"the man who sets up for an investigator of the <human understanding; but I will tell you, Sir, "though he could not, that there are neither 66 more nor less than five several forts of dreams " particularly distinguished, and I defy even the "feven fleepers themselves to name a fixth. "The first of these was by the Greeks denomi"nated Oneiros, by the Latins Somnium, (fimply "a Dream) and you must be afleep to dream it." "Granted," quoth I. "What is granted?" rejoined the philofopher, "Not that fleep is in all "cafes indifpenfable to the man who dreams.""Humph!" quoth I.-My uncle proceeded. "The fecond fort of dreams you fhall under"ftand was by the aforefaid Greeks called. "Orama, by the Latins Vifio, or as we might fay "a vifion; in this cafe take notice you may be

afleep, or you may be awake, or neither, or (6 as it were between both; your eyes may be "fhut, or they may be open, looking inwards 66 or outwards or upwards, either with fight or "without fight, as it pleafes God, but the vifion "you must fee, or how elfe can it rightly "be called a vifion?" "True," replied I, "there is a fect who are particularly favoured "with this kind of vifions." "Prythee, don't "interrupt me," said my uncle, and again went

on.

«The

"The third fort of dreams to speak accord"ing to the Greeks we shall call Chrematismos, "according to the Latins we must denominate "it Oraculum, (an oracle); now this differs from "a vifion, in as much as it may happen to a man "born blind as well as to Argus himfelf, for he "has nothing for it but to liften, understand "and believe, and whatever it tells him fhall <c come true, though it never entered into his "head to preconceive one tittle of what is told "him; and where is Mr. Locke and his wak"ing thoughts here ?"" He is done for," I anfwered, "there is no difputing against an "oracle."

"The fourth fort," refumed he, " is the Enup"tion of the aforefaid Greeks and answers to "the Latin Infomnium, which is in fact a dream ❝ and no dream, a kind of refverie, when a man "doses between fleeping and waking and builds "caftles (as we say) in the air upon the ram"blings of his own fancy.

"The fifth and last fort of dreams is by "Greeks and Latins mutually ftiled Phantafma, "a word adopted into our own language by the "greatest poet, who ever wrote in it: now this "phantafma is a visitation peculiar to the first "mental abfence or flumber, when the man

"fancies

fancies himself yet waking, and in fact can "fcarce be called afleep; at which time strange images and appearances feem to float before "him and terrify his imagination. Here then વ you have all the feveral denominations of "dreams perfectly diftinguished and defined," quoth the old fophift, and throwing himself back in his chair with an air of triumph, waited for the applaufe, which I was not backward in beftowing upon this pedantic farrago of dogmatizing dullness.

It will readily be believed that my uncle Antony did not fail to revive his favorite controverfy, which had produced fuch fatal confequences to his difcarded fon: in fact he held faft with thofe antient philofophers, who maintained the eternity of this material world, and as he faw no period when men would not be in existence, no moment in time to come when mortality shall ceafe, he by confequence argued that there could be no moment in time, when immortality fhall commence. There were other points refpecting this grand stumbling-block of his philofophy, the human foul, upon which he was equally puzzled, for he fidel with Ariftotle against Plato in the unintelligible controverfy concerning its power of motion: but whilft

my uncle Antony was thus unluckily wedded to the wrong fide in all cafes, where reafon ought to have been his guide, in points of mere quibble and fophiftry, which reason has nothing to fay to, and where a wife man would take neither fide, he regularly took both, or hung fufpended between them like Socrates in the basket.

Of this fort was the celebrated queftionOvumne prius fuerit, an gallina-viz: “ Whether the egg was anterior to the hen, or the hen to the egg."-This enquiry never failed to intereft his paffions in a peculiar degree, and he found fo much to fay on both fides, that he could never well determine which fide to be of: at length however, hoping to bring it to some point, he took up the caufe of Egg verfus Hen, and having compofed a learned effay, published it in one of the monthly magazines, as a lure to future controverfialists. This effay he had so often avowed in my hearing, and piqued himself fo highly upon it, that I must have been dull indeed not to have understood how to flatter him upon it: but when he had found month after month flip away, and nobody mounting the stage upon his challenge, he felt angry at the contempt, with which his labours were paffed over, and

without

without imparting to me his purpose, furnished the fame magazine with a counter-efsay, in which his former argument was handled with an afperity truly controverfial, and the hen was triumphantly made to cackle over the new-laid egg, decidedly posterior to herself.

I am inclined to think that if Antony had any partiality, it was not to this fide; but as the fecond effay was clearly pofterior to the first, (whatever the egg may have been to the hen) it had the advantage of being couched in all the fpirit of a reply with an agreeable tinge of the malice of one, fo that when at length it came down printed in a fair type, and respectfully posted in the front of the long-wifht-for magazine, -his heart beat with joy, and calling out to me in a lofty tone of counterfeited anger, as he run his eye over it" By the horns of Jupiter "Ammon," quoth he, "here is a fellow has "the confidence to enter the lifts against me in "the notable queftion of the egg."" Then I "hope you will break that egg about his ears," replied I." Hold your tongue, puppy, and list"en," quoth the fophift and immediately began to read.

At every pause I was ready with a pooh! or a pifh! which I hooked in with every mark of contempt