presently see, in the region of illusory belief, and its influence is
very marked in the seemingly cooler region of external perception. The
effect of any emotional excitement appears to be to give a preternatural
vividness and persistence to the ideas answering to it, that is to say,
the ideas which are its excitants, or which are otherwise associated
with it. Owing to this circumstance, when the mind is under the
temporary sway of any feeling, as, for example, fear, there will be a
special readiness to interpret objects by help of images congruent with
the emotion. Thus, a man under the control of fear will be ready to see
any kind of fear-inspiring object whenever there is any resemblance to
such in the things actually present to his vision. The state of awe
which the surrounding circumstances of a spiritualist _seance_ inspires
produces a general readiness of mind to perceive what is strange,
mysterious, and apparently miraculous.

It is worth noting, perhaps, that those delightful half-illusions which
imitative art seeks to produce are greatly favoured by such a temporary
attitude of the interpreting imagination. In the theatre, for example,
we are prepared for realizing the semblance of life that is to be
unfolded before us. We come knowing that what is to be performed aims at
representing a real action or actual series of events. We not improbably
work ourselves into a slightly excited state in anticipation of such a
representation. More than this, as the play progresses, the realization
of what has gone before produces a strong disposition to believe in the
reality of what is to follow. And this effect is proportionate to the
degree of coherence and continuity in the action. In this way, there is
a cumulative effect on the mind. If the action is good, the illusion, as
every play-goer knows, is most complete towards the end.

Were it not for all this mental preparation, the illusory character of
the performance would be too patent to view, and our enjoyment would
suffer. A man is often aware of this when coming into a theatre during
the progress of a piece before his mind accommodates itself to the
meaning of the play. And the same thing is recognizable in the fact that
the frequenter of the theatre has his susceptibility to histrionic
delusion increased by acquiring a habit of looking out for the meaning
of the performance. Persons who first see a play, unless they be of
exceptional imagination and have though