THE SUBCONSCIOUS 271 



day. And then, when "it*s murky overhead," I love 

 to turn over for another nap. During these moments 

 of half-wakefulness strange fantasies come and go, 

 usually foolish vagaries leaving no solid residue of any 

 value to the wideawake consciousness. The inhibi- 

 tions of the conventionalized thinking to which we 

 have schooled ourselves are partially lifted, yet with- 

 out that complete abandonment of rational control 

 characteristic of the night-time dream. Detached frag- 

 ments of previous experience seem to come together, 

 as if by mutual attraction, often in bizarre patterns 

 and occasionally in flashes of real originality that en- 

 dure the scrutiny of rational analysis in full daylight. 



After all, the real springs of inspiration are inter- 

 nal, though the raw materials are drawn from outside 

 sources, from experiences of some sort. These ma- 

 terials are stored away, often unsorted, but somehow 

 they seem to assemble themselves in some kind of 

 order, and a new experience may pull a trigger which 

 releases one of these unconsciously assembled or un- 

 deliberated trains of memories fabricated in a new 

 pattern which perhaps we could not have invented by 

 purposeful ratiocination. Or in fantasy, when the 

 ordinary controls of formalized thinking are relaxed 

 the data of experience may reassemble in accordance 

 with laws of subconscious association and appear to 

 flash into consciousness as if communicated to us 

 from the outside. 



Authors almost without number have confessed 



