Dealings with the Dead/Part 2/Curves
Curves.
This book, which after all is but prefatory to a volume on the general subject of the life beyond, which we are, ere long, to give to the world, would be incomplete were we to neglect or omit to answer certain very pregnant questions, that must arise in the mind of the reader, as he or she proceeds in its perusal: accordingly, this section, a short one, shall be devoted to that end.
As I rose in the air, and passed over a sunny region, which had not felt the effects of the terrific storm of thunder and rain, there came a feeling, that there was a vast difference between my then present state, and that in which the aerial journey from the city in the East was accomplished. In both cases, the altitude reached was probably the same, or approximately so; but in the first flight I was not one-fiftieth part as conscious, or awake, as during the second: there was also a difference in the rapidity of motion.
The individual calling himself Thotmor, and concerning whose reality I am perfectly convinced, now moved through the air at but a slight elevation above me; while formerly, I had not seen him at all, previous to making his acquaintance near the house of the sleepy student.
At one time, among my other miseries, there possessed me a very uncomfortable apprehension, lest, by some mishap, my guide should be unable to sustain me, and that I should fall. Now the reader will say, "That was impossible; for a spirit, being lighter than air, must necessarily ascend." Another one will say, "True, so it must; but being so very much lighter than air, what is to hinder it from going up with a rush—what prevents it from going up vertically with the speed of a rifle ball, seeing that the pressure of air must force it upward with a power almost inconceivable? How is it that a spirit gets to earth at all, seeing that light bodies cannot displace heavy ones; and how could a spirit move off at an angle at all?"
These, and a multitude of other questions were present in my mind, along with many novel suggestions, provoked by the peculiar circumstances in which the narrator of these experiences was placed.
Let us try to make the matter clear, by remarking, in the first place, that the prevailing sensation was such as is experienced by those who go up into the great deep in balloons, during their novitiate in the business of cloud-climbing.
Among other questions that arose, and which I put to myself, was this:" Do I as a spirit, for the time being, actually ascend? Am I really here, on the breast of earth's great cushion—the atmosphere? or is all this an experience of the soul—an episode of dream-life? Am I really here, or is this, that so resembles me, only an alter ego—a second self—the result of a pushing forth of faculty? Is it a mere phantom, which my soul has shaped, and sent forth, and then lodged its intelligence in, for a time, by way of experiment and freak? If so, how is it done?
"In either case, the question is a grave one; for if it be not myself, here in the air, but only a soul-created phasma, of what sort of materials is this appearance made, and whence comes the wierd and mighty power that can call these images into being, and endow them with all the resemblance of reality?"
These and similar queries suggested themselves to me; and while the last one was still fresh in my mind, I noticed that the earth beneath me was smiling in glad freshness;—for the storm had not passed over that part of the land, although even then and there it was raining—a soft, gentle, sweet and sunshiny summer rain, such as happens when the "Devil whips his wife"—I beg pardon—wed to whip her; for, according to modern philosophers, of the "Harmonial" order, he has deceased these eleven years, and, of course, cannot thus chastise her any more. Be that as it may, however, it was raining; and here was an opportunity to solve a much mooted point, namely: "Do spiritual beings get wet in a rain storm? Do the rain-drops and hail-stones pass through them, or do they bound off as from a solid body?" Most attentively did I make the closest observations, in order to be able to solve the question. I decided that the, rain passed through us, yet touched us not at all, as apparently did the wind. Preferring to make every point as clear as possible, I shall attempt to illustrate this one, even at the risk of a little prolixity and repetition. The subject is an interesting one, and demands it.
Now, everybody knows that nothing less dense than water, save air, in violent motion, will turn aside or shed it; and that which constitutes the spiritual body is, of course, infinitely finer and more subtle than even the rarest gas, much less the thick and heavy atmosphere surrounding this and all other globes.
This fact being conceded, it follows that all such bodies must be pervious; and they are so, and not so at the same time. Remember that spirit is not soul; forget not that the latter is the Winged Globe, of Which I have spoken, and the former is a projection, an out-creation from it. This out-projection or spirit is, of course, perfectly atomless and unparticled. We gaze into a mirror, and behold a semblance of ourselves; and the same figure may be gazed at by a hundred thousand eyes; everybody will at once acknowledge that the likeness is perfect and real, yet every one knows that not one single atom of any sort of matter enters into its composition.
