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ally the insane think them to be true perceptions, and endeavor to conform their conduct to them. Yet in some instances, and very often in the beginning of insanity, they admit that they are morbid and contend against them. A question of deeper interest, and of closer relation to the subjects treated in these articles, is whether subjective visions are possible to the sane; and, if so, whether they are at all common, and liable to occur as isolated circumstances. On a full survey of the subject, both these questions will be answered in the affirmative. To say nothing of the visions produced by alcohol, opium, hasheesh, fever, blows upon the head, prolonged abstinence, deep anxiety, or those which precede attacks of epilepsy or of apoplexy, it is certain that hallucinations often arise without assignable cause or subsequent effect; and the subjects of them demonstrate their sanity by recognizing the unreal character of their perceptions.

Griesinger, one of the most eminent and discriminating writers on mental diseases, says: "Nothing would be more erroneous than to consider a man to be mentally diseased because he had hallucinations. The most extended experience shows rather that such phenomena occur in the lives of very distinguished and highly intellectual men, of the most different dispositions and various casts of mind, but especially in those of warm and powerful imagination." In illustration he speaks of Tasso, who, in the presence of Manco, carried on a long conversation with his protecting spirit; and of Goethe's well-known blue-gray vision, and his ideal flowers with their curious buds. He speaks briefly also of the hallucinations of Sir Walter Scott, Jean Paul, Benvenuto Cellini, Spinoza, Pascal; of Van Helmont, who saw his own soul in the form of a light with a human countenance; of Andral, the great physician, who experienced an hallucination of sight; and of Leuret, who, in his "Fragments of Psychology," gives an account of a phantasm of hearing which he experienced.

A. Brierre de Boismont divided hallucinations that are compatible with sanity into two kinds those which are corrected by the understanding, and those which, on account of superstition, sluggishness of thought, love of the marvelous, inability to interpret them correctly, or because the emotions which they excite make calm consideration impossible, are not corrected. The cases which he adduces are numerous and striking. One is that of Talma, who, when he trod the stage, could by the force of his will make all the brilliant dresses of his numerous audience disappear and substitute skeletons for the living characters. When he had thus filled the theater with these singular spectators, his emotions were

such as to give to his playing a force which produced the most striking effects. The case of an intelligent lady who would see a robber enter her chamber and conceal himself under her bed is in point. Though the spectacle produced violent palpitation of the heart and universal trembling, she was aware of its falsity, and after some moments her judgment and reason would triumph so that she could approach the bed and examine it without fear.

Another case was communicated by a physician of acknowledged reputation to Sir Walter Scott. The first hallucination was that of the presence of a great cat. After a few months the cat disappeared, and a phantom of a higher grade took its place-that of a gentleman usher dressed as though he was in the service of a lord lieutenant, or of some great functionary of the Church. But after some months he disappeared, and a phantom horrible and distressing, a skeleton, appeared. The fact of these visions was concealed by the subject of them, who was an important officer in a department of justice, for several years. Though he knew that they were of subjective origin, they wore him out, and he died a victim to the agony in which his years were passed.

Dr. Abercrombie gives a case of a man who had been all his life beset by hallucinations: when he met a friend in the street, he was uncertain whether he was a real person or a phantom, but by paying close attention he could distinguish between them. Dr. Abercrombie declares that he was at the time of writing in good health, of a clear intellect, and occupied in business.

Many striking instances, the most valuable of which are those personally attested by Boismont, or by the authorities whom he quotes, are given where the mind was sane, though the hallucinations were not corrected by it. It must not be supposed that these hallucinations of the sane are confined to persons of distinction, of sedentary habits, or of poetic temperaments. Many have had once or twice in their lives spectral illusions, or instances of hallucination; and among plain men, mechanics, laborers, and the peasantry of all nations, they are very common. Griesinger, after giving a list of distinguished men who, though sane, had hallucinations, says: "Judging from what we have heard and observed on this subject, hallucinations doubtless occur also in men of very average minds, not as rare but as frequently overlooked phenomena."

Spectral illusions are very common in children, and are most frequently, though not always, perceived in the night between waking and sleeping.

