1881. 1 OH the Visions of Sane Persons. 651 



but actual Lalluciuatious of sight, souud, or other sense, at one or 

 more periods of their lives. I have a considerable packet of 

 instances contributed by my personal friends, besides a large number 

 communicated to me by otlier correspondents. One lady, a distin- 

 guished authoress, who was at the time a little fidgeted, but in no 

 way overwrought or ill, assured me that she once saw the principal 

 character of one of her novels glide through the door straight up to 

 her. It was about the size of a large doll, and it disaj^peared as 

 suddenly as it came. Another lady, the daughter of an eminent 

 musician, often imagines she hears her father jjlaying. The day she 

 told me of it the incident had again occurred. She was sitting in a 

 room with her maid, and she asked the maid to open the door that 

 she might hear the music better. The moment the maid got up the 

 hallucination disappeared. Again, another lady, apparently in 

 vigorous health, and belonging to a vigorous family, told me that 

 during some past months she had been j^lagued by voices. The 

 words were at first simple nonsense ; then the word " pray " was 

 frequently repeated ; this was followed by some more or less coherent 

 sentences of little import, and finally the voices left her. In short, 

 the familiar hallucinations of the insane are to be met with far more 

 frequently than is commonly supposed, among people moving in 

 society and in good working health. 



I have now nearly done with my summary of facts ; it remains to 

 make a few comments on them. 



The weirdness of visions lies in their sudden appearance, in their 

 vividness while present, and in their sudden departure. An incident 

 in the Zoological Gardens struck me as a helpful simile. I happened 

 to walk to the seal-pond at a moment when a sheen rested on the 

 unbroken surface of the water. After waiting a while 1 became 

 suddenly aware of the head of a seal, black, conspicuous, and 

 motionless, just as though it had always been there, at a spot on 

 which my eye had rested a moment previously and seen nothing. 

 Again, after a while my eye wandered, and on its returning to the 

 spot, the seal was gone. The water had closed in silence over its 

 head without leaving a ripple, and the sheen on the surface of the 

 pond was as unbroken as when I first reached it. Where did the seal 

 come from, and whither did it go? This could easily have been 

 answered if the glare had not obstructed the view of the movements 

 of the animal under water. As it was, a solitary link in a continuous 

 chain of actions stood isolated from all the rest. So it is with the 

 visions ; a single stage in a series of mental processes emerges into 

 the domain of consciousness. All that precedes and follows lies 

 outside of it, and its character can only be inferred. We see in a 

 general way, that a condition of the presentation of visions lies in 

 the over-sensitiveness of certain tracks or domains of brain action, 

 and the under-sensitiveness of others ; certain stages in a mental 

 process being vividly represented in consciousness while the other 

 stages are unfelt. It is also well known that a condition of partial 



