Most of the errors of philosophers have arisen from considering
the human being in a point of view too detailed and circumscribed
He is not a moral, and an intellectual,--but also, and pre-eminently,
an imaginative being. His own mind is his law; his own mind is all
things to him. If we would arrive at any knowledge which should be
serviceable from the practical conclusions to which it leads, we
ought to consider the mind of man and the universe as the great
whole on which to exercise our speculations. Here, above all,
verbal disputes ought to be laid aside, though this has long been
their chosen field of battle. It imports little to inquire whether
thought be distinct from the objects of thought. The use of the
words EXTERNAL and INTERNAL, as applied to the establishment of this
distinction, has been the symbol and the source of much dispute.
This is merely an affair of words, and as the dispute deserves, to
say, that when speaking of the objects of thought, we indeed only
describe one of the forms of thought--or that, speaking of thought,
we only apprehend one of the operations of the universal system of
beings.
V--CATALOGUE OF THE PHENOMENA OF DREAMS, AS CONNECTING SLEEPING
AND WAKING
1. Let us reflect on our infancy, and give as faithfully as possible
a relation of the events of sleep.
And first I am bound to present a faithful picture of my own peculiar
nature relatively to sleep. I do not doubt that were every individual
to imitate me, it would be found that among many circumstances
peculiar to their individual nature, a sufficiently general
resemblance would be found to prove the connexion existing between
those peculiarities and the most universal phenomena. I shall employ
caution, indeed, as to the facts which I state, that they contain
nothing false or exaggerated. But they contain no more than certain
elucidations of my own nature; concerning the degree in which
it resembles, or differs from, that of others, I am by no means
accurately aware. It is sufficient, however, to caution the reader
against drawing general inferences from particular instances.
I omit the general instances of delusion in fever or delirium, as
well as mere dreams considered in themselves. A delineation of this
subject, however inexhaustible and interesting, is to be passed
over. What is the connexion of sleeping and of waking?
2. I distinctly remember dreaming three several times, between
intervals of two or more years, the same precise dream. It was
not so much what is ordinarily called a dream; the single image,
unconnected with all other images, of a youth who was educated at
the same school with myself, presented itself in sleep. Even now,
after the lapse of many years, I can never hear the name of this
youth, without the three places where I dreamed of him presenting
themselves distinctly to my mind.
3. In dreams, images acquire associations peculiar to dreaming; so
that the idea of a particular house, when it recurs a second time
in dreams, will have relation with the idea of the same house, in
the first time, of a nature entirely different from that which the
house excites, when seen or thought of in relation to waking ideas.
4. I have beheld scenes, with the intimate and unaccountable
connexion of which with the obscure parts of my own nature, I
have been irresistibly impressed. I have beheld a scene which has
produced no unusual effect on my thoughts. After the lapse of many
years I have dreamed of this scene. It has hung on my memory, it
has haunted my thoughts, at intervals, with the pertinacity of an
object connected with human affections. I have visited this scene
again. Neither the dream could be dissociated from the landscape,
nor the landscape from the dream, nor feelings, such as neither
singly could have awakened, from both.
But the most remarkable event of this nature, which ever occurred
to me, happened five years ago at Oxford. I was walking with
a friend, in the neighbourhood of that city, engaged in earnest
and interesting conversation. We suddenly turned the corner of a
lane, and the view, which its high banks and hedges had concealed,
presented itself. The view consisted of a wind-mill, standing
in one among many plashy meadows, inclosed with stone walls; the
irregular and broken ground, between the wall and the road on which
we stood; a long low hill behind the windmill, and a grey covering
of uniform cloud spread over the evening sky. It was that season
when the last leaf had just fallen from the scant and stunted ash.
The scene surely was a common scene; the season and the hour little
calculated to kindle lawless thought; it was a tame uninteresting
assemblage of objects, such as would drive the imagination for
refuge in serious and sober talk, to the evening fireside, and the
dessert of winter fruits and wine. The effect which it produced on
me was not such as could have been expected. I suddenly remembered
to have seen that exact scene in some dream of long--. [Footnote:
Here I was obliged to leave off, overcome by thrilling horror.]
[1815; publ. 1840]