His
explanation of the phenomenon was, that, in some cases, all that
prevents a vivid conception from assuming objectivity, is the
self-assertion of external objects. The gradual approach of
darkness cannot surprise and isolate the phantasm; but the
suddenness of the lightning could and did, obliterating everything
without, and leaving that over which it had no power standing alone,
and therefore visible.
'But,' I ventured to ask, 'whence the minuteness of detail,
surpassing, you say, all that your memory could supply?'
'That I think was a quickening of the memory by the realism of the
presentation. Excited by the vision, it caught at its own past, as
it were, and suddenly recalled that which it had forgotten. In the
rapidity of all pure mental action, this at once took its part in
the apparent objectivity.'
To return to the narrative of my first evening in Falconer's
company.
It was strange how insensible the street population was to the
grandeur of the storm. While the thunder was billowing and
bellowing over and around us--
'A hundred pins for one ha'penny,' bawled a man from the gutter,
with the importance of a Cagliostro.
'Evening Star! Telegrauwff!' roared an ear-splitting urchin in my
very face. I gave him a shove off the pavement.
'Ah! don't do that,' said Falconer. 'It only widens the crack
between him and his fellows--not much, but a little.'
'You are right,' I said. 'I won't do it again.
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