January 27, 1899.] 



iSCIENCE. 



123 



"Consequently, whatever is absolutely- 

 impossible you cannot form an idea of?" 



" This I grant." 



" But can a color or a triangle, such as 

 you describe these abstract general ideas, 

 really exist?" 



"It is absolutely impossible such things 

 exist in nature." 



" Should it not follow, then, that they can 

 not exist in your mind, or, in other words, 

 that you cannot conceive or frame an idea 

 of them ? I do not perceive that I can, by 

 any facultj', whether intellect or imagina- 

 tion, conceive or form an idea of that which 

 is impossible and includes a contradiction." 

 (Alciphron VII.,6.) 



" I am of a vulgar cast, simple enough to 

 believe my senses and to leave things as I 

 find them. To be plain, it is my opinion 

 that' the real things are the very things I 

 see and feel and perceive by my senses. 

 These I know and, finding they answer all 

 the necessities and purposes of life, have no 

 reason to be solicitous about any other un- 

 known beings. A piece of sensible bread, 

 for instance, would stay my stomach better 

 than ten thousand times as much of that 

 insensible, unintelligible real bread you 

 speak of. It is likewise my opinion that 

 colors and other sensible qualities are in the 

 objects. I cannot, for my life, help thinking 

 that snow is white and fire hot. Away, then, 

 with all that skepticism, all those ridicu- 

 lous philosophical doubts. I might as well 

 doubt my own being as the being of those 

 things I actually see and feel." (Three 

 Dialogues, III.) 



While we are unable to doubt the being 

 of those things we see and feel, we do con- 

 tinually doubt or question the evidence of 

 our senses, for error and illusion and hal- 

 lucination are, unfortunately, as real as 

 truth ; and the part of Powell's book 

 which deals with illusions is that which the 

 reader will find most attractive and sug- 

 gestive. 



' ' When a youth, as I was breaking prairie 

 with an ox team, my labor was interrupted 

 by a rattlesnake, and, during the day, I 

 saw and killed several of these serpents. 

 At one time the lash of my whip flew oif. 

 In trying to pick it up I grasped a stick. 

 The fear of being bitten by a snake, and the 

 degree of expectant attention to which I 

 was wrought, caused me to interpret the 

 sense impression of touch as caused by a 

 rattlesnake. At the same time I distinctly 

 heard the rattle of the snake." 



"A soldier in the suspense which precedes 

 the battle, when sharpshooters are now and 

 then picking off a man, may have his gun 

 or his clothing touched by a rifle ball and 

 in the suspense of the occasion may imagine 

 that he has received a serious, perhaps a 

 deadly wound, and may shi'iek with pain. 

 A mustard plaster on the head may cause 

 a man to dream of an Indian conflict in 

 which he is scalped, as I have observed." 



All savages believe that hallucinations are 

 a means of divination, and, as many intox- 

 icants produce hallucinations, all of the 

 North American tribes make use of these, 

 supplemented with many rites, such as 

 dancing, singing, ululation, the beating of 

 drums, and the tormenting of the body by 

 various painful operations, all designed to 

 produce ecstatic states and the consequent 

 hallucinations. 



If the Society for Psychical Eesearch 

 were to make a census of those who believe 

 that hallucinations often reveal the un- 

 known past or future, Powell tells us that 

 they would find among the North American 

 Indians one hundred per cent, ready to 

 testify to the truth of this opinion. 



Erroneous judgments once made may be 

 repeated in perpetuating fallacies, and myths 

 are invented to explain them. Then the 

 myths become sacred, and the moral nature 

 is enlisted in their defense. 



" The stars were seen to move along the 

 firmament, or the surface of a solid, from 



