these reasons for forgetting the dream, so many dreams are retained in
memory. The continued efforts of the authors to formulate laws for the
remembering of dreams amounts to an admission that here too there is
something puzzling and unsolved. Certain peculiarities relating to the
memory of dreams have been particularly noticed of late, _e.g._, that a
dream which is considered forgotten in the morning may be recalled in
the course of the day through a perception which accidentally touches
the forgotten content of the dream (Radestock,[54] Tissié[68]). The
entire memory of the dream is open to an objection calculated to
depreciate its value very markedly in critical eyes. One may doubt
whether our memory, which omits so much from the dream, does not falsify
what it retained.
Such doubts relating to the exactness of the reproduction of the dream
are expressed by Strümpell when he says: “It therefore easily happens
that the active consciousness involuntarily inserts much in recollection
of the dream; one imagines one has dreamt all sorts of things which the
actual dream did not contain.”
Jessen[36] (p. 547) expresses himself very decidedly: “Moreover we must
not lose sight of the fact, hitherto little heeded, that in the
investigation and interpretation of orderly and logical dreams we almost
always play with the truth when we recall a dream to memory.
Unconsciously and unwittingly we fill up the gaps and supplement the
dream pictures. Rarely, and perhaps never, has a connected dream been as
connected as it appears to us in memory. Even the most truth-loving
person can hardly relate a dream without exaggerating and embellishing
it. The tendency of the human mind to conceive everything in connection
is so great that it unwittingly supplies the deficiencies of connection
if the dream is recalled somewhat disconnectedly.”
The observations of V. Eggers,[20] though surely independently
conceived, sound almost like a translation of Jessen’s words: “...
L’observation des rêves a ses difficultés spéciales et le seul moyen
d’éviter toute erreur en pareille matière est de confier au papier sans
le moindre retard ce que l’on vient d’éprouver et de remarquer; sinon,
l’oubli vient vite ou total ou partiel; l’oubli total est sans gravité;
mais l’oubli partiel est perfide; car si l’on se met ensuite à raconter
ce que l’on n’a pas oublié, on est exposé à compléter par imagination
les fragments incohérents et disjoints fourni par la mémoire ...; on
devient artiste à son insu, et le récit, périodiquement répété s’impose
à la créance de son auteur, qui, de bonne foi, le présente comme un fait
authentique, dûment établi selon les bonnes méthodes....”
Similarly Spitta,[64] who seems to think that it is only in our attempt
to reproduce the dream that we put in order the loosely associated dream
elements: “To make connection out of disconnection, that is, to add the
process of logical connection which is absent in the dream.”
As we do not at present possess any other objective control for the
reliability of our memory, and as indeed such a control is impossible in
examining the dream which is our own experience, and for which our
memory is the only source, it is a question what value we may attach to
our recollections of dreams.
(_e_) _The Psychological Peculiarities of Dreams._—In the scientific
investigation of the dream we start with the assumption that the dream
is an occurrence of our own psychic activity; nevertheless the finished
dream appears to us as something strange, the authorship of which we are
so little forced to recognise that we can just as easily say “a dream
appeared to me,” as “I have dreamt.” Whence this “psychic strangeness”
of the dream? According to our discussion of the sources of dreams we
may suppose that it does not depend on the material reaching the dream
content; because this is for the most part common to the dream life and
waking life. One may ask whether in the dream it is not changes in the
psychic processes which call forth this impression, and may so put to
test a psychological characteristic of the dream.
No one has more strongly emphasized the essential difference between
dream and waking life, and utilised this difference for more
far-reaching conclusions, than G. Th. Fechner[25] in some observations
in his _Elements of Psychophysic_ (p. 520, part 11). He believes that
“neither the simple depression of conscious psychic life under the main
threshold,” nor the distraction of attention from the influences of the
outer world, suffices to explain the peculiarities of the dream life as
compared with the waking life. He rather believes that the scene of
dreams is laid elsewhere than in the waking presentation life. “If the
scene of the psychophysical activity were the same during the sleeping
and the waking states, the dream, in my opinion, could only be a
continuation of the waking ideation maintaining itself at a lower degree
of intensity, and must moreover share with the latter its material and
form. But the state of affairs is quite different.”
