Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/475

DREAM 455 (which is intermediate between the soul and the animal part) the power of accompanying the soul in its nights to the celestial regions, and so of sharing in the contemplation of divine truths. Synesius exalts the rank of dreaming among the arts of divination, setting it far above other modes of prophecy as being most simple and sure, open to all, unencumbered with expensive and laborious prepara tions, and so on. He affirms that he has repeatedly found dreams of service in arranging his ideas, and in improving his style of composition. Mediaeval and modern Christian theologians have continued to attribute dreams, or, more accurately, certain orders of dream, to the intermediate agency of the divine Being. The popular theory of dreams to be met with among the later European peoples bears the impress of that folk-lore which developed itself in the Middle Ages under influences partly Christian, partly pagan. Dreams were referred to a variety of supernatural agencies, including not only God and the devil, but also subordinate beings, as fairy, fiend (incubus), &c. Further, the art of interpreting dreams according to definite rules (oneiromancy) was developed to a very high point. (See Brand, Popular Antiquities, vol. iii. Dictionary of Dreams], In our own times certain restricted classes of dreams are customarily associated with the action of benevolent or malignant beings. On the other hand, people are now wont to interpret dreams as omens or signs without dis tinctly attributing them to any supernatural agent. This view of dreams forms the transition-point between the religious and the scientific theories. (c) The Dream as a Subjective Phenomenon Dependent on Xatural Causes. While the theory of the divine or super natural origin of dreams has thus held its ground so long, there has been gradually growing up from an early period of human history a more scientific conception of the phenomenon as dependent on natural laws (of mind and body). Psychologists and physiologists alike have approached the subject from their respective points of view, and sought to explain the phenomena of dreaming as natural events. The first germs of a scientific theory of dreams are to be found in antiquity. Thus Democritus, from whom the Epicureans derived their theory, held that dreams are the product of the simulacra or phantasms of corporeal objects which are constantly floating in the atmosphere, and which attack the soul during repose. Again, Plato speaks in the Republic of dreaming as illustrating the dominant mental impulses and habits of the individual (unchecked appetite, and temperance with intellectual pursuits), and thus connects it with the normal waking operations of feeling and thought. Aristotle in his short treatise on dreams (-n-epl IwTrviw) refers dreaming to the action of objects of outward sense which leave behind impressions on the soul and bodily frame. Dreaming is said to be the function of the sensitive part of the mind, but of this so far as phantastic ; and a dream is defined as " the phantasm arising from the motion of sensible per ceptions when it presents itself to him who is asleep." Aristotle further has some correct observations on the immediate bodily conditions of dreaming, and on the exaggeration of sensation in this condition of mind. Thus, he says, we fancy it thunders and lightens when a small sound is produced in our ears ; we imagine that we are eating honey in consequence of a defluxion of the least quantity of phlegm. In the De Divinatione of Cicero we have almost an unique instance among classic writings of a complete rejection of the doctrine of the supernatural origin of dreams, and of a full and consistent adoption of the natural method of explaining the phenomena. Cicero s position stands in marked contrast to that of partial sceptics, as, for example, Pliny, who seems content to exclude from the supernatural method of explanation certain of the more obviously natural dreams, such as those occurring immediately after food and wine, or when ono has just fallen asleep after waking (Nat. Hist.) While philosophers were thus learning to regard dreams as natural processes, physicians, on the other side, had their attention called to dreaming in its relation to patho logical bodily conditions. It seems probable, indeed, that men occupied in studying bodily diseases were among the first to suspect the true nature and origin of dreaming. Thus Hippocrates, while inclined to admit that some dreams may be divine, distinctly says that others arise from the action of the mind and the body. Hippocrates, too, appears to have been the first to supply a scientific basis for the premonitory character of certain kinds of dreams. There are dreams, he says, which announce beforehand the affections of the body. This idea has, as we shall see presently, been confirmed by modern pathological observa tions. It is easy to understand that this prognostic side of dreams was in the early stages of knowledge greatly exaggerated. This appears to be true of the speculations of Galen, who held that to dream one s thigh was turned into stone signified the approaching loss of this member. This belief in the premonitory character of dreams was only one side of a general doctrine of dreams according to which they arise from bodily disturbances, and so may serve as symptoms which the physician has to include in the complete diagnosis of a disease. This idea, which is recognized by modern physiologists as true within certain limits, led in the first crude stages of scientific investigation to exaggerated and fanciful conclusions. Thus a new system of dream-interpretation came into vogue according to which to dream of a certain thing always means a dis turbance in one particular organ. In the doctrines of Oriental physicians (the Hindus and Chinese) dreams are thus referred to pathological states of the five organs heart, Kings, kidneys, spleen, and liver. Thus to dream of war and fighting signifies a bad state of the lungs ; of fire, smoke, &c., a bad state of the heart, and so on. Modern Theory of Dreams. Under this head we shall give an account of the principal results of modern in vestigations, psychological and physiological, on the nature and conditions of dreams. Respecting many points there is still considerable diversity of view. Certain questions of fact yet remain unanswered, the reason of this being the inaccessibility of dream-phenomena to accurate and adequate observation. Further, owing to the divided condition of psychological principles, the explanation of dreaming assumes very different forms with different writers. On the one hand there are those who conceive the mind as an independent spiritual substance, which employs the body as its instrument, but is not dependent on this. With these, dreams will naturally wear the aspect of products of some spiritual faculty or faculties which are not involved in the sleep of the body and the senses. At the other extreme are those who regard mental phenomena as an outcome of bodily changes, as a refined result of physical processes. By these, dreams will be regarded as given off, so to speak, by the various organs of the body during sleep. Midway between the spiritualist and materialist hypotheses is the scientific view in its narrower sense, namely, the doctrine that the mental and the bodily are perfectly dissimilar regions of phenomena, which are yet connected in such a way that bodily events appear as the conditions of mental events. In the follow ing account of modern dream theory we shall confine our selves for the most part to the last stand-point, though indicating here and there how the other theories of the relation of mind to body lead to divergent conclusions. On the very threshold of our inquiry we are met by a

much disputed question What is the relation of dreaming