 Section 9 of Complete Hypnotism. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Complete Hypnotism, Mesmerism, Mind Reading, and Spiritualism by A. Alpheus. Chapter 6 Simulation. Deception and Hypnotism very common. Examples of neuropathic deceit, detecting simulation, professional subjects, how Dr. Louis of the Charity Hospital at Paris was deceived, and possibility of detecting deception in all cases, confessions of a professional hypnotic subject. It has already been remarked that hypnotism and hysteria are conditions very nearly allied, and that hysterical neuropathic individuals make the best hypnotic subjects. Now persons of this character are in most cases morally as well as physically degenerate, and it is a curious fact that deception seems to be an inherent element in nearly all such characters. Expert doctors have been thoroughly deceived. And again, persons who have been trying to expose frauds have also been deceived by the positive statements of such persons that they were deceiving the doctors when they were not. A deceased vanity seems to operate in such cases, and the subjects take any method which promises for the time being to bring them into prominence. Nearly to attract attention is a mania with some people. There is also something about the study of hypnotism, and similar subjects in which delusions constitute half the existence that seems to destroy the faculty for distinguishing between truth and delusion. Undoubtedly, we must look on such manifestations as a species of insanity. There is also a point at which the unconscious deceiver, for the sake of gain, passes into the conscious deceiver. At the close of this chapter, we will give some cases illustrating the fact that persons may learn by practice to do seemingly impossible things, such as holding themselves perfectly rigid as in the cataleptic state, while their head rests on one chair and their heels on another, and a heavy person sits upon them. First, let us cite a few cases of what may be called neuropathic deceit, a kind of insanity which shows itself in deceiving. The newspapers record similar cases from time to time. The first two of the following are quoted by Dr. Cormel from the French Cards, etc. Number 1. The Comtesse de W, a cuter maid of having attempted to poison her. The case was a celebrated one, and a courtroom was strong with women who sympathized with the supposed victim. The maid was condemned to death, but a second trial was granted, at which it was conclusively proved that the Comtesse had herself bound herself on her bed and had herself poured out the poison, which was found still blackening her breast and lips. Number 2. In 1886, a man called Eulis broke into the shop of a secondhand dealer, facing his own house in Paris, and there began deliberate leads to take away the goods, just as if he were removing his own furniture. This he did without hurrying himself in any way and transported the property to his own premises. Being caught in the very act of the theft, he seemed at first to be flurried and bewildered. When arrested and taken to the lock-up, he seemed to be in a state of abstraction, when spoken to he made no reply, seemed ready to fall asleep, and when brought before the examining magistrate actually fell asleep. Dr. Garnier, the medical man attached to the infirmary of the police establishment, had no doubt of his irresponsibility and he was released from custody. Number 3. While engaged as a police cart reporter for a Boston newspaper, the present writer saw a number of strange cases of the same kind. One was that of a quiet, refined, well-educated lady who was brought in for shop listing. Although her husband looked well to do, and she did not sell or even use the things she took, she had made a regular business of stealing whenever she could. She had begun it about seven months before by taking a lace handkerchief, which she slipped under her shawl. Soon after, she accomplished another theft. I felt so encouraged, she said, that I got a large bag which I fastened under my dress, and into this, I slipped whatever I could take when the clerks were not looking. I do not know what made me do it. My success seemed to lead me on. Other cases of claptomania could easily be cited. Simulation. Same with yours, Benet and Fair, which is already a tumbling block in the study of hysterical cases, becomes far more formidable in such studies as we are now occupied with. It is only when he has to deal with physical phenomena that the operator feels himself on firm ground. Yet even here, we can by no means feel certain. Physicians have invented various ingenious pieces of apparatus for testing the circulation and other physiological conditions, but even these things are not sure tests. The writer knows of the case of a man who has such control over his heart and lungs that he can actually throw himself into a profound sleep in which the breathing is so absolutely stopped for an hour that a mirror is not moistened in the least by the breath, nor can the pulses be felt. To all intents and purposes, the man appears to be dead, but in due time, he comes to life again, apparently knoweth the worst for his experiments. If an ordinary person were asked to hold out his arms at full length for five minutes, he would soon become ex-hosted. His breathing would quicken, his pulse rate increased. It might be supposed that if these conditions did not follow, the subject was in a hypnotic trance, but it is well known that persons may easily train themselves to hold out the arms for any length of time without increasing the respiration by one breath or raising the pulse rate at all. We all remember Montaigne's famous illustration in which she said that if a woman began by carrying a calf about every day, she would still be able to carry it when it became an ox. In the Paris hospital, where the greater number of regular scientific experiments have been conducted, it is found that trained subjects are required for all of the more difficult demonstrations. But some of these famous scientists have been deceived. There is no doubt. They know it themselves. A case which will serve as an illustration is that of Dr. Louis, some of whose operations were exposed by Dr. Ernest Hart, an English student of hypnotism of a skeptical turn of mind. One of Dr. Louis's pupils in a book he has published makes the following statement, which helps to explain the circumstances which we will give a little later. Says he, we know that many hospital patients who are subjected to the higher or greater treatment of hypnotism are of very doubtful reputations. We know also the effects of a temperament which in them is peculiarly addicted to simulation and which is exaggerated by the vicinity of maladies similar to their own. To judge of this, it is necessary to have seen them encourage each other in simulation, rehearsing among themselves, or even before the medical students of the establishment, the experiments to which they have been subjected, and going through their different consortions and attitudes to exercise themselves in them. And then again, in the present day, has not the designation of a hypnotical subject become almost a social position to be fed, to be paid, admired, exhibited in public, run after, and all the rest of it. All this is enough to make the most impartial looker on skeptical. But is it enough to enable us to produce a priori negation? Certainly not, but it is sufficient to justify legitimate doubt. And when we come to moral phenomena where we have to put faith in the subject, the difficulty becomes still greater. Supposing suggestion and hallucination to be granted can they be demonstrated? Can we, by plunging the subject in hypnotical sleep, feel a sure of what he may affirm? That is impossible. For simulation and some nambulism are not reciprocally exclusive terms, and Mosheur Petrae has established a fact that a subject who sleeps may still simulate. Mosheurs Benet and Faire, in their book, speak of the honnest tublier whom is some nambulist amelie cheated for four years consecutively. Let us now quote Mr. Hart's investigations. Dr. Lewis is an often quoted authority on hypnotism in Paris and is at the head of what is called the Charity Hospital School of Hypnotical Experiments. In 1892, he announced some startling results in which some people still have faith, more or less. What he was supposed to accomplish was stated thus in the London Palma Gazette, issue of December 2. Dr. Lewis then showed us how a similar artificial state of suffering could be created without suggestion. In fact, by the mere proximity of certain substances. A pinch of cold dust, for example, corked and sealed in a small file and placed by the side of the neck of a hypnotized person produces symptoms of suffocation by smoke. A tube of distilled water, similarly placed, provokes signs of incipient hydrophobia, while another very simple concoction put in contact with a flesh brings on symptoms of suffocation by drowning. Signs of drunkenness were said to be caused by a small cork bottle of brandy and the nature of a cat by a cork bottle of valerian. Patients also saw beautiful blue flames about the north pole of a magnet and distasteful red flames about the south pole. While by means of a magnet, it was said that the symptoms of illness of a sick patient might be transferred to a well person, also in the hypnotic state, but of course in a waking, the well person at once threw off sickness that had been transferred, but the sick person was permanently relieved. These experiments are cited in some recent books apparently with faith. The following counter experiments will therefore be read with interest. Dr. Hart gives a full account of his investigations in the 19th century. Dr. Lewis gave Dr. Hart some demonstrations which Elanche describes as follows. A tube containing 10 grams of cognac were placed at a certain point on the subject's neck, which Dr. Lewis said was the seat of the great nerve plexus. The effect on margarite was very rapid and marked. She began to move her lips into swallows, the expression of her face changed, and she asked, What have you been giving me to drink? I'm quite