Lippincott'S Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Volume 26 December, 1880. by Various None (have you read this book txt) 📖
- Author: Various None
Book online «Lippincott'S Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Volume 26 December, 1880. by Various None (have you read this book txt) 📖». Author Various None
Over From The Unconsciousness Of Sleep To The Consciousness Of Waking
Movements Further Illustrates The Complete Distinction Between The Two
Cerebral Functions.
If Memory, Then, Be Not Part Of Consciousness, What Is Its Nature? There
Is A Law Governing Nervous Actions Both In Health And Disease Which Is
Known As That Of Habitual Action. The Curious Reflex Movements Made By
The Frog When Acid Is Put Upon Its Foot, As Detailed In My Last Paper,
Were Explained By This Law. The Spinal Cord, After Having Frequently
Performed A Certain Act Under The Stimulus Of Conscious Sensation,
Becomes So Accustomed To Perform That Act That It Does It When The
Oft-Felt Peripheral Impulse Comes Again To It, Although The Cerebral
Functions And Consciousness Are Suspended. A Nerve-Centre, Even Of The
Lowest Kind, Once Moulded By Repeated Acts, Retains Their
Impression--I.E. Remembers Them. Learning To Walk Is, As Was Shown In
The Last Paper, Training The Memory Of The Lower Nerve-Centres At The
Base Of The Brain Until At Last They Direct The Movements Of Walking
Without Aid From Consciousness. The Musician Studies A Piece Of Music.
At First The Notes Are Struck In Obedience To A Conscious Act Of The
Will Founded Upon A Conscious Recognition Of The Printed Type. By And By
The Piece Is So Well Known That It Is Played Even When The Attention Is
Directed To Some Other Subject; That Is, The Act Of Playing Has Been
Repeated Until The Lower Nerve-Centres, Which Preside Over The Movements
Of The Fingers During The Playing, Have Been So Impressed That When Once
The Impulses Are Started They Flow On Uninterruptedly Until The Whole
Set Has Been Gone Through And The Piece Of Music Is Finished. This Is
The Result Of Memory Of The Lower Nerve-Centres. At First, The Child
Reads Only By A Distinct Conscious Effort Of Memory, Recalling Painfully
Each Word. After A Time The Words Become So Impressed Upon The Lower
Nerve-Centres That We May Read On When Our Attention Is Directed To Some
Other Thing. Thus, Often We Read Aloud And Are Unconscious Of What We
Have Read, Precisely As The Compositor Habitually Sets Up Pages Of
Manuscript Without The Faintest Idea Of What It Is All About. This Law
Of Habitual Action Applies Not Only To The Lower Nerve-Centres In Their
Healthy Condition, But With Equal Force In disease. It Is Notorious That
One Of The Great Difficulties In The Cure Of Epilepsy Is The Habit Which
Is Acquired By The Nerve-Centres Of Having At Intervals Attacks Of
Convulsive Discharge Of Nerve-Force. Some Years Since I Saw In
Consultation A Case Which Well Illustrates This Point. A Boy Was Struck
In The Head With A Brick, And Dropped Unconscious. On Coming To Be Was
Seized With An Epileptic Convulsion. These Convulsions Continually
Recurred For Many Months Before I Saw Him. He Never Went Two Hours
Without Them, And Had Usually From Thirty To Forty A Day--Some, It Is
True, Very Slight, But Others Very Severe. Medicines Had No Influence
Over Him, And With The Idea That There Might Be A Point Of Irritation In
The Wound Itself Causing The Epilepsy, The Scar Was Taken Out. The
Result Was That The Seizures Were The Same Day Reduced Very Much In
Frequency, And In a Short Time Became Amenable To Treatment, So That
Finally Complete Recovery Occurred. He Had, However, Probably Fifty
Convulsions In all After The Removal Of The Scar Before This Result Was
Achieved. Undoubtedly, In This Case The Point Of Irritation Was Removed
By The Operation. The Cause Of The Convulsions Having Been Taken Away,
They Should Have Stopped At Once. But Here The Law Of Habitual Action
Asserted Itself, And It Was Necessary To Overcome The Remembrance Of The
Disease By The Nerve-Centres. It Is Plain That The Higher Nerve-Centre
Remembers The Idea Or Fact Because It Is Impressed By Ideas And Facts,
Precisely As The Lower Spinal Nerve-Centres In The Frog Remember
Volume 26 Title 1 (Lippincott'S Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science) Pg 126Irritations And Movements Which Have Impressed Them. The Faculty Of
Memory Resides In all Nerve-Centres: The Nature Of That Which Is
Remembered Depends Upon The Function Of The Individual Centre. A
Nerve-Cell Which Thinks Remembers Thought--A Nerve-Cell Which Causes
Motion Remembers Motion.
The So-Called Cases Of Double Consciousness Are Perfectly Simple In
Their Explanation When The True Nature Of Memory Is Borne In Mind. In
These Cases The Subject Seems To Lead A Double Life. The Attacks Usually
Come On Suddenly. In The First Attack All Memory Of The Past Is Lost.
The Person Is As An Untaught Child, And Is Forced To Begin Re-Education.
In Some Of These Cases This Second Education Has Gone On For Weeks, And
Advanced Perhaps Beyond The Stage Of Reading, When Suddenly The Patient
Passes Back To His Original Condition, Losing Now All Memory Of Events
Which Had Occurred And All The Knowledge Acquired In What May Be Called
His Second State, But Regaining All That He Had Originally Possessed.
