_I._ If this theory, so far seemingly very plausible, is really the correct one, it ought to go one step farther, and explain the many disorderly unintelligible rappings, thumpings, throwing of stones, hurling of furniture, etc., which often have occurred in the presence of particular persons, or at particular places.[3]
[3] See an article entitled "_A Remarkable Case of Physical Phenomena_," in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for August, 1868.
_P._ Those are manifestations which, when not the designed work of evil spirits, have their proximate source in the dream-region which lies between the natural and spiritual worlds.
_I._ Pray tell us what you mean by the dream-region that lies between the two worlds?
_P._ There are sometimes conditions in which the body is profoundly asleep, with no perturbations of the nervous system caused by previous mental and physical exercise. In this state the mind may still be perfectly awake, and independently, consciously, and even intensely active. When thus conditioned, it may be, and often is, among spirits in the spiritual world, though from the nature of the case it is seldom able to bring back into the bodily state any reminiscences of the scenes of that world. The dream state, properly speaking, is not this, but a state intermediate between this and the normal, wakeful state of the bodily senses, and is a state of broken, confused, irrational, inconsistent, and irresponsible thoughts, emotions, and apparent actions--the whole arising from confusedly intermixed bodily and spiritual states and influences. The potential spheres of spirits who desire to make manifestations to the natural world sometimes become commingled, designedly or otherwise, with the spheres of persons in the body who, in consequence of certain nervous or psychic disorders, are more or less in this dream-region even when the body is so far awake as to be _en rapport_ with external things; and in such cases, whatever manifestations may arise from the spiritual potencies with which such persons are surcharged, will of necessity be beyond the control, or possibly even beyond the cognizance, of any governing spirit, and will be irrational, inconsistent, and sometimes very annoying, or even destructive, according to the types of the dreamy mentality of the medium. If you will think for a moment, you will remember that the kind of manifestations referred to are never known to occur except in the presence of persons in a semi-somnambulic or highly hysterical state, or laboring under some analogous nervous disorders; and the persons are often of a low organization, and very ignorant.