THE DREAM-GOD,

OR

A SINGULAR EVOLVEMENT OF THOUGHT IN SLEEP.

BY JOHN CUNINGHAM.

NEW YORK: PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR BY ANDERSON & RAMSAY. 28 Frankfort Street.

Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1873, by JOHN CUNINGHAM, In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

TO MY FRIENDS.

Although requested by a number of you at various times to write this condensed narrative of an event in my life, associated with much misfortune, sadness and suffering which have continued for some years, it was not until during a lonely period of quietude at Brooklyn, N. Y., in the summer of 1872, that I made the effort. I do not expect the public to give much credence or interest to the matter, but to you who know me I can trustingly give the assurance that this little book is an unaffected and truthful production. It is published as an affectionate memorial to you of mutual esteem and friendship.

JOHN CUNINGHAM, of So. Ca.

April, 1873.

A SINGULAR EVOLVEMENT OF THOUGHT IN SLEEP.

A REMARKABLE DREAM.

The peculiar and startling effect of morphine on a person unaccustomed to its administration, was happily illustrated in the instance of a gentleman to whom, under its influence, (about three eighths of a grain,) the dream to be related occurred. This individual, (a South Carolinian resident on a plantation,) a few years ago, had lately received a severe and extensive burn, which confined him to his bed six months. An allusion by him in a casual conversation in the city of New York recently to the eventful dream and its circumstances, brought out a solicitation to him to write its narrative, which in substance he here gives.

[6]One evening in midwinter, a few weeks after the accident, the almost exhausted sufferer, having taken the prescribed nightly dose of morphine, fell asleep.

THE DREAM-GOD.

PART I.

The sleep was serene, the mind active, and the dream promptly and vividly supervened. A being in the form of a handsome and matured man, full of esprit, in a white and easy-fitting garment, with bright, broad and sweeping wings coming out from each side of his back below the shoulders, appeared to the patient at his bedside, and announced to him that he was the Spirit of Morphine, of a heavenly and immortal nature, and that he had come to carry him on an aerial voyage over many parts of the world; to show him many attractive regions and things, to introduce him to various races, royal personages, distinguished celebrities, etc.

The sleeper with surprise inquired, “How can I go with this stricken and impotent body?”

[8]The Immortal replied, “You must leave your body here; your spiritual being can accompany me.”

Sleeper.—“But I fear that before my return my friends may see and regard my inanimate body as dead, and bury it.”

Immortal.—“Fear not. I will restore you in due time to your body; and I will prepare you for our adventures as I am prepared.”

Thus assured, the somnipathist crept gently out, headway, from his “mortal coil,” glided over the headboard of his bedstead, glanced back upon his sleeping frame in his very image, then sprang lithely to the sill of the window, where the sash had already been thrown up by the Morpheus, and finding himself equipped with needed dress and wings, soared with his companion into the air.

Immortal.—“What route do you prefer?”

Mortal.—“I wish to have a birdseye view of Charleston, (once my home,) by gas-light and then toward the Arctic Pole.”

The aerial voyageurs were, as if in a moment, hovering in a slow, scrutinizing flight over Charleston, with stars above, and looking as upon stars below; and in front, athwart the ocean, a long line of light, gleaming from a newly-risen moon, invited their quickened pinions[9] into the illimitable spaces over the far-bounded deep. Curving in a wide ocean-sweep northward, and moving with lightning-speed, they perceived, although having a full sense of comfort, varying currents of icy gales and warm breezes; and from their transparent height saw beneath them the dark, girdling strata of cyclone hurricanes, or sheeny, swathe-clouds of crystal congelations; or, within their extended girdles, broad, oval areas of clear-rolling sea, and far down, by a peculiar dim lighting of its depths, the plains, hills and vales it immersed, and the myriad tribes of the deep in their amazing animate forms.

Mortal.—“I would see the borealis.”

Immortal.—“You shall, anon.”

