52 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2na S. No 55., Jan. 17. '57. 



disposition, or any other cause, languid, or only slightly 

 attentive to the conversation. The persuasion of the 

 scene being a repetition cornea on when the attention has 

 been roused by some accidental circumstance. ... I 

 believe the explanation to be this : onh' one brain has 

 been used in the immediately preceding part of the scene ; 

 the other brain has been asleep, or in an analogous state 

 nearly approaching it. When the attention of both 

 brains is roused to the topic, there is the same vague 

 consciousness that the ideas have parsed through the 

 mind before, which takes place on re-perusing the page 

 M'c had read while thinking on some other subject. The 

 ideas have passed through the mind before ; and as there 

 was not a sufficient consciousness to fix them in the 

 mind, without a renewal, We have no means of knowing 

 the length of time that had elapsed between the faint 

 impression received by the single brain, and the distinct 

 impression by the double brain. It may seem to have 

 been many years. 



" The strongest example of this delusion T ever recol- 

 lect in my own person was at the funeral of* the Princess 

 Charlotte. . . . Several disturbed nights previous!}', 

 and the almost total privation of rest on the night im- 

 mediately preceding it, had put my mind into a state of 

 hysterical irritability, which was still further increased 

 by grief, and by exhaustion for want of food. . . ., I 

 had been standing for four hours, and on taking my place 

 beside the coffin in St. George's Chapel, was only pre- 

 vented from tainting b.v the interest of the scene. . . . 

 Suddenh', after the pathetic miserere of Mozart, the music 

 ceased, and there was an absolute silence. The coffin, 

 placed on a kind of altar covered with black cloth, sank 

 down so slowly through the floor, that it was only in 

 measuring its progress by some brilliant object be^-ond, 

 that any motion could be perceived. I had fallen into a 

 sort of torpid reverie, when f was recalled to consciousness 

 by a paroxysm Of grief on the part of the bereaved hus- 

 band, as his e3»e suddenly caught the Coffin sinking into 

 its black grave formed by the inverted covering of the 

 altar. In an instant, I felt not merely an impression, but 

 a conviction, that I had seen the whole scene before, and 

 had heai-d the very words addressed to myself bj' Sir 

 Geo. Nay lor. . . . Often did I discuss this matter 

 with my talented friend, the late Dr. Gooch, who always 

 took great interest in subjects occupying the debateable 

 region between physics and meti physics, but we could 

 never devise an explanation satisfactory to either of us. 

 I cannot but think that the theory of two brains affords a 

 sufficient solution of this othervvise inexplicable pheno- 

 irienon." 



It vVould seem to have been under slmilav de- 

 rangement of the nervous system, unstrung by 

 swkiiess, misfortune, or grief, or over-exertion, or 

 when the feelings have been deeply stirred by 

 sorrte national calamity, that this peculiar sensation 

 has tisually manifested itself. At such times the 

 very atmosphere seems fraught with some strange 

 influence ; every accustomed sound — even the 

 ticking of a clock — unnoticed betbre, faljs upon 

 the ear with almost painful distinctness, and the 

 silence which intervenes Seems almost pret^i*- 

 natiiral. In the case of Sir W. Scott, recorded in 

 that pathetic Diary of his closing life, from which 

 your correspondent F. has given an extract, his 

 mind had been hopelessly impaired by his almost 

 superhuman efforts to retrieve his ruined fortunes, 

 and the delicacy of his mental organisation, which, 

 his biographer remarks, he had always stoically 



endeavoured to hide, had become apparent to his 

 friends, before that entry was made in his Diary. 

 Indeed, the touching record of his wayward alter- 

 nation of feelings, at that very period, inscribed 

 by his own hand on a neighbouring page, shows 

 that there was every predisposition in his mind to 

 induce a state of morbid sensibility. 



" I spent the day," he says, " which was delightful, 

 wandering from place to place in the woods, sometimes 

 reading, sometimes 'chev/ing the cud of sweet and bitter 

 fancies,' 'idly stirred ' by the succession of a thousand 

 vague thoughts and fears, the gay strangely mingled 

 with those of dismal melancholy ;" tears which seemed 

 ready to flow unbidden; smiles which approached to 

 those of insanity; all that wild variety of mood which 

 solitude engenders." 



And so, too, in Hone's case, it was when he had 

 been completely worn down by the excitement of 

 hie extraordinary trial, that he was suddenly 

 startled by an apparent recognition of an apart- 

 ment^ which he had certainly entered for the first 

 time in his life. There is to be accounted for, 

 however, in his story, the curioiis fact, that he 

 proposed, as a test to himself of the reality of the 

 impression, the finding of a certain knot in the 

 wood of the window-shutter, and that he actually 

 did discover it. 



In fine, we may, perhaps, accept the ingenious 

 explanatory theory of Dr. Wigan as the most 

 plausible solution ; but, as to the doubleness or 

 duality of the mincL which the title of his book 

 implies, Sir Henry Holland, in his elegant Chap- 

 ters on Mental Physiology, affirms that he can see 

 no foundation for it. But, may we not with great 

 probability conclude, that the singular mental 

 phenomenon which forms the subject of this note 

 proceeds " from some incongruous action of the 

 double structure of the brain" to which perfect 

 unity of action belongs in a healthy state ? 



W. L. Nichols. 



Bath. 



There are " many mansions " in the kingdom of 

 God. Is it not then very possible that previously 

 to this rife the human soul hSs passed through 

 many mansioils, that is, many different phases of 

 existence, and that k. is destined to pass through 

 many more before it arrives at its final rest? 

 Surely if we could establish as true the idea of a 

 pre -existence, we should gain an additional argii- 

 ment, if such were wanting, in proof of an immor- 

 tality to come. 



We are told that Pythagoras recollected his 

 former self in the respective persons of a herald 

 named ^Ethalides, Euphorbus the Trojan, Her- 

 raotimus of Clazomena?, and others, and that he 

 even pointed out in the temple of Juno, at Argos, 

 the shield he used when he attacked Patroclus. 



CjIti any of your readers name others who have 

 felt, or pretended to feel, a consciousness of pre- 

 existence ? t. h\ D. 



