THE CEREBRUM, AND ITS FUNCTIONS. 799 



voluntary control over the direction of his thoughts which alone can enable 

 him to recall the desiderated impression. And the abolition of the sense of 

 personal identity Mr. A. believing himself to be Mrs. B., or Mrs. C. believing 

 herself to be Mr. D., and acting in conformity with that belief is induced in 

 the same mode; the assurance being continually repeated, until it has taken full 

 possession of the mind of the " subject," who cannot so direct his thoughts as 

 to bring his familiar experience to antagonize and dispel the illusive idea thus 

 forced upon him. The phenomena presented by different a biologized subjects" 

 are by no means the same; for in some individuals it is the relation of the mind 

 to bodily action which is most remarkably affected, in others it is the relation of 

 the perceptive consciousness to sensations, and in others (especially those who 

 are naturally of an imaginative and excitable disposition) it is the course of 

 thought and of emotion which is most completely under external guidance. It 

 is frequently to be observed, moreover, that some capability of volitional effort 

 still remains, so that the " subject" endeavors to resist the commands of the 

 operator ; but this may usually be subdued by the emphatic reiteration of the 

 assurance " You must do this/' or " You cannot do that," which, when it takes 

 complete possession of the mind of the subject, reduces the will to a state of 

 entire powerlessness. 1 



826. It is obvious that, if the account here given of the condition of the 

 Mind and of the mode of its operation on the Body, in the state of natural 

 and artificial Reverie and Abstraction, be correct, all the actions performed in 

 these states must be regarded as essentially automatic in their nature; the 

 course of thought being entirely determined by the associations previously formed, 

 and all the bodily movements being the direct manifestations of the ideas which 

 possess the mind at the time, just as the ordinary movements of " expression" 

 are of its emotions. And it is, therefore, in these remarkable phases of psychical 

 existence, that we have the clearest manifestation of the power which Cerebral 

 changes possess, to produce muscular movement independently either of Voli- 

 tion or of Emotion ; an action which may be distinguished as ideo-motor, since 

 it only takes place when these changes are of a kind to awaken the ideational 

 consciousness; and which is a true "reflex" action of the Cerebrum. The 

 same designation may be fairly applied, also, to all those actions performed by 

 us in our ordinary waking state, which are rather the automatic expressions of 

 the ideas which are dominant in our minds at the time, than prompted by dis- 

 tinct volitional effort ( 817). Of this kind, the act of expressing the thoughts 

 in language, whether by speech or writing, may be considered as a good ex- 

 ample; for the attention may be so completely given up to the choice of words 

 and to the composition of the sentences, that the movements by which these 

 words are uttered by the voice or traced on paper no more partake of the truly 

 volitional character, than do those of our limbs when we walk through the 

 streets in a state of Abstraction. And it is a curious evidence of the influence 

 of Ideas, rather than of the agency of the Will, in producing them, that, as our 

 conceptions are a little in advance of our speech or writing, it occasionally 



1 It is worthy of particular notice in this connection, that this want, not really of power 

 to move, but of belief in the possession of the power, is a frequent characteristic of that 

 state of the nervous system which is commonly designated as " Hysterical;" and that here, 

 also, the most efficacious treatment consists in the encouragement of volitional efforts on 

 the part of the patient to put the paralyzed limbs in action, and in the repetition of assur- 

 ances that she will recover the use of them, if she only take the appropriate means. The 

 expectation of recovery excited in other ways produces the same eifect ; and thus it has 

 been that many pseudo-miracles have been wrought on this class of patients by religious 

 enthusiasts, and that many wonderful cures have been effected by the supposed influence 

 of Mesmerism. All that is wanted is that state of confident anticipation which is commonly 

 designated as Faith. 



