Physiological origin of dreams.
The preface opens by stating that a desirable treasure lies hidden in the heart of the wise but that it is of no utility unless it is revealed. In other words, dreams must be interpreted. The author regards dreams, like thoughts in general, as beginning with the spiritus which rises from the heart and ascends through two arteries to the brain.[941] Our author perhaps still holds to Aristotle’s view of the importance of the heart in the nervous system as against Galen’s exclusive emphasis upon the brain, since he allots the heart a share even in mental processes; and he seems to be ignorant of Galen’s discovery that the arteries contain blood and not spiritus.
Origin and justification of the art of interpretation.
The preface goes on to justify the study of dreams on the ground that “the most ancient Magi and perfect physicians” thereby adjudged to each man health and sickness, life and death. “Medicine and divine thoughts, dreams, visions, or oracles are not prohibited, but demoniacal incantations, sorcery, lot-castings, insomnia, and vain phantasms are condemned that you may not readily trust in them.”[942] No doctrine is to be spurned wholesale, but only what is vicious in it. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego excelled all the Magi and soothsayers of the Chaldeans. Our author explains that among the Chaldeans then as today learning consisted not of the philosophy and sophistry of the Greeks and Latins, but of astronomy and interpretations of dreams. He alludes to a prayer of seven verses which they repeat when going to bed in order to receive responses in dreams. They pay little heed to the superficial meaning of their dreams, but by examining the inner meaning they learn either past or future. The author exhorts the person to whom he addresses the preface to do the same, laying aside all terrors that dreams may arouse in him. He points out that interpretation of dreams has Biblical sanction and that Joseph, Daniel, and Marduch all profited thereby.
Sources of the present treatise.
As for the present treatise, it is collected from divine and human scripture, based upon experience as well as reason, and drawn from Latins, Greeks, Persians, and the annals of Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar in which many of their dreams are recorded, for they were both lovers of the future and, since they had no philosophers like the Gentiles, God allowed them as a compensation to foresee the future in dreams. For by dreams life and death, poverty and riches, sickness and health, sorrow and joy, flight and victory, are known more easily than through astrology, a more difficult and manifold art.[943] But lest his introduction grow too long, the author at this point ends it and begins the text proper.
Demoniac and natural causes of dreams.
After stating what a dream is, the author discusses the origin and causes of dreams further. Some are from the devil or at least are influenced by demons, as when a monk was led to become a Jew by a dream in which he saw Moses with a chorus of angels in white, while Christ was surrounded by men in black. But when we see chimeras in dreams, this is generally due to impurity of the blood. The author also opines that, while the sage can judge from the nature of the dream whether there is fallacy and illusion of the demon in it, the origin of virtues and vices is mainly in ourselves. He who goes to sleep with an easy conscience is unlikely to be disturbed by nightmares and is more likely in quiet slumber to behold secrets and mysteries. The author next discusses the effect of the passions and exercise of the mental faculties upon the liver, heart, and brain. He adopts the common medieval view that the brain contains three ventricles devoted respectively to imagination, reason, and memory. He explains that the so-called incubus, popularly thought of as a dwarf or satyr who sits on the sleeper, is really a feeling of suffocation produced by blood-pressure near the heart. The interpretation of a dream must vary according to the social rank of the person concerned. As images in a mirror deceive the ordinary observer but are readily accounted for by the geometer, and as the philosopher notes the significations of other planets than the sun and moon, whose effects alone impress the vulgar herd, so there are dreams which only a skilled interpreter can explain. Dreams are affected by food and by the humors prevailing in the body, and also by the occult virtues of gems, of which a list is given from “Evax” or Marbod.[944]
Interpretation.
The second book takes up again the varying significations of dreams according to the person concerned, and also the significance of the time of the dream. The four seasons, the phases of the moon, nativity of the dreamer, and hour of the night are discussed. The remaining two-thirds of the treatise consists in stating the interpretation to be placed upon the varied persons and things seen in dreams, beginning with God and Jesus Christ, and continuing with crucifixes, idols, statues, bells, hell, the resurrection of the dead, and so on and so forth. Early mention of eunuchs and icons suggests a Byzantine source. More especially in the last third of the treatise, various marginal headings indicate that the interpretations are “according to the Indians” or “according to the Persians and Egyptians,” which suggests that use is being made of the work of Achmet or of Leo Tuscus’ translation thereof.