The persistence of dreams after one is fully awake is also a suggestive occasional experi

ence. After the appearance of the article on "Dreams, Nightmare, and Somnambulism," the editor of THE CENTURY received a letter written by a gentleman of the city of New York describing a dream which he had had a few weeks before, in which he dreamed that he was lying on his back in his own room and saw a frightful black hobgoblin, well defined in shape, which stood by the side of his bed and acted as if about to attack him. In the midst of the horror produced by the specter he awoke, found himself lying on his back just as he had dreamed, looked around the room and recognized the furniture and other things in the room, but continued to see the hobgoblin as plainly as he saw anything else, heard him growl, and distinctly saw him going on with his hostile demonstrations. Reasoning upon what he should do, he struggled to move, was unable to stir hand or foot for some time, but finally did move, and that instant the uncanny specter vanished. He says: "I had my eyes on the hobgoblin at the moment when I made the movement, and at once tried to see whether there was any object in the room which I could have mistaken for it, but could find none."

The books of marvels contain narratives which sometimes afford the evidence of their explanation, but frequently omit details which a person not disposed to the marvelous would be sure to examine if he had the opportunity. In Stilling's "Pneumatology," translated from the German and edited by Dr. George Bush, there are many of these. Stilling endeavors to show that people who see themselves are generally likely to die soon afterwards. He says: "When a person sees himself out of himself, while others who are present observe nothing, the apparition may be real, or it may be merely imaginary; but when it is also perceived by others it is no fantasy, but something real." He then gravely adds, "I myself know of persons having seen themselves and dying shortly afterwards."

He tells of one of the Government secretaries who went, as he was wont to do, to the archives to look for a paper which was very important. On arriving there he saw himself sitting on a chair. Much terrified, he went home and sent a woman servant to fetch the documents. It is asserted that the woman found him there also. Dr. Stilling does not say that the man died "shortly afterwards"; but that he did die some time after is probable, as the book is nearly a hundred years old.

Another case is that of a professor who was having a theological dispute with a number of his friends. Having occasion to go to the library for a book, he saw himself sitting on a chair at the table where he usually sat.

Going nearer, he looked over the shoulder of the person and saw that this figure of himself pointed with one finger of the right hand to a passage in the Bible. He looked at the passage indicated and saw that it was, "Set thine house in order, for thou shalt die." Full of astonishment and fear, he went back to the company and related the occurrence; and in spite of all they could say he was firm in the opinion that this apparition betokened his death, and accordingly took leave of his friends. "The day after, at six o'clock in the evening, he expired, being advanced in years." Many persons can be found who are not advanced in years who would be killed by such an experience as this.

The origin of such visions is readily traced. To imagine one's self in a familiar place with almost the vividness of life is not uncommon. Whether the vision shall be that of one's self or of another, when the mind is in such a state as to develop visions, depends much on the general belief at the time. The same principle is illustrated where it seems impossible not to see, in his accustomed seat at the table, a person who has died; and when worn with anxiety and long watching, even strong-minded men have been for a moment almost certain that they saw the familiar figure pass through the room. They have felt "the touch of a vanished hand" and heard "the sound of a voice that is still." Add a belief in the marvelous to such impressions and the vision is complete.

Sudden flashes of the imagination may develop the phenomenon instantaneously. Thus a sea captain engaged in his duty saw in the mist the figure of a boyhood companion beckoning to him. He was certain that it portended his death or that of the friend whose figure he saw, but nothing came of it. A gentleman passing along the street suddenly saw his brother whom he had not seen for twentyfive years. The figure was plain, and he was about to speak to him when he disappeared. Sometime afterwards the news came of his death at about the time of the vision. Taken alone it might seem as if there was some connection between the two circumstances; but so many have such occasional experiences which seem remarkably real, and yet are not followed by any noteworthy event, that the natural explanation is adequate to cover the cases.

The visions and hallucinations of hypnotism and animal magnetism require special examination.

HABITUAL VISIONS.