The dream seemed to change. The parties suddenly found themselves lying in open sea-shells, structured to their lengths and sizes, floating side by side on a tranquil waste of waters, feet foremost, heads pillowed, and eyes bent upward and northward. A lowered and murky sky appeared as a dun-colored ceiling, of little height above them; and they were thoughtful, and in low tones they occasionally uttered weird thoughts on life—mankind—earth—God. A drowsy moment ensues. Then slowly lifts the gloomy canopy, and along the[10] distant northern horizon, the fog having rapidly disappeared, a lengthened arc of whitish light spans itself. The heavens are again clear. From the bright arc dart upward along their northern hemisphere radiant streams of every lighter hue, and in incessant changeful brilliancy—a panoramic spread of incandescent splendors. A whirl of cold, shimmering light dashes around and over towering icebergs, and amazes the eye. It closes, and when again it opens, the Arctic travellers find themselves soaring aloft, and they look upon an open,

calm, unfrozen polar sea.[A] The Spirit of Morphine remarks: “You now see, and will see, things unknown to man. This comparative warmth comes from the fire and glowing heat in the bowels of the earth, as you will soon ascertain.”

They move on; they are at the Pole; the north star is in the zenith. A magnetic needle appears hanging in mid-air, like the visioned dagger before Macbeth, and dips southward and westward toward the other—the magnetic—pole, degrees away. A glare disturbs the eye, and terrible sounds surround[11] them. Behold! the Pole is a large cylindrical aperture (miles in diameter) in our globe, down through which are seen the molten mass and fiery flame within the crust of earth! The watery billows, like a whirlpool, surge in loud roar around its circumferent shore, but enter not; and a column of heat ever rushes on the Arctic air.

A cry of terror and awe escapes from the sleeper. He is conscious of it, but does not awake. The dream resumes.

They are now flying southward, and the somnipathist has a vision (a dream in this dream) of a midsummer circling sun shining a day of months. They view the peculiarities of Iceland, examine the maelstrom, (that singular natural wonder, gurgitating into another earth-aperture, off Norway,) and comprehend by a glance Lapland, Norway and Sweden, their curiosities, peoples, customs, etc. There is not time or space for details. They are en voyage for the Court of Russia.

They alight at the Winter Palace of the Czar.

The Immortal with his pupil enters with free and commanding port—obstructions vanish. A festive scene of splendor—gayety, glitter and ceremony commingled—is at its height. Through the maze of an amazed,[12] gorgeous, throng, they advance to the Emperor, surrounded by rank and beauty; and through the influence of a celestial majesty more enthralling than his own, they secure his deferential and cordial attention. Then follows a confused but charming association with “beautiful women and brave men,” amid all social bewitcheries.

The scene changes. They are seated in a small ice-crystal[B] salon, glistening on all sides except the carpeted floor, with the Emperor and his prime minister alone, all exhilarant with wine, and now sipping the potent subtlety of China’s most famed and fragrant tea, priced at its weight in gold. The philosophy of government, from a republican standpoint, rushes upon the soul of the American, and he exclaims to the mighty potentate of all the Russias:

“How can your humanity conscientiously hold and wield the power of imperial despotism?”

Emperor.—“The one-man power in the light and dignity of a principle, appeals to reason and fascinates the soul. It is the true[13] theory of human government. I am God’s vicegerent, as king and priest, for the well-being and good order of my people.”

Prime Minister.—“This system derives its type from the One-God control of the universe. It has divinity from above, it has patriarchal sanction here below. It can bear comparison with its opposite extreme in absolutism—a pure democracy, the mere many-power, unrestrained, unregulated and uninstructed. What is more irresponsible, more selfishly callous, more heedlessly unstable, and more grinding than the vulgar tyranny of a bare popular majority? Extremes meet and have a singular affinity; it is the secret of the growing friendship between Russia and the United States.”

American.—“Ha! Our American people are not a mass democracy. The United States are republics federated under a Constitution—a system which excludes both your extremes.”

Prime Minister.—“Indeed!”

Immortal.—“There is a golden mean for all finite governments. Uncontrolled power is only for the Infinite.”

Emperor.—“Is even political self-government a right?”

[14]American.—“Surely mankind is entitled to it and should possess it.”

Immortal.—“No! Self-government is the eventual prize of intelligence and virtue. The ignorant or vicious are incapable of it. In the meantime, it is the privilege of the human race to secure it by attempered wisdom, and to guard it against the passions and ignorance of the many, the few, or the one. Goodness in the use of power, more than the form of government, is the great desideratum. Seek most to elevate the mind and heart of man!”

American to Emperor.—“Sire! it is then your best mission to do well your part!”

