Now this artificial hallucination was, as we have seen, a picture of an actual occurrence for which there was amnesia. It must, therefore, have been determined by that experience. The psychological phenomena manifested, however, were really much more complicated than would appear at first sight. An analysis of this vision, which unfolded itself like a cinematograph picture, would show that it was a composite visual representation of several different kinds of experiences—of past perceptions of her body and face, of her conscious knowledge of her relation to the environment (in the street), of muscular movements, and of her knowledge derived from subconscious tactile impressions of the act. Of these last she was not aware at the time of their occurrence. Much of this knowledge must have persisted as a residuum of the original experience and functioned subconsciously. Thereby, perhaps, the original secondary visual images were reproduced and emerged into consciousness as the hallucination or pictorial memory.
Similar phenomena indicative of conservation being effected by means of a residuum of the original experience may be produced experimentally in various ways. For instance, in certain hysterics with anesthesia if you prick a number of times a part of the body—say the hand—in which all tactile sensation has been lost, and later direct the subject to look into a crystal, he will see a number, perhaps written on a hand. This number, let us say five, will correctly designate the number of times the hand was pricked. Now, because of the loss of sensibility, the subject was unaware of the pin-pricks. Nevertheless, of course, they were recorded subconsciously, coconsciously)[coconsciously)]. Their subsequent transformation into a visual hallucination not only shows that they were conserved, but that they left something which was capable of taking part, outside of consciousness, in a secondary process which gave rise to the hallucination.
An examination of all crystal visions, so far as they are translated memories of actual experiences, will show this same evidence for a conserved residuum.
That conservation is not merely a figure of speech to express the ability to determine the recurrence of a previous experience, but means a specific residuum capable of independent and elaborate functioning, is brought out more conspicuously in those visions which are elaborately fabricated symbolisms of an antecedent experience. In other words, the vision is not a literal recurrence of a previous phase of consciousness, in that the latter has been worked over, so to speak, so as to appear in consciousness in a reconstructed form. Though reconstructed it either still retains its original meaning or is worked out to a completion of its thoughts, or to a fulfilment of the emotional strivings pertaining to them (anxieties, wishes, etc.). These visions, perhaps, more frequently occur spontaneously, often at moments of crises in a person’s life, but also are observed under experimental conditions. Sometimes they answer the doubts, scruples and other problems which have troubled the subject, sometimes they express the imaginary fulfilment of intense longings or of anxieties and dreads which have been entertained, or disturbing thoughts which have pricked the conscience.[[46]] We are obliged to conclude, in the light of experimental observations of the same class, that such phenomena are determined by the specific residua of antecedent thoughts which must be conserved and function in a specific manner to appear in this metamorphosed form.
Similar residual processes underlying post-hypnotic phenomena.—Conserved experiences which give rise to more complicated secondary elaboration may be observed in suggested post-hypnotic phenomena. Experiments of this kind may be varied in many ways. The phenomenon may be an hallucination similar to the one I have just described in hysterics, or a so-called subconscious calculation. You suggest in hypnosis to a suitable subject that he shall multiply certain numbers, or calculate the number of seconds intervening between certain hours—let us say between 10:43 and 5:13 o’clock—the answer to be given in writing on a certain day. The subject is then awakened immediately, before he has time to do the calculation while in hypnosis. Later, if the experiment is successful, at the time designated the subject will absent-mindedly or automatically write the figures giving the answer.
There are two modes in which these calculations may be accomplished. In a special and limited class of cases, where there is a large split-off subconscious personality, or doubling of consciousness, the calculation may be made entirely by this secondary subconscious self, in the same fashion as it would be made by the principal personality if the problem were given in the waking state. The subconscious personality will go through each conscious step in the calculation in the same way.[[47]] In a second class of cases the calculations are worked out, apparently, unconsciously, without participation in the process by a subconscious personality even when such exists. At most it would seem that isolated numbers representing different steps in the calculation arise from time to time coconsciously as a limited secondary consciousness (of which the personal consciousness is unaware) until finally the figures of the completed answer appear therein. The calculation itself appears to be still another process outside both the personal and the secondary consciousness. When the problem has been finished the answer is finally given automatically. The whole process is too complicated to go into at this time before we have studied the problems of the coconscious.[[48]] It is enough to say that it is[it is] plain that the hypnotic experience—the suggested problem—must be considered as some kind of specific residuum, psychological or neural, and that this residuum must be one capable of quite elaborate independent and subconscious intellectual activity before finally becoming transformed into the final answer.