It cannot be handled, but everybody can see it; nor would a pistol ball, shot through the head of that figure, harm it in the least degree, because it is not substance, although it is substantial. It is not a shadow, for it is real,—which latter fact is proved daily by those who first coax this image to enter a camera, and no sooner does it get fairly in than the clever artist impales it against a tablet of glass, or ivory, and lo! everybody carries the chained image to his home for everybody else to look at, who chooses so to do. This is Photography.
Now, the wind and rain, cold and heat, are as powerless and inefficient to act upon a spirit as they are upon the image in the camera, or a mirror. In other words, the spiritual body is a projected image of the soul,—is a sort of objectified subjective state; or is a fixed idea—an out-creation.[1]
The image in the glass is not made up of parts,—it is a unit,—an entity,—is homogeneous. "If so, how can it be scientifically true that the rain passes through it? If it does so pass, it must make holes through it; and if holes are made through it, then its homogeneity is at an end for evermore."
This is a fair, as it certainly is the strongest objection that can be urged against the position assumed. But the answer, which forever sets it at rest, is this: "Spirit is not matter."
The subject may be further illustrated, thus: Suppose a large sheet of flame issuing, not from a jet, but from the edge of a hollow disk, and that the rush of gas is great enough to impel the sheet of flame six feet into the air. Now, try to wet this flame; it will take some time before you succeed in the enterprise. Take a watering pot and sprinkle it to your heart's content; but, although the drops of water will reach the ground through the disk, and displace portions thereof, for an infinitesimal space of time, yet they will neither wet nor touch it.
Every drop of water has an envelope of an electric nature, doubtless; and that each particle of flame has a corresponding one is self-evident. The respective envelopes may come in contact with each other, but their respective principles—never.
Now, the spirit is far more difficult to reach than would be this flame. As stated before, every perfect thing is globular: the sun, within the brain, I have called by its true name—a winged globe; the electric moon, whose seat is in, on and about the solar plexus, is literally an electric moon, perfectly globular. The human being, body, soul, spirit, is surrounded by an atmosphere of the same form, or nearly so; and this enveloping aura, this spirit-garb, protects its centre—the man—from injury or contact with other things (unless, indeed, it be voluntarily broken down, or yields to assaults from without by the abjectivity of the will). True, a person may be injured magnetically through this sphere, by pressure or malaria, although itself remains unruptured and intact; just as a pistol ball will kill a man, without actually touching his flesh. If he chance to be dressed in silk, it may drive its bulk into his flesh, yet not a particle of lead shall touch it.
I observed the aura or sphere which surrounded myself and my two glorified companions. The raindrops passed through it, as also through portions of our respective persons, just as they would through a sheet of flame-lightning, but without actual contact or wetting either. We have every reason to believe that, as we ascend, the air grows colder, until at the height of forty-five miles the cold must be in the neighborhood of three thousand degrees below zero. Now, spirits frequently pass through this—they must pass through it to reach us, yet they are unaffected thereby, for the reason that they are superior to all material influences.
Moses, Elias, the spiritual visitants of the Patriarchs, of the man of Uz, he whom John saw,—and others, had to come through this intense cold; and the fact that they did so proves that material forces have but little, if any effect upon spirit. It therefore defies one extreme, and consequently ought the other. It does so. For the spirits seen walking about in the fiery furnace, which was heated seven times hotter than its wont, for the especial grilling of Messieurs Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, bade defiance to fire;—a fatal fact against the theory of a physical hell—the spirits proving not only water, ice, and wind, but fire-proof also!
Continuing my scrutiny, I observed that never a drop of rain fell upon the centre of the heads of either of the aerial party: for just over the crown of every human being in the body is a thick bone; out of the body, a magnetic shield, impenetrable by anything whatever; for every drop of rain slides off it, as from an iron roof. Place a spirit under a stream of falling water, and the central globe would instantly condense to infinitesimal proportions, so firmly embraced by its shield as to resemble the original monad; nor could water ever come in contact with it, any more than the same water could come in contact with a plate of iron at a white heat, which every one knows is a physical impossibility. I humbly trust that I have been understood.
In reply to "How can a spirit reach earth at all, or move through air at any angle up or down?" I reply: Electrically. It projects an image of itself to where it would be;—every man who thinks of a distant point does the same, only that the thing cannot be seen with earthly eyes. There is a magnetic railway between the projection and the projector, along which this latter moves.