What Fechner really meant has never been made clear, nor has anybody
else, to my knowledge, followed further the road, the clue to which he
indicated in this remark. An anatomical interpretation in the sense of
physiological brain localisations, or even in reference to histological
sections of the cerebral cortex, will surely have to be excluded. The
thought may, however, prove ingenious and fruitful if it can be referred
to a psychic apparatus which is constructed out of many instances placed
one behind another.
Other authors have been content to render prominent one or another of
the tangible psychological peculiarities of the dream life, and perhaps
to take these as a starting point for more far-reaching attempts at
explanation.
It has been justly remarked that one of the main peculiarities of the
dream life appears even in the state of falling asleep, and is to be
designated as the phenomenon inducing sleep. According to
Schleiermacher[61] (p. 351), the characteristic part of the waking state
is the fact that the psychic activity occurs in ideas rather than in
pictures. But the dream thinks in pictures, and one may observe that
with the approach of sleep the voluntary activities become difficult in
the same measure as the involuntary appear, the latter belonging wholly
to the class of pictures. The inability for such presentation work as we
perceive to be intentionally desired, and the appearance of pictures
which is regularly connected with this distraction, these are two
qualities which are constant in the dream, and which in its
psychological analysis we must recognise as essential characters of the
dream life. Concerning the pictures—the hypnogogic hallucinations—we
have discovered that even in their content they are identical with the
dream pictures.
The dream therefore thinks preponderately, but not exclusively, in
visual pictures. It also makes use of auditory pictures, and to a lesser
extent of the impressions of the other senses. Much is also simply
thought or imagined (probably represented by remnants of word
presentations), just as in the waking state. But still what is
characteristic for the dream is only those elements of the content which
act like pictures, _i.e._ which resemble more the perceptions than the
memory presentations. Disregarding all the discussions concerning the
nature of hallucinations, familiar to every psychiatrist, we can say,
with all well-versed authors, that the dream hallucinates, that is,
replaces thoughts through hallucinations. In this respect there is no
difference between visual and acoustic presentations; it has been
noticed that the memory of a succession of sounds with which one falls
asleep becomes transformed while sinking into sleep into an
hallucination of the same melody, so as to make room again on awakening,
which may repeatedly alternate with falling into a slumber, for the
softer memory presentations which are differently formed in quality.
The transformation of an idea into an hallucination is not the only
deviation of the dream from a waking thought which perhaps corresponds
to it. From these pictures the dream forms a situation, it presents
something in the present, it dramatises an idea, as Spitta[64] (p. 145)
puts it.[K] But the characteristic of this side of the dream life
becomes complete only when it is remembered that while dreaming we do
not—as a rule; the exceptions require a special explanation—imagine that
we are thinking, but that we are living through an experience, _i.e._,
we accept the hallucination with full belief. The criticism that this
has not been experienced but only thought in a peculiar
manner—dreamt—comes to us only on awakening. This character
distinguishes the genuine sleeping dream from day dreaming, which is
never confused with reality.
The characteristics of the dream life thus far considered have been
summed up by Burdach[8] (p. 476) in the following sentences: “As
characteristic features of the dream we may add (_a_) that the
subjective activity of our mind appears as objective, inasmuch as our
faculty of perception perceives the products of phantasy as if they were
sensory activities ... (_b_) sleep abrogates one’s self-command, hence
falling asleep necessitates a certain amount of passivity.... The
slumber pictures are conditioned by the relaxation of one’s
self-command.”
