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308

ILLUSION AND HALLUCINATION.

was a member, is given as a rare example of philosophical and careful analysis of what he himself regarded as a series of false sensations.* He imagined (so he relates) that his room was full of human figures, moving about; all the exact counterpart of living persons, except that they were somewhat paler; some known to him, some strangers; who occasionally spoke to each other and to him; so that at times he was in doubt whether or not some of his friends had come to visit him.

An illusion, unlike a hallucination, has a foundation in reality. We actually see or hear something, which we mistake for something else.† The mirage of the Desert, the Fata Morgana of the Mediterranean, are well-known examples. Many superstitions hence take their rise. Witness the Giant of the Brocken, aerial armies contending in the clouds, and the like.‡

Nicolai read his memoir on the subject of the specters or phantoms which disturbed him, with psychological remarks thereon, to the Royal Society of Berlin, on the 28th of February, 1799. The translation of this paper is given in Nicholson's Journal, vol. vi. p. 161.

† In actual mania, hallucinations are commonly set down as much more frequent than illusions. De Boismont mentions that, out of one hundred and eighty-one cases of mania observed by Messrs. Aubanel and Thore, illusions showed themselves in sixteen instances, while hallucination supervened in fifty-four. The exact list was as follows: Illusions of sight, nine; of hearing, seven; hallucinations of hearing, twenty-three; of sight, twenty-one; of taste, five; of touch, two; of smell, one; internal, two."Des Hallucinations," p. 168.

In the "Philosophical Magazine" (vol. i. p. 232) will be found a record of the observations which finally explained to the scientific world the nature of the gigantic appearance which, from the summit of the Brocken, (one of the Hartz Mountains,) for long years excited the wondering credulity of the inhabitants and the astonishment of the passing traveler. A Mr. Haue devoted some time to this subject. One day, while he was contemplating the giant, a violent puff of wind was on the point of carrying off his hat. Suddenly clapping his hand upon it, the giant did the same. Mr. Haue bowed to him, and the salute was returned. He then called the proprietor of the neighboring inn and imparted to him his discovery. The experiments were renewed with the same effect. It became evident that the appearance was but an optical effect produced by a strongly

NO COLLECTIVE HALLUCINATIONS.

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There are collective illusions; for it is evident that the same false appearance which deceives the senses of one man is not unlikely to deceive those of others also. Thus, an Italian historian relates that the inhabitants of the city of Florence were for several hours the dupes of a remarkable deception. There was seen, in the air, floating above the city, the colossal figure of an angel; and groups of spectators, gathered together in the principal streets, gazed in adoration, convinced that some miracle was about to take place. After a time it was discovered that this portentous appearance was but a simple optical illusion, caused by the reflection, on a cloud, of the figure of the gilded angel which surmounts the celebrated Duomo, brightly illuminated by the rays of the sun.

But I know of no well-authenticated instance of collective hallucinations. No two patients that I ever heard of imagined the presence of the same cat or dog at the same moment. None of Nicolai's friends perceived the figures which showed themselves to him. When Brutus's evil genius appeared to the Roman leader, no one but himself saw the colossal presence or heard the warning words, "We shall meet again at Philippi." It was Nero's eyes alone that were haunted with the specter of his murdered mother.*

illuminated body placed amid light clouds, reflected from a considerable distance, and magnified till it appeared five or six hundred feet in height.

In Westmoreland and other mountainous countries the peasants often imagine that they see in the clouds troops of cavalry and armies on the march,—when, in point of fact, it is but the reflection of horses pasturing on a hill-side, and peaceful travelers or laborers passing over the landscape.

*There is no proof that the appearances which presented themselves to Nicolai, to Brutus, and to Nero were other than mere hallucinations; yet, if it should appear that apparitions, whether of the living or the dead, are sometimes of objective character, we are assuming too much when we receive it as certain that nothing appeared to either of these men.

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BIOLOGICAL EXPERIMENTS.

This is a distinction of much practical importance. If two persons perceive at the same time the same phenomenon, we may conclude that that phenomenon is an objective reality,-has, in some phase or other, actual existence.

