Were we to enter more profoundly into the mysterious phenomena of

dreams, our present lucubrations might become too abstruse; and, after
all, no philosophical nor satisfactory account can be given of them.
Such of our readers therefore, as may wish for a more minute inquiry
into the opinions above stated, we beg leave to refer to the respective
authors whom we have already quoted. The reader, who is fond to find
amusement even in a serious subject, from the scenes of nocturnal
imagination, will be glad, perhaps for a moment, to be transported into
the regions of poetic fancy. And here we find that the fancy is not more
sportive in dreams, than are the poets in their descriptions of her
nocturnal vagaries. On the effects of the imagination in dreams, the
following effusion, put into the mouth of the volatile Mercurio, is an
admirable illustration:--

O, then I see, Queen Mab has been with you.
She is the fancy's midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate stone
On the fore-finger of an Alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies,
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep:
Her waggon spokes made of long spinners' legs;
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces of the smallest spider's web;
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams;
Her whip of cricket's bone; the lash of film;
Her waggoner, a small grey coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm,
Prickt from the lazy finger of a maid.
Her chariot is an empty hazel nut,
Made by the joiner squirril, old grub,
Time out of mind the fairies' coachmakers:
And in this state she gallops night by night,
Thro' lovers' brains, and then they dream of love;
On courtiers' knees, that dream on curtsies strait;
O'er lawyers' fingers, who strait dream on fees;
O'er ladies lips, who strait on kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plague,
Because their breath with sweetmeats tainted are.
Sometimes she gallops o'er a lawyer's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit,
And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig tail,
Tickling the parson as he lies asleep;
Then dreams he of another benefice;
Sometimes she driveth o'er a soldier's neck
And then he dreams of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscades, Spanish blades,
Of healths fire fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ears, at which he starts and wakes,
And being thus frighted, swears a pray'r or two,
And sleeps again.

Lucretius, and Petronius in his poem on the vanity of dreams, had
preceded our immortal bard in a description of the effects of dreams on
different kinds of persons. Both the passages here alluded to, only
serve to shew the vast superiority of Shakspeare's boundless genius:
their sense is thus admirably expressed by Stepney:

At dead of night imperial reason sleeps,
And fancy with her train, her revels keeps;
Then airy phantoms a mix'd scene display,
Of what we heard, or saw, or wish'd by day;
For memory those images retains
Which passion form'd, and still the strongest reigns.
Huntsmen renew the chase they lately run,
And generals fight again their battles won.
Spectres and fairies haunt the murderer's dreams;
Grants and disgraces are the courtier's themes.
The miser spies a thief, or a new hoard;
The cit's a knight; the sycophant a lord,
Thus fancy's in the wild distraction lost,
With what we most abhor, or covet most.
Honours and state before this phantom fall;
For sleep, like death, its image, equals all.

Chaucer in his tale of the Cock and Fox, has a fine description, thus
versified by Dryden:--

Dreams are but interludes which fancy makes:
When monarch reason sleeps, this mimic wakes;
Compounds a medley of disjointed things,
A court of coblers and a mob of kings:
Light fumes are merry, grosser fumes are sad:
Both are the reasonable soul run mad;
And many monstrous forms in sleep we see,
That neither were, or are, or e'er can be.
Sometimes forgotten things, long cast behind,
Rush forward in the brain, and come to mind.
The nurse's legends are for truth received,
And the man dreams but what the boy believed,
Sometimes we but rehearse a former play,
The night restores our actions done by day;
As hounds in sleep will open for their prey.
In short, the farce of dreams is of a piece
In chimeras all; and more absurd or less.

Shakspeare again:--

I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain phantasy,
Which is as thin of substance as the air,
And more inconsistant than the wind.

Nor must Milton be omitted--

In the soul
Are many lesser faculties, that serve
Reason as chief; among these Fancy next
Her office holds; of all external things,
Which the five watchful senses represent,
She forms imaginations, airy shapes,
Which reason joining, or disjoining, frames,
And all that we affirm, or what deny, or call
Our knowledge or opinion; then retires
Into her private cell, when nature rests.
Oft in her absence mimic fancy wakes,
To imitate her; but misjoining shapes,
Wild works produces oft, but most in dreams
Ill matching words or deeds, long past or tale.


PRINCIPAL PHENOMENA IN DREAMING.

