On the Marvelous Occurrences in the World

Fourthly, a stronger impression of the likeness and the bell assists. Secondly, I say that it is possible for it to appear to Sortes who is hearing wind that he hears a bell, or to one hearing a bell that he hears a man, and similar things. This happens either on account of a strong actual imagination, or on account of a strong impression of that likeness and not the other, or on account of the medium through which the sound is multiplied, from which it receives its figure, through which and under which such a likeness of sound enters the ears. For by diverse causes, sound is figured in the medium in diverse ways, just as it appears if one places a finger in the ear while moving it slightly while singing, how wonderfully the sound is diversified. Thus, wind perhaps passing through a narrow window, or the sound of a bell through the thickets of fields, or through the fronds of trees, receives diverse figures, such that it is represented otherwise than as a simple sound, so that it appears to have a likeness of a voice or of speech, especially if there is a likeness of someone strongly impressed in the phantasia imagination, or if there is an actual thought. For then, by a light occasion, wonderful appearances are made. Indeed, even if there is no actual thought regarding something, yet with the imaginative likeness remaining, for a small motion it very easily makes appear what is not. As a timid person, on account of the light figuration of the sound which the wind makes, will judge himself to hear the voice of a man groaning; and if I hear Plato another common placeholder name for a person coughing, it is possible that I believe it to be Sortes. Just as sometimes...