Part 17

There have thus been passed in review a variety of involuntary movements obtained in different ways, and with bearings upon many points of importance to the psychologist. They by no means exhaust the possibilities of research, or the deduction of conclusions in this field of study; but they may serve to illustrate how subtle and intricate are the expressions of the thoughts that lie within. That involuntary movements are by no means limited to the type here illustrated is easily shown. In the exhibitions of muscle-reading, the changes in breathing, the flushing, the tremor of the subject when the reader approaches the hiding-place, and the relative relaxation when he is on the wrong scent, serve as valuable clues; to borrow the apt expression of "hide and seek," the performer grows "hot" and "cold" with his subject. Then, too, the tentative excursions in one direction and another, to determine in which the subject follows with least resistance, present another variation of the same process. The hushed calm of the audience when success is near, the restlessness and whispering during a false scent, are equally welcome suggestions which a clever performer freely utilizes, thereby adding to the éclat of his exhibition. When a combination of numbers or of letters in a word is to be guessed, the operator passes over with the subject the several digits or the alphabet, and notes at which the tell-tale tremor or mark of excitement occurs, and so again performs the feat on the basis of the involuntary contractions that express the slight changes of attention or interest when the correct number or letter is indicated. In much the same way we unwittingly betray our feelings and emotions, our interest or distraction or ennui; the correct interpretation of these in others and their suppression in one's self form part of the artificial complexity of social intercourse. But in the line of experimental demonstration also, another form of involuntary movement has been brought forward in recent years by the investigation of Hansen and Lehmann upon "involuntary whispering." This investigation brings out the fact that many of us, when we think intently of a number, tend to innervate the mechanism appropriate to its utterance. We do not actually speak or whisper the word or sound, but we initiate the process. If one person thinks of a number,--say from one to ten, or from one to one hundred,--and the other records any number which at the same moment suggests itself to him, it may result that the proportion of correct or partially correct guesses exceeds that which chance would produce; and arguments for telepathy have been based on such results. In the series of experiments in question these "involuntary whisperings" were not severely suppressed,--much as in the automatograph tests one might determine to let the glass move if it would. It must be understood that there was no true whispering nor any movement of the speaking mechanism which a bystander could detect; and yet it seems likely that the one participant was influenced in his guessing by the vague but yet real, subconscious, embryonic articulation of the other. The proof of this lies mainly in the analysis of the successes and errors; for the confusions are strikingly between numerals of somewhat similar sound,--as between fourteen and forty, or sixty and thirty, or six and seven. If the two persons are seated in the respective foci of two concave surfaces which collect the sound (thus in a measure paralleling the exalted sensibility of specially gifted or hypnotized subjects), the chances of success seem to be increased. While the investigation is both complex and incomplete, yet the general trend of it is sufficiently clear to make it probable that "involuntary whispering" serves more or less frequently as a subconscious and involuntary indication of thought. It shows again that below the threshold of conscious acquisition and intentional expression lie a considerable range of activities, which though they blossom unseen do not quite waste their fragrance, but come wafted over in vague and subtle essence. The falling of a drop of water is unheard, but the sound of the roaring torrent is but the sound of myriads of drops. The boundary between the conscious and the unconscious is broad and indefinite; and vague influences, if not direct messages, pass from one side to the other.

The general bearing of the study of involuntary movements I have indicated at the outset; and no elaborate comment on the practical significance of the results described seems necessary. They certainly facilitate the appreciation of the reality of the subconscious and the involuntary; and in connection with explanations of muscle-reading or telepathy, they illustrate how naturally a neglect of this realm of psychological activity may lead to false conclusions. They bring a striking corroboration of the view that thought is but more or less successfully suppressed action, and as a well-known muscle-reader expresses it, all willing is either pushing or pulling.

THE DREAMS OF THE BLIND

Man is predominantly a visual animal. To him seeing is believing,--a saying which in canine parlance might readily become smelling is believing. We teach by illustrations, models, and object-lessons, and reduce complex relations to the curves of the graphic method, to bring home and impress our statements. Our every-day language, as well as the imagery of poetry, abounds in metaphors and similes appealing to images which the eye has taught us to appreciate. The eye is also the medium of impressions of æsthetic as well as of intellectual value; and one grand division of art is lost to those who cannot see. The eye, too, forms the centre of emotional expression, and reveals to our fellow-men the subtile variations in mood and passion, as it is to the physician a delicate index of our well-being. There are reasons for believing that it was the function of sight as a distance-sense that led to its supremacy in the lives of our primitive ancestors. Whatever its origin, the growth of civilization has served to develop this eye-mindedness of the race, and to increase and diversify the modes of its cultivation.