Throw forth an image by glasses across the street. It will find no difficulty in reaching the spot whither you send it. Analogous to this is the power of soul to go whither it listeth, unimpeded, and of its own free will.
The ultimatum of all philosophy is, to teach men how to live; to instruct them how to die; establish a conviction of immortality; and explain how this latter is, and why, and to whither it shall lead. The sole business of this book, and that which is to follow in due season, is not to controvert any current system of philosophy—Harmonial, Spiritualistic, or otherwise—but to present, not a mere theory or hypothesis on the subject of an hereafter and its sequences, but to give forth what I know to be the truth, so far as that truth extends; nor do I fail to be impressed with a deep assurance that, although much herein given necessarily antagonizes a few of the popular Spiritual theories, yet I believe that that which I have now given concerning the soul and its destiny, is perfectly true and correct. I care not how much soever the reader may doubt the aerial experiences herein narrated—for these are but illustrative, at best, and in other respects are of little account—yet the Theory I know to be the only true one yet advanced; and it is to the principles wherein this theory is founded, that I call the attention of the Thinking World, and challenge its respect.
Not a human being, whom I ever saw, was fully satisfied with either Modern Spiritualism, or what is called Harmonial Philosophy; for the more a man bases his hopes of a life hereafter upon either of them, the more he stands on slippery ground. Doubt after doubt seizes on the mind, until at last people turn away, sad-hearted and desperate, from so-called systems of Immortalism, to take refuge in the church, which erewhile they so loudly berated and condemned—resort once again to the Blessed Book, or else unhappily drift out upon the shoreless, hopeless sea of atheism. There are untold multitudes who will gladly hail anything that promises to remove the dreadful doubts concerning, not only their continued existence, but their chances of bliss beyond the veil. To such this book and its fellow comes; for the benefit of such they both are, and are to be sent forth upon the world's great tide.
Thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the truths here written—with the principles set forth and running like a gold-vein through that portion which is descriptive mainly—no one can help feeling strong in the certitude of an hereafter—this being the only attempt ever yet made in this country to treat of the soul per se, and in its higher and deeper relations, so far as the writer is aware.
Concerning the absolute origin and final destiny of the soul itself, the answer to the question, What is God, and a few others of equal import, the reader must wait for the second volume; for, in the present, we have only entered the outskirts of the illimitable course—have scarcely touched the preface of the mighty volume, Soul. Herein we are only at the top of one of the lesser hills, from which we catch a faint, very faint view, and hear but the distant throbbing pulses of the vast ocean, on whose swelling bosom, and upborne by whose wisdom-crested waves all men shall ere long sail.
As true lovers of our race, we ask all good people to embark with us anon upon an intellectual voyage across the Deep, in search of facts and truths far more stately and sublime than those usually purporting to come from super-mundane sources.
All truths are necessarily dogmatic; nor has any attempt herein been made to hinder their expression from being the same. Our great Master and Exemplar in virtue was dogmatic—why not his followers be the same?
It seems essential, at this point, that the writer should say something, not concerning the spiritual realms, but of the man-spirit—the self—the developed and developing monad. Now, what is a monad? The reply is: Something quite analogous to, but not exactly, the Leibnitzian; 'Particle,' but that which is to universal spirit precisely what an atom is to universal substance or matter—with this difference: you cannot cut an idea into halves or pieces, for it is, was, and ever will be, a unit; so is a monad.
An atom of matter is divisible to infinity—a single grain of sand being, by a mental process, capable of disintegration so great, that were each portion to be separated from its fellow by only the millionth of an inch, yet the vast concave of the dome, the walls of the sidereal heaven, the awful height and depths of space, the dizzy steeps of the great Profound, would not afford room to hold them all, even though the worlds were rushed out of being for accommodation's sake. Yet not one of these portions would be spirit, because that is indivisible; they can never be. It is a philosophic truth, as well as a scientific axiom, that "Matter is divisible forever; spirit is not."
Beasts have spirits, but not immortal ones; for the reason that they are the result of mere physical energy, and natural elements acted on by natural forces. Their mission is to serve certain uses, the greatest of which is that of affording, in some mysterious way, temporary homes for higher beings, or rather for what is thereafter to become such—as already alluded to in the article on Transmigration.