giddy. At first she had a stupid and troubled look, then she began to get gay. I am ashamed of myself, she said. I feel quite tipsy, and after passing through some of the faces of lively and sobriety, she began to fall from the chair and was the difficulty prevented from sprawling on the floor. She was uncomfortable and seemed in the point of vomiting, and she felt calm. Another patient gave all the signs of imagining himself transformed into a cat when a small cocktail of valerian was placed on his neck. In the presence of a number of distinguished doctors in Paris, Dr. Hart tried a series of experiments in which, by his conversation, he gave the patient no clue to exactly what drug he was using. In order that if the patient was simulating, he would not know what to simulate. Margarite was the subject of several of these experiments, one of which is described as follows. I took a shoe which was supposed to contain alcohol, but which did contain cherry laurel water. Margarite immediately began to use the words of M. Sejuice Note to smile agreeably and then to laugh. She became gay. It makes me laugh, she said. And then, I'm not tipsy, I want to sing, and so on through the whole performance of a not-ungraceful jissery which we stopped at that stage for I was lost to have the degrading performance of drunkenness carried to the extreme I had seen her go through at the charit. I now applied a tube of alcohol, asking the assistant, however, to give me Valerian, which no doubt this profoundly hypnotized subject perfectly well heard, for she immediately went through the whole cat performance. She spat, she scratched, she mewed, she leaped about on all fours, and she was as thoroughly cat-like as had been Dr. Louis' subjects. Similar experiments as to the effect of magnets and electric currents were tried. They were taken by Dr. Seju runs thus. She found the North Pole, notwithstanding there was no current, very pretty. She wasn't if she were fascinated by it. She caressed the blue flames and showed every sign of the light. Then came the phenomena of attraction. She followed the magnet with the light across the room, as though fascinated by it, the bar was turned to us to present the other end or what was it called in the language of La Charite, of repulsion and horror, with clenched fists, and as to push her she fell backward into the arms of Anne-Claire and was carried, still showing all the signs of terror and repulsion back to her chair. The bar was again turned until what should have been the North Pole was presented to her. She again resumed the same attitude to attraction and tears bedewed her cheeks. Ah, she said, it is blue, the flame mounts, and she rose from her seat following the magnet around the room. Similar but false phenomena were obtained in succession with all the different forms of magnet and non-magnet. Marguerite was never once right, but throughout her acting was perfect. She was utterly unable at any time really to distinguish between a plain bar of iron, the magnetized magnet, or a horseshoe magnet carrying a full current and one from which the current was wholly cut off. Five different patients were tested in the same way through a long series of experiments but a practical proof that Dr. Lewis had been totally deceived and his new and wonderful discoveries amounted to nothing. There is, however, another possible explanation namely telepathy in a real hypnotic condition. Even if Dr. Lewis' experiments were genuine, this would be the rational explanation. They were a case of suggestion of some sort without doubt. Nearly every book on hypnotism gives various rules for detecting simulation of the hypnotic state. One of the commonest tests is that of anesthesia. A pen or pen knife is stuck into a subject to see if he is insensible to pain but as we shall see in a later chapter, this insensibility also may be simulated for by long training some persons learn to control their facial expressions perfectly. We have already seen that the pulse and respiration tests are not sufficient. Hypnotic persons often flush slightly in the face but it is true that there are persons in the body at will. Mr. Ernest Hart had an article in The Century Magazine on the eternal gullible in which he gives a concessions of a professional hypnotic subject. This person, whom he calls L, he brought to his house where some experiments were tried in the presence of a number of doctors whose names are quoted. The quotation of a paragraph or two for Mr. Hart's article will be of interest says he, the catalepsy business has more artistic merit than any of the others. He said, how did L make his muscles that he could be lifted in one piece like an Egyptian mummy? He lay with his head in the back of one chair and his heels in another and allowed a fairly heavy man to sit in his stomach. It seemed to me, however, that he was here within a straw or two of the limit of his endurance. The blister trick, spoken of by truth as having deceived some medical men, was done by rapidly biting and sucking the skin of the wrist. The blisters were plainly visible. Possibly, L had made his skin so tough by repeated biting, that he could no longer raise the blister. One point in L's exhibition, which was undoubtedly genuine, was this remarkable and historical endurance of pain. He stood before a smiling and open-eyed, while he ran long needles into the fleshy part of his arms and legs without flinching. And he allowed one of the gentlemen present to pinch his skin in different parts with strong, carnated pincers and which to most people would have cost intense pain. L allowed no sign of suffering or discomfort to appear. It did not set his teeth or wints. His pulse was not quickened and the pupil of his eye did not dilate as physiologists tell us it does when pain passes a certain limit. It may be said that this merely shows that in L, the limit of endurance was beyond the normal standard. Or, in other words, that his sensitivity was less than that of the average man. At any rate, his respect was so remarkable that some of the gentlemen present were feigned to explain it by supposed post-apnotic suggestion, the theory apparently being that L and his comrades hypnotized one another and thus made themselves insensible to pain. As surgeons have reasons to know, persons vary widely in their sensitivity to pain. I have seen a man chat quietly with bystanders while his character at the artery was being tied without the use of chloroform. During the Russel-Turkish war, he astonished English doctors by undergoing the most formidable amputations with no other anesthetic than a cigarette. Hysterical women will inflict very severe pain on themselves, merely for wantonness or in order to excite sympathy. The fociers who allow themselves to be hung up by hooks beneath their shoulder blades seem to think little of it and, as a matter of fact, I believe are not much inconvenienced by the process. The fact is, the amateur can always be deceived and there are no special tests that can be relied on. If a person is well accustomed to hypnotic manifestations and also a good judge of human nature and will keep constantly on guard using every precaution to avoid deception, it is altogether likely that it can be entirely obviated but one must use this good judgment in every possible way. In the case of fresh subjects or persons well known, of course there is little possibility of deception and the fact that deception exists does not in any way invalidate the truth of hypnotism as a scientific phenomenon. We cite it merely as one of the physiological peculiarities connected with a mental condition of which it is a manifestation. The fact that a tendency to deception exists is interesting in itself and may have an influence upon a judgment of her fellow beings. There is, to be sure, a tendency on the part of scientific writers to find lunatics instead of criminals in which of the well demonstrated fact that many criminals are insane helps to make us charitable. End of section 9 Recording by Hilary Hauvin Section 10 of Complete Hypnotism This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Complete Hypnotism, Mesmerism, Mind Reading and Spiritualism Chapter 7 Criminal Suggestion Laboratory Crimes Dr. Cox experiments showing criminal suggestion is not possible. Dr. William James's theory a bad man cannot be made good what I expect to make a good man bad. One of the most interesting phases of hypnotism is that of post-hypnotic suggestion to which reference has already been made. It is true that the suggestion made during the hypnotic condition will do after coming out of the hypnotic sleep may be carried out. A surgeon professional hypnotizer claims that once he has hypnotized the person he can keep that person forever after under his influence by means of post-hypnotic suggestion. He says to him while in the hypnotic sleep whenever I look at you or point at you you will fall asleep. No one can hypnotize you but me whenever I try to hypnotize you you will fall asleep. Like while he is sound asleep let in 8 weeks he will mail you a letter with a blank piece of note paper inside and during the intervening period you may yourself forget the occurrence but in exactly 8 weeks he will carry out the suggestion. Suggestions of this nature are always carried out especially when the suggestion is to take effect on some certain day or date named. Suggest to a subject that in 90 days from a given date he will come to your house with his coat on inside out The same writer also definitely claims that he can hypnotize people against their will. If this were true what a terrible power would a shrewd evil minded criminal have to compel the execution of any of his plans. We hope to show that it is not true but you must admit that many scientific men have tried experiments which they believe demonstrate beyond the doubt that criminal use can be and is made of hypnotic influence. If it were possible to make a person follow out any line of conduct while actually under hypnotic influence it would be bad enough but the use of post-hypnotic suggestion opens a yet more far reaching and dangerous avenue. Among the most definite claims of the