i/° OF REVERIE. Sect. XIX. i.' 



SECT. xix. ; 



OF REVERIE. 



i. Various degrees of reverie. 2. Sleep-walkers. Cafe of a young 

 ly. Great fur prife at awaking. And total for gctfulnefs of 

 what pnffed in reverie. 3. No fufpenjion of volition in reverie. 

 4. Senfitive motions continue, and are conftflent. 5. Irritative 

 motions continue, but are not fucceeded by fenfation. 6. Volition 

 necefhry for the perception of feeble impreffions. 7. A fociated mo- 

 tions continue. 8. Nerves offenfe are irritable infeep, but not in 

 reverie, p. Somnambuli are not afleep; Contagion received but 

 once. 10. Definition of reverie. 



1. "When we are employed with great fenfation of pleafure, 

 t with great efforts of volition, in the purfuit of fome intereft- " 

 ing train of ideas, we ceafe to be confeious of our exiflence, 

 are inattentive to time and place ? and do not diftinguifh this 

 train of fenfitive and voluntary ideas from the irritative ones ex- 

 cited by the prefence of external objects, though our organs of 

 fenfe are furrounded with their accuftomed ftimuli, till at length 

 this interefting train of ideas becomes exhaufted, or the appulfes 

 of external objects are applied with unufal violence, and we re- 

 turn with furprife, or with regret, into the common track of life. 

 This is termed reverie or ftudium. 



In fome conftitutions thefe reveries continue a confiderable i 

 time, and are not to be removed without greater difficulty, but 

 are experienced in a lefs degree by us all ; when we attend ear- 

 neftly to the ideas excited by volition or fenfation, with their af- 

 fociated connexions) but are at the fame time confeious at inter- 

 vals of the itimuli of furrpunding bodies. Thus in being pref- 

 ent at a play, or in reading a romance, fome perforrs are fo totally 1 

 abforbed as to forget their ufual time of fleep, and to neglect their 

 meals ; while ethers are faid to have been fo involved in volun- 

 tary ftudy as not to have heard the difcharge of artillery ; and 

 there is a (lory of an Italian politician, who could think fo intenfe- 

 Jy on other fubjecls, as to be infenfible to the torture of the rack. 



From hence it appears, that thefe catenations of ideas and 

 mufcular motions, which form the trains of reverie, are compo- 

 fed both cf voluntary and fenfitive afTbciations of them ; and 

 that thefe ideas differ from thofe of delirium or of fleep, as they 

 are kept conhTient by the power of volition ; and they differ al- 

 \o from jthe trains of ideas belonging to infanity, as they are as 

 frequently excited by fenfation as by volition. But laftly, that 



the 