HALLUCINATIONS may become frequent, and to a certain extent systematic, especially if a belief in their supernatural origin exists; in which case a person may be for a long period

of sound and discriminating understanding, except when in a trance, or beholding a vision. The visions of St. Theresa have, for three hundred years, formed an important chapter in religious literature, and another in pathology. At twelve she was devoutly pious, becoming so after the death of her mother. About the age of fifteen she fell off into a very worldly state, and against her will was placed by her father in a convent. She was frequently ill, and finally, after a year and a half, owing to dangerous sickness, returned home. Sometime afterwards she was seized with a violent fever, and upon recovery determined to devote herself to a religious life, and in opposition to her father's wishes entered a Carmelite convent and took the veil. This was in her twentieth year. Her biographer, as translated by Dr. Madden, says that she was attacked "with frequent fits of fainting and swooning, and a violent pain at her heart, which sometimes deprived her of her senses.' Her first trance was in 1537, in her twenty-third year; it lasted for four days, and during it through excess of pain she bit her tongue in many places-a phenomenon common to fits of various kinds. At last she was reduced almost to a skeleton, had a paralytic affection of her limbs, and remained a cripple for three years. Her first vision was three years later, when she had allowed herself some dissipation of mind. "The apparition of our Lord was suddenly presented to the eyes of her soul, with a rigorous aspect testifying to the displeasure occasioned by her conduct."

There were great differences of opinion as to the source of her visions. Several very learned priests and confessors judged her to be deluded by the devil. One of them instructed her to make the sign of the cross, and to insult the vision as that of a fiend. In one of her visions, according to her statement, the Lord appeared angry at her instructions, and bade her tell them it was tyranny. She acknowledged that she frequently saw devils in hideous figures, but she drove them away by the cross or by holy water. She also claimed to see St. Joseph, the blessed Virgin, and other saints; had visions of purgatory, and saw a great number of souls in heaven who had been there.

There is no difficulty in explaining her visions on natural principles. She was a religious woman, in such a state of health as to be subject to trances, and they took their character from her conventual and other religious instruction. Visions of this kind have been common in the excitable of all sects. The early Methodists had many of them, which Mr. Wesley could not understand; and he expelled some persons from the society because they persisted against his commands in narrating visions which even he could not accept as of divine origin.

Luther suffered from hallucinations of a religious character for a considerable period of his life. The opposition he encountered, his sedentary life, taken in connection with the extraordinary powers attributed to Satan in the Middle Ages, fully explain his visions. Luther thought that the devil removed a bag of nuts, transformed himself into a fly, hung on his neck, and lay with him in bed. His visions would sometimes come on after nightmare. Here is his own account: "I awoke in the middle of the night. Satan appeared to me. I was seized with horror. I sweated and trembled. My heart beat in a frightful manner. The devil conversed with me. His logic was accompanied by a voice so alarming that the blood froze in my veins."

Zuinglius had a similar experience when he was half asleep. A phantom, black or white, he could not say which, appeared before him, called him a coward, and stirred him up to fight. This is explained by Forbes Winslow as a case of overheated sensorium, “during the transient continuance of which the retina became so disturbed as to conjure up a phantom which the patient not only mistook for a reality, but, what is still worse, acted upon his mistaken or diseased imagination."

Swedenborg's visions were of the same class. He was educated, devoted himself for many years to science, and up to his fifty-fourth year had the reputation of a scientific and philosophic student; was a professor in the mineralogical school, and believed to be a simple-minded man of the world. About 1743 he had a violent fever, in which for a little time he was mad, and rushed from the house stark naked, proclaiming himself the Messiah. After that period a change took place in him, and he lived twenty-nine years in the firm conviction that he held continual intercourse with angels and also with deceased human beings. He says that he conversed with St. Paul during the whole year, particularly in reference to the text Romans iii. 28. He asserted that he had conversed three times with St. John, once with Moses, a hundred times with Luther, and with angels daily "for twenty years."