evil deeds that may be compelled during hypnotic sleep is that of Dr. Luis who we have already seen as being himself deceived by professional hypnotic subjects. Says he, you cannot only oblige his defenseless being who is incapable of opposing the slightest resistance to give from hand to hand but you can also make him sign a promise, draw up a bill of exchange or any other kind of agreement. You may make him write unholographic will which according to French law would be valid which he will hand over to you and of which he will never know the existence. He is ready to fulfill the minutest legal formalities and will do so with a calm, serene and natural manner calculated to deceive the most expert law officers. This some nambulists will not hesitate either you may be sure to make a denunciation or to bear false witness. They are, I repeat, the passive instruments of your will. For instance, take E. She will at my bidding write out and sign a donation of 40 pounds in my favor. In a criminal point of view the subject under certain suggestions will make false denunciations accuse this or that person and maintain with the greatest assurance that he has assisted in an imaginary crime. I will recall to your mind a prestigious assassination which I have exhibited before you. I was careful to place the subject's hands a piece of paper instead of a dagger or a revolver but it is evident that if they had held veritable murderous instruments the scene might have had a tragic ending. Many experiments along this line have been tried such as suggesting the theft of a watch or a spoon which afterward was actually carried out. It may be said at once that these laboratory crimes are in most cases successful. A person with nothing will give away any amount of stone to do so but quite different is the case of a wealthy merchant who really has money to find a way. Dr. Koch describes one or two experiments of his own which have an important bearing on the question of criminal suggestion. Says he, a girl who was hypnotized deeply was given a glass of water and was told that it was a lighted lamp. A broomstick was placed across the room and she was told that it was a man who intended to injure her. It was suggested to her that she throw the glass of water. She's supposing it was a lighted lamp at the broomstick her enemy and she immediately threw it with much violence. Then a man was placed across the room and she was given instead of a glass of water a lighted lamp. I told her that the lamp was a glass of water and that the man across the room was her brother. It was suggested to her that this clothing was on fire and she was commanded to extinguish the fire by throwing the lighted lamp at the individual who had been sold as was previously mentioned that it was a glass of water. Without her knowledge, a person is placed behind her for the purpose of quickly checking her movements if desired. I then commanded her to throw the lamp at the man. She raised the lamp, hesitated, wavered and then became very hysterical laughing and crying alternately. This condition was so profound that she came very near dropping the lamp. Immediately after she was quieted I made a number of tests to prove that she was deeply hypnotized. Standing in front of her, I gave her a piece of cardboard telling her that it was a dagger and commanded her to stab me. She immediately struck at me with a piece of cardboard. I then gave her an open pocket knife and commanded her to strike at me with it. Again she raised it to execute my command, again hesitated and had another hysterical attack. I have tried similar experiments with 30 or 40 people with similar results. Some of them would have injured themselves but really I am convinced at command but to what extent I of course cannot say that they could have been induced to harm others or to set fire to houses, etc. I do not believe. I say this after very careful reading and a large amount of experimentation. Dr. Koch also declares his belief that no person can be hypnotized against his will by a person who is repugnant to him. The facts in the case are probably those that might be indicated by a common sense consideration of the conditions. This weak-minded and susceptible to temptation, to theft, for instance, no doubt a familiar acquaintance of a similar character might hypnotize a person and cause him to commit the crime to which his moral nature is by no means averse. If, on the other hand, the personality of the hypnotizer and the crime itself are repugnant to the hypnotic subject, who will absolutely refuse to do as he is bidden, even while in the deepest hypnotic sleep. On this point nearly all authorities agree. Again, there is absolutely no well authenticated case of crime committed by a person under hypnotic influence. There have been several cases reported and one woman in Paris who aided in a murder was released in her plea of irresponsibility because she had been hypnotized. In none of these cases, however, was there any really satisfactory evidence that hypnotism existed. In all the cases reported, there seemed to be no doubt of the weak character into disposition to crime. In another class of cases, only those of criminal assault upon girls and women, the only evidence ever adduced that the injured person was hypnotized was the statement of that person, which cannot really be called evidence at all. The fact is, a weak character can be tempted and brought under virtual control much more easily by ordinary means than by hypnotism. The man who over persuades a businessman to endorse a note uses no hypnotic influence. He is merely making a clever play upon the man's vanity, egotism, or good nature. A profound study of the hypnotic state, such as has been made by Professor William James of Harvard College, the great authority on psychical phenomena and president of the Psychic Research Society, leads to the conviction that in the hypnotic sleep, the will is only in abeyance as it is in natural slumber or in sleepwalking and any unusual or especially exciting occurrence, especially anything that runs against the grain of the nature reawakens that will and it soon becomes as active as ever. It is ten times more true in the matter of post-hypnotic suggestion, which is very much weaker than suggestion that takes effect during the actual hypnotic sleep. We shall see furthermore that while acting under a delusion at the suggestion of the operator, the patient is really conscious all the time of the real facts in the case. Indeed, much more keenly so often times than the operator himself. For instance, if a line is drawn on a sheet of paper that is told there is no line, he will maintain there is no line, but he has to see it in order to ignore it. Moreover, persons trained to obey instinctively do obey even in their waking state. It requires a special faculty to resist obedience even during our ordinary waking condition. Says a recent writer, it is certain that we are naturally inclined to obey, conflicts and our systems are the characteristics of some rare individuals. But between admitting this we are doomed to obey, even the least of us, lies a gulf. The same writer says further Hypnotic suggestion is an order given for a few seconds at most a few minutes to an individual in a state of induced sleep. The suggestion may be repeated, but it is absolutely powerless to transform a criminal into an honest man, or vice versa. Here is an excellent argument. If it is possible to make criminals, it should be quite as easy to make honest men. It is true that the weak are sometimes helped for good. But there is no case in record in which a person who really wished to be bad was ever made good. And the history of hypnotism is full of attempts in that direction. A good illustration is an experiment tried by Colonel de Rochas. An excellent subject, blank, had been left alone for a few minutes in an apartment and had stolen a valuable article. After he had left, the theft was discovered. A few days after it was suggested to the subject that he should restart a stolen object that commended energetically and imperatively reiterated, but in vain. The theft had been committed by the subject who had sold the article to an old curiosity dealer and had just eventually found an information received from a third party. Yet the subject would execute all the imaginary crimes he was ordered. As to the value of the so-called laboratory crimes, the statement of Dr. Cormel is of interest. In order to throw myself out of the window I should do it, so certain that I might either that there would be somebody under the window to catch me or that I should be stopped in time. The experimentalist's own interests and the consequences of such an act are a sure guarantee. End of Section 10, Recording by Hillary Hovind. Section 11 of Complete Hypnotism This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Stuart Bell. Complete Hypnotism, Mesmerism, Mind Reading and Spiritualism by A. Alpheus. Chapter 8 Dangers and Being Hypnotised Condemnation of Public Performances A Common Sense View Evidence Furnished by Lafontaine by Dr. Cormel by Dr. Hart, by Dr. Cock No Danger in Hypnotism if rightly used by physicians or scientists. Having considered the dangers to society through criminal hypnotic suggestion let us now consider what dangers there may be to the individual who is hypnotised. Before citing evidence let us consider the subject from a rational point of view. Several things have already been established. We know that hypnotism is akin to hysteria and other forms of insanity. It is, in short, a kind of experimental insanity. Really good hypnotic subjects have not a perfect mental balance. We have also seen that repetition of the process increases the susceptibility and in some cases persons frequently hypnotised are thrown into the hypnotic state by very slight physical agences such as looking at a bright door knob. Furthermore, we know that the hypnotic patient is in a very sensitive condition easily impressed. Moreover, it is well known that exertions required of hypnotic subjects are nervously very exhausting so much so that headache frequently follows. From these facts any reasonable