From these practical descriptions let us proceed to take a view of the
principal phenomena in dreaming. And first, Mr. Locke's beautiful _modes
of_ which will greatly illustrate the preceding observations.

"When the mind," says Locke, "turns its view inward upon itself, and
contemplates its own actions, _thinking_ is the first that occurs. In it
the mind observes a great variety of modifications, and from thence
receives distinct _ideas_. Thus the perception, which actually
accompanies, and is annexed to any impression on the body, made by an
external object, being distinct from all other modifications of
thinking, furnishes the mind with a distinct idea which we call
_sensation_; which is, as it were, the actual entrance of an idea into
the understanding by the senses.

"The same idea, when it occurs again without the operation of the like
object on the external sensory, is _remembrance_: if it be sought after
by the mind, and with pain and endeavour found, and brought again in
view, it is _recollection_: if it be held there long under
consideration, it is _contemplation_; when ideas float in our mind
without any reflexion or regard of the understanding, it is that which
the French call _reverie_;[87] our language has scarce a name for it.
When the ideas that offer themselves (for as I have observed in another
place, while we are awake, there will always be a train of ideas
succeeding one another in our minds) are taken notice of, and, as it
were, registered in the memory, it is _attention_; when the mind, with
great earnestness, and of choice, fixes its view on any idea, considers
it on all sides, and will not be called off by the ordinary
solicitations of other ideas, it is what we call _intention_ or _study_.
Sleep without dreaming is rest from all these: and _dreaming_ itself, is
the having of ideas (while the outward senses are stopped, so that they
receive not outward objects with their usual quickness) in the mind, not
suggested by any external objects, or known occasion, nor under any
choice or conduct of the understanding at all, and whether that which we
call _ecstasy_, be not dreaming with the eyes open, I leave to be
examined."

Dr. Beattie, in his "Dissertations moral and critical," has an
ingenious essay on this subject, in which he attempts to ascertain, not
so much the _efficient_ as the _final_ causes of the phenomenon, and to
obviate those superstitions in regard to it, which have sometimes
troubled weak minds. He labours, with great earnestness, to shew, that
dreams may be of use in the way of physical admonition: that persons,
who attend to them with this view, may make important discoveries with
regard to their health; that they may be serviceable as the means of
moral improvement; that, by attending to them, we may discern our
predominant passions, and receive good hints for the regulation of them;
that they may have been intended by Providence to serve as an amusement
to the mental powers; and that dreaming is not universal, because,
probably, all constitutions do not require such intellectual amusement.
In observations of this kind, we may discover the ingenuity of fancy and
the sagacity of conjecture. We may find amusement in the arguments, but
we look in vain for satisfaction. Nature, certainly, does nothing in
vain, yet we are far from thinking, that man is able, in every case, to
discover her intentions. Final causes, perhaps, ought never to be the
subject of human speculation, but when they are plain and obvious. To
substitute vain conjectures, instead of the designs of Providence, on
subjects where those designs are beyond our reach, serves only to
furnish matter for the cavils of the sceptical, and the sneers of the
licentious.

Among the many striking phenomena in our dreams, it may be observed,
that, while they last, the memory seems to lie wholly torpid, and the
understanding to be employed only about such objects as are then
presented, without comparing the present with the past. When we sleep,
we often converse with a friend who is either absent or dead, without
remembering that the grave or the ocean is between us. We float, like a
feather, upon the wind; for we find ourselves this moment in England,
and the next in India, without reflecting that the laws of nature are
suspended, or inquiring how the scene could have been so suddenly
shifted before us. We are familiar with prodigies; we accommodate
ourselves to every event, however romantic; and we not only reason, but
act upon principles, which are in the highest degree absurd and
extravagant. Our dreams, moreover, are so far from being the effect of a
voluntary effort, that we neither know of what we shall dream, or
whether we shall dream at all.

But sleep is not the only time in which strange and unconnected objects
involve our ideas in confusion. Besides the _reveries_ of the day,
already spoken of, we have, in a moral view, our _waking-dreams_, which
are not less chimerical, and impossible to be realized, than the
imaginations of the night.

Night visions may befriend----
Our waking dreams are fatal. How I dreamt
Of things impossible (could sleep do more?)
Of joys perpetual in perpetual change!
Of stable pleasures on the tossing wave!
Eternal sunshine in the storms of life!
How richly were my noon-tide trances hung,
With gorgeous tapestries of pictur'd joys!
Till at deaths' toll,----
Starting I woke, and found myself undone.

