is action
descends sometimes to the sensitive organs, so that on awaking, the
wisest persons think they see the images they have dreamt of.

"Plutarch, in the Life of Brutus, relates that Cassius persuaded
Brutus that a spectre which the latter declared he had seen on waking,
was an effect of his imagination; and this is the argument which he
puts in his mouth:--

"'The spirit of man being extremely active in its nature, and in
continual motion, which produces always some fantasy; above all,
melancholy persons, like you, Brutus, are more apt to form to
themselves in the imagination ideal images, which sometimes pass to
their external senses.'

"Galen, so skilled in the knowledge of all the springs of the human
body, attributes spectres to the extreme subtility of sight and
hearing.

"What I have read in Cardan seems to establish the opinion of Galen.
He says that, being in the city of Milan, it was reported that there
was an angel in the air, who appeared visibly, and having ran to the
market-place, he, with two thousand others, saw the same. As even the
most learned were in admiration at this wonder, a clever lawyer, who
came to the spot, having observed the thing attentively, sensibly made
them remark that what they saw was not an angel, but the figure of an
angel, in stone, placed on the top of the belfry of St. Gothard, which
being imprinted in a thick cloud by means of a sunbeam which fell upon
it, was reflected to the eyes of those who possessed the most piercing
vision. If this fact had not been cleared up on the spot by a man
exempt from all prejudice, it would have passed for certain that it
was a real angel, since it had been seen by the most enlightened
persons in the town to the number of two thousand.

"The celebrated du Laurent, in his treatise on Melancholy, attributes
to it the most surprising effects; of which he gives an infinite
number of instances, which seem to surpass the power of nature.

"St. Augustine, when consulted by Evodius, Bishop of Upsal, on the
subject I am treating of, answers him in these terms: 'In regard to
visions, even of those by which we learn something of the future, it
is not possible to explain how they are formed, unless we could first
of all know how everything arises which passes through our minds when
we think; for we see clearly that a number of images are excited in
our minds, which images represent to us what has struck either our
eyes or our other senses. We ex