Cabanis, the philosopher, found in his sleep the conclusions of many problems that he was not able to solve while awake. Condorcet, the mathematician, found in his sleep the final steps in a calculation that baffled him while awake. Napoleon was a great believer in dreams and was often guided by them in his campaigns. Columbus, it is said, dreamed that a voice spoke to him saying, “God will give thee the keys of the gates of the Ocean,” and that it was this that kept up his courage. In remote times the greatest of importance was attached to dreams. The ancients resorted to them in cases of difficulty or calamity. When pestilence spread among the Greeks before Troy, Homer represents Achilles as taking refuge in dreams, his reason being,— “_Dreams descend from Jove_.” Aristotle, Plato, Zeno, Pythagoras, Socrates, Xenophon and Sophocles have all expressed their belief in the divine or prophetic character of dreams. A great number of historical instances are recorded in Greek and Latin classics of dreams that came true. The night before the assassination of Julius Cæsar, his wife Calpurnia dreamed that her husband fell bleeding across her knees. She tried to warn him, but he laughed at her fears. On the night that Attila died, the Emperor Marcian at Constantinople dreamed that he saw the bow of the conqueror broken asunder. Cicero relates a dream thru which a murderer was brought to justice. Dreams were even allowed to influence legislation. During the Marsic War (90 B.C.) the Roman senate ordered the temple of Juno to be rebuilt, in consequence of a dream. There are many other examples in ancient history. The old fathers of the Christian Church attached considerable importance to dreams. Tertullian thought they came from God as one of a series of prophecy, though he attributed many dreams to the influence of evil spirits. St. Augustine relates a dream thru which he was convinced of the immortality of the soul. How Dreams Should be Interpreted There are two kinds of dreams: those that are reproductions of one’s waking thoughts or actions, or the result of digestive disturbances; and those that proceed from some psychological condition which we cannot probe or understand. Many dreams are of so trivial a nature that it would be foolish to attribute any importance to them. Others seems to come from some outside inspiration and are prophetic. The ancient sages who were celebrated as interpreters of dreams had a maxim that the “Result of dreams often follows their interpretation.” They meant that if you believe that a dream means a certain thing, you will fashion your actions so that that thing will come true.