The eye, thus constantly stimulated in waking life, and attracting to its sensations the focus of attention, possessing, as it does, in the retinal fovea a special and unique aid to concentrative attention, does not yield up its supremacy in the world of dreams. The visual centres subside but slowly from their day's stimulation; and the rich stock of images which these centres have stored up is completely at the service of the fancy that guides our dreams. Indeed, the dream itself is spoken of as a vision.

Though, as a race, we are eye-minded, individually we differ much with regard to the rôle that sight plays in our psychic life. In one direction a good index of its importance is to be found in the perfection of the visualizing faculty, of which Mr. Galton has given an interesting account. He asked various persons to describe, amongst other things, the vividness of their mental picture when calling to mind the morning's breakfast-table. To some the mental scene was as clear and as natural as reality, lacking none of the details of form or color; to others the resulting mental image was tolerably distinct, with the conspicuous features well brought out, but the rest dim and ill-defined; while a third group could only piece together a very vague, fragmentary, and unreliable series of images, with no distinct or constant picture.

Similar differences are observable with regard to memories. Some persons firmly retain what they read, while the memory forte of others is in what they hear; and pathology supports this subdivision of the sense-memories by showing, for example, that all remembrance for seen objects may be lost while that for sounds remains intact. A case, remarkable in several aspects, is recorded by M. Charcot. The subject in question could accurately call up, in full detail, all the scenes of his many travels, could repeat pages of his favorite authors from the mental picture of the printed page, and by the same means could mentally add long columns of numbers. The mere mention of a scene in a play, or of a conversation with a friend, immediately brought up a vivid picture of the entire circumstance. Through nervous prostration he lost this visual memory. An attempt to sketch a familiar scene now resulted in a childish scrawl; he remembered little of his correspondence, forgot the appearance of his wife and friends, and even failed to recognize his own image in a mirror. Yet his eyesight was intact and his intellect unimpaired. In order to remember things he had now to have them read aloud to him, and thus bring into play his undisturbed auditory centre--to him an almost new experience.

The function of vision in dreams is doubtless subject to similar individual variations, though probably to a less extent. Seeing, with rare exceptions, constitutes the typical operation in dreams; it is this sense, too, that, under the influence of drugs or of other excitement, is most readily stimulated into morbid action, and most easily furnishes the basis of delusions and hallucinations to a disordered mind. The dependence of the nature and content of dreams upon the waking experiences is so clearly proven that it would be surprising not to find in them the individual characteristics of our mental processes; and if Aristotle is right in saying that in waking life we all have a world in common but in dreams each has a world of his own, we may look to the evidence of dream-life for indications of unrestrained and distinctive psychological traits.

With regard to the blind, much of what has been said above is entirely irrelevant. However intimately we appreciate the function of sight in our own mental development, it is almost impossible to imagine how different our life would have been had we never seen. But here, at the outset, a fundamental distinction must be drawn between those blind from birth or early infancy, and those who lose their sight in youth or adult life. "It is better to have seen and lost one's sight than never to have seen at all," is quite as true as the sentiment which this form of statement parodies. Expressed physiologically, this means, that to have begun the general brain-building process with the aid of the eye insures some further self-development of the visual centre, and thus makes possible a kind of mental possession of which those born blind are inevitably deprived.

A fact of prime importance regarding the development of the sight-centre is the age at which its education is sufficiently completed to enable it to continue its function without further object-lessons on the part of the retina. If we accept as the test of the independent existence of the sight-centre its automatic excitation in dreams, the question can be answered by determining the age of the onset of blindness, which divides those who do not from those who still retain in their dream-life the images derived from the world of sight. The data that enable me to answer this question were gathered at the Institutions for the Blind in Philadelphia and Baltimore. Nearly 200 persons of both sexes were personally examined, and their answers to quite a long series of questions recorded. All dates and ages were verified by the register of the institution, and the degree of sight was tested.

