IMAGINATION  AND  VISION

By W.H. Bates, M.D., New York City, N.Y.



SWING:  The normal eye with normal sight has many illusions.
Illusions are not seen, they are always imagined, and when imagined
perfectly it is usually difficult to tell whether things are seen or
only imagined.  When the normal eye has normal sight everything
remembered, imagined, or seen is moving.   This movement, or swing, is
slow, short and easy, and is so inconspicuous that very few people have
ever notced it.   When the swing stops an effort is always necessary,
the swing is an illusion, because stationary objects do not swing;
they only appear to swing, and being an illusion the swing is never
seen, it is always imaged.

HALOS:  Another illusion of the normal eye is that the white spaces
between the lines of letters, between the words, or between the letters
are whiter than the rest of the page where there are no letters.   The
white centres of the letters and the immediate background appear whiter
than they really are.   The illusion is so strong with some people that
it is difficult to prove to them the facts.   When one reads ordinary
type in a newspaper or book, this whiteness, in the neighbourhood of
the letters is seldom noticed.   I have called this whiteness Halos.
To see the Halos, or to imagine them, is a great benefit to the sight.
 Some patients with imperfect sight have been cured very promptly after
they learned how to imagine the Halos.   The Halos are illusions, and
being illusions they are imagined and not seen.

SIZE:  The size of letters is only what we imagine it to be.   Many
artists with normal sight will imagine letters much too large or much
too small.  Wearing glasses increases the error of estimating the size.
  Imagination of the size varies with the light, varies with the
distance and varies with the nature of the object.   Some people in a
bright light imagine letters larger than they really are, and when the
light is dimmer they imagine the letters smaller than they really are.
 The reverse may be true.   It is curious that some one letter, or
object, will be imagined more nearly the exact size than some other
letter, or object, of the same size.   This fact is well illustrated by
comparing the length of a horse’s head with a flour barrel.  It is
remarkable how many people will imagine a flour barrel much taller than
the lenght of a horse’s head.  The size of object is only what we
imagine it to be.

COLOURS:  Colour perception is largely a matter of the imagination.  It
is interesting to note how perception of colour varies with
individuals.  It is a matter of common observation that two artists
painting the same portrait produce two pictures that are usually not at
all similar.   The colour of the eyes might vary, the colour of the
hair might be different, although both artists may have what is usually
considered to be normal vision.  The colours that they see, or paint,
are quite variable.   Colours seen through glass are always modified.
If we use a strong magnifying glass and hold it over a piece of black
cloth, the part magnified appears decidedly less black than that part
seen with the naked eye.   The same is true of white and red and all
other colours.   An artist who wears glasses is seriously handicapped
in imagining colours correctly.   It is impossible to see colours
correctly with glasses, and although one may remember a colour
perfectly, it is always imagined wrong, or quite different than when
imagined by the normal eye with normal sight without glasses.

FORM:  The form of letters and other object is imaged differently by
different people and by the same person differently when seen at
different times.    When a capital leter E is regarded with the middle
line directly in the centre, the space above the middle line will
appear much larger than the space below.    This is an illusion, and
being an illusion, of course, it is only imagined.

LOCATION:  The location of letters in a sentence or in words, is
imagined oftentimes incorrectly.   Some persons with normal eyes and
normal sight will imagine the first letter of a word to be the last
letter, or a letter in the middle of a word may appear to be at either
end.    Occasionally we find individuals who will read a page of a
book, or a line of letters, as if they were reversed, as seen in a
mirror.   Children, when first learning to read, will begin at the end
of a sentence and read it correctly, although they are reading it, in a
way, backwards.