PART II.

Farewells are spoken. The voyageurs are again a-wing. They reach the Arctic along the vast Siberian coast. There the cold is most intense, and of the frozen regions it is the wildest and grandest. A shimmering light seems to permeate it ever, even in its darkest periods. The ice presents plains, abysses, mountains. Everywhere are the débris of long-frozen animals. Over its dry waste of congealed waters, the fierce blasts, as if by frictional action on its rugged surfaces, ever generate electrical phenomena. In midwinter and darkness, scintillating flashes gleam along them in the nether air. Such was their vision.

The disembodied, as one startled, exclaims: “See yon iceberg like a mountain of glass. What is that within it? It resembles the carcass of a dead animal, but it is too huge. It is at least sixty feet long, and of elephantine proportions.”

[16]Immortal.—“It is an ancient specimen of the behemoth (B’Hemoth) tribes. Its species is extinct. Its bulk is many times that of the mastodon. Its massive ivory tusks are similar to those of the walrus. Its remains have been frozen in there for thousands of years. Putrescence is here unknown.”

Mortal.—“What wonders! Can this be nature?”

Immortal.—“We are approaching others.”

Mortal.—“Yes, look! What a vast lizard or crocodile yonder encased—five hundred feet long! But I see fins, also.”

Immortal.—“It is of the primeval species of sauroid fish. It has been frozen during cycles of time. This region was once warmer. Nature’s changeful developments are a curious mystery to man, but it ever unfolds in increasing knowledge.”

They wheel southward—anon traverse Chinese Tartary—sweep over the Chinese wall, and alight in Pekin. They poise themselves on a lofty pagoda.

Mortal.—“These Chinese are a mysterious people. I am curious about them. That wall was a great enterprise in its day, and a singular one.”

Immortal.—“They are a swarm from an ancient[17] human hive, and have long been numerous and astute. They have been, and are superior to the average of mankind, but inferior to the more illumined and most cultivated. Their numbers and limited geographic sphere have made them feel want; yet their inventions, although multiplied, have been petty, fanciful, crude and clumsy contrivances to meet emergency, in comparison with the grander discoveries and more studied and beautiful designs of other and higher civilizations. Necessity has stimulated their cunning, but precludes their reflection; it has pinched their faculties, as the ‘iron shoe’ has their feet. Their mental contraction has been rendered more compressive by their moral and spiritual defects. They have had no conception of a God, per se. It is the conception which most expands man!”

Mortal.—“But this pagoda (truly it is a grotesque structure!) is a temple devoted to some worship.”

Immortal.—“It is a fane of the merest idolatry, and dedicated to idols, ‘of the earth, earthly,’ not to any images which are even typical of divine essences. But of this, anon.”

Mortal.—“The Chinese have, however, a demi-god—their ‘Celestial Emperor.’”

[18]Immortal.—“Yes, he is their immediate authority, temporal and spiritual. Yet he and his mandarins, alike with his subjects, are constrained, by the dominancy of twenty-four centuries of veneration for the great Chinese philosopher and moralist, Koong-Foo-tse, (latinized, Confucius,) to worship in the temples dedicated to that extraordinary statesman and expounder. This pagoda is one of these temples, which have been reared in all chief cities and towns. His ‘nine books’ constitute the creed and code—the bible—of the ‘Celestial Empire,’ and you will deem it a singular fact that they contain no mention of a Creator—no allusion to God.”

Mortal.—“It is indeed strange for so intelligent a people. All other peoples have some kind of a belief and worship of a Supreme Being. Hark! I hear sounds from below—I hear chants!”

Immortal.—“Yes, they are from the Emperor and his court, performing idol-service, offering fruits, wines, flowers and fancy articles, and now singing chants. We will witness their return to the palace, and then visit them.”

Soon the vision embraced a scene of Oriental pomp—a pageant, with its ceremonies, gorgeous displays and vain-glorious crudities.[19] This narrative must dispense with the description, nor could the reader be made to receive the impression produced on the visitor from the West, while gazing on the dramas of the East.

His Celestial Majesty—“brother of the sun and cousin of the stars”—is now enthroned in his extended residence, amid princely persons, political potentates and priestly dignitaries, surrounded by every burnishment and administered to by varied flattery and all servility. The voyageurs suddenly appear before and among them.