Many of the fabulous stories of ghosts or apparitions have originated
unquestionably in dreams. There are times of slumber when we are
sensible of being asleep. "When the thoughts are much troubled," says
Hobbes, "and when a person sleeps without the circumstance of going to
bed, or pulling off his clothes, as when he nods in his chair, it is
very difficult to distinguish a dream from a reality. On the contrary,
he that composes himself to sleep, in case of any uncouth or absurd
fancy, easily suspects it to have been a dream."[88] On this principle,
Hobbes has ingeniously accounted for the spectre which is said to have
appeared to Brutus; and the well-known story told by Clarendon, of the
apparition of the duke of Buckingham's father will admit of a similar
solution. There was no man at that time in the kingdom so much the topic
of conversation as the duke; and, from the corruptness of his character,
he was very likely to fall a sacrifice to the corruptness of the times.
Sir George Villiers is said to have appeared to the man at
midnight--there is therefore the greatest probability that the man was
asleep; and the dream affrighting him, made a strong impression, and was
likely to be repeated.

History furnishes us with numerous instances of a forecast having been
communicated through the medium of dreams, some of which are so
extraordinary as almost to shake our belief that the hand of Providence
is not sometimes evident through their instrumentality. Cicero, in his
first book on Divination, tells us, that Heraclides, a clever man, and
who had been a disciple of Plato, writes that the mother of Phalaris saw
in a dream the statues of the gods which she had consecrated in the
house of her son; and among other things, it appeared to her, that from
a cup which Mercury held in his hand, he had spilled some blood from it,
and that the blood had scarcely touched the ground, than rising up in
large bubbles it filled the whole house. This dream of the mother was
afterwards but too truly verified in the cruelty of the son. Cyrus
dreamt that seeing the sun at his feet, he made three different
unsuccessful attempts to lay his hand upon it, at each of which it
evaded him. The Persian Magi who interpreted this dream told him that
these three attempts to seize the sun signified that he would reign
thirty years. This prediction was verified: he died at the age of
seventy, having begun to reign when he was forty years old.

"There is doubtless," says Cicero, "something even among barbarians
which marks that they possess the gift of presentiment and divination."
The Indian Calanus mounting the flaming faggot on which he was about to
be burnt, exclaimed "O what a fine exit from life, when my body, like
that of Hercules, shall be consumed by the fire, my spirit will freely
enjoy the light." And Alexander having asked if he had anything to say,
he replied, "Yes, I shall soon see you," which happened as he foretold,
Alexander having died a few days afterwards at Babylon. Xenophon, an
ardent disciple of Socrates, relates that in the war which he made in
favour of young Cyrus, he had some dreams which were followed by the
most miraculous events. Shall we say that Xenophon does not speak truth,
or is too extravagant? What! so great a personage, and so divine a
spirit as Aristotle, can he be deceived? Or does he wish to deceive
others, when he tells us of Eudemus of Cyprus, one of his friends,
wishing to go into Macedonia, passed by Pheres, a celebrated town in
Thessaly, which at that time was under the dominion of the tyrant
Alexander; and that having fallen very sick, he saw in a dream a very
handsome young man, who told him that he would cure him, and that the
tyrant Alexander would shortly die, but as to himself, he would return
home at the end of five years. Aristotle remarks that the two first
predictions were, indeed, soon accomplished; that Eudemus recovered, and
that the tyrant was killed by his wife's brothers; but that at the
expiration of five years, the time at which it was hoped Eudemus,
according to the dream, was to return to Sicily, his native country,
news were received that he had been killed in a combat near Syracuse;
which gave rise to another interpretation of the dream, namely, that,
when the spirit or soul of Eudemus left his body, it went thence
straight to his own house.--A cup of massy gold having been stolen from
the temple of Hercules, this god appeared in a dream to Sophocles three
consecutive times, and pointed out the thief to him; who was put to the
torture, confessed the delinquency, and gave up the cup. The temple
afterwards received the name of Hercules Indicator.

An endless variety of similar instances, both from ancient and modern
history, might be adduced of the singularity of dreams, as well as their
instrumentality in revealing secrets which, without such agency, had
lain for ever in oblivion; these, however, are sufficient for our
purpose here; and the occurrence of one of a very recent date, connected
with the discovery of the body of the murdered Maria Martin, in the red
barn, is still fresh in the recollection of our readers. That there is a
ridiculous infatuation attached by some people to dreams, which have no
meaning, and which are the offsprings of the day's thoughts, even among
persons whose education should inform them better, particularly among
the fair sex, cannot be denied; indeed, a conversation seldom passes
among them, but some inconsistent dream or other, form a leading feature
of their gossip; and doubtless is with them an hysterical symptom.

