Tratado de los sueños (Treatise on Dreams)

Author’s Prologue

Illustrious sir, having frequently thought about and recalled many treatises which in the presence of Your Worship were practiced during the time when I enjoyed your divine conversation, among them I have just now recalled that you said to me one Sabbath, being in Bel Veder [Belvedere], that you very much wished to know something good concerning dreams, both with regard to their essence as well as their causes, and to satisfy three doubts which you always entertained in their regard.

The first, you wished to know how to understand what some scholars say, that just as the temperaments of men are different, so are their dreams different, since the temperament depends on the material composition [of the body] insofar as its overall quality results from the mixture of individual contrary qualities, according to the definition of temperament. And the imagination, through which dreams can come to be, is a faculty of the soul, and not matter, as the forms of dreams differ according to the difference of that same material composition.

The second, and one which you particularly desired to know, was if there was any natural reason that would satisfactorily and properly enable us to understand what the forms signify since the imagination appears to contain things which are yet to come and that should be true as signified in the dream, as our learned men would have it.

The third, which is what causes a man to dream about things long forgotten and which he cannot remember when he is awake; and together with this which you most particularly desired, was to hear expounded well the [biblical] story about the dreams which Joseph solved and dreamed, and to know whether one could give any natural reason for them beyond that it appears to be by divine influence.

I, sir, being very desirous to satisfy Your Worship—although at that moment it seemed to me that I had given in general several sufficient reasons—since it seems to me that Your Worship has not remained wholly satisfied, finding myself at present at the time when we are reading the dreams that Joseph dreamed and interpreted, and together with this, I at the same time dreamed a dream much to my satisfaction—with all the circumstances that are required in order for its significance to be true—about the growth and increase of the prosperity and happy state of Your Worship, which I shall relate extensively at the very end, together with its meaning which I did interpret from that dream, seeking a natural reason for the outcome of the meaning to be certain, it seemed to me fitting to discuss this matter in the briefest style possible, since I know that you would wish it so, and Your Worship will take from whatever seems to you to be the best. [ . . . ]

The second type is: dreams that show the truth of what is to come, the certainty of what will be in it—i.e., the second doubt which concerned Your Worship. These dreams do not occur for any of the aforementioned causes that would make them uncertain and variable; and they are divided into two different kinds [species] even though the causes may be the same in both kinds.

The first kind in which natural reason manifests itself most clearly, as will be stated more fully, are dreams that are dreamed by thoughtless men, which is one of the reasons they [the dreams] are uncertain, as we have said, and that they [the dreamers] should be strong-minded to oppose and thwart and destroy with true reasoning and sufficient proofs the false imaginings that fantasy frequently invents.

The second kind are dreams that the majority of people who are not wise or learned dream, being of balanced temperament and reasonably intelligent, for in such people their dreams will be true because their understanding concludes what is to come based on the experience they have of the past; with the reasonable intelligence he [the dreamer] has, paying careful attention to it [the dream], he will make it true and not miss the outcome.