Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-07-10
Continued from Third Page.)

We. most of us, have some idea
Of the making of dreams. Some
sound, some internal Or external
disturbance lifts the mental exist
ence out of the unconscious toward
waking The mind ceases to forget
memory and attention dawn and the
drifting mental content groups itself
with an assumption of reasonable
| connectedness about the disturbing
sensation. Then we either wake and
remember. or the whole stir subsidies
back into forgetfulness and uncon-
seriousness. Most of us realize how
the impressions of yesterday in par
ticular and of remote yesterdays less
patiently supply forms and color to
the stir and how desires we have
thwarted and temptations we have
resisted escape into this dream life
and play havoc with our suppress
Sions
Premonitions Often Escape.
What most of us do not realize,
says Dunno, is the share which little
scraps of tomorrow's impressions also
| contribute That is the essence of
the discovery. 1t is difficult at the
time to sift the foreshadowings from
the recollections and the distorted,
escaped suppressions. so unimpor-
tant and elusive they seem to be. 1t
is only when the premonitions are
exceptionally striking that they are
| remembered and recognized when
they turn up In actual fact, and so
detected: They have to be very vivid
or very peculiar. But the more
closely and skillfully you watch. he
insists. the more of the futurist ele-
ment is evident in the dream.
Moreover. he had added to the
| observation of what | may call
natural dreaming the observation of
states Of mind when the attention is
deliberately relaxed so as to leave
the mental existence at level hardly
above the level of recording con-
seriousness. He turns his back as it
were on the mental existence and
then suddenly snatches what is there
nefore 1t sails out of reach, and in
these phases of mind also he finds
the images Of future and past i'm
pressions mingling together
Now l think 1t may be possible to
put these facts into comprehensive
relationship to quite a number of
other facts which do not enter into
DUNES speculation. I won't exactly
follow him in this statement that fol-
lows, which is necessarily in the space
at my disposal very sketchy state
ment. Partly 1t derives from him and
partly / am adding something of my
own. The point of interest is that our
mind can be considered as existing in
the past and in the future. as extend
ing. so to speak, both ways beyond
what we consider to be the actual
moment.
How Long Now:
hope that does not strike the reader
as too crazy proposition. Most of
US have given very little thought to
what we mean by the actual moment.
What we do mean by now? How
much time is it? Behind now"
stretches the past, ahead is the future,
but is 1t itself an infinitesimal in.
slant? Do we merely exist as flash,
as series of flashes, so to speak, of
no duration at all. between a past gone
by and future still to come, or does
now" bulge into both past and fu-
ture?
This will be a novel and amusing
question to most people and a pro.
foundly Irritating one to certain
types. They will be so accustomed to
speak OF past and future as though
thCS "SAC lA ACTUAL COuldCL DIT Inc
present, that the assertion will be as.
tonishing and difficult, and yet as they
think it over, it will acquire an insinu-
ating and troublesome FEASIBILITY,
that now" is perhaps always a meas
urable and may under certain circuM-
stances be a quite considerable piece
OF time. 1t sounds paradoxical to say
that portions Of the past and future
both enter into now" but actual ex-
perience gives feeling in favor of
that illogical view. To be illogical is
not necessarily to be in error. Man.
kind may have been thinking about
past and future in the wrong way.
Next. would suggest that as we
become attentive to anything and eX-
cited by actual fact. nov" gathers
itself together. and the more ex-
cited and attentive we are the
more now gathers itself together
toward its central point. AS we
become increasingly active and ION
the spot, the acuter and the mar
rover does the now under at
I tention become. In our crises we
live as We say only for the moment.
AS we relapse toward inattention.
reveries. dreaminess. now" becomes
obtuse and broader and broader In
the hypnotic condition in dreaming
md still more so In dreamIess sleep
now may broaden down toward
and below the limit of consciousness.
until it spreads it may be to large
parts and even to all Of our mental