Beginning with cases of total blindness (including under this head those upon whom light has simply a general subjective "heat-effect," enabling them to distinguish between night and day, between shade and sunshine, but inducing little or no tendency to project the cause of the sensation into the external world), I find on my list fifty-eight such cases. Of these, thirty-two became blind before the completion of their fifth year, and not one of this group of thirty-two sees in dreams. Six became blind between the fifth and the seventh year: of these, four have dreams of seeing, but two of them do so seldom and with some vagueness; while two never dream of seeing at all. Of twenty persons who became blind after their seventh year all have "dream-vision"--as I shall term the faculty of seeing in dreams. The period from the fifth to the seventh year is thus indicated as the critical one. Before this age the visual centre is undergoing its elementary education; its life is closely dependent upon the constant food-supply of sensations; and when these are cut off by blindness, it degenerates and decays. If blindness occurs between the fifth and the seventh years, the preservation of the visualizing power depends on the degree of development of the individual. If the faculty is retained, it is neither stable nor pronounced. If sight is lost after the seventh year, the sight-centre can, in spite of the loss, maintain its function; and the dreams of such an individual may be hardly distinguishable from those of a seeing person.

It was a very unexpected discovery, to find, after I had planned and partly completed this investigation, that I had a predecessor. So long ago as 1838, Dr. G. Heermann studied the dreams of the blind with the view of determining this same question, the physiological significance of which, however, was not then clearly understood. He records the answers of fourteen totally blind persons who lost their sight previous to their fifth year, and none of these has dream-vision. Of four who lost their sight between the fifth and the seventh year, one has dream-vision; one has it dimly and occasionally; and two do not definitely know. Of thirty-five who became blind after their seventh year all have dream-vision. The two independent researches thus yield the very same conclusion. Dr. Heermann includes in his list many aged persons, and from their answers is able to conclude that, generally speaking, those who become blind in mature life retain the power of dream-vision longer than those who become blind nearer the critical age of five to seven years. He records twelve cases where dream-vision still continues after a blindness of from ten to fifteen years, four of from fifteen to twenty years, four of from twenty to twenty-five years, and one of thirty-five years. In one case dream-vision was maintained for fifty-two, and in another for fifty-four years, but then faded out.

With regard to the partially blind, the question most analogous to the persistence of dream-vision after total blindness, is whether or not the dream-vision is brighter and clearer than that of waking life; whether the sight-centre maintains the full normal power to which it was educated, or whether the partial loss of sight has essentially altered and replaced it. To this rather difficult question I have fewer and less satisfactory answers than to the former inquiry; but the evidence is perfectly in accord with the previous conclusions. Of twenty-three who describe their dream-vision as only as clear as waking sight, all became blind not later than the close of their fifth year; while of twenty-four whose dream-vision is more or less markedly clearer than their partial sight, all lost their full sight not earlier than their sixth year. The age that marks off those to whom total blindness carries with it the loss of dream-vision from those whose dream-vision continues, is thus the age at which the sight-centre has reached a sufficient stage of development to enable it to maintain its full function, when partially or totally deprived of retinal stimulation. The same age is also assigned by some authorities as the limiting age at which deafness will cause muteness (unless special pains be taken to prevent it); while later the vocal organs, though trained to action by the ear, can perform their duties without the teacher's aid. This, too, is assigned as the earliest age at which we have a remembrance of ourselves. This last statement I am able to test by one hundred answers, collected among these blind persons, to the question, "What is your earliest remembrance of yourself?" The average age to which these memories go back is 5.2 years; seventy-nine instances being included between the third and the sixth years. At this period of child development--the centre of which is at about the close of the fifth year--there seems to be a general declaration of independence of the sense-centres from their food-supply of sensations. Mr. Sully finds sense, imagination, and abstraction to be the order in which the precocity of great men reveals itself; and the critical period which we are now considering seems to mark the point at which imagination and abstraction as permanent mental powers ordinarily come into play. M. Perez likewise recognizes the distinctive character of this era of childhood by making the second part of his "Child Psychology" embrace the period from the third to the seventh year.

