220 Reverie^ considered as 



a new figure ; or a felicity of diction or of 

 thought. This reflection may serve to anali2ie 

 the art of keeping attention awake in others.-^v 

 It may recommend the impressions we have 

 enumerated, as useful expedients in oratory ; 

 and explain the principle, which makes us 

 wish to have a public speaker in our view, 

 while Vv^e are listening to him. 



When the habit of mental absence is suffi. 

 ciently confirmed to constitute a disease, the 

 appulses of external objects, which would 

 interrupt reverie in stronger minds, are found 

 to strike upon the senses in vain. A man is 

 mentboned'. in- Zoonomia, who, during the 

 paroxi'sm of reverie, was reciting some lines 

 from Pope, one of which he had forgotten, it 

 Was several times ineffectually shouted in his 

 ears; till at length, after much labour, he 

 recollected it by his own efforts. Yet though 

 isiich appulses do not destroy, they sometimes 

 harmonize with ihe waking dream. In this 

 case they excite attention ; and the reverie, 

 without, being "broken, insensibly glides into 

 sutyects connected with these appulses. In 

 the work we have just now quoted, is an in- 

 lijre'Sting account of a young person, tv'ho, 

 while lost in reverie, heard a passing bell; and 

 without feeing recalled to a consciousness of 

 r-vMandc^f Ing- th^igTit/.^was'-^soon aft^r heard- to 