Residual processes underlying dreams.—When citing the evidence of dreams for the conservation of forgotten experiences I spoke of one type of dream as a symbolical memory. I may now add it is more than this; it is a fabrication. The original experience or thought may appear in the dream after being worked over into a fantasy, allegory, symbolism, or other product of imagination. Such a dream is not a recurrent phase of consciousness, but a newly fabricated phase. Further, analytical and experimental researches go to show that the fabrication is performed by the original phase without the latter recurring in the content of the personal consciousness. The original phase must therefore have been conserved in some form capable of such independent and specific functioning, i.e., fabrication below the threshold of consciousness. For instance:
The subject dreamed that she was standing where two roads separated. One was broad and bright and beautiful, and many people she knew were going that way. The other road was the rocky path, quite dark, and no one was going that way, but she had to go. And she said, “Oh, why must I go this way? Will no one go with me?” And a voice replied, “I will go with you.” She looked around, and there were some tall black figures; they all had names across their foreheads in bright letters, and the one who spoke was Disappointment; and all the others said, “We will go with you,” and they were Sorrow, Loss, Pain, Fear, and Loneliness, and she fell down on her face in anguish.
Now an analysis of the antecedent thought of this subject and a knowledge of her circumstances and mental life, though we cannot go into them here, make it perfectly clear that as a fact, whether there was any causal connection or not, this dream was a symbolic expression of those thoughts. The rocky path has been shown to be symbolic of her conception of her own life entertained through years—the other road symbolic of the life longed for and imagined as granted to others. Likewise the rest of the dream symbolized, in a way which any one can easily recognize, the lot which she had in her disappointment actually fancied was hers. The thoughts thus symbolized had been constantly recurring thoughts and therefore had been conserved. They were reproduced in the dream, not in their original form, but translated into symbols and an allegory. Something must, therefore, have effected the translation. In other words, the dream is not a recurrent phase of consciousness but an allegorical fabrication which expresses these thoughts, not literally as they originally occurred, but in the form of an imaginative story. Now the similarity of the allegorical dream thoughts to the original thoughts can be explained only in two ways: either as pure chance coincidence, or through a relation of cause and effect. In the latter case the dream might have been determined either by the specific antecedent thoughts in question—those revealed as memories in the analysis, or both series might have been determined by a third, as yet unrevealed, series. For the purposes of the present problem it is immaterial which so long as the dream was determined by some antecedent thought. The very great frequency, not to say universality, with which this same similarity or a logical relation with antecedent thoughts is found in dreams after analysis renders chance coincidence very improbable. We must believe, therefore, that the dream was determined by antecedent experiences. It is beyond my purpose to enter here into an exposition of the theory of the mechanism of dreams, although I shall touch upon it later in some detail in connection with subconscious processes. We need here only concern ourselves with this mechanism so far as it bears upon the principle of conservation. Suffice it to say that analytical observations (Freud) have, it seems to me, conclusively shown that conserved experiences may be not only the determining factors in dreams, but that while in a state of conservation they are capable of undergoing elaborate fabrication and afterwards appearing so thoroughly transformed in consciousness as not to be superficially recognizable. I have also been able to reach the same conclusions by the method of experimental production of dreams.
The only question is, in what form can a thought be so conserved that it can, while still in a state of conservation, without itself rising into consciousness, fabricate a symbolism, allegory, or other work requiring imagination and reasoning? The only logical and intelligible inference is that the antecedent conscious experience has been either itself specifically conserved as such outside of the personal consciousness, or has left some neural residuum or disposition capable of functioning and constructing the conscious dream fabrication.