person may make a few clear deductions. First, repeated strain of excitement in hypnotic silences will wear out the constitution just as certainly as repeated strain of excitement in social life or the like which, as we know, frequently produces nervous exhaustion. Second, it is always dangerous to submit oneself to the influence of an inferior or untrustworthy person. This is just as true in hypnotism as it is in the moral realm. Bad companions corrupt and since the hypnotic subject is in a condition especially susceptible, a little association of this kind, a little submission to the inferior or immoral will produce correspondingly more detrimental consequences. Third, since hypnotism is an abnormal condition just as drunkenness is one should not allow a public hypnotiser to experiment upon one and make one do ridiculous things merely through amusement. Any more than one would allow a really insane person to be exhibited for money. All than one would allow himself to be made drunk, merely that by his absurd antics he might amuse somebody. It takes little reflection to convince anyone that hypnotism for amusement either on the public stage or in the home is highly obnoxious even if it is not highly dangerous. If the hypnotiser is an honest man and a man of character little injury may follow but we can never know that and the risk of getting into bad hands should prevent everyone from submitting to influence at all. The fact is however that we should strongly doubt the good character of anyone who hypnotises for amusement regarding him in the same light as we would one who intoxicated people on the stage for amusement or gave him chloroform or went about with a troupe of insane people that he might exhibit their idiosyncrasies. Honest, right-minded people do not do those things. At the same time there is nothing wiser that a man can do than to submit himself fully to a stronger and wiser nature than his own. A physician in whom you have confidence may do a thousand times more for you by hypnotism than by the use of drugs. It is a safe rule to place hypnotism in exactly the same category as drugs. Rightly used drugs are invaluable, wrongly used they become the instruments of the murderer. At all times should they be used with great caution the same is true of hypnotism. Now let us cite some evidence. Lafontaine a professional hypnotist gives some interesting facts. He says that public hypnotic entertainment usually induce a great many of the audience to become amateur hypnotists and these experiments may cause suffocation. Fear often results in congestion or a rush of blood to the brain. If the digestion is not completed, more especially if the repast has been more abundant than usual, congestion may be produced and death may be instantaneous. The most violent convulsions may result from too complete magnetization of the brain. A convulsive movement may be so powerful that the body will suddenly describe a circle the head touching the heels and seem to adhere to them. In this latter case there is torpor without sleep sometimes it has been impossible to awake the subject. A waiter at Nantes who was magnetized by a commercial traveller remained for two days in a state of lethargy and for three hours Dr. Foe and numerous spectators were able to verify that the cold, the pulse no longer throbbed, the heart had no pulsations, respiration had ceased and there was not sufficient breath to dim a glass held before the mouth. Moreover the patient was stiff his eyes were dull and glassy. Nevertheless La Fontaine was able to recall this man to life. Dr. Cormel says paralysis of one or more members or of the tongue may follow the awakening. The effects of the contractions of the internal muscles due often to almost imperceptible touches the diaphragm and therefore the respiration may be stopped in the same manner catalepsy and more especially lethargy produce these phenomena. There are on record a number of cases of idiocy, madness and epilepsy caused by the unskillful provoking of hypnotic sleep. One case is sufficiently interesting for it is almost exactly similar to a case that occurred at one of the American colleges. The subject was a young professor at a boys school. One evening he was present at some public experiments that were being performed in a tavern. He was no way upset at the site but the next day one of his pupils looking at him fixedly sent him to sleep. The boys soon got into the habit of amusing themselves by sending him to sleep and the unhappy professor had to leave the school and place himself under the care of a doctor. Doctor Ernest Hart gives an experience of his own which carries with it its own warning. Says he Staying at the well-known country house in Kent of a distinguished London banker, formerly Member of Parliament for Greenwich, I had been caught upon to set to sleep and to arrest a continuous barking cough from which a young lady who was staying at the house was suffering too consequently was a torment to herself and her friends. I thought this a good opportunity for a control experiment and I sat her down in front of a lighted candle which I assured her that I had previously mesmerized. Presently her cough ceased and she fell into a profound sleep which lasted until twelve o'clock the next day. When I returned from shooting I was informed that she was still asleep and could not be awoke and I had great difficulty in her. That night there was a large dinner party and unluckily I sat opposite to her. Presently she again became drowsy and had to be led from the table alleging to my confusion that I was again mesmerizing her. So susceptible did she become to my supposed mesmeric influence which I vainly assured her as was the case that I was very far from exercising or attempting to exercise that it was found expedient to take her up to the condom. I was out riding in the afternoon that she left and as we passed the railway station my host who was riding with me suggested that as his friends were just leaving by that train he would like to alight and take leave of them. I dismounted with him and went onto the platform and avoided any leave taking, but unfortunately in walking up and down it seemed that I twice passed the window of the young lady's carriage. She was again mesmerized and fell into a sleep which lasted throughout the journey and recurred at intervals for some days afterwards. In commenting on this Dr Hart notes that in reality mesmerism is self-produced and the will of the operator even when exercised directly against it has no effect if the subject believes that the will is being operated in favour of it. Says he as long as the person operated on believed that my will was that she should sleep sleep followed the most energetic willing in my internal consciousness that there should be no sleep failed to prevent it where the usual physical methods of hypnotization stillness, repose, a fixed gaze all the verbal expression of an order to sleep were employed The dangers of hypnotism have been recognised by the law of every civilised country except the United States where alone public performances are permitted. Dr Cox says I have occasionally seen subjects who complained of headache, vertigo, nausea and other similar symptoms after having been hypnotised but these conditions were at a future hypnotic sitting easily remedied by suggestion. Speaking of the use of hypnotism by doctors under conditions of reasonable care Dr Cox says further there is one contraindication greater than all the rest it applies more to the physician than to the patient more to the masses than to any single individual it is not confined to hypnotism alone it has blocked the wheels of human progress through the ages which have gone it is undue enthusiasm it is the danger that certain individuals will become so enamoured with its charms that other equally valuable means of cure will be ignored mental therapeutics has come to stay it is yet in its infancy and will grow but if it were possible to kill it it would be strangled by the fanaticism and prejudice of its devotees the whole field is fascinating and alluring it promises so much that it is in danger of being missed by the ignorant to such an extent that great harm may result this is true not only of mental therapeutics and hypnotism but of every other blessing we possess hypnotism has nothing to fear from the senseless skepticism and contempt of those who have no knowledge of the subject he adds, personately enough while hypnotism can be used in a greater or less degree by everyone it can only be used intelligently by those who understand not only hypnotism itself but disease as well Dr. Koch is a firm believer that the right use of hypnotism by intelligent persons does not weaken the will says he I do not believe that there is any danger whatever in this I have no evidence and I have studied a large number of hypnotized subjects that hypnotism will render a subject less capable of exercising his will when he is relieved from the hypnotic trance I do not believe that it increases in any way his susceptibility to ordinary suggestion however in regard to the dangers of public performances by professional hypnotizers Dr. Koch is equally positive says he the dangers of public exhibitions made ludicrous as they are by the operators should be condemned by all intelligent men and women not from the danger of hypnotism itself so much as from the liability of the performers to disturb the mental poise of that large mass of ill balanced individuals which makes up no inconsiderable part of society in conclusion he says patients have been injured by the misuse of hypnotism this is true of every remedial agent ever employed for the relief of man every article we eat if wrongly prepared, if stale or if too much is taken we will be harmful every act, every duty of our lives may, if overdone become an injury then for the sake of clearness let me state in closing that hypnotism is dangerous only when it is misused or when it is applied to that large class of persons who are inherently unsound especially if that mysterious thing we call credulity predominates to a very great extent over the reason and over other