Sometimes in our sleeping dreams, we imagine ourselves involved in
inextricable woe, and enjoy at waking, the ecstasy of a deliverance from
it. "And such a deliverance," says Dr. Beattie, "will every good man
meet with at last, when he is taken away from the evils of life, and
awakes in the regions of everlasting light and peace; looking back upon
the world and its troubles, with a surprise and satisfaction similar in
kind (though far higher in degree) to that which we now feel, when we
escape from a terrifying dream, and open our eyes to the sweet serenity
of a summer morning." Sometimes, in our dreams, we imagine scenes of
pure and unutterable joy; and how much do we regret at waking, that the
heavenly vision is no more! But what must the raptures of the good man
be, when he enters the regions of immortality, and beholds the radiant
fields of permanent delight! The idea of such a happy death, such a
sweet transition, from the dreams of earth to the realities of heaven,
is thus beautifully described by Dryden, in his poem entitled Eleonora:

"She passed serenely, with a single breath;
This moment perfect health, the next was death;
One sigh did her eternal bliss assure;
So little penance needs when souls are pure.
As gentle dreams our waking thoughts pursue;
Or, one dream past, we slide into a new;
So close they follow and such wild order keep,
We think ourselves awake and are asleep;
So softly death succeeded life in her:
She did but dream of heaven and she was there."


DEFINITION OF DREAMS.

Dreams are vagaries of the imagination, and in most instances proceed
from external sensations. They take place only when our sleep is
unsound, in which case the brain and nervous system are capable of
performing certain motions. We seldom dream during the first hours of
sleep; perhaps because the nervous fluid is then too much exhausted; but
dreams mostly occur towards the morning, when this fluid has been, in
some measure, restored.

Every thing capable of interrupting the tranquillity of mind and body,
may produce dreams; such are the various kinds of grief and sorrow,
exertions of the mind, affections and passions, crude and undigested
food, a hard and inconvenient posture of the body. Those ideas which
have lately occupied our minds or made a lively impression upon us,
generally constitute the principal subject of a dream, and more or less
employ our imagination, when we are asleep.

Animals are likewise apt to dream, though seldom; and even men living
temperately, and enjoying a perfect state of health, are seldom
disturbed with this play of the fancy. And, indeed, there are examples
of lively and spirited persons who never dream at all. The great
physiologist Haller considers dreaming as a symptom of disease, or as a
stimulating cause, by which the perfect tranquillity of the sensorium is
interrupted. Hence, that sleep is the most refreshing, which is
undisturbed by dreams, or, at least, when we have the distinct
recollection of them. Most of our dreams are then nothing more than
sports of the fancy, and derive their origin chiefly from external
impressions; almost every thing we see and hear, when awake, leads our
imagination to collateral notions or representations, which, in a
manner, spontaneously, and without the least effort, associate with
external sensations. The place where a person whom we love formerly
resided, a dress similar to that which we have seen her wear, or the
objects that employed her attention, no sooner catch our eye, than she
immediately occupies our mind. And, though these images associating with
external sensations, do not arrive at complete consciousness within the
power of imagination, yet even in their latent state they may become
very strong and permanent.

Cicero furnishes us with a story of two Arcadians, who, travelling
together, arrived at Megara, a city of Greece, between Athens and
Corinth, where one of them lodged in a friend's house, and the other at
an inn. After supper, the person who lodged at the private house went to
bed, and falling asleep, dreamed that his friend at the inn appeared to
him and begged his assistance, because the innkeeper was going to kill
him. The man immediately got out of bed much frightened at the dream;
but recovering himself, and falling asleep again, his friend appeared to
him a second time, and desired that, as he would not assist him in time,
he would take care at least not to let his death go unpunished; that the
innkeeper having murdered him had thrown his body into a cart and
covered it with dung; he therefore begged that he would be at the city
gate in the morning, before the cart was out; struck with this new
dream, he went early to the gate, saw the cart, and asked the driver
what was in it; the driver immediately fled, the dead body was taken
out of the cart, and the innkeeper apprehended and executed.