III

The general fact thus brought to light--that the mode in which a brain-centre will function depends so largely upon its initial education, but that, this education once completed, the centre can maintain its function, though deprived of sense-stimulation--is sufficiently important to merit further illustration. This fact, though very clear and evident when stated from a modern point of view, has not always been recognized. So ingenious a thinker as Erasmus Darwin inferred from two cases (the one of a blind man, the other of a deaf-mute) in which the wanting senses were also absent in dreams, that the peripheral sense-organ was necessary for all perception, subjective as well as objective; and entirely neglected the age at which the sense was lost. Such noted physiologists as Reil, Rudolphi, Hartman, Wardrop (who says, "when an organ of sense is totally destroyed, the ideas which were received by that organ seem to perish along with it as well as the power of perception"), more or less distinctly favored this view; while some teachers of the blind and the physiologists Nasse and Autentreith rightly drew the distinction between those born, and those who became, blind. An experimental demonstration of the original dependence of the perceptive and emotional powers upon sense-impressions was furnished by Boffi and Schiff, who found that young dogs whose olfactory bulbs had been removed failed to develop any affection for man.

What is true of the visual, is doubtless equally true of the other perceptive centres. The dreams of the deaf-mute offer an attractive and untouched field for such study. The few accounts of such dreams that I have met with, fail to give the age at which deafness set in; in one case, however, in which deafness occurred at thirty years, the pantomimic had replaced the spoken language in the dreams of thirty years later. Similarly, cripples dream of their lost limbs for many years after their loss; in such cases, however, stimulation of the cut nerves may be the suggestive cause of such dreams. A man of forty, who lost his right arm seventeen years before, still dreams of having the arm. The earliest age of losing and dreaming about a lost limb, of which I find a record, is of a boy of thirteen years who lost a leg at the age of ten; this boy still dreams of walking on his feet. Those who are born cripples must necessarily have their defects represented in their dream consciousness. Heermann cites the case of a man born without hands, forearms, feet, or lower legs. He always dreamt of walking on his knees; and all the peculiarities of his movements were present in his dream-life.

The dreams of those both blind and deaf are especially instructive. Many of Laura Bridgman's dreams have been recorded; and an unpublished manuscript by Dr. G. Stanley Hall places at my service a valuable account of her sleep and dreams. Sight and hearing were as absent from her dreams as they were from the dark and silent world which alone she knew. The tactual-motor sensations, by which she communicated with her fellow-beings, and through which almost all her intellectual food reached her, also formed her mainstay in dreams. This accounts for the suddenness and fright with which she often waked from her dreams; she is perchance dreaming of an animal, which to us would first make itself seen or heard, but to her is present only when it touches and startles her--for she lacks any anticipatory sense. Language has become so all-important a factor in civilized life, that it naturally is frequently represented in dreams. We not only dream of speaking and being spoken to, but we actually innervate the appropriate muscles and talk in our sleep; this Laura Bridgman also did. "Her sleep seemed almost never undisturbed by dreams. Again and again she would suddenly talk a few words or letters with her fingers, too rapidly and too imperfectly to be intelligible (just as other people utter incoherent words and inarticulate sounds in sleep), but apparently never making a sentence." So, too, all the people who enter into her dreams talk with their fingers. This habit had already presented itself at the age of twelve, four years after her first lesson in the alphabet. "I do not dream to talk with mouth; I dream to talk with fingers." No prettier illustration could be given of the way in which her fancy built upon her real experiences, than the fact recorded by Charles Dickens, that on picking up her doll he found across its eyes a green band such as she herself wore. The organic sensations originating in the viscera, though often prominently represented in dreams of normal persons, seemed especially prominent in her dreams. She tells of feeling her blood rush about, and of her heart beating fast when suddenly waking, much frightened, from a distressing dream. One such dream she describes as "hard, heavy, and thick;" terms which, though to us glaringly inappropriate in reference to so fairy-like a structure as a dream, form an accurate description in the language of her own realistic senses. In short, her dreams are accurately modeled upon the experiences of her waking life, reproducing in detail all the peculiarities of thought and action which a very special education had impressed upon her curious mind.