faculties of the mind and spiritualism by A. Alpheus chapter 9 hypnotism in medicine anesthesia restoring the use of muscles hallucination bad habits anesthesia it is well known that hypnotism may be used to render subjects insensible to pain thus numerous startling experiments are performed in public such as running with the cheeks or arms sewing the tongue to the ear etc. the curious part of it is that the insensibility may be confined to one spot only even persons who are not wholly under hypnotic influence may have an arm or a leg or any smaller part rendered insensible by suggestion so that no pain will be felt this has suggested the use of hypnotism in surgery in the case of chloroform ether etc about the year 1860 some of the medical profession hoped that hypnotism might come into general use for producing insensibility during surgical operations Dr. Guerinot in Paris reported the following successful operation the thigh of a patient was amputated after the operation says the doctor the patient and asked him how he felt he replied that he felt as if he were in heaven and he seized hold of my hand and kissed it turning to a medical student he added I was aware of all that was being done to me and the proof is that I knew my thigh was cut off at the moment when you asked me if I felt any pain the writer who records this case continues however was but a transitory stage it was soon recognized that a considerable time and a good deal of preparation were necessary to induce the patients to sleep and medical men had recourse to a more rapid and certain method that is chloroform thus the year 1860 saw the rise and fall of bradyism as a means of surgical anesthesia close quote in the most detailed cases of successful use of hypnotism as an anesthetic was presented to the hypnotic congress which meant in 1889 by Dr. Fort professor of anatomy quote on the 21st of October 1887 a young Italian tradesman aged 20 Jean M came to me and asked me to take off a when he had on his forehead his eyebrow the tumor was about the size of a walnut I was reluctant to make use of chloroform although the patient wished it and I tried a sort of hypnotic experiment finding that my patient was easily hypnotizable I promised to extract the tumor in a painless manner and without the use of chloroform the next day I placed him in a chair and induced sleep by a fixed gaze two Italian physicians doctors Triani and Colombo who were present during the operation declared that the subject lost all sensibility and that his muscles retained all the different positions in which they were put exactly as in the cataleptic state the patient saw nothing felt nothing and heard nothing his brain remaining in communication only with me as soon as we had ascertained that the patient was completely under the influence of the hypnotic slumber I said to him you will sleep for a quarter of an hour knowing that the operation would not last longer than that and he remained seated and perfectly motionless I made a transversal incision two and a half inches long and removed the tumor which I took out whole blood vessels with a pair of Dr. Pien's hemostatic pincers washed the wound and applied a dressing without making a single ligature the patient was still sleeping to maintain the dressing in proper position I fastened a bandage around his head while going through the operation I said to the patient lower your head raise your head turn to the right and he obeyed like an automaton when everything was finished I said to him now wake up he then awoke declared that he had felt nothing and did not suffer and he went away on foot as if nothing had been done to him five days after the dressing was removed and the cicatrix was found completely healed hypnotism has been tried by a painless dentistry but with many cases of failure which got into the courts and thoroughly discredited the attempt except in very special cases restoring the use of muscles there is no doubt that hypnotism may be extremely useful in curing many disorders that are essentially nervous especially such cases as those in which a patient has a fixed idea with him when he is not really affected cases of that description are often extremely obstinate and entirely unaffected by the ordinary therapeutic means ordinary doctors abandon the cases in despair but some person who understands mental suggestion for instance the Christian science doctors easily affect secure if the regular physician were a student of hypnotism he would know how to manage cases like that by way of illustration we quote reports of two cases one successful and one unsuccessful the following is from a report by one of the physicians of the charity hospital in Paris quote Gabrielle C became a patient of mine toward the end of 1886 she entered the charity hospital to be under treatment by an accident arising from pulmonary congestion and while there was suddenly seized with violent attacks of hysteroepilepsy which first contracted both legs and finally reduced them to complete immobility she had been in this state of absolute immobility for seven months and I had vainly tried every therapeutic remedy usual in such cases the intervention was first to restore the general constitution of the subject who was greatly weakened by her protracted stay in bed and then at the end of a certain time to have recourse to hypnotism and at the opportune moment suggest to her the idea of walking the patient was hypnotized every morning and the first degree that of lethargy then the cataleptic somnambulistic states were produced after a certain period of somnambulism she began to move and unconsciously took a few steps across the ward soon after it was suggested the locomotive powers having recovered their physical functions that she should walk when awake this she was able to do and in some weeks the cure was complete in this case however we had the ingenious idea of her personality at the moment when we induced her to walk the patient fancied she was somebody else and as such and in this roundabout manner we satisfactorily attained the object proposed close quote the following is Professor Del Boeuf's account of Dr. Bernheim's mode of suggestion at the hospital at Nancy a robust old man of about 75 years of age mobilized by sciatica which caused him intense pain was brought in he could not put a foot to the ground without screaming in pain lie down my poor friend I will soon relieve you Dr. Bernheim says that is impossible doctor you will see yes we shall see but I tell you we shall see nothing on hearing this answer I thought suggestion will be no use in this case the old man looked sullen and stubborn strangely enough he soon went off to sleep fell into a state of catalepsy and was insensible when pricked but when Mr. Bernheim said to him now you can walk he replied no I cannot you were telling me to do an impossible thing although Mr. Bernheim failed in this instance I could not but admire his skill after using every means of persuasion insinuation and coaxing he suddenly took up an imperative tone and in a sharp abrupt voice that did not admit a refusal said I tell you you can walk get up very well replied the old fellow I must if you insist upon it and he got out of bed no sooner however had his foot touched the floor he screamed even louder than before Mr. Bernheim ordered him to step out you tell me to do what is impossible he again replied and he did not move he had to be allowed to go to bed again and the whole time the experiment lasted he maintained an obstinate and ill-tempered air close quote these two cases give an admirable picture of the cases that can be and those that cannot be cured by hypnotism or any other method of mental suggestion hallucination hallucinations says a medical authority are very common among those who are partially insane they occur as a result of fever and frequently accompanied delirium they result from an impoverished condition of the blood if it is due to starvation indigestion and the use of drugs like belladonna hyosecarnus stromonium choral and many more that might be mentioned large numbers of cases of attempted cure by hypnotism successful and unsuccessful might be quoted there is no doubt in the use of partial insanity hypnotism may help many patients though not all but when the disease of the brain has gone farther especially when a well-developed lesion exists in the brain mental treatment is of little avail even if it can be practiced at all a few general remarks by Dr. Bernheim will be interesting says he, quote the mode of suggestion accepted to the special suggestibility of the subject a simple word does not always suffice in impressing the idea upon the mind it is sometimes necessary to reason to prove, to convince in some cases to affirm decidedly in others to insinuate gently for in the condition of sleep just as in the waking condition the moral individuality of each subject persists according to his character his inclinations his impressionability etc. hypnosis does not run all subjects into a uniform mold and make pure and simple automatons out of them moved solely by the will of the hypnotist it increases cerebral docility it makes the automatic activity preponderate over the will but the latter persists the subject thinks reasons, discusses accepts more readily than in the waking condition but does not always accept especially in the light degrees of sleep in these cases we must know the patient's character his particular psychical condition in order to make an impression upon him end quote bad habits the habit of the excessive use of alcoholic drinks morphine, tobacco, or the like may often be decidedly helped by hypnotism if the patient wants to be helped the method of operation is simple the operator hypnotizes the subject and when he is in deep sleep suggests that on awakening he will feel a deep disgust for the article he is in the habit of taking and if he takes it he will feel nausea or other unpleasant symptoms in most cases the suggested result takes place provided the subject can be hypnotized at all but unless the patient is himself anxious to break the habit fixed upon him the unpleasant effects soon wear off and he is