MULTIPLE IMAGES:  Many pesons with normal sight have told me that they
read or saw  every other line of small letters of the Snellen Test Card
double or triple with one image clear enough to be read, while the
other images were more or less blurred.  To see every other line of the
Snellen Card multiplied is an illusion, it is imagined not seen.   One
of my patients could, with each eye, see, or imagine he saw, nine moons
overlapping.   He also saw a large letter of the Snellen Card
multiplied, sometimes double, sometimes triple, and sometimes as many
as ten or twelve.   Some patients who saw large letters multiplied were
able to read the small letters with normal vision.    One patient with
normal vision for the small letters told me that the large letter was
blood red instead of being black as the small letters were.   In other
cases the black letters were described as having a shade of brown or a
shade of yellow or some other colour.
It is an interesting fact that some patients appear to have a better
imagination than they have sight.  One patient frequently said to me,
“I know the first letter of the line is an F, but I do not see it.   I
can imagine the third letter is a C, but I see it blurred.”
Some patients with imperfect sight cannot imagine they see a letter
even after they know what it is.   By practice they may become able to
imagine they see known letters, and when their imagination becomes
perfect their vision for unknown letters becomes normal.   Some
patients with normal vision may have little or no imagination.   They
cannot imagine they see mental pictures of any kind at all,
continuously, but they are usually able to imagine a mental picture of
a known letter for a fraction of a second or in flashes.   By repeated
flashes the mental pictures become more continuous.

IMAGINATION OF IMPERFECT SIGHT

The symptoms of imperfect sight are nearly always symptoms of imperfect
imagination.   It can always be demonstated that imperfect sight
requires an effort.    When a near-sighted person regards one letter of
diamond type at the near point with normal vision he becomes able to
imagine the letter is moving.   If the patient finds it difficult to
imagine the letter is moving, let him try to concentrate on one part of
the letter, on a small area about the size of a small period (full
stop).  This the patient may be able to do for a few seconds, or a part
of a minute, but the mind soon tires of the monotony and an effort is
felt in order to keep the period in mind and keep it stationary.
Every once in a while the period disappears, as well as the whole
letter, when one perseveres in trying to concentrate on a period and to
imagine the letter stationary.    It should be emphasised that it is
impossible to concenrate on the period for any great length of time,
and that the effort to do so keeps it stationary, and that the letter
becomes blurred or disappears altogether from the strain.  Now, when a
patient realises that it is impossible to concentrate, or imagine, a
letter stationary without blurring the sight, his mind may be willing
to believe that if he cannot see a letter stationary, when he does see
a letter with normal vision, that it must be moving.  One can
demonstate with the eyes closed that a letter cannot be remembered, or
imagined perfectly unless it is imagined to be moving.   When a myopic
patient looks at the distance with imperfect sight, it can be
demonstated that an effort is  always required.   When a black letter
is remembered perfectly with a normal swing the blackness of the letter
is altered to a shade of grey when an effort is made to stop the swing.
  With the eyes open the blackness of the letter of the Snellen Test
Card can be modified or lost by an effort to concentrate or to imagine
the card, and other objects are stationary.   It is a matter of great
practical importance to emphasize these facts to patients who have
imperfect sight with a view to treatment.   When the patient finds that
trying to concentrate, trying to stare, trying to see the letters by an
effort always fails, and the greater the effort the more decided
becomes the imperfect sight.   Have them demonstrate that in order to
fail they have to work hard, they have to make themselves very
uncomfortable , produce pain or headaches by the efforts they make to
see.   If they can read fine print with normal vision it is my custom
to call the attention of the patient to the fact that it is done
easily, that one letter can be read at a time, and that no attempt is
made to see a whole sentence at once.   When fine print is read
perfectly, the patient is perfectly comfortable.   When the myopic
patient looks at the Snellen Test Card with imperfect sight, the
smaller letters of a line all look alike, because the patient is trying
to see them all at once, and the more they try to see, the greater the
effort they make, the worse becomes their vision and the letters not
only lose their form but also their black colour.   I have found it a
good plan to have a near-sighted patient remember, or imagine, a letter
perfectly with a slow, short, easy swing, and call his attention to the
fact that it is done easily, quickly, and the memory or the imagination
of the letter is easy, quite continuous;  but the memory of the
imagination of an imperfect letter requires time, trouble, much effort,
and the imperfect letter may disappear from strain and then come back
again.   I like to emphasize the facts as well as I know how that the
memory or the imagination of imperfect sight is a very difficult thing
to do.   It is a very disagreeable thing to do, oftentimes painful and
producing all kinds of nervous and other discomforts, whereas the
memory of perfect sight is easy.   With the memory or the imagination
of perfect sight, it is impossible to be conscious of any pain or any
functional symptom of disease of any kind.   Imagination of perfect
sight is the quickest cure I know for distressing symptoms.   One could
put it up to the patient in this way:
“You have demonstrated that your imperfect sight is difficult and a
hardship.   You also demonstrated that the imagination of perfect sight
is easy and can be accomplished in no other way.   You have the choice.
  You are not colour blind: why should you, by an effort change the
colour of the letters from a black to a light grey?  Why should you put
a lot of fuzz and blur upon the letters which is not there?   It is a
difficult thing to do.   Why should you see double, triple?   The
letters are single, yet you multiply them by hard work.  It is a great
deal easier to imagine these letters single than to imagine them
multiplied.   Why do you do it?”
The patient cannot at first answer these questions.   He tries to put
the blame on the other fellow.  “It was the fault of my eye or the
fault of the light.  It was not my fault”.

