To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Shakespeare understood all to well that dreams are more than mere trains of ideas which present themselves to the mind during sleep. In dreaming there is no voluntary control of the current of thought and the principle of suggestion has unlimited sway. Usually there is no coherence in the images that appear, but the most extraordinary contradictions excite no surprise in the dreamer. Occasionally however, intellectual efforts are made during sleep that would be difficult to surpass in a waking state. It is said that Coleridge composed Kubla Khan, a beautiful fragment of a poem, while he was asleep. It is said that that similar occurrences have been recorded by other people.

Dreams arise from very natural causes and are merely the result of mental processes stimulated in the same way as are out thoughts during the daytime. A sensation of cold may cause one to dream of snowstorms and freezing while a ray of light may incite one to dream of a fire. It was said that a case of indigestion or eating a heavy meal too late at night might have brought on nightmarish dreams.

Years ago it was thought that dreams may in a general way indicate the condition of a person’s health or mental wellbeing and was the frequent accompaniment of some forms of disease.