From the Unconscious to the Conscious 



impression which has brought about the disturbance. 

 He then is impervious to any exterior influence and to 

 all reasoning. At such times an external contradiction 

 is never accepted. 



When mediums are persons of high intellectual type 

 the concentration of the psychic powers on ideas succeed- 

 ing one another rapidly and reinforced by this concen- 

 tration, makes them brilliant speakers and wonderful 

 improvisers; but the quality of their intellectual output 

 is extremely diverse, varying from high inspiration to 

 commonplace fluency, and mere incontinence of thought. 



Just as the neuropathic defects of men of genius 

 do not explain genius, so the characteristics or defects 

 of mediums do not explain mediumship, they are its 

 accompaniments. 



4. NEURASTHENIA 



It may seem strange to refer neurasthenia to a dis- 

 equilibrium in the individual grouping, but nothing is 

 more true. 



Neurasthenia is essentially due to a want of corre- 

 spondence between the vital dynamism and the organism. 



This disturbance can hardly exist without a congenital 

 predisposing cause, but it may be provoked by some 

 proximate cause, a slight infection or toxic influence, a 

 defect of glandular secretion, some organic defect or a 

 reflex action. Whatever the immediate cause may be, 

 there is no proportion between it and the symptoms 

 produced. 



The defective action of the vital dynamism appears 

 first as a feeling of fatigue. The vital functions, the 

 regular play of the organs, all which normally take place 

 unnoticed and regularly, require a painful effort in the 

 neurasthenic. 



His sleep is disturbed, there is always insomnia, or 

 hypo-somnia, which does not completely arrest the 



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