Not only is the passage from reality into dreamland thus symbolized by appropriate representation but the mental work of reality gradually merges with the mental work of the sleeping state. Thoughts of the day merge directly with the dream thoughts. There is no gap between waking thoughts and sleeping thoughts. This has been demonstrated by Silberer's experiments. "The very first dream," Silberer says, "visualizes, dramatises and interprets the very last waking thought." 1st EXAMPLE: "I applied some boric ointment to the mucous of my nose before retiring to relieve a painful dryness." DREAM: "I see some one offering money to some one else. Only I notice that it is my right hand which is putting money into my left hand." INTERPRETATION: "I have often thought that this medication did not help my nose trouble but simply concealed it. The action is therefore presented as illusory help." 2nd EXAMPLE: "I am thinking of a dramatic scene in which a character would intimate a certain fact to another character without putting the thought into words." DREAM: "One man is offering to another man a hot metallic cup." INTERPRETATION: "The cup transmits an impression of heat which has not to be expressed through spoken words." 3rd EXAMPLE: "I try to remember something which in my sleepy state eludes me." DREAM: "I apply for information to a grouchy clerk who refuses to impart it to me. The interpretation is obvious." 4th EXAMPLE: "I think that many simple arguments could be brought forth to prove some thesis of mine." DREAM: "A drove of white horses moves downward through my field of vision. Interpretation obvious." Likewise sleeping thoughts gradually merge with waking thoughts in the moments preceding awakening. The last dreams of the night or hypnopompic visions generally dramatize our awakening in picturesque, symbolical fashion. Here are several examples collected by Silberer from observations on himself: "I return to my home with a party of people, take leave of them at the door and enter." "After visiting some place, I drive home along the same road which lead me there." "One morning I woke up and decided to doze off for another half hour: I dreamt then that I was locked up in a house and I woke up saying: 'I must have the lock broken open.'" In hypnopompic visions we generally enter a house, a forest, a dark valley or take a train or a boat, or we fall (see typical dreams). CHAPTER V: WHERE DREAMS COME FROM To sleep does not mean "perchance to dream," but to dream from the very second when we close our eyes to the time when we open them again. "But I never dream," some one will surely say. To which I will answer: Make experiments on yourself or some one else. Have some one wake you up fifty times or a hundred times in one night. Repeat the experiment as many nights as your constitution will allow and every time you wake up, you will wake up with the clear or confused memory of some dream.