Swedenborg had an elevated style of thought, and when reasoning upon the fundamental principle which underlies his theological views he is acute and profound. Attention has frequently been called to his shrewdness in explaining why when he claimed to hear the voices of angels those who stood by could not, by his declaring that he was accustomed to see and hear angels when perfectly wide awake, and adding: "The speech of an angel or of a spirit sounds like and as loud as that of a man, but it is not heard by the bystanders. The reason is that the speech of an angel,

or of a spirit, finds entrance first into a man's thoughts, and reaches his organs of hearing from within." It is necessary only to read his literal statements to perceive the subjective character of the visions. He gives detailed accounts of the habits, form, and dress of the angels. He sends his opponents mostly to Gehenna and sees them there. The chief representatives of the reformed churches go to heaven, but Catholics and some of his Protestant opponents he sees in vision elsewhere.

The visions and hallucinations of men of this class are quoted against each other in the ecclesiastical conflicts of the Middle Ages, and more lately, as proofs of the doctrines held by them. But as proofs they are mutually destructive, exist in all religions, true or false, and are liable to occur apart from religion. In the revivals which occurred in the early part of this century in the United States, and which sometimes take place now, visions are not infrequently connected with religious experience. When men pray without attending to the necessary cares of the body days and weeks together, the result is faintings and trances accompanied by visions. Where they are believed to be of divine origin they produce profound impressions, but there is no reason to think their cause different from those already discussed, nor have unbelievers in Christianity escaped them.

The autobiography of Lord Herbert of Cherbury relates one of the most remarkable visions, and an equally remarkable illustration of inconsistency. Lord Herbert did not believe in Christianity, and wrote a book against the miracles recorded in the Bible. When it was completed he exhibited it to Grotius and Tilenus, whom he met in France. They praised it much and exhorted him to publish it; but he foresaw that it would encounter great opposition, and hesitated for some time, not knowing whether to print it or not. The history of what followed is given in his own words:

One fine day, about noon, my windows being open, I took my book, knelt down, and pronounced aloud these words: "O eternal God, creator of the light which illuminates me, thou who enlightenest souls when thou wouldst, tell me by a celestial sign if I should publish or suppress my work." I had hardly uttered these words than a loud but agreeable sound proceeded from heaven, which impressed me with such great joy that I felt convinced that my request was granted. Howsoever strange this may appear, I protest, before God, not only that I heard the sound, but saw, in the clearest sky on which I ever gazed, the spot whence it came. In consequence of this sign I published my book, and spread it throughout all Christian lands, amongst all the learned capable of reading and appreciating it.

This circumstance is of great importance. No doubt has ever been thrown upon the

truth of the recital, which shows how a person not subject to hallucinations may, under circumstances of deep meditation, or under the influence of strong desire and expectation,— if I may so speak,-generate an hallucination, which may be the only one that he will experience in the course of a lifetime, and leave no evil effects except the false inferences which he will draw from it when he supposes it to be of supernatural origin. It shows that the absence or the presence of any form of faith may not be an essential, and it is clear that Lord Herbert might easily have passed into a state of habitual visions in all respects analogous to those of Swedenborg and St. Theresa.

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Should a bright ray of light falling from some object in the chamber on the retina of a dying person excite the visual apparatus and cells, the hieroglyphic of a departed child, husband, lover, or friend be brought into the field of subjective sight, the beloved one would be reproduced, and at once projected into space. Intense emotion, engendered by such a sight, would for an instant break through the stupefying power of nature's anæsthetic, as the surgeon's knife sometimes momentarily breaks the spell of ether, and the dying individual springing, with eyes intent, features transfigured, and arms outstretched, towards the vision, would naturally pronounce the long-remembered name, and then fall back and die. Such scenes have occurred. Few could witness them without an overwhelming sense of awe, oppressed "with thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls," at beholding for a moment the apparent lifting of the veil and the glory within. To the dying such a vision would not be false. It him. The well-known features would be there, and would not be imagination. It would be real to yet they would be a creation or reproduction of a dissolving brain, and not a messenger from the opened heavens. The vision would be a physiological effect, not a supernatural intervention.

Dr. Clarke is not willing to say that it is impossible that there shall be to the dying a revelation of the future into which they are about to enter. He says: "Probably all such visions as these are automatic. But yet, who, believing in God and personal immortality, as the writer rejoices in doing, will dare to say absolutely all? — will dare to assert there is no possible exception?"