It is a question now of attempting to explain the credulity of the mind
in reference to the dream hallucinations, which can only appear after
the suspension of a certain arbitrary activity. Strümpell[66] asserts
that the mind behaves in this respect correctly, and in conformity with
its mechanism. The dream elements are by no means mere presentations,
but true and real experiences of the mind, similar to those that appear
in the waking state as a result of the senses (p. 34). Whereas in the
waking state the mind represents and thinks in word pictures and
language, in the dream it represents and thinks in real tangible
pictures (p. 35). Besides, the dream manifests a consciousness of space
by transferring the sensations and pictures, just as in the waking
state, into an outer space (p. 36). It must therefore be admitted that
the mind in the dream is in the same relation to its pictures and
perceptions as in the waking state (p. 43). If, however, it is thereby
led astray, this is due to the fact that it lacks in sleep the criticism
which alone can distinguish between the sensory perceptions emanating
from within or from without. It cannot subject its pictures to the tests
which alone can prove their objective reality. It furthermore neglects
to differentiate between pictures that are arbitrarily interchanged and
others where there is no free choice. It errs because it cannot apply to
its content the law of causality (p. 58). In brief, its alienation from
the outer world contains also the reason for its belief in the
subjective dream world.
Delbœuf[16] reaches the same conclusion through a somewhat different
line of argument. We give to the dream pictures the credence of reality
because in sleep we have no other impressions to compare them with,
because we are cut off from the outer world. But it is not perhaps
because we are unable to make tests in our sleep, that we believe in the
truth of our hallucinations. The dream may delude us with all these
tests, it may make us believe that we may touch the rose that we see in
the dream, and still we only dream. According to Delbœuf there is no
valid criterion to show whether something is a dream or a conscious
reality, except—and that only in practical generality—the fact of
awakening. “I declare delusional everything that is experienced between
the period of falling asleep and awakening, if I notice on awakening
that I lie in my bed undressed” (p. 84). “I have considered the dream
pictures real during sleep in consequence of the mental habit, which
cannot be put to sleep, of perceiving an outer world with which I can
contrast my ego.”[L]
As the deviation from the outer world is taken as the stamp for the most
striking characteristics of the dream, it will be worth while mentioning
some ingenious observations of old Burdach[8] which will throw light on
the relation of the sleeping mind to the outer world and at the same
time serve to prevent us from over-estimating the above deductions.
“Sleep results only under the condition,” says Burdach, “that the mind
is not excited by sensory stimuli ... but it is not the lack of sensory
stimuli that conditions sleep, but rather a lack of interest for the
same; some sensory impressions are even necessary in so far as they
serve to calm the mind; thus the miller can fall asleep only when he
hears the rattling of his mill, and he who finds it necessary to burn a
light at night, as a matter of precaution, cannot fall asleep in the
dark” (p. 457).
“The psyche isolates itself during sleep from the outer world, and
withdraws from the periphery.... Nevertheless, the connection is not
entirely interrupted; if one did not hear and feel even during sleep,
but only after awakening, he would certainly never awake. The
continuance of sensation is even more plainly shown by the fact that we
are not always awakened by the mere sensory force of the impression, but
by the psychic relation of the same; an indifferent word does not arouse
the sleeper, but if called by name he awakens ...: hence the psyche
differentiates sensations during sleep.... It is for this reason that we
may be awakened by the lack of a sensory stimulus if it relates to the
presentation of an important thing; thus one awakens when the light is
extinguished, and the miller when the mill comes to a standstill; that
is, the awakening is due to the cessation of a sensory activity, which
presupposes that it has been perceived, and that it has not disturbed
the mind, being indifferent or rather gratifying” (p. 460, &c.).
If we are willing to disregard these objections, which are not to be
taken lightly, we still must admit that the qualities of the dream life
thus far considered, which originate by withdrawing from the outer
world, cannot fully explain the strangeness of the dream. For otherwise
it would be possible to change back the hallucinations of the dream into
presentations and the situations of the dream into thoughts, and thus to
perform the task of dream interpretation. Now this is what we do when we
reproduce the dream from memory after awakening, and whether we are
fully or only partially successful in this back translation the dream
still retains its mysteriousness undiminished.
