and guide all our waking rational
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