THE IMAGINATION CURE:  From time to time I have published a description
of the imagination cure.   It is true that persons with normal vision
and persons with imperfect sight can regard small letters of a magazine
or a newspaper at ten feet away where they cannot consciously read the
letters and demonstrate that they must have seen all the letters on the
page of the magazine.   They must have seen the page with perfect
sight, because they can, with the aid of palming imagine any letter on
the page.   For example,  if the letter is a C, the second letter of
the fourth word of the tenth line, of the first column the patient can
imagine the left-hand side is curved and at the same time remember some
other letter perfectly.   If the patient remembers the left-hand  side
straight or open, the ability to remember some other letter perfectly
is lost.  This emphasizes the  fact that one cannot imagine one thing
perfectly and something else imperfectly.  It is not always an easy
matter for the patient to remember the same letter perfectly all the
time when trying to imagine each of the four sides of the unknown
letter.   Sometimes a letter F will serve for a while and at othertimes
the letter O or a B or some other letter, which can be remembered and
imagined perfectly black with the white centre as white as snow with
the sun shining on it, with a slow, short, easy swing.  When the four
sides of the unknown letter are imagined correctly, the known letter is
remembered perfectly.
Many people have difficulty in practising the imagination cure.
Instead of using the small letters of a magazine, one may have the
patient practise on the larger letters of the Snellen Test Card, which
is unfamiliar.   The Snellen Card, composed entirely of letters E
pointed in various directions, is, for some people, an easy one to
imagine.   One might readily believe that the Snellen Test Card, being
composed of larger letters, would be easier to imagine than the smaller
letters printed on a magazine page;  but this is not always true.  I
have had patients regard diamond type at more than ten feet for about
thirty seconds and demonstrate that they must have seen every letter on
the page perfectly in order to imagine it perfectly.  They not only
imagined any letter designated at the time, but they were able to do so
weeks and months afterwards.
The minds of some people are very sensitive, because there are
individuals who can imagine a designated letter, each side correctly,
with perfect comfort;  but when they imagine it wrong, then they have a
feeling of discomfort and even pain in the eyes or head.   It seems to
me that the imagination cure demonstrates that the vision of most
people is a great deal better than has ever een realised before.  I
have seen patients look at strange letters 100 yards away where they
could not consciously read them and yet, by the help of their
imagination, they become able to tell each letter on the distant card.
This ability to see unconsciously so well at the distance suggests that
it is quite possible that some people have practised this unconscious
wonderful vision at the distance and made it a conscious vision.   The
ability to see things at the distance so perfectly and so wonderfully
well is equalled by the ability of some people to see things very small
at the near point.

It can be demonstrated that VISION is only limited by the IMAGINATION.