Indeed, the surpassing evidence and truth in all, but especially in the inspired interpretation of Joseph of the dream of Pharaoh, and those of the still _more_ inspired oneirocritic, Daniel, cannot be compared with aught profane. The prophet not only _expounded_, but _reminded_ Nebuchadnezzar of his dream, when he himself had forgotten it. This was the result of special prayer to the Deity; and, remember, without this, the Chaldeans failed in their efforts. Even Josephus informs us, that Daniel “foretold good things and pleased, so that he was deemed divine.” And you have read, that Saul also prayed for a dream, but HE _dreamt not_, because he was not holy. And there are holy precepts regarding dreams, which are recorded to curb our superstitious reliance on _all_. We have assurances of true dreamers in the first chapter of Matthew, the second of the Acts, in Deuteronomy, and the thirty-fourth of Ecclesiasticus; the language of the son of Sirach was, that “_common_ dreams only serve to lift up fools.” With these reservations, I do believe that the real inspiration of a spirit is the gift only of the holy and the good; so that the presumption of divination and prophecy by _profane_ dreamers is an illusion; yet, I acknowledge with John Wesley, that many have been converted by a dreaming conscience; as we read of impressive dreams, which have effected the conversion of others by the mere recital. Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, was a sceptic; but, as we are informed by Burnet in his “Life and Death,” his mind was first led to the conviction of an immaterial spirit, by the prophetic dream of his mother, the Lady de la Warre, foreboding truly his own death. And I must ever admire the moral wisdom of Zeno, which (according to Plutarch) induced him to regard a dream as the test of virtue; for, if in his dream his heart did not _recoil_ from vicious suggestions, there was an immediate necessity of self-examination and repentance. I cannot forbear adding, that there is much wisdom in the estimation of his vision, by one of the shepherd kings of Egypt, Sabaco. He dreamed that the tutelary deity of Thebes enjoined him to kill the priests of Egypt, and, for this unmerciful injunction from the gods, that _they deemed him unfit for the throne_, he went into self-exile, to Æthiopia. EV. The conclusions of these moralists from dreaming impressions were somewhat straightlaced: yet _your_ reflections, Ida, point to the safest mode by which we may reconcile the conflict of the divine and the physiologist, and, above all, evince our devotion to the Creator; namely, to argue on creation as we _see it_, and on revelation as we _see it recorded_. Yet, with a mock solemnity, dreams and apparitions have been first adduced as proofs of the soul’s immortality; and then, in the same argument, are themselves proved _by_ this immortality; the points of the syllogism are reversed, and we have _petitio principii_, a begging of the question.