Case XIV

Ben Jonson, who had a tenacious memory, and a brilliant imagination, experienced occasionally these false impressions. He told Drammond that he had passed a whole night. in watching his great arm-chair, around which he saw Tartars, Turks, and Roman Catholics, rise up and fight; but he added that he knew these images to be the result of a heated imagination. The vision he had in the house of Sir Robert Cotton, in which he appeared to see his son die of the plague in London, had probably the same origin.*

The nature of hallucinations not being always recognized, it is sometimes necessary to examine, and to compare, in order not to fall into error.

* Patenon, op. cit.

Case XV

We read, in Abercrombie's work, of the case of a man who has been all his life beset with hallucinations. His tendency is such that, when he meets a friend in the street, he is uncertain whether he is a real person or a phantom. With close observation he can perceive a difference between them. The features of the real person are more decided, more complete than those of the phantom, but he usually corrects his visual impressions by touch, or by hearing their footsteps. He has the faculty of recalling his visions at will, by powerfully fixing his attention on the conceptions of his mind. This hallucination may comprise a figure, a scene, or an imaginary creation; but, although he has the power to produce the hallucination, he cannot dispel it; nor, having produced it, can he tell how long it will last. This man is in the prime of life, of clear intellect, good health, and occupied in business. Another person of his family has the same power, but in a less degree.*

Subsection II. - Hallucinations consistent with reason, not corrected by the understanding.

Some years since, in a note addressed to an honorable member, M. Bernard d'Apt, who requested my opinion on supernatural-ism, I openly avowed my sympathy in that grand creed. A journalist, for whom it was intended, hid it in his portfolio, out of friendship to me. This question has been renewed by M. Guizot, with his accustomed noble-mindedness.† We think, with him, that the existence of society is bound up in it. It is in vain that modern reason, which, notwithstanding its positivism, cannot explain the intimate cause of any phenomenon, rejects the supernatural; it is universal, and at the root of all hearts. The most elevated minds are frequently its most ardent disciples.

Dr. Sigmond goes still further; he says, in his remarks on hallucinations, that it would be difficult to find a celebrated man who has not, in his autobiography or his confessions, made allusion to some supernatural event of his life; he adds that the most sceptical have had, at one time or another, some extraordinary impression, presentiment, or vision.

* Abercrombie, Inquiries concerning the Intellectual Powers, 8vo. p. 380, eleventh edition, London, 1841. † See the Preface.

Thus it is that hallucinations are frequently accepted as realities, howsoever strange they may appear to those who experience them; but the judgment is not influenced. Men have witnessed some singular fact of which they give a more or less plausible explanation, but which, in secret, by a certain action of the mind, and a particular tendency to superstition, or rather to the supernatural, they are induced to regard as the presage of some weighty event, some exalted destiny, an inspiration from heaven, a warning of Providence. Many great men have believed in the existence of a star, a protecting genius; thus, marvellous apparitions have not always found them incredulous. The distinctive character of this kind of hallucination is, that, despite of it, the general character receives no stain, and a high reputation for wisdom, and virtue, and ability may be attained. We believe it not unfrequently happens that it is a lively stimulant to the execution of conceived projects.

Instances of this kind may be cited, for the genuineness of which the station of the individual, and the veracity of the witnesses, offer a sufficient guarantee.