Nothing material is endowed with perpetuity; for nothing particled can ever be so. True it is, that the spirit of a beast is many degrees finer in texture, and more sublimated than the luminiferous ether by which we come in contact with colors; but the soul of a man is myriads of degrees more subtile in constitution than even this essential part of animals. The last is particled, the former homogeneous, sui generis, Deific in origin, peculiar in nature, expansive in power, infinite in capacity of acquirement, and probably eternal in duration.
Comparisons are useful: Suppose, then, that the sacred rite is to be celebrated that shall call a new soul into outer being. Well, at the moment of orgasm, there leaps forth from the very heart of the winged globe a monad; with the speed of light, it rushes down the spinal column, supplied in its route with a nervo-magnetic garment—a voluntary contribution from every particle of his physical being. It reaches the neighborhood of the prostate gland, passes through it, during which it receives additional envelopes, of a nature easily understood. Its next leap is to the prepared ovum, which it only reaches after taking refuge in a hollow, shell, attached to what is called the "head of a spermatozoa," which in itself is the half germ (the ovum being the other) of the physical structure.
Imagine, if you please, a monad just incarnated in many folds. Its color is a pearly white, approaching the hue of pure fire; its bulk, with its investments about one-tenth that of the head of a small pin; without them, about so much less that probably a million might float without contact in a single drop of water. Its envelopes are the very incarnations and condensations of electricity and magnetism; and so possess the power of repelling uncongenialities, and of attracting whatever is essential to its development, during and subsequent to its temporary home at the gestative centre. The essences and life of all that the parent may eat and drink, or breathe—as perfumes, odors, and so forth—are gravitative to the precious point; and so the monad unfolds, and its envelopes grow; the one destined to become a living, active soul—the other, the temple of flesh and blood, in which it will, for three score years and ten, more or less, exercise and improve its faculties and powers. Now, this process is exactly analogous to that whereby God Himself brings humans into being; only that instead of having a female form to shield them (the monads), He made use of matter in other forms—worlds, and substantial things. It is easy to see how the first human being was brought into existence, albeit the full statement thereof belongs to another volume than the present—the first part of the present one merely giving an outline thereof.
Man's body is of the earth, earthy; it serves the soul's purposes for a time, and when it can no longer do so, we die because it is the nature of matter to decay and change; but soul being of God, the Honover, Aum, the Sacred, the Holy, the Great Mystery, lives on forever and for evermore; and in all human probability unfolds continually and incessantly.
Could you procure a microscopic view of a monad, you would behold a perfect resemblance of a human being of infinitesimal proportions, standing at full length, but with closed eyes, in the midst of a surrounding and protecting sphere, formed of something a myriad degrees more sublimated than the rarest imponderable known to science.[2]
Soul has two methods of increase: first, it feeds on notions, thoughts, sensations, ideas, emotions, hopes, joys, fears and anticipations, based on that which is external of itself. The experiences and discipline thus derived, constitute Progression. On the other hand, it creates, moulds, and fashions things from itself, and by the exercise, grows intuitive and strong. This is Development, or Unfolding. Souls are all of the same genesis, but, like trees of the forest, there are vast differences between them. Men often speak of "full souls, big souls, weak souls, strong souls, lean and fat souls," and so on—thus leaping to a truth by a single bound of intuition. For no greater truths exist than those words convey. People grow weary by labor, that's physical exhaustion; and of pleasure, that's sensational weariness; and of thinking, hoping, cogitating on a single subject, that's soul-tiredness—for all of which rest is demanded, or rather a change of attention and occupation.
The body is a laboratory, wherein the most beautiful and useful chemical labors are carried on; and it extracts and distils the finest essences from all things it manipulates. True it is, that a coarse man will only extract physical energy from beef and wine j but it is also true that these things contain something far more rare, and so subtle that it requires a stomach of finer texture and more elevated order to extract the higher essences, that go to inspire genius, develope poets, and sustain philosophers in thinking.
Some persons manufacture bleaching salts and oil of vitriol; others compouud the delicate odors which float upon the air of palaces, and radiate from the garments of refined women; yet both are chemists. And so of human bodies; they feed on the essences of food, and convert these essences into the most spiritual forms possible; this last is duly laid away in numberless magazines, or store-houses, which we call the "Nervous Ganglia." When these stores are distributed, the body grows strong. When the supply is exhausted, we become faint and weary, and finally fall asleep, whereupon the soul-sun sets for a while (vide the case of the student), withdraws from the brain, passes down the vertebrae, enters the solar plexus, changes the refined essences of the ganglia into pure fire, endows it with portions of its own divine life, sends a supply to every point where the communications are not cut off by disease; and so increases the vigor, life, and bulk of the body.
