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DREAMS AND DREAMING. 
By Rev . A. W. WELFORD, of Colne. 
November 19/A, 1907. 
The lecturer did not claim to be able to solve the mystery 
of dreams, but only to attempt a little elucidation, and to 
indicate the direction in which a complete understanding lies. 
It was correct to say that with qualifications, everybody 
dreams, but there are persons who say they never dream, — 
had never been troubled with joyous fancies or the horrors 
of nightmare. /Anyone should be chary in making a statement 
of that kind. It would be wiser to say he had no recollection 
of it. It is quite safe to affirm that all adults dream, but 
there were considerable doubts as to whether infants dream. 
Some cynic has said that there are those who never do anything 
else but sleep, that their life was a dream, and somewhat 
empty at that. 
Scientists had described sleep as a temporary loss of 
consciousness, a depression in the nerve centres, resulting in 
temporary oblivion. In sleep does the body or the mind only 
rest, or both ? There were metaphysical and strong psycho- 
logical grounds for believing that a sleeping mind is practically 
inconceivable. Mind by its very nature cannot sleep. They 
dreamt during the whole of their sleeping time. That 
there was no recollection was not an insuperable objection. 
It was the more vivid dreams that were remembered 
Dreaming might be cultivated. Again and again it had been 
testified that while people may not be usually conscious of 
ever dreaming, yet if suddenly aroused from sleep, they 
found they had been disturbed in a dream. It would seem 
that a natural waking gave opportunity to the dream 
images to pass away, leaving no trace, whereas a sudden 
arousing caught the dreamer, so to speak, in the act. 
More than one writer had drawn attention to the great 
similarity between the dream state and insanity. The dreamer 
may not be insane, though the insane may be a dreamer. It 
was not easy to discover to what extent the will power is 
exercised in dreamland. 
