Mind and Matter, Or, Physiological Inquiries

This historic book may have numerous typos or missing text. Not indexed. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1857. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... imperfect. We are to a certain extent aware of our situation. We know where we are, but we feel as if some power oppressed us, and prevented our moving our limbs. The fact is, not that the muscles will not obey the will, but that the will itself is not exercised. The paralysis and catalepsy of hysterical patients is of the same kind, and both the one and the other immediately vanish if a strong impression be made on the senses, or even on the imagination. Sound sleep is incompatible with voluntary exertion, mental or bodily. After long watchfulness, or severe labor, we sleep in spite of ourselves, because the power of exercising the volition is exhausted. If we would sleep under other circumstances, the first thing that we do is to abstain from exercising it. We place ourselves in that position in which we can remain without calling into action any of our voluntary muscles; we close our eyes that we may not be tempted to attend to visible objects; we exclude from our minds all disagreeable or otherwise exciting subjects to which our attention might be too earnestly directed. We cause a child to sleep by rocking him in his cradle. The so-called mesmeric passes may produce the same effect. When I do not easily fall asleep at night, I frequently succeed in obtaining sleep by watching the strange, indescribable, and ever varying spectra, which I refer to the eye, though they are probably in the brain itself, and which present themselves when real objects are excluded from the sight. It is not that on such occasions as those to which I have referred, there is absolutely no effort of attention, but the effort is so slight that it is next to none at all, and readily ceases of itself, at the same time that it prevents the greater effort which I should be led to ma...