I have had the opportunity of questioning a blind and deaf young man whose life-history offers a striking contrast to that of Laura Bridgman, and illustrates with all the force of an experimental demonstration the critical educational importance of the early years of life. He was, at the time of my questioning him, twenty-three years of age, and was earning a comfortable living as a broom-maker. He had an active interest in the affairs of the world, and disliked to be considered in any way peculiar. His eyesight began to fail him in early childhood; and in his fifth year the sight of one eye was entirely lost, while that of the other was very poor. After a less gradual loss of hearing, he became completely deaf in his ninth year. At the age of twelve he was (practically) totally blind, deaf, and nearly mute. The small remnant of articulating power has been cultivated; and those who are accustomed to it can understand his spoken language. He also communicates as Laura Bridgman did, and has a further advantage over her in possessing a very acute sense of smell. He remembers the world of sight and hearing perfectly, and in a little sketch of his life which he wrote for me vividly describes the sights and sounds of his play-days. He usually dreams of seeing and hearing, though the experiences of his present existence also enter into his dreams. Some of his dreams relate to flowers which he smelled and saw; he dreamt of being upset in a boat; shortly after his confirmation he dreamt of seeing God. When he dreams of making brooms, his dream is entirely in terms of motion and feeling, not of sight. His history thus strongly emphasizes the importance which a variety of evidence attributes to the period of childhood, and perhaps especially to that from the third to the seventh year.

The remarkable powers which Helen Keller has exhibited throughout her phenomenal education give to an account of her dream life an especial interest. I am fortunate in being able to present her own account as she prepared it at my solicitation. The wealth and brilliancy of her imagination frequently lead to modes of expression which seem to brusquely contradict her sightless and soundless condition. But a careful observation of her mental activities brings out the verbal or literary character of such allusions, in certain cases essentially aided by associations with impressions of the senses that remain to her. In such cases her familiarity, through literature and through intercourse, with the experiences of the hearing and seeing and with the emotional and intellectual associations that ordinary persons might have with definite scenes or occasions, enables her to realize, and her vivid imagination to construct, a somewhat idealized account of her vicarious experiences, though perhaps real emotions. Her dream life seems in complete concordance with her waking condition; but this imaginative factor must be constantly borne in mind in reading her report of her dream life. The intrinsic interest of this human document, and the charm of the narrative, present so lifelike and almost confidential a portrayal of her world of dreams, that any elaborate comment would be unnecessary. It should be remembered that Helen Keller became totally blind and deaf at nineteen months; that her instruction began at the age of seven years; that she learned to speak orally from her eleventh year; that at present she speaks orally almost exclusively, although very proficient in the use of the finger alphabet; that she is able to understand what is said to her by placing her fingers upon the lips and throat of the speaker, but that the more expeditious and certain mode of communicating with her is by making the letters of the finger-alphabet in the palm of her hand. This latter method she uses entirely with her teacher and with all who are conversant with it. This account of her dreams was prepared in August, 1900, when she was twenty years of age; it was written off-hand by her on a type-writer, and is presented in its original form.

MY DREAMS

"It is no exaggeration to say that I live two distinct lives,--one in the everyday world and the other in the Land of Nod! Like most people I generally forget my dreams as soon as I wake up in the morning; but I know that when I dream I am just as active and as much interested in everything--trees, books and events--as when I am awake.

"My dreams have strangely changed during the past twelve years. Before and after my teacher first came to me, they were devoid of sound, or thought or emotion of any kind, except fear, and only came in the form of sensations. I would often dream that I ran into a still, dark room, and that, while I stood there, I felt something fall heavily without any noise, causing the floor to shake up and down violently; and each time I woke up with a jump. As I learned more and more about the objects around me, this strange dream ceased to haunt me; but I was in a high state of excitement and received impressions very easily. It is not strange then that I dreamed at that time of a wolf, which seemed to rush towards me and put his cruel teeth deep into my body! I could not speak (the fact was, I could only spell with my fingers), and I tried to scream; but no sound escaped from my lips. It is very likely that I had heard the story of Red Riding Hood, and was deeply impressed by it. This dream, however, passed away in time, and I began to dream of objects outside of myself.

"I never spelled with my fingers in my sleep; but I have often spoken, and one night I actually laughed. I was dreaming of a great frolic with my schoolmates at the Perkins Institution. But, if I do not use the manual alphabet in my dreams, my friends sometimes spell to me. Their sentences are always brief and vague. I obtain information in a very curious manner, which it is difficult to describe. My mind acts as a sort of mirror, in which faces and landscapes are reflected, and thoughts, which throng unbidden in my brain, describe the conversation and the events going on around me.

