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advancing towards me, a troop of cavalry, the men and horses, however, all flayed. This horrible troop continued passing in a rapid gallop, and casting frightful looks on me. Their march, I thought, continued for five hours; and they were followed by an immense number of artillery-wagons full of bleeding corpses, whose limbs still quivered; a disgusting smell of blood and bitumen almost choked me. At length, the iron gate of the prison shutting with great force, awoke me again. I made my repeater strike; it was no more than midnight, so that the horrible phantasmagoria had lasted no more than two or three minutes; that is to say, the time necessary for relieving the sentry and shutting the gate. The cold was severe and the watchword short. The next day the turnkey confirmed my calculations."

Our dreams will not unfrequently go through all the particulars of some long journey, or of some military expedition, or of a circumnavigation of the globe, or of other long and perilous undertakings, in a less number of hours than it took weeks, or months, or even years in the actual performance of them. We go from land to land, and from city to city, and into desert places; we experience transitions from joy to sorrow and from poverty to wealth; we are occupied in the scenes and transactions of many long months; and then our slumbers are scattered, and behold, they are the doings of a fleeting watch of the night!

§ 101. Explanation of the preceding statements.

This striking circumstance in the history of our dreams is generally explained by supposing that our thoughts, as they successively occupy the mind, are more rapid than while we are awake. But their rapidity is at all times very great; so much so, that, in a few moments, crowds of ideas pass through the mind which it would take a long time to utter, and a far longer time would it take to perform all the transactions which they concern. This explanation, therefore, is not satisfactory, for our thoughts are oftentimes equally rapid in our waking moments.

The true reason, we apprehend, is to be found in those preceding sections which took under examination the ap

parent reality of dreams. Our conceptions in dreaming are considered by us real; every thought is an action; every idea is an event; and successive states of mind are successive actions and successive events. He who in his sleep has the conception of all the particulars of a long military expedition or of a circumnavigation of the globe, seems to himself to have actually experienced all the various and multiplied fortunes of the one and the other. Hence what appears to be the real time in dreams, but is only the apparent time, will not be that which is sufficient for the mere thought, but that which is necessary for the successive actions.

"Something perfectly analogous to this may be remarked," says Mr. Stewart," in the perceptions we obtain by the sense of sight.* When I look into a showbox where the deception is imperfect, I see only a set of paltry daubings of a few inches in diameter; but if the representation be executed with so much skill as to convey to me the idea of a distant prospect, every object before me swells in its dimensions in proportion to the extent of space which I conceive it to occupy; and what seemed before to be shut within the limits of a small wooden frame, is magnified in my apprehension to an immense landscape of woods, rivers, and mountains."

* Stewart's Elements, chapter on Dreaming.

MENTAL PHILOSOPH Y.

DIVISION FIRST.

THE INTELLECT OR UNDERSTANDING.

INTELLECTIVE OR INTELLECTUAL STATES OF THE MIND.

PART SECOND.

INTELLECTUAL STATES OF INTERNAL ORIGIN.

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