Emperor.—“Ha! what means this intrusion? Chamberlain of the Palace, accursed Mandarin! you shall lose your life for this. How came these persons into the Celestial Presence without permission and the salaam reverences? Hold! they have wings! Can they be Celestial? Spirit of Koong-Foo-tse! come, protect, guard us! Let all the great gongs be beaten! let dreadful sounds frighten them away!”

The Immortal, with a gesture, awes all into silence and composure.

American to Emperor.—“Man, what mean these presumptions? What does your ridiculous and despotic power claim?”

[20]Emperor.—“Not read the ‘Books!’ Read them. My power is immemorial and supreme. Yang and Yn, time and Koong-Foo-tse have founded it—yes, founded it on the analogy of parental authority, which they declare absolute. The nation is my family, and I am its father. I am sole entitled ruler, and I am—holy and sacred! Nor will I have contact with strangers and barbarians.”

American.—“What means he? What of Confucius?”

Immortal.—“Confucius was a Chinaman, who lived 550 years before Christ. He was a teacher of morals, rather than a founder of religion. For those dark ages, he was an extraordinary man; he was great as a philosopher, a moralist and a statesman. He made no pretence to inspiration. He inculcated the training of the physical system. The five elements, fire, water, wood, metal and earth (he called them Kings) were the basis of his system of philosophy. He maintained that the universe was generated by the union of two material principles—a heavenly and an earthly—Yang and Yn—but there is no mention of a Creator in his system. Man, he asserted, fell from purity and happiness by his own act; and by his own act he can or must recover them. His political[21] system, which is one of pure despotism, has been give by the Emperor. Spirit of Koong-Foo-tse, come forth!”

The apparition of Confucius here takes visible shape, and startles the assembly. The other or American immaterialized human, addresses him:

“Confucius, thy soul has now learned wisdom. How is it, that in life your great reason did not perceive and conceive that there must be and was a Being, all wise, all powerful, all good, eternal, and with His infinity universally present—the God and Creator?”

Confucius.—“I had no revelation!”

Immortal.—“Creation itself suggests and proves a Creator; it is His greatest revelation. The dual-elements in man (mind and matter,) should recognize His existence and essence.”

Confucius.—“I dimly perceived that there were two principles, but not precisely those of good and evil. I did not reason sufficiently at large. I thought only of earth, not of religion; of the material, not the divine. Zoroaster surpassed me in these regards.”

American.—“Emperor, the hand-writing of destroying Fate is on your wall. The hands of hundred of millions will pull it down. God will send light, by the invading influence of[22] the ‘outside barbarians’ of the far West, to scatter the darkness from your land. Your dynasty is doomed.”

The spectre of Confucius nods confirmation, and disappears.

The voyageurs pass out, and soar into the air.

Intense cimmerian darkness now seems to prevail everywhere, and the aerialists see themselves, as it were from a distance, flying as illumined transparent shapes through it. Afar off, and in another land, there is seen a small luminous spot on the horizon.

“What is yon bright object?”

“It is the ‘Temple of the Sun.’”

The speed of thought brings them to its full view. They swoop down; and pause in riveted contemplation of the sublime pile.

What a house, built by supposed hands! It is a structure from masses of the purest crystal; a mile long; two-thirds of a mile broad; a half-mile high to its eaves. A steeple, itself of a mile’s height and of beautiful proportions, towers with a superb aplomb a mile and a half above its front base. It is radiant with a whitish internal illumination, that shoots its apex of light upward to the dark empyrean. Over a central point of the[23] temple, a third distance from its rear, a lofty dome uplifts in grand majesty its imposing symmetry, and from which hangs pendent within, a vast globular light resembling and sacred to the sun, permeating and illuming with its golden rays the mighty mass. The double-tinted splendor of the tout ensemble, thrilled with rapture even an immortal soul! Above the dome, and from a staff like the lightning’s streak, floated a tri-colored oriflamme—a rainbow flag.

The occasion is a holy period to a people in southern Asia, of whom tens of thousands throng the columned interior. The flying visitors enter. Their eyes are instantly attracted upward to the high-vaulted ceiling, appearing like a slightly concaved sky, and of a deep cerulean hue, studded with stars (mystic phenomenon!) as if in deference to night.