

real differences between orderly waking or 

 primary concepts, and imagination, 

 memory, dream, illusion, breaks down, or 

 disappears altogether. In fact the con- 

 ditions under which the insane are bound 

 are then most closely realised. Let those 

 whose inexperience may have led them 

 hitherto to trifle with the full va^ue of the 

 natural guardians of our reason beware of 

 this consequence when they would erecb 

 the illusions of the crippled senses into 

 equality with the evidence of the com- 

 bined senses when free and unconditioned 

 and at their best. 



Although in a waking state, and under 

 ordinary circumstances, we may have 

 within ourselves a tolerably clear and un- 

 mistakable standard of what is real and 

 unreal, yet at times, and with relation to 

 particular concepts, there may be pro- 

 duced a very gradual and subtle blending 

 of the two. 



Especially is this result apt to arise 

 when the region of fancy is in its most 

 active state. 



THE REGION OF FANCY. 



There is something most mysterious 

 and perplexing in the concepts of fancy. 

 They flit before our minds in myriad 

 shapes, moods and colors, without sum- 

 mons ; change their humors as in a 

 kaleidoscope before we can well define 

 them ; and finally vanish, but to appear 

 again and again, under favorable circum- 

 stances, as at first. Maay suppose that 

 the world of fancy, automatic introspec- 

 tion, or imagination (clearly distinguished 

 by the conscious mind in health, from 

 what, for want of a better description, 

 we may call " external perception ") is 

 only fully disclosed to our minds during 

 sleep or in delirium. But this supposition 

 is traceable to inattention or inexperience. 

 The retrospect of memory, the poet's 

 trance, and the air castles built by the 

 waking dreamer gazing upon the bur- 

 nished cloud or glowiog ember, although 

 allied creations lack the vivid tone de- 

 velopment of those creatures and scenes 

 of fancy which startle us in the horrors 

 of nightmare, or elate us in our more 

 exalted moods during sleep. But the 

 waking state has also an undercurrent of 

 fancy which in every respect is analagous to 

 our concepts during sleep. 



UNDERCURRENTS OF FANCY EXPERIENCED 

 DURING WAKING STATE. 



Duriag our active waking state, when 

 the external world has its meximum 

 effect, the senses are continually drinking 

 in fresh concepts at their various portals, 

 each sense interpreting its varied impres- 

 sions with that order and consistency 

 which distinguishes the character of 

 external impressions or fresh concepts. 

 The reception of thpse primary concepts, 

 characterised by their greater intensity, 

 eclipses ihe softer reflex echoes of the 

 imagination just as the stars are blotted 

 from our vision by the approach of the 

 radiant sun. The reflective imagination 

 is not necessarily reduced to absolute in- 

 activity, but rather it is that to the 

 imaginative listener the louder speaking 

 voices eclipse the more feeble. 



The ghosts of the waking state are 

 clearly analogous to the horrid nightmare 

 demons of sleep. Such horrid dreams 

 may be produced artificially by wilful 

 interference with the breathing of the un- 

 conscious sleeper. (See " Illusions," by 

 James Sully, p. 116— International 

 series.) Thus, disturb the breathing 

 of the unconscious sleeper by plac- 

 ing a heavy fold of the bedclothes 

 over the mouth and partly the nostrils. 

 By degress his face flushes, the skin 

 exudes a sweat, the limbs are aimlessly 

 jerked about ss if in distress, and at last it 

 is so oppressive as to awake the uncon- 

 scious object of our experiment, who 

 immediately proceeds to relata that he 

 has awoke from a frightful dream, where- 

 in he vividly felc he was being suffocated 

 by some monster of horrid shape who sat 

 upon his chest and grasped his throat 

 with angry claws. 



But intense fear during the waking 

 state may at times, with superstitious 

 minds, produce somewhat corresponding 

 distorted coocepts. The young and timid 

 whose minds have been saturated with 

 the weird legends of the Scottish High- 

 lands, are at times specially subject to the 

 influence of such disturbing illusions 

 when obliged to travel alone in the silence 

 of the night through dismal glades of 

 sighing pines and peopled by repute by 



ghostly shades. To such it is possible 

 that the indistinct outline of a dead 



stump faintly shining by moonlight, the 



phosphorescent fungus, or even a curi- 



