The appearance of hallucinations occurred in a quite classical way in Flournoy's Helen Smith. I quote the cases in question from his article.[52]
"18 Mars. Tentative d'expérience dans l'obscurité. Mlle. Smith voit un ballon tantôt luminieux, tantôt s'obscurcissant.
"25 Mars. Mlle. Smith commence à distinguer de vagues lueurs, de longs rubans blancs, s'agitant du plancher au plafond, puis enfin une magnifique étoile qui dans l'obscurité s'est montrée à elle seule pendant toute la séance.
"1 Avril. Mlle. Smith se sent très agitée, elle a des frissons, est partiellement glacée. Elle est très inquiète et voit tout à coup se balançant au-dessus de la table une figure grimaçante et très laide avec de longs cheveux rouges. Elle voit alors un magnifique bouquet de roses de nuances diverses; tout à coup elle voit sortir de dessous le bouquet un petit serpent, qui, rampant doucement, vient sentir les fleurs, les regarde," etc.
Helen Smith[53] says in regard to the origin of her vision of March:
"La lueur rouge persista autour de moi et je me suis trouvée entourée de fleurs extraordinaires."
At all times the complex hallucinations of visionaries have occupied a peculiar place in scientific criticism. Macario[54] early separated these so-called intuition-hallucinations from others, since he maintains that they occur in persons of an eager mind, deep understanding and high nervous excitability. Hecker[55] expresses himself similarly but more enthusiastically.
His view is that their condition is "the congenital high development of the spiritual organ which calls into active, free and mobile play the life of the imagination, bringing it spontaneous activity." These hallucinations are "precursors or signs of mighty spiritual power." The vision is "an increased excitation which is harmoniously adapted to the most complete health of mind and body." The complex hallucinations do not belong to the waking state, but prefer as a rule a partial waking state. The visionary is buried in his vision even to complete annihilation. Flournoy was also always able to prove in the visions of H.S. "un certain degré d'obnubilation." In our case the vision is complicated by a state of sleep whose peculiarities we shall review later.
The Change in Character.
The most striking characteristic of the second stage in our case is the change in character. We meet many cases in the literature which have offered the symptom of spontaneous character-change. The first case in a scientific publication is Weir-Mitchell's[56] case of Mary Reynolds.
This was the case of a young woman living in Pennsylvania in 1811. After a deep sleep of about twenty hours she had totally forgotten her entire past and everything she had learnt; even the words she spoke had lost their meaning. She no longer knew her relatives. Slowly she re-learnt to read and write, but her writing was from right to left. More striking still was the change in her character. Instead of being melancholy, she was now cheerful in the extreme. Instead of being reserved, she was buoyant and sociable. Formerly taciturn and retiring, she was now merry and jocose. Her disposition was totally changed.[57]
In this state she renounced her former retired life and liked to undertake adventurous excursions unarmed, through wood and mountain, on foot and horseback. In one of these excursions she encountered a large black bear, which she took for a pig. The bear raised himself on his hind legs and gnashed his teeth at her. As she could not drive her horse on any further, she took an ordinary stick and hit the bear until it took to flight. Five weeks later, after a deep sleep, she returned to her earlier state with amnesia for the interval. These states alternated for about sixteen years. But her last twenty-five years Mary Reynolds passed exclusively in her second state.
Schroeder von der Kalk[58] reports on the following case: The patient became ill at the age of sixteen with periodic amnesia, after a previous tedious illness of three years. Sometimes in the morning after waking she passed through a peculiar choreic state, during which she made rhythmical movements with her arms. Throughout the whole day she would then exhibit a childish, silly behaviour and lost all her educated capabilities. (When normal she is very intelligent, well-read, speaks French well.) In the second state she begins to speak faulty French. On the second day she is again at times normal. The two states are completely separated by amnesia.[59]
Hoefelt[60] reports on a case of spontaneous somnambulism in a girl who, in her normal state, was submissive and modest, but in somnambulism was impertinent, rude and violent. Azam's[61] Felida was, in her normal state, depressed, inhibited, timid; and in the second state lively, confident, enterprising to recklessness. The second state gradually became the chief one, and finally so far suppressed the first state that the patient called her normal states, lasting now but a short time, "crises." The amnesic attacks had begun at 14½. In time the second state became milder and there was a certain approximation between the character of the two states. A very striking example of change in character is that worked out by Camuset, Ribot, Legrand du Saulle, Richer, Voisin, and put together by Bourru and Burot.[62] It is that of Louis V., a severe male hysteric with amnesic alternating character. In the first stage he is rude, cheeky, querulous, greedy, thievish, inconsiderate. In the second state he is an agreeable, sympathetic character, industrious, docile and obedient. This amnesic change of character has been used by Paul Lindau[63] in his drama "Der Andere" (The Other One).
Rieger[64] reports on a case parallel to Lindau's criminal lawyer. The unconscious personalities of Janet's Lucie and Léonie (Janet, l.c.) and Morton Prince's[65] may also be regarded as parallel with our case. There are, however, therapeutic artificial products whose importance lies in the domain of the dissociation of consciousness and of memory.
In the above cases, the second state is always separated from the first by an amnesic dissociation, and the change in character is, at times, accompanied by a break in the continuity of consciousness. In our case there is no amnesic disturbance; the passage from the first to the second stage follows quite gradually and the continuity of consciousness remains. The patient carries out in her waking state everything, otherwise unknown to her, from the field of the unconscious that she has experienced during hallucinations in the second stage.
Periodic changes in personality without amnesic dissociation are found in the region of folie circulaire, but are rarely seen in hysterics, as Renaudin's[66] case shows. A young man, whose behaviour had always been excellent, suddenly began to display the worst tendencies. There were no symptoms of insanity, but, on the other hand, the whole surface of the body was anæsthetic. This state showed periodic intervals, and in the same way the patient's character was subject to vacillations. As soon as the anæsthesia disappeared he was manageable and friendly. When the anæsthesia returned he was overcome by the worst instincts, which, it was observed, even included the wish to murder.
Remembering that our patient's age at the beginning