Furthermore all the authors assume unhesitatingly that still other more
far-reaching alterations take place in the presentation material of
waking life. One of them, Strümpell,[66] expresses himself as follows
(p. 17): “With the cessation of the objectively active outlook and of
the normal consciousness, the psyche loses the foundation in which were
rooted the feelings, desires, interests, and actions. Those psychic
states, feelings, interests, estimates which cling in the waking state
to the memory pictures also succumb to ... an obscure pressure, in
consequence of which their connection with the pictures becomes severed;
the perception pictures of things, persons, localities, events, and
actions of the waking state are singly very abundantly reproduced, but
none of these brings along its psychic value. The latter is removed from
them, and hence they float about in the mind dependent upon their own
resources....”
This deprivation the picture suffers of its psychic value, which again
goes back to the derivation from the outer world, is according to
Strümpell mainly responsible for the impression of strangeness with
which the dream is confronted in our memory.
We have heard that even falling asleep carries with it the abandonment
of one of the psychic activities—namely, the voluntary conduct of the
presentation course. Thus the supposition, suggested also by other
grounds, obtrudes itself, that the sleeping state may extend its
influence also over the psychic functions. One or the other of these
functions is perhaps entirely suspended; whether the remaining ones
continue to work undisturbed, whether they can furnish normal work under
the circumstances, is the next question. The idea occurs to us that the
peculiarities of the dream may be explained through the inferior psychic
activity during the sleeping state, but now comes the impression made by
the dream upon our waking judgment which is contrary to such a
conception. The dream is disconnected, it unites without hesitation the
worst contradictions, it allows impossibilities, it disregards our
authoritative knowledge from the day, and evinces ethical and moral
dulness. He who would behave in the waking state as the dream does in
its situations would be considered insane. He who in the waking state
would speak in such manner or report such things as occur in the dream
content, would impress us as confused and weak-minded. Thus we believe
that we are only finding words for the fact when we place but little
value on the psychic activity in the dream, and especially when we
declare that the higher intellectual activities are suspended or at
least much impaired in the dream.
With unusual unanimity—the exceptions will be dealt with elsewhere—the
authors have pronounced their judgments on the dream—such judgments as
lead immediately to a definite theory or explanation of the dream life.
It is time that I should supplement the _résumé_ which I have just given
with a collection of the utterances of different authors—philosophers
and physicians—on the psychological character of the dream.
According to Lemoine,[42] the incoherence of the dream picture is the
only essential character of the dream.
Maury[48] agrees with him; he says (p. 163): “Il n’y a pas des rêves
absolument raisonnables et qui ne contiennent quelque incohérence,
quelque anachronisme, quelque absurdité.”
According to Hegel, quoted by Spitta,[64] the dream lacks all objective
and comprehensible connection.
Dugas[19] says: “Le rêve, c’est l’anarchie psychique, affective et
mentale, c’est le jeu des fonctions livrées à elles-mêmes et s’exerçant
sans contrôle et sans but; dans le rêve l’esprit est un automate
spirituel.”
“The relaxation, solution, and confusion of the presentation life which
is held together through the logical force of the central ego” is
conceded even by Volkelt[72] (p. 14), according to whose theory the
psychic activity during sleep seems in no way aimless.
The absurdity of the presentation connections appearing in the dream can
hardly be more strongly condemned than it was by Cicero (_De Divin._
II.): “Nihil tam praepostere, tam incondite, tam monstruose cogitari
potest, quod non possimus somniare.”
Fechner[52] says (p. 522): “It is as if the psychological activity were
transferred from the brain of a reasonable being into the brain of a
fool.”
Radestock[35] (p. 145) says: “It seems indeed impossible to recognise in
this absurd action any firm law. Having withdrawn itself from the strict
police of the rational will guiding the waking presentation life, and of
the attention, the dream whirls everything about kaleidoscopically in
mad play.”
