TEE SYMBOLISM OF DREAMS 47 



even easy to accept. "When we are faced by the question of definite 

 and constant symbols it still remains true that scepticism is often called 

 for. But there can be no manner of doubt that our dreams are full of 

 symbolism. 10 



The conditions of dream-life, indeed, lend themselves with a peculiar 

 facility to the formation of symbolism, that is to say, of images which, 

 while evoked by a definite stimulus, are themselves of a totally different 

 order from that stimulus. The very fact that we sleep, that is to say, 

 that the avenues of sense which would normally supply the real image 

 of corresponding order to the stimulus are more or less closed, renders 

 symbolism inevitable. 11 The direct channels being thus largely choked, 

 other allied and parallel associations come into play, and since the con- 

 trol of attention and apperception is diminished, such play is often 

 unimpeded. Symbolism is the natural and inevitable result of these 

 conditions. 12 



It might still be asked why we do not in dreams more often recog- 

 nize the actual source of the stimuli applied to us. If a dreamer's feet 

 are in contact with something hot, it might seem more natural that he 

 should think of the actual hot-water bottle, rather than of an imaginary 

 Etna, and that, if he hears a singing in his ears, he should argue the 

 presence of the real bird he has often heard rather than a performance 

 of Haydn's " Creation " which he has never heard. Here, however, we 

 have to remember the tendency to magnification in dream imagery, a 

 tendency which rests on the emotionality of dreams. Emotion is nor- 



" bizarre analogies of internal sensations in virtue of which certain vibrations 

 of the nerves, certain instinctive movements of our viscera, correspond to sensa- 

 tions apparently quite different? According to this hypothesis experience 

 would bring to light mysterious affinities, the knowledge of which might become 

 a genuine science; . . . and a real key to dreams would not be an unrealizable 

 achievement if we could bring together and compare a sufficient number of 

 observations." 



10 It is interesting to note that hallucinations may also be symbolic. Thus 

 the Psychical Research Society's Committee on Hallucinations recognized a 

 symbolic group and recorded, for instance, the case of a man who, when his 

 child lies dying sees a blue flame in the air and hears a voice say " That's his 

 soul" (Proceedings Society Psychical Research, August, 1894, p. 125). 



u Maeder states that the tendency to symbolism in dreams and similar 

 modes of psychic activity is due to " vague thinking in a condition of diminished 

 attention." This is, however, an inadequate statement and misses the central 

 point. 



13 In the other spheres in which symbolism most tends to appear, the same 

 or allied conditions exist. In hallucinations, which (as Parish and others have 

 shown) tend to occur in hypnagogic or sleep-like states, the conditions are 

 clearly the same. The symbolism of an art, and notably music, is due to the 

 very conditions of the art, which exclude any appeal to other senses. The 

 primitive mind reaches symbolism through a similar condition of things, coming 

 as the result of ignorance and undeveloped powers of apperception. In insanity 

 these powers are morbidly disturbed or destroyed, with the same result. 