"I remember a beautiful and striking illustration of the peculiar mode of communication I have just mentioned. One night I dreamed that I was in a lovely mansion, all built of leaves and flowers. My thoughts declared the floor was of green twigs, and the ceiling of pink and white roses. The walls were of roses, pinks, hyacinths, and many other flowers, loosely arranged so as to make the whole structure wavy and graceful. Here and there I saw an opening between the leaves, which admitted the purest air. I learned that the flowers were imperishable, and with such a wonderful discovery thrilling my spirit I awoke.

"I do not think I have seen or heard more than once in my sleep. Then the sunlight flashed suddenly on my eyes, and I was so dazzled I could not think or distinguish anything. When I looked up, some one spelled hastily to me, 'Why, you are looking back upon your babyhood!' As to the sound I heard, it was like the rushing of a mighty cataract, and reminded me forcibly of my visit to Niagara Falls. I remembered as if it were yesterday how I had come very close to the water and felt the great roar by placing my hand on a soft pillow. Now, however, I knew I was far away from the place whence the sound came, and the vibration fell clear, though not loud, upon my eardrums; so I concluded in my sleep that I really heard. What happened next I have entirely forgotten; but in the morning I was deeply impressed by the only instance in which I had dreamed of hearing, and I wished I could go back to Dreamland, just to hear that far-off, inspiring sound.

"Occasionally I think I am reading with my fingers, either Braille or line print, and even translating a little Latin, but always with an odd feeling that I am touching forbidden fruit. Somehow I feel that the spirits of sleep are displeased if any thoughts of literature cross my mind. Still I am free to enjoy everything else--I can wander among flowers and trees and be with my friends, especially those who live at a distance from where I happen to be. Sometimes I am with my mother, and at other times with my sister Mildred. My teacher scarcely ever appears in my dreams; but I know she would very often if a cruel fate should tear her away from me. I shall never forget the morning seven or eight years ago, when I dreamed that my dear friend, Bishop Brooks, was dying. A few hours later I found that my dream was a terrible reality. It is probable that I thought of him at the very moment when he was passing away, and I certainly wept in the same manner and in the same place while I dreamed, that I did afterwards!

"I hardly ever dream of anything that has happened the day before, although I sometimes have several different dreams on the same night; nor do I dream of the same things often. However, I dream oftenest of the unpleasant and horrible, no matter how happy and successful the day may have been. Indeed, I have found it unadvisable to read terrible stories or tragedies often, or in the evening. They impress me so painfully, and retain so firm a hold of my imagination that they sooner or later force themselves into my dreams. About two years ago I read 'Sixty Years a Queen' the story of the awful massacre at Cawnpore, which took place during the Indian Mutiny. It filled me with a horror that haunted me persistently for several days. At last I managed to banish these disagreeable feelings; but one night a frightful distortion of the selfsame story appeared before my mind. I thought I was in a small prison. At first I only noticed a skeleton hanging up on one of the walls; then I felt a strange, awful sound, like heavy iron being cast down, and the most heartrending cries ensued. I was informed that twenty men were being put to death with the utmost cruelty. I rushed madly from one room to another, and, as each ruffian came out, I locked the door behind him, in the hope that some of the victims might thereby be saved. All my efforts were futile, and I awoke with a sickening horror weighing down on my heart. I have also fancied that I saw cities on fire, and brave, innocent men dragged to a fiery martyrdom. One instant I would stand in speechless bewilderment, as the flames leaped up, dark and glaring, into a black sky. The next moment I would be in the midst of the conflagration, trying to save some of the sufferers, and seeing in dismay how they slipped away beyond my power. At such times I have thought myself the most wretched person in the world; but in the morning the bright sunshine and fresh air of our own dear, beautiful world would chase away those horrible phantoms.

"On the whole, my dreams are consistent with my feelings and sympathies; but once I thought I was engaged in a great boat-race between Yale and Harvard. Now, in reality I am always on Harvard's side in the great games; but at that time I dreamed that I was a thorough Yale man! Perhaps this inconsistency arose from the fact that a long time ago I had declared how glad I was of Harvard's failure to win a certain boat-race, because the Yale men rowed with the American stroke and the Harvard men had learned the English stroke. At any rate, sleeping or waking, I love my friends, and never think they change or grow unkind. From time to time I make friends in my dreams; but usually I am too busy running around and watching other people to have any long conversations or 'reveries.'