J ?o OF REVERIE. SECT. XIX. i. 



SECT., XIX. 



OF REVERIE. 



i. Various degrees of reverie. 2. Sleep-walkers. Cafe of a young 

 lady. Great furprife at awaking, dnd total forgetjulnejs of 

 what paffed in reverie. 3. No Jufpenfton of volition in reverie. 

 4. Senfaive motions continue, an<$kflre conjijlent, 5. Irritative 

 motions continue ', but are not fucceeded b\ fen fat ion. 6. Volition 

 neffary for the perception of feeble imprejflons. 7. Affociated mo- 

 tions continue. 8. Nerves of fenfe are irritable injleep> but not 

 in reverie. 9. Somnambuli are not ajleep. Contagion received 

 but once. 10. Definition of reverie. 



i. WHEN we are employed with great fenfation of pleafure, 

 or with great efforts of volition, in the purfuit of fome intereft- 

 ing train of ideas, we ceafe to be confcious of our exiftence, 

 are inattentive to time and place, and do not diftinguifti this 

 train of fenfitive and voluntary ideas from the irritative ones ex- 

 cited by the prefence of external objects, though our organs of 

 fenfe are furrounded with their accuilomed ftimuli, till at length 

 this interefting train of ideas becomes exhaufted, or the appulfes 

 of external obje&s are applied with unufual violence, and we re- 

 turn with furprife, or with regret, into the common track o'f life. 

 This is termed reverie or ftudium. 



In fome conilitutions thefe reveries continue a confiderable 

 time, and are not to be removed without greater difficulty, but 

 are experienced in a lefs degree by us all ; when we attend ear- 

 neilly to the ideas excited by volition or fenfation, with their af- 

 fociated connexions, but are at the fame time confcious at inter- 

 vals of the ftimuli of furrounding bodies. Thus in being pref- 

 ent at a play, or in reading a romance, fome perfons are fo totally 

 abforbed as to forget their ufual time of fleep, and to neglect their 

 meals ; while others are faid to have been fo involved in volun- 

 tary ftudy as not to have heard the difcharge of artillery, and 

 there is a ftory of an Italian politician, who could think fo intenfe- 

 ly on other fubjefts, as to be infenfible to the torture of the rack. 



From hence it appears, that thefe catenations of ideas and 

 mufcular motions, which form the trains of reverie, are compo- 

 pofed both of voluntary and fenfitive afTociations of them ; and 

 that thefe ideas differ from thofe of delirium or of fleep, as they 

 are kept confident by the power of volition ; and they differ al- 

 fo from the trains of ideas belonging to infanity, as they are as 

 frequently excited by fenfation as by volition. But laftly, that 



the 