It is very frequently observed, that in a dream a series of
representations is suddenly interrupted, and another series of a very
different kind occupies its place. This happens as soon as an idea
associates itself; which, from whatever cause, is more interesting than
that immediately preceding. The last then becomes the prevailing one,
and determines the association. Yet, by this too, the imagination is
frequently reconducted to the former series. The interruption in the
course of the preceding occurrences is remarked, and the power of
abstracting similarities is in search of the cause of this irregularity.
Hence, in such cases, there usually happens some unfortunate event or
other, which occasions the interruption of the story. The representing
power may again suddenly conduct us to another series of ideas, and thus
the imagination may be led by the subreasoning power before defined,
from one scene to another. Of this kind, for instance, is the following
remarkable dream, as related and explained in the works of professor
Maas of Halle: "I dreamed once," says he "that the Pope visited me. He
commanded me to open my desk, and carefully examined all the papers it
contained. While he was thus employed, a very sparkling diamond fell out
of his triple crown into my desk, of which, however, neither of us took
any notice. As soon as the Pope had withdrawn, I retired to bed, but was
soon obliged to rise, on account of a thick smoke, the cause of which I
had yet to learn. Upon examination I discovered, that the diamond had
set fire to the papers in my desk, and burnt them to ashes."

On account of the peculiar circumstances by which this dream was
occasioned, it deserves the following short analysis. "On the preceding
evening," says professor Maas, "I was visited by a friend with whom I
had a lively conversation, upon Joseph IInd's suppression of monasteries
and convents. With this idea, though I did not become conscious of it in
my dream, was associated the visit which the Pope publicly paid the
Emperor Joseph at Vienna, in consequence of the measures taken against
the clergy; and with this again was combined, however faintly, the
representation of the visit, which had been paid me by my friend. These
two events were, by the subreasoning faculty, compounded into one,
according to the established rule--that things which agree in their
parts, also correspond as to the whole;--hence the Pope's visit, was
changed into a visit made to me. The subreasoning faculty then, in order
to account for this extraordinary visit, fixed upon that which was the
most important object in my room, namely, the desk, or rather the papers
contained in it. That a diamond fell out of the triple crown was a
collateral association, which was owing merely to the representation of
the desk. Some days before when opening the desk, I had broken the glass
of my watch, which I held in my hand, and the fragments fell among the
papers. Hence no farther attention was paid to the diamond, being a
representation of a collateral series of things. But afterwards the
representation of the sparkling stones was again excited, and became the
prevailing idea; hence it determined the succeeding association. On
account of its similarity, it excited, the representation of fire, with
which it was confounded; hence arose fire and smoke.--But, in the event,
the writings only were burnt, not the desk itself; to which, being of
comparatively less value, the attention was not at all directed." It is
farther observable, that there are in the human mind certain obscure
representations, and that it is necessary to be convinced of the reality
of these images, if we are desirous of perceiving the connexion, which
subsists among the operations of the imagination. Of the numerous
phenomena, founded on obscure ideas, and which consequently prove their
existence, we shall only remark the following. It is a well known fact,
that many dreams originate in the impressions made in the body during
sleep; and they consist of analogous images or such as are associated
with sensations that would arise from these impressions, during a waking
state. Hence, for instance, if our legs are placed in a perpendicular
posture, we are often terrified by a dream that implies the imminent
danger of falling from a steep rock or precipice. The mind must
represent to itself these external impressions in a lively manner,
otherwise no ideal picture could be thus excited; but, as we do not
become at all conscious of them, they are but faintly and obscurely
represented.

If we make a resolution to rise earlier in the morning than usual; and
if we impress the determination on our mind, immediately before going to
rest, we are almost certain to succeed. Now it is self-evident that this
success cannot be ascribed to the efforts of the body, but altogether to
the mind, which probably, during sleep perceives and computes the
duration of time, so that it makes an impression on the body, which
enables us to awake at an appointed hour. Yet all this takes place,
without our consciousness, and the representations remain obscure. Many
productions of art are so complicated, that a variety of simple
conceptions are requisite to lay the foundation of them; yet the artist
is almost entirely unconscious of these individual notions. Thus a
person performs a piece of music, without being obliged to reflect, in a
conscious manner, on the signification of the notes, their value, and
the order of the fingers he must observe; nay even without clearly
distinguishing the strings of the harp, or the keys of the harpsichord.
We cannot attribute this to the mechanism of the body, which might
gradually accustom itself to the accurate placing of the fingers. This
could be applied only where we place a piece of music, frequently
practised; but it is totally inapplicable to a new piece, which is
played by the professor with equal facility, though he has never seen it
before. In the latter case there must arise, necessarily, an ideal
representation, or an act of judgment, previous to every motion of the
finger.