When this recuperative work is done, the soul sometimes rests awhile, and remains shut out from this world for hours; during which time our existence is vegetative only, and we are in a deathly slumber, so far as outward consciousness is concerned. At such times, the soul is making itself familiar with the elements of that lofty and transcendant knowledge which all good human beings are destined to fully acquire after death. It is talking with God, and God is in turn conversing with it. It is perusing its volume of Reminiscences, and these sometimes vaguely, dimly flash forth on the outward memory, causing men to doubt the story that they have not pre-existed. Sometimes it is intently listening to the glorious melodies which the seraphim sing, or drinking in the knowledge of archangels; for it is indeed true that—
"Sometimes the aerial synod bends,
And the mighty choir descends,
And the brains of men thenceforth
Teem with unaccustomed thoughts."
The soul returns from the inner to the outer life, and, in spite of philosophy or reasoning to the contrary, will entertain vague memories, indistinct yet half-positive assurances of having been aforetime in some other place than earth, or hell, or heaven; nor can it get rid of this conviction, because it is true! We have existed somewhere else! We have lived and acted parts before, long ages ago, before this world was ushered into being from the fiery vortex of the Sun of suns; we have lived and moved and had a being in a strange and far-off world.
A realm of mystery and wonder, memory-filled, sublime;
Not in this world, or hell, heaven, space or time!
And so we sleep. At other times, without arousing the body, the soul cautiously re-ascends its daily throne, takes advantage of the physical quiescence and slumber, and plays many a fantastic trick with the materials in its magazines,—all for its own amusement and that of its phantasmal comrades and lookers on, who do not fail to gather round the bedside and join the spectral sport.
Sometimes it overhauls the sheets of memory, sportively, racily, jocundly, mixes them all together, puts incongruous events alongside of bitter remembrances; takes a character here, and one there, and forces them to perform the most ridiculous and absurd dramas imaginable; nor does imagination itself escape, for the soul touches it, and forthwith it produces, like a fecund mother, and the night-born offspring are forced to mingle themselves in one indescribable medley, along with things of pure memory and reminiscence, thus forming an olla podrida without order, system, head, foot, beginning or end. We are dreaming![3]
At other times, having placed proper sentinels to guard the body and telegraph to itself on the least appearance of danger, the royal soul, feeling its high-born nature demanding a supply not to be found within itself always, leaves for a while the scene of its sojourn, and leaps upward to the starry vault, to hold converse with the stars and their holy tenants: Then we have visions!
Again, it takes journeys over the earth's surface, visits old, familiar, or new and unknown places, persons and things: Then we are clairvoyant.
These are moods and phases of the soul's existence and activities, but they are not the highest; for, at Still other times, it arrays itself in its most regal garb, and, marshaled by an army itself has called into being, solemnly marches forth to attend The Council of the Hours!—and here a holy awe steals over me, as this trait and power of the soul is revealed. At such times we prophecy and become familiar with events, persons, principles, and things yet unborn in time and space;—we have receded behind the wall of consciousness, and bathed for a time in the sea of mystery, every billow and wavelet of which constitutes a destiny. For that all things that are yet to be, at this moment exist as monads and uncarnated thoughts in the Mind of Minds, there cannot be a shadow of doubt; nether can there be one that man has been, still is, and hereafter will be, intromitted to this sacred labyrinth of knowledge, under certain conditions yet unknown to us. And yet man is a free-acting being.
Bye-and-bye the sleep is ended, and we return to outer, every-day life. The soul's magazines have been stored full of the needful energies, both for itself and body; and it can at will, and sometimes by the action of a power lying back of volition, send forth these fiery elements to warm up and invigorate the outer self, as occasion may demand. Thus comes the blush of love, the inspiration of song, and acting, the fire and energy of speech and oratory, the flames of lust and passion, the brutal vigor of the athlete and pugilist, the blaze of anger, and the sudden and awful courage and ferocity of those who, at other times, are poltroons and errant cowards.
Of course, some people accumulate more of this fire than others, and some are more sensitive to its action—even when it is quiescent—than less fine organizations possibly could be; and these very sensitive persons will, from the effect this accumulated power has upon them, tell you more of an individual's character from a half hour's association, than others could after a dozen years of intimacy, for they come in almost direct rapport with the soul itself, with something of which the "sphere" is charged; whereas those who are not so sensitive must base their verdict on what they see and hear,—the others, on what they feel and know.
