AND BODILY STATES UPON THE IMAGINATION. 65 



senses ; our being would be a blank, and we should feel that we 

 were, like Campbell's last man, alone in the world. The passions 

 are our mental stimuli ; and I have shown how they modify the 

 state of the imagination during sleep : hence, if we wish to sleep 

 undisturbed, or to be visited only by those dreams which are agree- 

 able, we should remove all strong mental impression, of an unplea- 

 sant character, from our thoughts before retiring to rest. Unhap- 

 pily, however, for such is the tenure of our existence, we are un- 

 able, in many instances, to control the gloomy ideas which will in- 

 trude themselves, unbidden and unwished, into the mind, — we can- 

 not get rid of the melancholy produced by loss of fortune, 

 injured fame, or false friendship, — so that we in reality possess 

 more power over the condition of the body, than we do over the 

 state of the mind ; and, consequently, these recollections will be 

 called up during sleep, and invested with all the false colouring 

 with which the Imagination can array them. The state of our 

 body, also, modifies the condition of the mind, as I have said, in a 

 degree as marked as that produced by the passions; but with regard 

 to the management of this, some rules may be laid down, which 

 will influence, in a great measure, the Imagination of our dreams. 

 Physiologists have divided the stimuli which affect our body into 

 classes ; such are the great divisions established by Halle of the 

 circumfusa and injesta, — the former including all physical causes, 

 such as climate, the atmosphere, and the seasons, which aifect us 

 from without, — the latter comprehending such as operat;e upon the 

 body from within, in the shape of the infinite modifications of diet. 

 There is a third class of causes, which may afiect the mind 

 through the medium of the body ; and that is the imperfect exha- 

 lation or excretion of those liquids or gases which are become 

 foreign to its nature, and which are evidenced in the perspiration: 

 from the skin, the vapour from the lungs, and the serous fluids ex- 

 haled on the surface of every membrane, and in the interior of every 

 cavity throughout the whole organization. From impure air, from 

 indolence, and from other causes, these become retained or not fur- 

 nished in sufficient quantity ; and the result is, a state of bodily 

 complaint, which, re-acting upon the mind in sleep, becomes a source 

 of unpleasant dreams. Exercise, during a state of health, is the 

 great medium of preserving these eliminations, or excretions, in a 

 state of sufficient activity. In bringing one division of causes af- 

 fecting the bodily health to bear upon the condition of the mind 

 during sleep, we should, if we wish to rest in peace and dream of 

 happiness, have a chamber of moderate capacity, well supplied with 



VOL. IV. NO. XV. s 



