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muscles, and cause them to speak the word, strike the blow, put 
one foot before another. If we wish to ascertain whether there 
is any probability that the hypothesis is true, in what direction 
should we look for proof? The answer is clear. We must en- 
deavour to find out whether the results that follow the functional 
exercise of the material organs of man, are ever to be met with 
dissociated from the exercise of those functions.. To the late 
Serjeant Cox belongs the merit of the suggestion that if the mech- 
anism of man is composed of soul as well as body, the fact must be 
capable of proof, and some facts might surely be discovered that 
would throw some light upon the subject. 
SOMNAMBULISM. 
The state of artificial somnambulism, or the mesmeric state, 
offers a wide field for observations to the student of Psychology. 
Somnambulism, or sleep-walking, has no connection with sleep; 
although natural somnambulism occurs more often when the patient 
is asleep, or has lain down to rest in the dark, than at any other 
time. The mesmeric state, or trance, is the state of somnambulism 
artificially induced. Somnambulism is the mesmeric state natur- 
ally induced. The word “sleep-walking” should be discarded, 
on account of its being inseparably connected in our minds with the 
condition of sleep ; an objection which does not apply to the word 
“somnambulism,” though of course the meaning of the two words 
is the same. The appearance of the patient in somnambulism is 
that of one plunged in profound slumber: in the great majority of 
instances the eyes are firmly closed ; the countenance is extremely 
placid, and the face very pale, the extremities abnormally cold and 
clammy; the breathing regular and full, with frequent sighing, or, 
to be more accurate, with deep inspirations that make the sound 
of a sigh, but are not, like sighing, expressions of any mental 
emotion. But here the resemblance to sleep ends. The conditions 
differ from those of sleep in these particulars: the muscles are not 
flaccid, but retain all, and often more than than all, the ordinary 
tension of working life. The limbs are not relaxed, but in energetic 
action. The head does not droop. The muscles are extremely 
a 
