"In my dreams," said the Swedish mathematician, "I find the fourth dimension, the fifth dimension, the hundredth dimension!"
"In my dreams," said the Sorenskriver, waving his arms grandiosely, "I see Norway standing by herself, strong, powerful, irresistible as the Vikinger themselves, no union with a sister country—nei, nei, pardon me, Mathematiker!"
"Why, you would take away the very inspiration of the poet, the very life of the patriot's spirit," said Katharine, turning to Clifford.
"You are all speaking of the dreams which are the outcome of the best and highest part of ourselves," said Clifford, speaking as if he were in a dream himself. "But what about the dreams which are not the outcome of our best selves?"
"Oh, surely they pass away as other dreams," she answered.
"But do you not see," he said, "that if there is a chance that the artist remembers the rapture with which he discovered in his dream that marvellous colour, and the patriot the joy which he felt on beholding in his dreams his country strong and irresistible, there is also a chance that less noble feelings experienced in a dream may also be remembered?"
The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders.
"Mon Dieu!" he said. "We cannot always be noble—not even in our dreams. I, for my part, would rather take the chance of dreaming that I injured or murdered some one and rejoiced over it, than lose the chance of dreaming that I was the greatest artist in the world. Why, I have murdered all my rivals in my dreams, and they are still alive and painting with great éclat pictures entirely inferior to mine! And I am no worse for having assassinated them and rejoiced over my evil deeds in my dream."
"Probably because there were no evil consequences," Clifford said. "But supposing there had been evil consequences, what then?"
"But you do not seriously believe that there is any such close relationship between dream-life and actual life, between dream-cause and actual effect?" asked Gerda.