Hildebrandt[35] (p. 45) says: “What wonderful jumps the dreamer allows
himself, _e.g._, in his chain of reasoning! With what unconcern he sees
the most familiar laws of experience turned upside down! What ridiculous
contradictions he can tolerate in the orders of nature and society
before things go too far, as we say, and the overstraining of the
nonsense brings an awakening! We often multiply quite unconcernedly:
three times three make twenty; we are not at all surprised when a dog
recites poetry for us, when a dead person walks to his grave, and when a
rock swims on the water; we go in all earnestness by high command to the
duchy of Bernburg or the principality of Lichtenstein in order to
observe the navy of the country, or we allow ourselves to be recruited
as a volunteer by Charles XII. shortly before the battle of Poltawa.”
Binz[4] (p. 33) points to a dream theory resulting from the impressions.
“Among ten dreams nine at least have an absurd content. We unite in them
persons or things which do not bear the slightest relation to one
another. In the next moment, as in a kaleidoscope, the grouping changes,
if possible to one more nonsensical and irrational than before; thus the
changing play of the imperfectly sleeping brain continues until we
awaken, and put our hand to our forehead and ask ourselves whether we
really still possess the faculty of rational imagination and thought.”
Maury[48] (p. 50) finds for the relation of the dream picture to the
waking thoughts, a comparison most impressive for the physician: “La
production de ces images que chez l’homme éveillé fait le plus souvent
naître la volonté, correspond, pour l’intelligence, à ce que cont pour
la motilité certains mouvements que nous offrent la chorée et les
affections paralytiques....” For the rest, he considers the dream “toute
une série de dégradation de la faculté pensant et raisonant” (p. 27).
It is hardly necessary to mention the utterances of the authors which
repeat Maury’s assertion for the individual higher psychic activities.
According to Strümpell,[66] some logical mental operations based on
relations and connections disappear in the dream—naturally also at
points where the nonsense is not obvious (p. 26). According to
Spitta,[64] (p. 148) the presentations in the dream are entirely
withdrawn from the laws of causality. Radestock[54] and others emphasize
the weakness of judgment and decision in the dream. According to
Jodl[37] (p. 123), there is no critique in the dream, and no correcting
of a series of perceptions through the content of the sum of
consciousness. The same author states that “all forms of conscious
activity occur in the dream, but they are imperfect, inhibited, and
isolated from one another.” The contradictions manifested in the dream
towards our conscious knowledge are explained by Stricker[77][78] (and
many others), on the ground that facts are forgotten in the dream and
logical relations between presentations are lost (p. 98), &c., &c.
The authors who in general speak thus unfavourably about the psychic
capacities in the dream, nevertheless admit that the dream retains a
certain remnant of psychic activity. Wundt,[76] whose teaching has
influenced so many other workers in the dream problems, positively
admits this. One might inquire as to the kind and behaviour of the
remnants of the psychic life which manifest themselves in the dream. It
is now quite universally acknowledged that the reproductive capacity,
the memory in the dream, seems to have been least affected; indeed it
may show a certain superiority over the same function in the waking life
(_vid. supra_, p. 10), although a part of the absurdities of the dream
are to be explained by just this forgetfulness of the dream life.
According to Spitta,[64] it is the emotional life of the psyche that is
not overtaken by sleep and that then directs the dream. “By emotion
[“Gemüth”] we understand the constant comprehension of the feelings as
the inmost subjective essence of man” (p. 84).
Scholz[59] (p. 37) sees a psychic activity manifested in the dream in
the “allegorising interpretation” to which the dream material is
subjected. Siebeck[62] verifies also in the dream the “supplementary
interpretative activity” (p. 11) which the mind exerts on all that is
perceived and viewed. The judgment of the apparently highest psychic
function, the consciousness, presents for the dream a special
difficulty. As we can know anything only through consciousness, there
can be no doubt as to its retention; Spitta, however, believes that only
consciousness is retained in the dream, and not self-consciousness.
Delbœuf[16] confesses that he is unable to conceive this
differentiation.