as bad as ever doctor cock treated a large number of cases which he reports in detail in his book on hypnotism in a fair proportion of the cases he was successful in some cases completely so in other cases he failed entirely owing to lack of moral stamina in the patient himself his conclusions seem to be that hypnotism may be made a very effective aid to moral suasion but after all character is the chief force which throws off such habits once they are fixed the morphine habit is usually the result of a doctor's prescription at some time and it is practiced more or less involuntarily such cases are often materially helped by the proper suggestions the same is true of bad habits in children the weak may be strengthened by the stronger nature and hypnotism may come in as an effective aid to moral influence but after all there is the deciding factor Dr. James R. Cook devotes a considerable part of his book on hypnotism to the use of hypnotism in medical practice and for further interesting details the reader is referred to that able work end of section 12 recording by Matthew Westra section 13 of hypnotism this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Bologna Times complete hypnotism mesmerism mind reading and spiritualism by A. Alpheus chapter 10 hypnotism of animals snake charming we are familiar with the snake charmer and the charming of birds by snakes how much hypnotism there is in these performances it would be hard to say it is probable that a bird is fascinated to some extent by the steady gaze of a serpent's eyes but fear will certainly paralyze a bird as effectively as hypnotism Father Kertcher was the first to try a familiar experiment with hens and cocks if you hold a hen's head with the beak upon a piece of board and then draw a chalk line from the beak to the edge of the board the hen when released will continue to hold her head in the same position for some time finally walking slowly away as if roused from a stupor farmer's wives often try a sort of hypnotic experiment on hens they wish to transfer from one nest to another when sitting they put the hen's head under her wing and gently rock her to and fro till she apparently goes to sleep when she may be carried to another nest and will remain there afterward horses are frequently managed by a steady gaze into their eyes Dr. Mall states that a method of hypnotizing horses named after its inventor as Balasiran has been introduced into Austria by law for the shooing of horses in the army we have all heard of the snake charmers of India who make the snakes imitate all their movements some suppose this is by hypnotization it may be the result of training however certainly real charmers of wild beasts tend by being bitten or injured in some other way which would seem to show that the hypnotization does not always work or else it does not exist at all we have some fairly well-known instances of hypnotism produced in animals Lafontaine the magnetizer some 30 years ago held public exhibitions in Paris in which he reduced cats squirrels and lions to such complete insensibility that they felt neither pricks nor blows the harvies or sillies of Egypt import to the ringed snake the appearance of a stick by pressure on the head which induces a species of tetanus says E.W. Lane the following description of serpent charming the asuans of the province of Seuss Morocco will be of interest the principal charmer began by whirling with astonishing rapidity and a kind of frenzy dance around the wicker basket that contained the serpents which were covered by a goat's gun suddenly he stopped plunged his naked arm into the basket and drew out a cobra de capello or else a hage a fearful reptile which is able to swell its head by spreading out the scales which cover it and which is thought to be Cleopatra's asp the serpent of Egypt in Morocco it is known as the buska the charmer folded and unfolded the greenish black viper as if it were a piece of muslin he rolled it like a turban around his head and continued his dance while the serpent contained its position and seemed to follow every movement and wish of the dancer the buska was then placed on the ground and raising itself straight on end in the attitude it assumes on desert roads to attract travelers began to sway from right to left following the rhythm of the music the asua whirling more and more rapidly and constantly narrowing circles plunged his hand once more into the basket and pulled out two of the most venomous reptiles of the desert of Seuss serpent's thicker than a man's arm two or three feet long whose shining scales are spotted black or yellow and whose bite-sins, as it were a burning fire through the veins this reptile is probably the torrida dipsus of antiquity Europeans now call it the lefa the two lefas more vigorous and less docile than the buska lay half curled up their heads on one side ready to dart forward and followed with glittering eyes the movement of the dancer Hindu charmers are still more wonderful they juggle with a dozen different species of reptiles at the same time making them come and go with the sound of the charmer's whistle like the gentilists of tame animals these serpents have never been known to bite their charmers it is well known that some animals, like the opossum fain death when caught whether this is to be compared to hypnotism is doubtful other animals, called hibernating sleep for months with no other food than their fat but this, again can hardly be called hypnotism hypnotism, mesmerism, mind reading and spiritualism by A. Alpheus chapter 11 a scientific explanation of hypnotism Dr. Hart's theory in the introduction to this book the reader will find a summary of the theories of hypnotism there is no doubt that hypnotism is a complex state which cannot be explained in an offhand way in a sentence or two there are, however, certain aspects which we may suppose sufficiently explained by certain scientific writers on the subject first, what is the character of the delusions apparently created in the mind of a person in the hypnotic condition by a simple word of mouth statement as when the physician says now, I am going to cut your leg off but it will not hurt you in the least and the patient suffers nothing in answer to this question Professor William James of Harvard College one of the leading authorities on the scientific aspects of physical phenomena in this country reports the following experiments make a stroke on a paper or blackboard and tell the subject it is not there and he will see nothing but the clean paper or board next, he not looking surround the original stroke with other strokes exactly like it and ask him what he sees he will point out one by one the new strokes and omit the original one every time no matter how numerous the next strokes may be or in what order they are arranged similarly if the original single line to which he is blind be doubled by a prism of 16 degrees placed before one of his eyes both being kept open he will say that he now sees one stroke and pointing the direction in which lies the image seen through the prism another experiment proves that he must see it in order to ignore it make a red cross invisible to the hypnotic subject on a sheet of white paper and yet cause him to look fixedly at a dot on the paper on or near the red cross he will on transferring his eye to the blank sheet see a bluish green after image of the cross this proves that it has impressed his sensibility he has felt but not perceived it he had actually ignored it refused to recognize it as it were Doctor Ernest Hart an English writer in an article in the British Medical Journal gives a general explanation of the phenomena of hypnotism which we may accept as true so far as it goes but which is evidently incomplete he seems to minimize personal influence too much that personal influence which we all exerted various times and which he ignores not because he would deny it but because he fears the countenance to the magnetic fluid and other similar theories says he we have arrived at the point at which it will be plain that the condition produced in these cases and known under a varied jargon invented either to conceal ignorance to express hypothesis or to mask the design of impressing the imagination and possibly prey upon the pockets of a credulous and wonder loving public such names as mesmeric condition, magnetic sleep clairvoyance electrobiology animal magnetism and many other aliases such a condition I say is always subjective it is independent of passes or gestures it has no relation to any fluid emanating from the operator it has no relation to his will or to any influence which he exercises upon inanimate objects distance does not affect it nor proximity or intervention of any conductors or non conductors whether silk or glass or stone or even a brick wall we can transmit the order to sleep by telephone or by telegraph we can practically get the same results while eliminating even the operator if we can contrive to influence the imagination or to affect the physical condition of the subject by any one of a great number of contrivances what does all this mean I will refer to one or two facts in relation to the structure and function of the brain and show one or two simple experiments of very ancient parentage and date which will I think help to an explanation first let us recall something of what we know of the anatomy and localization of function in the brain and of the nature of ordinary sleep the brain as you know is a complicated organ made up internally of nerve masses or ganglia of which the central masses are connected with the automatic functions and involuntary actions of the body such as the action of the heart lungs, stomach, bowels etc while the investing surface shows a system of complicated convolutions rich in grey matter thickly sewn with microscopic cells in which the nerve ends terminate at the base of the brain is a complete circle of arteries from which spring great numbers of small arterial vessels carrying a profuse blood supply throughout the whole mass and capable of contraction in small tracts so that small areas of the brain may at any given moment become bloodless while