During the past thirty years I have seen many persons die, and many who supposed

themselves to be dying who afterwards recovered, but I have no ground to suppose any of the visions supernatural, nor have seen any indication of the development of a faculty of cognizing another world. The single case given by Dr. Clarke appears insufficient to raise a presumption, much less to support a conclusion.1 The following facts cannot be disputed nor disregarded in the elucidation of the subject: First. Such dying visions occur in all parts of the world, under every form of civilization and religion, and if the dying appear to see anything, it is in harmony with the traditions which they have received.

Second. Such visions are often experienced by those whose lives have not been marked by religious consistency, while many of the most devout are permitted to die without such aid, and sometimes experience the severest mental conflicts as they approach the crisis.

Third. Where persons appear to see angels and disembodied spirits, the visions accord with the traditional views of their shape and expression; and where wicked persons see fiends and evil spirits, they harmonize with the descriptions which have been made the materials of sermons, poems, and supernatural

narratives.

Fourth. Many of the most remarkable visions have been seen by persons who supposed themselves to be dying, but were not; and who when they recovered had not the slightest recollection of what had occurred. When a student I was called in with the others to witness the deathbed scene of the most popular young man in the institution. He had professed on the bed of death a religious experience, and was supposed to be dying of typhoid fever. Never have I heard more vivid descriptions or more eloquent words. It seemed as though he must see another state of being. After the scene he sunk into a lethargic state, so remained for some days, and gradually recovered. Both his religious conversion and visions were entirely forgotten, and not until many years afterwards did he enter upon a religious life.

Fifth. A consideration of great weight is this: the Catholic Church confers great honor upon the Holy Virgin; Protestants seldom make any reference to her. Trained as the Roman

1 Some years ago I was visiting at the house of a citizen of Brooklyn, now one of the editors of a leading scientific publication. A gentleman, the father of his wife, was very ill. His disease was consumption complicated with extreme age. It was thought that he could not survive the day. For several days he had been in a state of stupor bordering upon coma, nor had he spoken for some hours. During the absence of his daughter from the room I sat by his bedside watching his painful breathing and anticipating the end, which could not be long delayed. Suddenly the dying man opened his eyes and said, "Old Virginia, old Virginia, old Virginia." I immediately summoned his daughter, but he never

Catholics are to supplicate the sympathy and prayers of the mother of our Lord, when they have visions of any kind I am informed by devout priests and by physicians that she generally appears in the foreground. Among the visions which dying Protestants have been supposed to see I have heard of only two in which the Virgin figured, and these were of persons trained in their youth as Catholics.

APPARITIONS.

THE passage most frequently quoted on the subject of apparitions is that which Dr. Johnson in "Rasselas " puts into the mouth of the sage Imlac:

That the dead are seen no more I will not under

take to maintain against the concurrent testimony of all ages and all nations. There is no people, rude or unlearned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth; those that never heard of one another would not have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience could make credible. That it is doubted by single cavilers can very little weaken the general evidence; and some who deny it with their tongues confess it with fears.

All authorities agree that Dr. Johnson was very superstitious, and this passage when critically examined does not seem to be entitled to the weight which his great name and its clearness of statement have given to it. The concurrent testimony of all ages and nations can hardly create a presumption, unless it be assumed that there have been no universal errors. The assertion that the opinion could become universal only by its truth compels the assumption that all universal opinions are true. To prove that the dead are seen no more, or cannot appear to living beings, is of course impossible. But that a thing cannot be proven impossible is not a reason for believing it actual. No one can demonstrate that the spirit of Mahomet is not now embodied in the present Sultan of Turkey, but no one believes it to be so.

The belief in apparitions, common in all ages, was generally dying out in the middle of the last century, but was revived in the uttered another syllable or showed any sign of consciousness, and died in a few hours. On asking members of the family if he had ever been connected in any way with Virginia, they said he had not, but was a native of Kentucky. Three months afterwards his son-in-law informed me that inquiry suggested by the circumstance revealed the fact that he was born in Virginia and lived there until he was ten years old. The sole explanation was that the vital force was so nearly exhausted as to be incapable of stimulating any of the brain cells, except those early impressed; and a vision of the lovely scenes of his childhood rose in his mind, and his intelligence was sufficient only to recognize it as in a dream.

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