Of this state I shall adduce two instances. The first is related by Professor Silliman, and quoted by Dr. PRichard. "A lady of New England, of respectable family, became subject to paroxysms, which came on suddenly, and after continuing an indefinite time, went off as suddenly, leaving her mind perfectly rational. It often happened that when she was engaged in conversation she would stop short in the midst of it, and commence a conversation on some other subject, not having the remotest connection with the previous one; nor would she advert to that during the paroxysm. When she became natural again, she would pursue the same conversation in which she had been engaged during the lucid interval, beginning where she had left off. To such a degree was this carried, that she would complete an unfinished story or sentence, or even an unfinished word. When the next paroxysm came on, she would continue the conversation which she had been pursuing in her preceding paroxysms; so that she appeared as a person might be supposed to do, who had two souls, each occasionally dormant, and occasionally active, and utterly ignorant of what the other was doing."

The second example was published by Dr. Dyce, in the Edinburgh Philosophical Transactions, and is quoted by Dr. Aberceombie. "The patient, who was a servant girl, was first attacked by fits of somnolency during the day, which came on with a cloudiness before her eyes and a pain in her head. In these fits she talked of scenes and transactions which appeared to be as in a dream, used to follow her occupations, dressed herself and the children of the family, and laid out a table correctly for breakfast. Being taken to church during the attack, she behaved properly, evidently attended to and was affected by the preacher, so as to shed tears. During the attack her eyelids were generally half-shut; her eyes sometimes resembled those of a person affected with amaurosis, that is, with a dilated and insensible state of the pupil, but sometimes they were quite natural. She had a dull, vacant look, but when excited knew what was said to her, though she often mistook the speaker: it was observed that she discerned objects which were but faintly illuminated. 'The paroxysms generally continued about an hour, but she could be roused out of them; and then she yawned and stretched herself, like a person awaking out of sleep. At one time she read distinctly a portion of a book that was presented to her, and she sang much better than in the waking state."

Dr. Abercrombie thought that no explanation could be found for these cases. It might, therefore, seem rather pre-sumptuous if we were to attempt anything of the kind: but we shall venture on one or two remarks which may tend to elucidate the subject.

The healthy waking of the mind is the resumption of the form of consciousness which existed previously to sleep. The objects before the eyes have the same aspect and the same associations; the thoughts return to the same channel; the occupations of the previous day, and those projected for the ensuing day, are remembered, and there is no confusion of personal identity. But a man may awake up to the outward world, and that world is all changed to him. His eyes are open, and his ears catch every sound, and he can feel and handle. But, alas! how delicate and fragile a thing is perception! All has gone wrong. He is awake, and he looks around his chamber in which he has every day, for years, hailed the morning sunshine. It has once more lighted up his household gods; and dear familiar faces are anxiously bent on those eyes which look, and yet have no speculation in them; and gentle voices hail, and condole, and soothe, and number up many a word and name, which but the day before would have been key-notes to his heart's sweetest harmonies; but all is now jarred and "jangled out of tune." He looks out on a new world projected from his own inner being. By a melancholy power, a fatal gift, of appropriating and assimilating the real objects perceived by his senses, he takes possession of them, nay, disembodies them, and fuses them into his imaginary creation. And as for those beloved beings who fondly think themselves linked with all his strongest and most tender memories, he takes no more note of them than as they swell that strange fantastic pageant which floats before his bewildered fancy; they are mere dramatis persona in the mad farce or tragedy which his poor brain is weaving. They are all shadows; no more the dear flesh and blood realities of his heart; they are metamorphosed into the unsubstantial figments of a distempered imagination.

What is the explanation of all this ? It is, that all things relatively to the percipient mind are as they seem: -

"Nothing is; but all things teem."

For to seem, is to be seen in a certain relation. No outward sensation is perfectly isolated; it is always connected with some other, past or present, from which it may take, or to which it may impart its hue, and tone, and character. Perception, as distinguished by metaphysicians from sensation, is resolvable into this. The individual we have been describing is awake, but awake with a new consciousness. In the morbid state of his brain, ideas (using this word as representative of the results of internal operations of the mind, as distinguished from those received from without) have so undue a vivacity and preponderance, that outward objects are no longer viewed in their former associations; they are made subordinate, and mere appendages, as it were, to the internal changes. It is a frightful excess of what, to a certain extent, is often taking place in healthy but powerful minds, which impress their own individuality on the external world. The speculative philosopher who views outward objects in relation to some comprehensive theory elaborated in his own mind, to which he fits all that he sees and hears, is the subject of a somewhat like process of thought. So, also, is the creative artist, who does not content himself with barely imitating nature, but who looks at nature through the media of his peculiar faculties, and, having invested the objects with a beauty and sublimity derived from his own mind, represents them with those forms and colours on the canvas or marble. His own subjectivity is first thrown upon the outward world, and then by his art made objective to other eyes.