other parts of the brain may simultaneously become highly congested now if the brain or any part of it be deprived of the circulation of blood through it or be rendered partially bloodless or if it be excessively congested and overloaded with blood or if it be subjected to local pressure the part of the brain self acted upon ceases to be capable of exercising its functions the regularity of the action of the brain and the sanity and completeness of the thought which is one of the functions of its activity depend upon the healthy regularity of the quantity of blood passing through all its parts and upon the healthy quality of the blood so circulating if we press upon the carotid arteries which pass up through the neck to form the arterial circle of willus at the base of the brain within the skull of which I have already spoken and which supplies the brain with blood we quickly, as everyone knows produce insensibility thought is abolished consciousness lost and if we continue the pressure all those automatic actions of the body such as the beating of the heart the breathing motions of the lungs which maintain life and are controlled by the lower brain centers of ganglia death and sewers we know by observation in cases where portions of the skull have been removed either in men or in animals that during natural sleep the upper part of the brain its convoluted surface which in health and in the waking state is faintly pink like a blushing cheek from the color of the blood circulating through the network of capillary arteries becomes white and almost bloodless it is in these upper convolutions of the brain we know that the will and the directing power are resident so that in sleep the will is abolished and consciousness fades gradually away as the blood is pressed out by the contraction of the arteries so also the consciousness and the directing will may be abolished by altering the quality of the blood passing through the convolutions of the brain we may introduce a volatile substance such as chloroform and its first effect will be to abolish consciousness and induce profound slumber and a blessing sensibility to pain the like effects will follow more slowly upon the absorption of a drug such as opium or we may induce hallucinations by introducing into the blood other toxic substances such as indian hemp or strimonium we are not conscious of the mechanism producing the arterial contraction and the bloodlessness of those convolutions related to natural sleep but we are not all together without control over them we can we know help to compose ourselves to sleep as we say in ordinary language we retire into a darkened room we relieve ourselves from the stimulus of the special senses we free ourselves from the influence of noises of strong light of powerful colours or of tactile impressions we lie down and endeavour to soothe brain activity by driving away disturbing thoughts or as people sometimes say try to think of nothing and happily we generally succeed more or less well some people possess an even more marked control over this mechanism of sleep I can generally succeed in putting myself to sleep at any hour of the day either in the library chair or in the broam this is, so to speak a process of self-hypnotisation and I have often practised it when going from house to house when in the midst of a busy practice I sometimes have amused my friends and family by exercising this faculty which I do not think it very difficult to acquire we also know that many persons can wake at a fixed hour in the morning by setting their minds upon it just before going to sleep now there is something here which deserves a little further examination but which it would take too much time to develop fully at present most people know something of what is meant by reflex action the nerves which pass from the various organs to the brain convey with great rapidity messages to its various parts which are answered by reflected waves of impulse if the soles of the feet be tickled contraction of the toes or involuntary laughter will be excited or perhaps only a shattering and skin contraction known as goose skin the irritation of the nerve end in the skin has carried a message to the involuntary or voluntary ganglia of the brain which has responded by reflecting back again nerve impulses which have contracted the muscles of the feet or skin muscles or have given rise to associated ideas and explosion of laughter in the same way if during sleep heat be applied to the soles of the feet dreams of walking over hot surfaces persurias or fujiyama or still hotter places may be produced or dreams of adventure on frozen surfaces or in arctic regions created by applying ice to the feet of the sleeper here then it is seen that we have a mechanism in the body known to physiologists as the ideomotor or sensory motor system of nerves which can produce without the consciousness of the individual and automatically a series of muscular contractions and remember that the coats of the arteries are muscular and contractile under the influence of external stimuli acting without the help of the consciousness or when the consciousness is in abeyance I will give another example of this which completes the chain of phenomena in the natural brain and the natural body I wish to bring under notice in explanation of the true as distinguished from the false or falsely interpreted phenomena of hypnotism mesmerism and electrobiology I will take the excellent illustration quoted by Dr. B. W. Carpenter in his old time but valuable book on the physiology of the brain when a hungry man sees food or when let us say a hungry boy looks into a cook shop he becomes aware of a watering of the mouth and annoying sensation at the stomach what does this mean it means that the mental impression made upon him by the welcome and appetizing spectacle has caused a secretion of saliva and of gastric juice that is to say the brain has through the ideomotor set of nerves sent a message which has dilated the vessels around the salivary and gastric glands increase the flow of blood through them and quicken their secretion here we have then a pure subjective mental activity acting through a mechanism of which the boy is quite ignorant and which he is unable to control and producing that action on the vessels of dilation and contraction which as we have seen is the essential condition of brain activity and evolution of thought and is related to the quickening or the abolition of consciousness and to the activity or abeyance of function in the wheel centers and upper convolutions of the brain as in its other centers of localization here then we have something like a clue to the phenomena phenomena which as I have pointed out are similar to and have much in common with mesmeric sleep hypnotism or electrobiology we have already I hope eliminating from our minds the false theory experimentally proved to be false that the wheel or the gestures or the magnetic or vital fluid of the operator are necessary for the abolition of the consciousness and the abeyance of the wheel of the subject we now see that ideas arising in the mind of the subject are sufficient to influence the circulation in the brain of the person operated on and such variations of the blood supply as are adequate to produce sleep in the natural state or artificial slumber either by total deprivation or by excessive increase or local aberration in the quantity or quality of blood in a like manner it is possible to produce coma and prolonged insensibility by pressure of the thumbs on the carotid or hallucination dreams and visions by drugs or by external stimulation of the nerves that may be only partially affected and the person in whom sleep coma or hallucination is produced whether by physical means or by the influence of suggestion may remain subject to the will of others and incapable of exercising his own volition in short Dr. Hart's theory is that hypnotism comes from controlling the blood supply of the brain cutting off the supply from parts or increasing it in other parts this theory is born out by the well-known fact that hypnotism can blush or turn pale at will that some people always blush on the mention of certain things or calling up certain ideas certain other ideas will make them turn pale now if certain parts of the brain are made to blush or turn pale there is no doubt that hypnotism will follow since blushing and turning pale are known to be due to the opening and closing of the blood vessels we may say that the subject is induced by some means by the proportions of the brain and keep it out until he is told to let it in again end of section 14 CHAPTER XII telepathy and clairvoyance peculiar power in hypnotic state experiments phantasms of the living explained by telepathy it has already been noticed that persons in the hypnotic state seem to have certain of their senses greatly heightened in power they can remember see and hear things that ordinary persons would be entirely ignorant of there is abundant evidence that a supersensory perception is also developed entirely beyond the most highly developed condition of the ordinary senses such as being able to tell clearly what some other person is doing at a great distance in view of the discovery of the X or Rintigan Ray the ability to see through a stone wall does not seem so strange as it did before that discovery it is on power of supersensory or extrasensory perception that what is known as telepathy and clairvoyance are based that such things really exist and are not wholly a matter of superstitions has been thoroughly demonstrated in a scientific way by the British society for psychical research and kindred societies in various parts of the world strictly speaking such phenomena as these are to hypnotism but our study of hypnotism will enable us to understand them to some extent and the investigation of them is a natural corollary to the study of hypnotism for the reason that it has been found that these extraordinary powers are often possessed by persons under hypnotic influence until the discovery of hypnotism there was little to go on in conducting a scientific investigation because clairvoyance could not be