These arguments, we trust, are sufficient, to evince the occurrence of
these obscure notions and representations, from which all our dreams
originate. Before, however, we close this subject, we shall relate the
following extraordinary dream of the celebrated Galileo, who at a very
advanced age had lost his sight. In one of his walks over a beautiful
plain, conducted by his pupil Troicelli, the venerable sage related the
following dream to him. "Once," said he, "my eyes permitted me to enjoy
the charms of these fields. But now, since their light is extinguished,
these pleasures are lost to me for ever. Heaven justly inflicts the
punishment which was predicted to me many years ago. When in prison, and
impatiently languishing for liberty, I began to be discontented with the
ways of Providence; Copernicus appeared to me in a dream; his celestial
spirit conducted me over luminous stars, and, in a threatening voice,
reprehended me for having murmured against him, at whose _fiat_ all
these worlds had proceeded from nothing. 'A time shall come (said he)
when thine eyes shall refuse to assist thee in contemplating these
wonders.'"

We shall now proceed to notice the subject of dreams in another point of
view--that is, as being employed as a medium of divination in the cure
of diseases, in which the fancies of the brain appear, in reality, to as
little advantage as they do with reference to any other considerations
in which such pretended omens exist.

FOOTNOTES:

[81] Wolfius, Psychol. Empir. Sect. 123.

[82] Mem. de l'acad. de Berlin, tom. ii. p. 316.

[83] Arist. de insomn. cap 3.

[84] Quae in vita usurpant homines, cogitant, curant, vident quaeque
agunt vigilantes, agitantque, ea cuique in somno accidunt. _De Div._

[85] Essay on Human Understanding, book, chap. i. sect 17.

[86] Obs, on Man, vol. 1, sect. 5.

[87] There is a phenomenon in the mind, which, though it happen to us
while we are perfectly awake, yet approaches the nearest to sleep of any
I know. It is called the _Reverie_, or, as some term it, the _brown
study_, a sort of middle state between waking and sleeping; in which,
though our eyes are open, our senses seem to be entirely shut up, and we
are quite insensible of every thing about us, yet we are all the while
engaged in a musing indolence of thought, or a supine and lolling kind
of roving from one fairy scene to another, without any self-command;
from which, if any noise or accident rouse us, we wake as from a real
dream, and are often as much at a loss to tell how our thoughts were
employed, as if we had waked from the soundest sleep. This is frequently
called _dreaming_, sometimes _absence_, a thing often observed in lovers
and people of a melancholy or indeed speculative turn.--_Fordyce's
Dialogues concerning education, vol. II. p. 255._

[88] Leviathan, part. 1. c. 1.




CHAPTER XI.


ON INCUBATION; OR THE ART OF HEALING BY VISIONARY DIVINATION.

Medicine unquestionably ranks among the most ancient of all human
sciences. In the infant state of society, when simplicity of manners
characterised the pursuits of mankind, medical assistance was little
wanted; but when the nature of man degenerated, and vice and luxury
corrupted his habits of innocence and temperance, diseases sprung up
which those aids alone could check or eradicate. The knowledge of them
at first could not fail to be empirical and precarious. The sick were
placed in the high ways, that travellers and passers by might assist
them with their counsel; and at length the priesthood appropriated this
privilege exclusively to themselves.

It was not merely the sacerdotal dignity which rendered them objects of
awe and reverence to the illiterate multitude; the priests were regarded
as the depositaries of science and learning; and proved themselves as
skilful as they were successful, in cementing their influence by those
arts which were best calculated to inflame the prejudices of the vulgar
in their favour.

It is the work of ages to wean men and nations from popular illusions,
and the deep-rooted opinions transmitted from sire to son: it cannot
therefore surprise us, that even when the intellectual energy of Greece
was signalizing itself by efforts which have commanded the admiration of
after ages, it should still remain a popular dogma in medicine "that
persons labouring under bodily infirmity, might be thrown into a state
of charmed torpor, in which, though destitute of any previous medical
knowledge, they would be enabled to ascertain the nature of their
malady, as well as of the diseases of others, and devise the means of
their cure." Upon this dogma was founded the mystery of incubations, or
the art of healing by visionary divination.