Weeks Or Months Afterward The Second State Reoccurs, The Individual Now
Forgetting All Memory Of The First Or Natural Condition. It Is Usually
Found That Events Happening And Knowledge Acquired During The First
Attack Of What We Have Called The Second State Are Remembered In
Subsequent Returns, So That The Second Education Can Be Taken Up At The
Point At Which It Was Lost, And Progress Be Made. This Alternation Of
Conditions Has In Some Instances Gone On For Years, The Patient Living,
As It Were, Two Lives At Broken Intervals. This Condition, Usually
Called Double Consciousness, Is Not Double Consciousness At All, But, If
The Term May Be Allowed, Double Memory. It Is Evidently Allied In Its
Nature To The Loss Of The Sense Of Personal Identity. Certain Phenomena
Of Remembrance Seen Frequently In exhausting Diseases, And Especially In
Old Age, Show The Permanence Of Impressions Made Upon The Higher
Nerve-Centres, And Are Also Very Similar In Their Nature To This
So-Called Double Consciousness. Not Long Since A Very Aged Lady Of
Philadelphia, Who Was At The Point Of Death, Began To Talk In an Unknown
Tongue, Soon Losing Entirely Her Power Of Expressing Herself In english.
No One Could For A Time Make Out The Language She Was Speaking, But It
Was Finally Found To Be Portuguese; And In Tracing The History Of The
Octogenarian It Was Discovered That Until Four Or Five Years Of Age She
Had Been Brought Up In Rio Janeiro, Where Portuguese Is Spoken. There Is
Little Difference Between The Nature Of Such A Case And That Of The
So-Called Double Consciousness, Both Involving The Forgetting Of That
Which Has Been Known For Years.
There Is A Curious Mental Condition Sometimes Produced By Large Doses Of
Hasheesh Which Might Be Termed Double Consciousness More Correctly Than
The State To Which The Name Is Usually Applied. I Once Took An Enormous
Dose Of This Substance. After Suffering From A Series Of Symptoms Which
It Is Not Necessary Here To Detail, I Was Seized With A Horrible
Undefined Fear, As Of Impending Death, And Began At The Same Time To
Have Marked Periods When All Connection Seemed To Be Severed Between The
External World And Myself. During These Periods I Was Unconscious In So
Far That I Was Oblivious Of All External Objects, But On Coming Out Of
One It Was Not A Blank, Dreamless Void Upon Which I Looked Back, A Mere
Empty Space, But Rather A Period Of Active But Aimless Life, Full, Not
Of Connected Thought, But Of Disjointed Images. The Mind, Freed From The
Ordinary Laws Of Association, Passed, As It Were, With Lightning-Like
Rapidity From One Idea To Another. The Duration Of These Attacks Was But
Volume 26 Title 1 (Lippincott'S Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science) Pg 127A Few Seconds, But To Me They Seemed Endless. Although I Was Perfectly
Conscious During The Intermissions Between The Paroxysms, All Power Of
Measuring Time Was Lost: Seconds Appeared To Be Hours--Minutes Grew To
Days--Hours Stretched Out To Infinity. I Would Look At My Watch, And
Then After An Hour Or Two, As I Thought, Would Look Again And Find That
Scarcely A Minute Had Elapsed. The Minute-Hand Appeared Motionless, As
Though Graven In The Face Itself: The Laggard Second-Hand Moved So
Slowly That It Seemed A Hopeless Task To Watch It During Its Whole
Infinite Round Of A Minute, And I Always Gave Up In despair Before The
Sixty Seconds Had Elapsed. When My Mind Was Most Lucid There Was A
Distinct Duplex Action In Regard To The Duration Of Time. I Would Think
To Myself, "It Has Been So Long Since A Certain Event!"--An Hour, For
Example, Since The Doctor Was Summoned--But Reason Would Say, "No, It
Has Been Only A Few Minutes: Your Thoughts And Feelings Are Caused By
The Hasheesh." Nevertheless, I Was Not Able To Shake Off, Even For A
Moment, This Sense Of The Almost Indefinite Prolongation Of Time.
Gradually The Periods Of Unconsciousness Became Longer And More
Frequent, And The Oppressive Feeling Of Impending Death More Intense. It
Was Like A Horrible Nightmare: Each Successive Paroxysm Was Felt To Be
The Longest I Had Suffered. As I Came Out Of It A Voice Seemed
Constantly Saying, "You Are Getting Worse; Your Paroxysms Are Growing
Longer And Deeper; They Will Overmaster You; You Will Die." A Sense Of
Personal Antagonism Between My Will-Power And Myself, As Affected By The
Drug, Grew Very Strong. I Felt As Though My Only Chance Was To Struggle
Against These Paroxysms--That I Must Constantly Arouse Myself By An
Effort Of Will; And That Effort Was Made With Infinite Toil And Pain. It
Seemed To Me As If Some Evil Spirit Had The Control Of The Whole Of Me
Except The Will, And Was In determined Conflict With That, The Last
Citadel Of My Being. Once Or Twice During A Paroxysm I Felt Myself
Mounting Upward, Expanding, Dilating, Dissolving Into The Wide Confines
Of Space, Overwhelmed By A Horrible, Unutterable Despair. Then By A
Tremendous Effort I Seemed To Break Loose And To Start Up With The
Shuddering Thought, "Next Time You Will Not Be Able To Throw This Off;
And What Then?" The Sense Of Double Consciousness Which I Had To Some
Extent Is Often, Under The Action Of Hasheesh, Much More Distinct. I
Have Known Patients To Whom It Seemed That They Themselves Sitting Upon
The Chair Were In continual Conversation With A Second Self Standing In
Front Of Them. The Explanation Of This Curious Condition Is A Difficult
One. It Is Possible That The Two Sides Of The Brain, Which Are
Accustomed In Health To Work As
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