Turner the painter made frequent use of a practice analogous to that of looking for fire-faces in the burning coals; he was known to give colours to children to daub in play on paper, while he keenly watched for suggestive but accidental combinations.
I have myself had frequent experience of the automatic construction of fantastic figures, through a practice I have somewhat encouraged for the purpose, of allowing my hand to scribble at its own will, while I am giving my best attention to what is being said by others, as at small committees. It is always a surprise to me to see the result whenever I turn my thoughts on what I have been subconsciously doing. I can rarely recollect even a few of the steps by which the drawings were made; they grew piece-meal, with some almost forgotten notice, from time to time, of the sketch as a whole. I can trace no likeness between what I draw and the images that present themselves to me in dreams, and I find that a very trifling accident, such as a chance dot on the paper, may have great influence on the general character of any one of these automatic sketches.
Visions, like dreams, are often mere patchworks built up of bits of recollections. The following is one of these:--
"When passing a shop in Tottenham Court Road, I went in to order a Dutch cheese, and the proprietor (a bullet-headed man whom I had never seen before) rolled a cheese on the marble slab of his counter, asking me if that one would do. I answered 'Yes,' left the shop, and thought no more of the incident. The following evening, on closing my eyes, I saw a head detached from the body rolling about slightly on a white surface. I recognised the face, but could not remember where I had seen it, and it was only after thinking about it for some time that I identified it as that of the cheesemonger who had sold me the cheese on the previous day. I may mention that I have often seen the man since, and that I found the vision I saw was exactly like him, although if I had been asked to describe the man before I saw the vision I should have been unable to do so."
Recollections need not be combined like mosaic work; they may be blended, on the principle of composite portraiture. I suspect that the phantasmagoria may be in some part due to blended memories; the number of possible combinations would be practically endless, and each combination would give a new face. There would thus be no limit to the dies in the coinage of the brain.
I have found that the peculiarities of visualisation, such as the tendency to see Number-Forms, and the still rarer tendency to associate colour with sound, is strongly hereditary, and I should infer, what facts seem to confirm, that the tendency to be a seer of visions is equally so. Under these circumstances we should expect that it would be unequally developed in different races, and that a large natural gift of the visionary faculty might become characteristic not only of certain families, as among the second-sight seers of Scotland, but of certain races, as that of the Gipsies.
It happens that the mere acts of fasting, of want of sleep, and of solitary musing, are severally conducive to visions. I have myself been told of cases in which persons accidentally long deprived of food became for a brief time subject to them. One was of a pleasure party driven out to sea, and not being able to reach the coast till nightfall, at a place where they got shelter but nothing to eat. They were mentally at ease and conscious of safety, but all were troubled with visions that were half dreams and half hallucinations. The cases of visions following protracted wakefulness are well known, and I have collected a few of them myself. I have already spoken of the maddening effect of solitariness: its influence may be inferred from the recognised advantages of social amusements in the treatment of the insane. It follows that the spiritual discipline undergone for purposes of self-control and self-mortification, have also the incidental effect of producing visions. It is to be expected that these should often bear a close relation to the prevalent subjects of thought, and although they may be really no more than the products of one portion of the brain, which another portion of the same brain is engaged in contemplating, they often, through error, receive a religious sanction. This is notably the case among half-civilised races.
The number of great men who have been once, twice, or more frequently, subject to hallucinations is considerable. A list, to which it would be easy to make large additions, is given by Brierre de Boismont (Hallucinations, etc., 1862), from whom I translate the following account of the star of the first Napoleon, which he heard, second-hand, from General Rapp:--
"In 1806 General Rapp, on his return from the siege of Dantzic, having occasion to speak to the Emperor, entered his study without being announced. He found him so absorbed that his entry was unperceived. The General seeing the Emperor continue motionless, thought he might be ill, and purposely made a noise. Napoleon immediately roused himself, and without any preamble, seizing Rapp by the arm, said to him, pointing to the sky, 'Look there, up there.' The General remained silent, but on being asked a second time, he answered that he perceived nothing. 'What!' replied the Emperor, 'you do not see it? It is my star, it is before you, brilliant;' then animating by degrees, he cried out, 'it has never abandoned me, I see it on all great occasions, it commands me to go forward, and it is a constant sign of good fortune to me.'"
Napoleon was no doubt a consummate actor, ready and unscrupulous in imposing on others, but I see no reason to distrust the genuineness of this particular outburst, seeing that it is not the only instance of his referring to the guidance of his star, as a literal vision and not as a mere phrase, and that his belief in destiny was notorious.