230 Shadowings 



revival so magnified and prolonged as to create 

 the illusion of flight. We know that in actual 

 time the duration of most dreams is very brief. 

 But in the half -life of sleep (nightmare offering 

 some startling exceptions) there is scarcely more 

 than a faint smouldering of consciousness by 

 comparison with the quick flash and vivid thrill 

 of active cerebration ; and time, to the dream 

 ing brain, would seem to be magnified, somewhat 

 as it must be relatively magnified to the feeble 

 consciousness of an insect. Supposing that any 

 memory of the sensation of falling, together 

 with the memory of the concomitant fear, should 

 be accidentally revived in sleep, the dream-pro 

 longation of the sensation and the emotion 

 unchecked by the natural sequence of shock 

 might suffice to revive other and even pleasur 

 able memories of airy motion. And these, again, 

 might quicken other combinations of interrelated 

 memories able to furnish all the incident and 

 scenery of the long phantasmagoria. 



But this hypothesis will not fully explain cer 

 tain feelings and ideas of a character different 

 from any experience of waking-hours, the ex 

 ultation of voluntary motion without exertion, 

 the pleasure of the utterly impossible, the 



