SCIENTIFIC DREAMS OF THE PAST. 365 



In 1760 another dreamer, Tiphaigne de La Roche, published 

 under the title of Giphantie, an anagram of his name, a curious 

 little work in which photography is described in the ultimate 

 state to which it has just been brought with the reproduction 

 of the colors. Tiphaigne supposes himself transported to the 

 palace of the elementary genii, the chief of whom told him : " You 

 know that the rays of light, reflected from different bodies, form a 

 picture and depict those bodies on all smooth surfaces, iike the 

 retina of the eye, water, and ice. The elementary spirits have 

 endeavored to fix those transient images ; they have composed a 

 very subtle and viscous matter, quick in drying and hardening, by 

 means of which a picture is made in a wink. They wash a piece 

 of cloth with this matter, and present it to the objects which they 

 desire to depict. The first effect of the varnished cloth is that of 

 a mirror, in which one can see all the bodies, near and distant, of 

 which the light can bring the image. The cloth with its viscous 

 coating holds the images, which the glass can not do. The mirror 

 represents the objects faithfully to you, but retains none ; our 

 cloths represent them no less faithfully, but keep them all. The 

 impression of the images is made the instant the cloth receives 

 them. It is taken away at once, and put in a dark place ; an hour 

 later, the coating has dried, and you have a picture, all the more 

 precious because no art can imitate the truthfulness of it, and time 

 can not damage it in any way. We take from the purest source, 

 the body of light, the colors which painters extract from differ- 

 ent materials, and which time never fails to change. The pre- 

 cision of the design, the variety of the expression, the touches of 

 more or less strength, the gradation of shades, the rules of per- 

 spective, are all abandoned to Nature, which, with a sure course 

 that is never false to itself, traces on our cloths the images which 

 are imposed by her on our eyes, and cause us to question whether 

 what we call realities are not other kinds of phantoms imposed 

 upon our sight, hearing, touch, and all the senses at once. The 

 elementary spirit then went into physical details; first on the 

 nature of the adhesive substance which intercepts and holds the 

 rays ; then on the difficulties met in preparing and using it ; and, 

 lastly, on the part played by light and the dried substance ; three 

 problems which I propose to the physicists of our time, and leave 

 to their sagacity." 



The function given by Tiphaigne to the elementary spirits sug- 

 gests that that author had been initiated into the occult sciences, 

 according to which all the substances in nature possess a proper 

 life, a kind of mortal soul, defined by the term elemental, which 

 directs their reciprocal actions. 



" There is not a thing in the world, not a blade of grass, over 

 which a spirit does not reign," says the Cabala of the Jews; 



