Dreams and How to Guide Them

The Marquis Hervey de Saint-Denys (1822-1892), a French oriental scholar , began at the age of thirteen to examine his dreams regularly as a means of occupying his free time. Within a year he found himself 'developing a faculty that was largely responsible for the observations recorded' in this book: while dreaming he was often conscious of his 'true situation' - that is he was aware while dreaming that he was dreaming. He had not set out to cultivate this ability; almost certainly he had not known that such an ability was possible. But once having come a cross it in the course of recording his dreams, he fostered its growth. He discovered further that during dreaming he would h ave 'sufficient control' of his ideas 'to guide their development in whatever direction it suited' him to do so. For several decades he studied - and guided - his dreams. In 1867, at the age of forty-five, he published this remarkable book , which reports his experiences. It is the first book ever written about the direction of dreams during the process of dreaming, and it remains today the most thorough.