250 MYTH AND SCIENCE. 



or to appear to be, actual realities, even in a strictly 

 normal condition of mind and body. Nor do they 

 only implicitly tend to become such by the innate 

 impulse of the mind, but they actually become so in 

 fugitive moments of which man is scarcely conscious, 

 and they appear to him exactly as they do in dreams. 

 Hence it follows that there is no hard and fast line 

 between the sleeping and waking states, so far as the 

 nature of images, their source, action, and combina- 

 tions are concerned, when men are distracted in 

 mind, and the course of their thoughts is not volun- 

 tarily directed to some definite object ; so that by a 

 psychological process the phenomena of the waking 

 state may be partly transformed into those of dreams. 

 The vivid character of the image, presented to the 

 senses as if actually there, is common to both pheno- 

 mena. The way in which we begin to dream, shows how, 

 owing to our physiological conditions, we pass through 

 regular stages from the waking state into that of sleep. 



"Nuovo pensiero dentro a me si mi so, 

 Dal qual piii altri nacquero e diversi ; 

 E tanto di uno in altro vaneggiai 

 Che gli ocelli per vaghezza ricopersi, 

 E il pensanieuto in soguo trasmutai." * 



So Dante writes in the "Purgatorio " with deep and 

 subtle truth. Each man can verify for himself the 

 exactness of the great poet's description. 



* A new thought entered my mind, whence others, differing from 

 the first, arose ; and as I roamed from one to another I was tempted to 

 close my eyes, and thought was changed into a dream. 