It is not our object here to discuss whether a man can be capable of
divination: such a power, however, was assigned to him, not only by the
vulgar, but by the greater number of the philosophical sects of
antiquity; and it does appear to savour a little of temerity, that
Epicurus and the cynics should have ventured to reject a belief so
universally and strenuously maintained, and resting on an infinity of
traditions and accounts of prophets, in whom Greece had abounded from
her earliest times, and of whose divine gift of prophecy the firmest
conviction was currently entertained. Aeschylus, Plutarch, Apuleius, and
other Greek authors, bear ample testimony of this persuasion, and tell
us that by uncommon and irregular motions of the body intoxicating
vapours, or certain holy ejaculations, men might be thrown into an
enchanted trance; in which, being in a state between sleeping and
waking, they were unsusceptible of external impressions and obtaining a
glimpse of futurity, were gifted with the power of prophecy. Here their
allusion, however, only concerns the celebrated divinations of the
Pythia.[89] We must therefore, probe somewhat deeper, in order to
illustrate that species of divination which was the result of dreams,
and a source of divination on the nature of diseases and their remedies.

This kind of superstition was in no less acceptation than the former
among the ancients, whose temples were constantly crowded with the sick,
and reverberated with their supplications for divinatory dreams, which
were regarded as an immediate gift from the gods. Indeed, the celestial
origin of dreams was universally admitted by the nations of antiquity,
and thence also their efficacy as oracles. Nothing could be more natural
than such an idea. From the crude and imperfect notions which long
prevailed with respect to the soul, it was scarcely possible for them to
ascribe the impressions, which their memory retained of the creation of
their fancy during their slumbers, to the instrumentality of their own
conceits; they could not fail therefore to impute them to the
interposition of some foreign agent, and to whom more naturally could
they refer them than to a divinity? When awake, they imagined themselves
always attended by the gods in person, and ascribed every thought, and
resolved every appearance or accident, which deviated from the common
course of nature, to the immediate influence of a superintending deity.
It was under such impressions that so many nations originally rested
their belief in divinatory dreams. The records of antiquity therefore
abound in instances (for the greater part of an early date) where the
actions of men have been the result of a dream, whose conceit was
entirely at variance with the real state of their affairs. It was not
long before the diversity of dreams awakened their attention: some were
connected and simple, others were obscure, and made up of curious
fancies, though not incapable of being resolved by the windings and
turnings of allegory.

It was no unnatural transition from the received belief in dreams, to
the idea that they might become the medium of seeking instruction from
the gods: hence the institution of oracles, whose responses were given
in dreams; and the addition of sleeping chambers to many temples, such
as those in Epidaurus and at Oropos. Here it was, that after pious
ceremonies and prayers, men laid themselves down in expectation of
dreams; when the expectation was realized, though the dream proved ever
so confused or intricate, the dreamer always succeeded in reconciling
it to his circumstances: his own belief and priestly wiles, readily
effected the solution. The conceit of dreams, according to the votary's
wishes, was so powerfully promoted by the preparatory initiation he had
undergone, that it would have been somewhat extraordinary had he been
altogether disappointed. He was generally anxious to increase the fame
of his divinity by his dream, and possessed a high veneration and deep
impression of the miracles which that divinity had wrought. With these
predispositions he resorted to the temple, where he had a whole day
before him to ponder on his malady, and on every sort of remedy that
might have been suggested to him; how natural was it, therefore, for his
busy imagination to fix, in his sleep, upon one particular remedy more
forcibly than upon another? Add to this, the solemn lonely hour of night
was the appointed hour for his sleep, which was preceded by prayer and
other inspiring ceremonies, that would naturally elevate his devotion to
the highest pitch. He had also previously perambulated the temple, and
with a full heart surveyed the offerings of those whose sickness had
departed from them.

If all these preparations were unavailing, the officiants of the temple
had still means in reserve, by which the credulous should be thrown into
that bodily state which was indispensable to the divinatory sleep: of
these, succeeding instances will be hereafter produced. In those days,
there were however, some men from whom the somniferous faculty was
withheld: they were, therefore, admonished to repeat their prayers and
oblations, in order to win the divinity's favour: and the ultimate and
customary resort was, if success did not crown his perseverance, to
pronounce it a token, that such patients were an eyesore to the
divinity.

