of this kind; its subject was that of a deceased person, which, after haunting him for a few moments, did not return until several hours had expired.

2dly, A morbific cause of spectral illusions may, with very little intermission, influence ideas as they occur in their natural order of association. Thus, in a case recorded in the Pschyology of Bonnet, a gentleman labouring under some morbid affection of the brain, saw, while awake, various figures of animals, of human beings, of chariots, or of buildings, all in motion, which would successively approach towards him, recede, and disappear. But, at the same time, numerous sensations and ideas, unaffected in their degree of vividness, must have constantly interrupted this succession of spectral impressions, otherwise the judgment could not, as the narrative decidedly states, have remained entire.

3dly, A morbific cause of the same kind may, in its vivifying action, extend to some definite quality of sensations and ideas, whether that quality be pleasurable or painful. To the indications of this general action I have very frequently alluded, particularly in my description of the effects on the mind of the nitrous oxide and febrile miasma.

These remarks on the mode in which ideas may be renovated in a highly-intense state, will enable us, whenever we would wish to explain such popular narratives on the subject of ghosts or demonology as may be considered authentic, to apply with more success those pathological principles relative to spectral illusions which I have endeavoured to establish. For, in adverting to the subject of those waking visions

detailed in the first chapter of this work, which Nicolai the Prussian bookseller experienced, it is evident that his intense imagination was impressed with no appearance which was of itself supernatural. The objects of his second sight (to use the well-known term of the Scottish Highlanders), were all of the most familiar kind, men and women in their natural form and aspect, horses, dogs, or birds. Not of this earthly nature, however, were the illusions of superstitious ages, which constantly teemed either with angels or demons. In reference, then, to the view which I have taken, that spectral illusions ought to be regarded as nothing more than recollected images of the mind, which have been rendered by disease as intense as actual impressions, and which have been recalled in this vivid state by the well-known law of association, the figures of many phantasms may be indiscriminately referred to the delineations of those enthusiastic declaimers, historians, or poets, who have boldly attempted to supply from their own wild phantasy, the forms which they have supposed to have been imperfectly described in sacred records. From the imagination of ecclesiastical writers; from the stone or carved images of saints and angels, which have adorned the walls of religious edifices; or from emblematical pictures or portraits, which might have otherwise met with a popular diffusion, the sensible forms assumed by apparitions of this kind have been derived. By a high-wrought embellishment, they have been as determinately fixed in the mind as any familiar object which may be found in nature. No wonder then, that when, from some morbid state of the sys

tem, the superstitious have been rendered liable to spectral impressions, the figures of saints, angels, ghosts, or demons, should, above all other shapes, have formed the subject of their waking visions.

The late Dr Ferrier took some pains to trace to their real source the spectral figures which have been attributed to demoniacal visits. Thus, in his observations on the work of Remy, the commissioner in Lorraine for the trial of witches, he makes the following remark :-" My edition of this book was printed by Vincenti, at Lyons, in 1595. It is entitled Damonolatreia. The trials appear to have begun in 1583. .Mr Remy seems to have felt great anxiety to ascertain the exact features and dress of the demons, with whom many persons supposed themselves to be familiar. Yet nothing transpired in his examinations, which varied from the usual figures exhibited by the gross sculptures and paintings of the middle age. They are said to be black-faced, with sunk but fiery eyes, their mouths wide, and smelling of sulphur, their hands hairy, with claws, their feet horny and cloven." There is, also, in another part of Dr Ferrier's work, the following account given of a case which passed under his own personal observation :"I had occasion," he observes, " to see a young married woman, whose first indication of illness was a spectral delusion. She told me, that her apartment appeared suddenly to be filled with devils, and that her terror impelled her to quit the house with great precipitation. When she was brought back, she saw the whole staircase filled by diabolical forms, and was in agonies of fear for several days. After this first im

pression wore off, she heard a voice tempting her to self-destruction, and prohibiting her from all exercises of piety. Such was the account given by her when she was sensible of the delusion, yet unable to resist the horror of the impression. When she was nearly recovered, I had the curiosity to question her, as I have interrogated others, respecting the forms of the demons with which she had been claimed; but I

never could obtain any other account, than that they were very small, very much deformed, and had horns and claws, like the imps of our terrific modern romances." To this illustration of the general origin of the figures of demoniacal illusions, I might observe, that in the case of a patient suffering under delirium tremens, which came under my notice, the devils who flitted around his bed, were described to me as exactly like the forms that he had recently seen exhibited on the stage in the popular drama of Don Giovanni.

Dr Ferrier of Manchester was among the first to shew the importance of explaining the causes, which have given rise to the illusive creations of the mind. "I conceive," says this acute and ingenious writer, "that the unaffected accounts of spectral visions should engage the attention of the philosopher as well as the physician. Instead of regarding these stories with the horror of the vulgar, or the disdain of the sceptic, we should examine them accurately, and should ascertain their exact relation to the state of the brain and of the external senses." * It must be

* Ferrier's Theory of Apparitions, p. 139.

confessed, however, that, in narratives of this kind, the circumstances most interesting to the pathologist, either from having been considered as unnecessary or inconvenient to the purposes or views of superstition, appear in most instances to have been altogether suppressed. The field of inquiry is, therefore, in this particular department of our dissertation, rather limited; and hence the necessity of pointing out beforehand the various morbific causes of spectral impressions, by which the true nature of phantasms may admit of a readier explanation, than by having recourse for such a purpose to the extravagancies of a supernatural agency. Yet still a few scattered glimpses of truth break through the mysterious stories which excite the attention of the learned and the vulgar, and, by the light which such rays afford, I shall avail myself, however feebly it may gleam through the obscure and gloomy regions of demonology.

The object, then, to be held in view in this department of our inquiry, is simply this :-While an attempt will be made to apply the medical cases which have been adduced towards the explanation of many supposed visitations of good and evil spirits, it will be always necessary to demonstrate in what manner the subject of the illusions thus induced has corresponded with the fanciful imagery which owes its origin to various preconceived superstitions. In connexion, likewise, with the illustrations which I shall adduce of the morbid origin of many supernatural visitants recorded in popular narratives, it may not be uninstructive to glance at the opinions entertained through a number of ages, relative to their nature,