to dream who are most addicted to intense think. ing. In this view, even disagreeable dreams are useful as a life of violent activity, of hardship, and even of danger, is recommended, and known to give relief, to persons oppressed with melancholy, and other mental disorders.

160. In ancient times, the dreams of some men were prophetical; but as we are not prophets, we have no reason to think that ours are of that sort. It may happen indeed, in the revolution of chances, that a dream shall resemble a future event. But this is rare; and, when it happens, not more wonderful, than that an irregular clock should now and then point at the right hour. Nor can it be admitted, that dreams are suggested by invisible beings; as they are for the most part mere trifles, and depend so much on the state of our mind and body. The soul in herself seems to possess vivacicity sufficient to account for all the odd appearances that occur in sleep. For even when we are awake, and in health, very strange thoughts will sometimes arise in the mind. And, in certain diseases, waking thoughts are often as extravagant as the wildest dreams.

161. Our dreams are exceedingly various; but that they should be so, is not at all surprising. A very slight impression made on our organs of sense in sleep; a sound heard imperfectly; a greater or less degree of heat; our breathing in any respect

interrupted, by the state of the stomach and bowels, by an awkward position of the head, or by external things affecting our organs of respiration; the temperature of the air in general, or that of our bedchamber in particular;-these, and the like casualties, as well as the tenor of our thoughts through the day, the state of our health, and the passions that may happen to predominate in our mind, have all considerable influence in giving variety to our nocturnal imaginations. Uncommon dreams, therefore, should give us no concern. In these visionary appearances, uniformity would be more wonderful, than the greatest variety. Some people, it is true, often find the same dream recur upon them. Possibly this may be in part owing to habit; they dream the same thing a third or a fourth time, because they have talked or thought of it more than of other dreams. Hence, with respect to disagreeable dreams, we may learn a caution; which is, to banish them from our thoughts as soon as possible, and never speak of them at all. It is indeed a vulgar observation, but there is truth in it, that they who seldom talk of dreams are not often troubled with them.

SECTION IX.

Of some Secondary Sensations.

162. Or the perceptive powers of man there still remain to be considered, conscience, whereby we distinguish between vice and virtue; and reason, whereby we perceive the difference between truth and falsehood. These, to prevent unnecessary repetition, we pass by at present, as they will come in our way hereafter, the former in moral philosophy, the latter in logic. If I had not wished to avoid troubling my hearers with too many divisions and subdivisions in the beginning, I would have divided sensation into primary and secondary. The former has been spoken of already. The latter I now enter upon; and, indeed, could hardly bring it in sooner; what has been said on the subject of imagination being necessary as an introduction to it. These secondary faculties of sensation have, by some writers, been called internal senses; by others, emotions. The name is of little importance the nature of the thing will soon appear.

163. We perceive colours and figures by the eye; we also perceive that some colours and figures are beautiful, and others not. This power of perceiving beauty, which the brutes have not,

though they see as well as we, I call a secondary sense. We perceive sounds by the ear; we also perceive, that certain combinations of sound have harmony, and that others are dissonant. This power of perceiving harmony, called in common language a musical ear, is another secondary sense, which the brutes have not, and of which many men who hear well enough are utterly destitute. Of these secondary senses there are, no doubt, many in the human constitution. I confine myself to those of novelty, sublimity, beauty, imitation, harmony, and ridicule; which, together with sympathy, which I shall also describe, form what is commonly called good taste. The pleasures received by the secondary senses are, by Addison, in the sixth volume of the Spectator, and by Akenside, in the title of a poem which he wrote on the subject, termed pleasures of imagination.

164. OF NOVELTY. Things in themselves indifferent, or even disagreeable, may be agreeable when new; and novelty in general has a charm in it, of which every rational, or every human being at least, is sensible. Hence our passion for variety, for amusement, for news, for strange sights, and for knowledge in general. The pleasure we take in new things arises from the active nature of man. We are never happy unless employed about something; and when we have nothing to do in the way of business or amusement, the mind becomes Yet into this state

languid, and of course uneasy.

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we are apt to fall, when there is nothing to rouse our attention, or give play to our faculties. For when we have long been conversant about one set of objects, the mind comprehends them so easily, that they give it no exercise. In this case, a new object occurring gives an impulse to the mind, and puts it upon exerting itself; and the exertion, if moderate, is agreeable. If the new object occasion surprise, or any other lively and pleasing emotion, its novelty will be still more interesting, because it will convey to the mind a more sprightly and perhaps a more permanent impulse.

165. Some things are more disagreeable at first, than they come to be afterwards; which may be owing to one or other of these two causes. Either the new object may have required, in order to its being comprehended, a violent and painful exertion of the faculties; as in the case of one entering upon a new study, or a new course of life: or we may have fixed our first attention on what seemed disagreeable in the new object; not discovering its agreeable qualities till we were better acquainted with it. Hence let us learn, that a good course of life, though somewhat unpleasant at first, ought not on that account to be relinquished; for we may be assured it will in time become pleasant, if persisted in. It is remarkable, that men sometimes contract a most violent liking to certain tastes that were at first extremely offensive, as those of