From this divinatory sleep, arose the vulgar expressions in Greece
[Greek: enkoimasdai], and [Greek: enkoimaesis][90] The latin terms are
_incubare_ and _incubatio_ an exact translation of the Greek words. It
appears, therefore, that the Romans and Greeks were equally acquainted
with the institution; though we find but very little mention made of it
by the Latin writers, yet this is no argument against its prevalence
among the Romans, as we are left with as scanty accounts of many other
superstitions which were in vogue amongst them. It is highly probable
that it was not by any means so popular in Rome as in Greece; and the
cause of this may, perhaps, be found in the reflecting disposition and
sober character of the haughty Roman, to which the light and volatile
temperament of the Grecian, formed so striking a contrast.

That incubation was a ready means of diving into the future, needs no
demonstration. Although its practice was chiefly resorted to in cases
where medical aid was desired, it was still made use of in every other
case, in which the ancient oracles were consulted. Whether it arose in
Greece, or migrated thither from the East, is a point with which the
ancients have left us unacquainted, though they advert to its prevalence
amongst those who were called barbarians. Strabo has several instances
of it, and particularly mentions a place in the Caspian sea, where such
an oracle existed;[91] he also relates, in his celebrated account of
Moses, that this law-giver laid it down, in common with the priests of
Esculapius, that to those who led a chaste and virtuous life the deity
would vouchsafe prophetical visions in his sanctuary; but to those who
were of idle and impure habits, they would be denied.[92]

Pomponius Mela even mentions a savage nation, in the interior of
Africa, who laid themselves down to sleep on the grave-stones of their
ancestors, and looked upon the dreams they had on those spots as oracles
from the dead.[93] We shall see, hereafter, that this superstition was
equally indigenous among the Egyptians. Although it be doubtful whether
the Greeks owed this species of divination to their own invention or
not, its existence may at least be traced as far as the earliest ages of
their history; notwithstanding no positive mention of it has been made
either by Homer or the authors following him.

The oracular power of dreams, and the sanctuaries where they are
supposed to be dispersed, have been diffusely treated of in the
compilations of Van Dale and other learned writers. These species of
oracles were in high estimation, even in the most enlightened and
flourishing periods of Greece; it is somewhat singular, however, that no
people cherished them more devoutly than the Spartans, who depended
altogether upon oracles in their weightiest affairs of state. Of all the
civilized nations of Greece, Sparta always approved herself the most
superstitious; her advancement was rather the effect of her policy, than
of any stimulus given to her civilization by science. This consideration
will enable us to account for the powerful influence which, even in the
latest stages of Lacedemonian story, attached to the responses of
Passiphae, a local goddess of Thalame, but little known beyond the
confines of Laconia. The extent of their influence is particularly
evident in the history of Agis and Cleomenes.[94]

The greater part of these somnambulistic oracles were ascribed to
persons who had distinguished themselves as great dreamers when on
earth. In old times there was a description of prophets who pretended to
prepare themselves for the foreboding of future events through the
medium of sacred dreams. They were classed under the appellation of
[Greek: Oneiroploi], to which rank the most celebrated Vates of the
heroic age belonged. In this way it was that a sacred spot was dedicated
to Calchus, whence he gave his responses in dreams after his decease:
this spot lay in Daunia, on the coast of the Adriatic. The supplicant's
offices began with the offering up of a ram, on whose skin he laid
himself down, and in this situation, received the instruction he sought
for.[95] Amphilocus, a contemporary soothsayer, who accompanied the
Epigoni in the first Theban war, had a similar oracle at Mallos, in
Cilicia, which Pausanias asserts, even at the close of the second
century, to have been the most credible of his age; it is also mentioned
by Dion Cassius, in his history of Commodus.[96]

The most famous, however, of this class of oracles, was that of
Amphiaraus, the father of Amphilocus, which was one of the five
principal oracles of Greece; he had signalized himself as a sapient
soothsayer in the first Theban war; and his oracle was situated at
Oropos, on the borders of Boetia and Attica. Of all others this deserves
our most particular attention, as it was resorted to more frequently in
cases of infirmity and disease, than in any other circumstances. His
responses were always delivered in dreams, in whose interpretation, as
he was the first to possess that faculty. Pausanias says he received
divine honours. Those who repaired to Amphiaraus's oracle to supplicate
his aid, laid themselves down in the manner we have just related, after
several preparatory lustrations and sacrifices, on the skin of a ram