The results of what have been usually called electrobiological experiments cannot with any propriety be adduced in confutation of this position. The biologized patient knowingly and voluntarily subjects himself to an artificial influence, of which the temporary effect is to produce false sensations; just as the eater of hasheesh, or the chewer of opium, conjures up the phantasmagoria of a partial insanity, or the confirmed drunkard exposes himself to the terrible delusions of delirium-tremens. But all these sufferers know, when the fit has passed, that there was nothing of reality in the imaginations that overcame them.

If we could be biologized without ostensible agency, in a seemingly normal and quiet state of mind and body, unconsciously to ourselves at the time, and without any subsequent conviction of our trance-like condition, then would Reason herself cease to be trustworthy, our very senses become blind guides, and men would but grope about in the mists of Pyrrhonism. Nothing in the economy of the universe, so far as we have explored it, allows us for a moment to entertain the idea that its Creator has permitted, or will ever permit, such a source of delusion.

We are justified in asserting, then, as a general rule, that what the senses of two or more persons perceive at the same time is not a hallucination; in other words, that there is some foundation for it.

But it does not follow that the converse of the proposition is true. It is not logical to conclude that, in every instance in which some strange appearance can be perceived by one observer only among many, it is a

REICHENBACH'S EXPERIMENTS.

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hallucination. In some cases where certain persons perceive phenomena which escape the senses of others, it is certain that the phenomena are, or may be, real. An every-day example of this is the fact that persons endowed with strong power of distant vision clearly distinguish objects which are invisible to the short-sighted. Again, Reichenbach reports that his sensitives saw, at the poles of the magnet, odic light, and felt, from the near contact of large free cystals, odic sensations, which by Reichenbach himself, and others as insensible to odic impressions as he, were utterly unperceived.* It is true that before such experiments can rationally produce conviction they must be repeated again and again, by various observers and with numerous subjects, each subject unknowing the testimony of the preceding, and the result of these various experiments must be carefully collated and compared. But, these precautions scrupulously taken, there is nothing in the nature of the experiments themselves to cause them to be set aside as untrustworthy.

There is nothing, then, absurd or illogical in the supposition that some persons may have true perceptions of which we are unconscious. We may not be able to comprehend how they receive these; but our ignorance of the mode of action does not disprove the reality of the effect. I knew an English gentleman who, if a cat had been secreted in a room where he was, invariably and infallibly detected her presence. How he perceived this, except by a general feeling of uneasiness, he could never explain; yet the fact was certain.

Reichenbach, in his "Sensitive Mensch," (vol. i. p. 1,) estimates the number of sensitives, including all who have any perception whatever of odic sights and feelings, at nearly one-half the human race. Cases of high sensitiveness are, he says, most commonly found in the diseased; sometimes, however, in the healthy. In both he considers them comparatively

rare.

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EXCEPTIONAL CASES OF PERCEPTION.

If we were all born deaf and dumb, we could not imagine how a human being should be able to perceive that a person he did not see was in an adjoining room, or how he could possibly become conscious that a townclock, a mile off and wholly out of sight, was half an hour faster than the watch in his pocket. If to a deafmute, congenitally such, we say, in explanation, that we know these things because we hear the sound of the person's voice and of the clock striking, the words are to him without significance. They explain to him nothing. He believes that there is a perception which those around him call hearing, because they all agree in informing him of this. He believes that, under particular circumstances, they do become conscious of the distant and the unseen. But, if his infirmity continue till death, he will pass to another world with no conviction of the reality of hearing save that belief alone, unsustained except by the evidence of testimony.

What presumption is there against the supposition that, as there are exceptional cases in which some of our fellow-creatures are inferior to us in the range of their perceptions, there may be exceptional cases also in which some of them are superior? And why may not we, like the life-long deaf-mute, have to await the enlightenment of death before we can receive as true, except by faith in others' words, the allegations touching these superior perceptions?

There is, it is true, between the case of the deaf-mute and ours this difference: he is in the minority, we in the majority: his witnesses, therefore, are much more numerous than ours. But the question remains, are our witnesses, occasional only though they be, sufficient in number and in credibility?

That question, so far as it regards what are commonly called apparitions, it is my object in the next chapter to discuss.

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