University of Virginia Library

Phenomena explained

Portraits, landscape-paintings, fac-similes of penman- ship, peculiarities of expression, recollected sentences, can all be taken from pictorial thought and memory as readily as from objects cognizable by the senses. Mortal mind sees what it believes as certainly as it believes what it sees. It feels, hears, and sees its own thoughts. Pictures are mentally formed before the artist can convey them to canvas. So is it

with all material conceptions. Mind-readers perceive these pictures of thought. They copy or reproduce them, even when they are lost to the memory of the mind in which they are discoverable.