SECT. XIX. 2. O F R E V E R I E. *6f 



time confcious at intervals of the ftiinuli of fur- 

 founding bodies. Thus in being prefent 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 (aid to 

 have been fo involved in voluntary ftudy as not to 

 have heard the discharge of artillery ; and there is 

 a ftory of an Italian politician, who could think fo 

 intenfely on other fubjecls, 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 compofed both of voluntary and 

 fenfitive aflbciations of them ; and that thefe ideas 

 differ from thofe of delirium or of fleep, as they 

 are kept confident by the power of volition ; ancl 

 they differ alfo from the trains of ideas belonging 

 to infanity, as they are as frequently excited by 

 fenfation as by volition. But laitly, that the whole 

 fenforial power is fo employed on thefe trains of 

 complete reverie, that like the violent efforts of 

 volition, as in convulfions or infanity ; or like the 

 great activity of the irritative motions in drunken- 

 nefs ; or of the fenfitive motions in delirium ; 

 they preclude all fenfation confequent to external 

 ftimulus. 



2. Thofe perfons, who are faid to walk in their 

 fleep, are affected with reverie to fo great a degree, 

 that it becomes a formidable difeafe ; the eflence of 

 which confifts in the inaptitude of the mind to at* 

 tend to external ftimuli. Many hiflories of this 

 difeafe have been publifhed by medical writers $ of 

 which there is a very curious one in the Laufanne 

 Tranfaftions. I fhall here fubjoin an account of 

 fuch a cafe, with its cure, for the better illuf- 

 tration of this fubject. 



A. very ingenious and elegant young lady, with 

 light eyes and hair, about the age of feventeen, in 



other 