This fact is beginning to be well known; but there is a consideration arising out of it of vast importance. It is this: Those who are most sensitive are the very ones who absorb deepest of those energies. They draw it in like sponges, and give it out the same, as may be daily seen on the platforms whence "spiritual mediums" fulminate their doctrines. There you will see a fine, sensitive, delicate woman speaking for hours in tones of thunder, and with an energy sufficient to rack a far stouter frame to pieces,—physically sustained by what she draws from the audience, and returns likewise,—with something added from herself. Such persons, sitting in "circles," either draw off the very life of those with whom they join hands or come in contact, or else themselves are sponged dry[4] Now, one of these sensitives will so absorb the sphere of persons with whom they may chance to be, that they may be led to do many a naughty thing, even against their own inclinations and judgment—especially is this true with reference to the tender passion. Their conduct may be very reprehensible, their hearts be very pure. Of course this condition is a morbid one, and should be sternly fought against and battled down.
The question is often asked, "Do spirits eat?" Answer: In the Middle States, eating is a strong phantasy; the inhabitants believe they eat. In the Soul-world stomachs are useless, as well as the organs of sex, but the soul absorbs nutriment spontaneously. There is no waste!
Having thus briefly replied to the objections likely to be raised, I now resume the narrative at the point where it was left incomplete. What further took place will be found in the next section. As the splendid sentences of Thotmor, recorded in a previous section, fell upon the hearing of my soul, that soul involuntarily bowed itself in awe: and as the expression, "the workshop of the Eternal God; the orchestra of the Symphonies, the ladder reaching from Nothing to the Great Dome, beneath which sits in awful majesty, the Great I am,"—reached my understanding, there went up from the soul's deepest profound a desire to know who, what, and where was this supreme Ruler of the starry skies.
Scarcely was this thought fairly formed, when a deep slumber gently but rapidly stole over me. How long it continued I know not, but when consciousness for a moment returned again, I found myself brushing the dust from my apparel, beneath the trees from which my first journey had commenced. This occupation could not have lasted more than a minute, when I started off mechanically toward a deeper nook, and more secluded spot among the trees and bushes, apparently guided by instinct, or directed by a power above myself. And I lay me down, as if wearied with undue physical labor, and soon a gentle buzzing sound, like unto that made by myriad insects when the Day-God hies him to his slumber, and all the great, big world is still, lulled me into a sweet and soft repose. And a deep sleep fell upon my eyelids; and in that strange, mysterious rest, I experienced that which was not all a dream. I hasten to present the result of this last display of power.
- ↑ This sublime truth will be elaborated at length in the second volume, of which this is the first.—Pub.
- ↑ "Over the graves of the newly dead, may, on dark nights, be seen hovering the forms of those within them—strange, ghastly, ghostly forms they are. The exhalations of the decaying bodies assume the shape and proportions of the living being, and affright the passers by—Jung Stilling.
"Burn a rose, and then mix its asheswith water in a bowl; set it away in a still place, and in a few days a thin, glairy scum will rise upon the surface, and arrange itself in the exact form of the original flower."—Report of Acad. Sci., Paris, 1834.
The acorn, split in two and exposed to a strong light and high magnifying power, will disclose the perfect outlines of an oak tree. The germ of all things contains the likeness of what hereafter they are destined to become, and so also does the germ or monad of a man. Pub. - ↑ An objection may be urged here, to the effect that animals dream, as well as human beings. Dogs bark in their sleep, and manifest all the phenomena of dreaming. Has the dog, therefore, got a soul that pernoctates, goes abroad, and so forth? To this I reply: It is by no means certain that the sleep-barking of dogs and other beasts is anything more or less than a merely physical, nervous agitation. I am not sure that they really do have dreams. Still, on this point I am open to conviction, and just as soon as any well-bred dog, not one of your mongrel hounds either, shall tell me what he dreamed, I will announce that highly interesting fact to the world; but until one shall do so, I shall insist upon the hypothesis, above set forth, that these somnolent exhibitions are in some way connected with what I call the process of monad-gestation, and not to the dreaming of the beast as such.
- ↑ For further light on this point see a book called "The Sexual Question," by the writer of this work, and shortly to be published.