22 The Eev. James Wills on Dreams. 



from the force of these objections might be allowed. But it cannot be allowed 

 that separate ideas, of which the synchronism is impossible in conception, of 

 which the nature involves separate apprehension and mutual remoteness, could 

 by any known law of mind be brought by habit into the instantaneous compass 

 of a single instant. Even if we were to admit Mr. Stewart's theory, it is plain 

 enough that the result in question is not a consequence. If true, it must be 

 otherwise explained. 



Now as to the fact of such dreams, I am ready to admit, to the full extent 

 of the statements which I have often met, that they sometimes occur. But Mr. 

 Stewart's theory led him into the mistake of assuming them to be the only form 

 in which they may occur. On this point it is unnecessary to detain your atten- 

 tion. It may be enough to affirm that, from the ordinary experience of mankind 

 it seems probable that most dreams occupy the time which the same succession 

 of ideas would require in waking, — there seems, at least, no ground for the con- 

 trary supposition. Waking, too, as well as sleep, has its fits of instantaneous 

 conception. But in addition to the causes of illusion already mentioned, it may 

 be added, as well known, that the dreamer's impression as to the character of 

 the imaginary phenomena of his dream is in most instances very different from 

 the more distinct recollection to be obtained after waking. The inference 

 would seem to be that the imagined sequence of incidents is not, in most 

 instances, what it has appeared to be : a gleam of sober light streaming into the 

 vaporous medley of broken associations may have given a character of form and 

 connexion such as fancy discerns among the clouds. There are in the mind 

 habitual tendencies as well as combinations. 



But a subject of more interest is that of the law which seems to regulate 

 the actual recollection of a dream. This topic is here of the more importance, 

 as it has a very material bearing upon the explanations of the law of memory 

 already ascertained in the previous parts of this inquiry.* 



Of this there are three distinct cases to be noticed. And first, as more 

 directly including the principle, the case in which the incidents of one dream 

 are distinctly recalled in another. Dr. Abercrombie and other medical writers 

 have observed that there exists a community of consciousness tending to produce 



* Transactions, Vol. xxi. Part i. 