produced by any artificial means and so could not be studied under proper restrictive conditions we will first quote two experiments performed by Dr. Koch which the writer heard him describe with his own lips the first case was that of a girl suffering from hysterical tremor the doctor had hypnotized her for the cure of it and accidentally stumbled on an example of thought-transference she complained on one occasion of a taste of spice in her mouth as the doctor had been chewing some spice he had once guessed that this might be telepathy nothing was said at the time but the next time the girl was hypnotized the doctor put a quinine tablet in his mouth the girl had once asked for water and said she had a very bitter taste in her mouth the water was given her and the doctor went behind a screen where he put cayenne pepper in his mouth severely burning himself no one but the doctor knew of the experiment at the time and the girl immediately cried and became so hysterical that she had to be awakened the burning in her mouth disappeared as soon as she came out of the hypnotic state but the doctor continued to suffer nearly 300 similar experiments with 36 different subjects were tried by Dr. Koch and of these 69 were entirely successful the others were doubtful or complete failures the most remarkable of the experiments may be given in the doctor's own words I told the subject to remain perfectly still for five minutes and to relate to me at the end of this time any sensation he might experience I passed into another room and closed the door and locked it went into a closet in the room and closed the door after me took down from a shelf first a linen sheet then a paste board box then a toy engine owned by a child in the house I went back to my subject and asked him what experience he had had he said I seemed to go into another room and from thence into a dark closet I wanted something off a shelf but did not know what I took down from that shelf a piece of smooth cloth a long square paste board box and a tin engine these were all the sensations he had experienced I saw the articles with his eyes which I had removed from the shelf he answered that the closet was dark and that he only felt them with his hands I asked him how he knew that the engine was tin he said but the sound of it as my hands touched it I heard the wheels rattle now the only sound made by me while in the closet was simply the rattling of the wheels of the toy as I took it off the shelf this could not possibly have been heard as the subject was distant from me two large rooms and there were two closed doors between us and the noise was very slight neither could the subject have judged where I went as I had on light slippers which made no noise the subject had never visited the house before and naturally did not know the contents of the closet as he was carefully observed from the moment he entered the house similar experiments are on record persons in the hypnotic condition have been able to tell what other persons were doing in distant parts of the city could tell the pages of the books they might be reading and the numbers of all sorts of articles while in London the writer had an opportunity of witnessing a performance of this kind there was a young boy who seemed to have this peculiar power a queer old desk had come into the house from Italy and as it was a valuable piece of furniture the owner was anxious to learn its pedigree without having examined the desk beforehand in any way the boy, during one of his trances said that in certain place a secret spring would be found which would open an unknown drawer and behind that drawer would be found the name of the maker of the desk and the date 1639 the desk was it once examined and the name and date found exactly as described it is clear in this case that this information could not have been in the mind of any one unless it were some person in Italy once the desk had come it is more likely that the remarkable supersensory power given enabled reading through the wood we may now turn our attention to another class of phenomena of great interest and that is the visions persons in the ordinary state have of friends who are on the point of death it would seem that by an extraordinary effort the mind of a person in the waking state might be impressed through a great distance at the moment of death an almost superhuman mental effort is more likely impossible than at any other time and it is peculiar that these visions or phantasms are largely confined to that moment the natural explanation that rises to the ordinary mind is of course this supposition is strengthened by the fact that the visions sometimes appear immediately after death as well as at the time and just before this may be explained however on the theory that the ordinary mind is not easily impressed and when unconsciously impressed some time may elapse before the impression becomes perceptible to the conscious mind just as in passing by on a swift train we may see something but we cannot realize that we have seen it till some time afterward when we remember what we have unconsciously observed the British Society for Psychical Research has compiled two large volumes of carefully authenticated cases which are published under the title Phantasms of the Living we quote one or two interesting cases Amissa L. sends the following report January 4th, 1886 on one of the last days of July about the year 1860 at three o'clock p.m. I was sitting in the drawing-room at the rectory reading and my thoughts entirely occupied I suddenly looked up and saw most distinctly a tall thin old gentleman enter the room and walk to the table he wore a peculiar old-fashioned cloak which I recognized as belonging to my great-uncle I then looked at him closely and referred his features and appearance perfectly although I had not seen him since I was quite a child in his hand was a roll of paper and he appeared to be very agitated I was not in the least alarmed as I firmly believed he was my uncle not knowing then of his illness I asked him if he wanted my father who, as I said, was not at home he then appeared still more agitated and distressed but made no remark he then left the room passing through the open door I noticed that although it was a very wet day there was no appearance of his having walked either in mud or rain he had no umbrella but a thick walking-stick which I recognized at once when my father brought it home after the funeral on questioning the servants they declared that no one had rung the bell neither did they see anyone enter my father had a letter by the next post asking him to go at once to my uncle who was very ill in Lectershire he started at once but on his arrival was told that his uncle had died at exactly three o'clock that afternoon and had asked for him by name several times in an anxious and troubled manner and a roll of paper was found under his pillow I may mention that my father was his only nephew and having no son he always led him to think that he would have no legacy such however was not the case and it is supposed that as they were always good friends he was influenced in his last illness and probably went too late he wished to alter his will in answer to inquiries Miss L adds I told my mother and an uncle at once about the strange appearance before the news arrived and also my father directly he returned all of whom are now dead they advised me to dismiss it from my memory but agreed that it could not be imagination as I described my uncle so exactly and they did not consider me to be either of a nervous or superstitious temperament I am quite sure that I have stated the facts truthfully and correctly the facts are as fresh in my memory as if they happened only yesterday although so many years have passed away I can assure you that nothing of the sort ever occurred before or since neither have I been subject to nervous or imaginative fancies this strange apparition was in broad daylight and as I was only reading the illustrated newspaper there was nothing to excite my imagination hundreds of cases of this kind have been reported by persons whose truthfulness cannot be doubted and every effort has been made to eliminate possibility of hallucination or accidental fancy that things of this kind do occur may be said to be scientifically proven such facts as these have stimulated experiment in the direction of testing thought transference these experiments have usually been in the reading of numbers and names and a certain measure of success has resulted it may be added however that no claimants ever appeared for various banknotes and consented in strong boxes to be turned over to anyone who would read the numbers just why success was never attained under these conditions it would be hard to say the writer once made a slight observation in this direction when matching pennies with his brother he found that if the other looked at the penny he could match nearly every time there may have been some unconscious expression of face that gave the clue persons in hypnotic trance are expert muscle readers for instance let such a person take your hand and then go through the alphabet naming the letters if you have any word in your mind as the muscle reader comes to each letter the muscles will unconsciously contract by giving attention to the muscles you can make them contract on the wrong letters and entirely mislead such a person end of section 15 recording by Elliott Miller Oswego, Illinois June 2009 section 16 of Complete Hypnotism This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Elliott Miller Complete Hypnotism Mesmerism Mind Reading and Spiritualism by A. Alpheus Chapter 13 The Confessions of Medium Spiritualistic Phenomena Explained on Theory of Telepathy Interesting Statement of Mrs. Piper The Famous Medium of the Psychical Research Society The subject of spiritualism has been very thoroughly investigated by the Society for Psychical Research both in England and this country and under circumstances so peculiarly advantageous that a world of light has been thrown at the connection between hypnotism and this strange phenomenon Professor William James the professor of psychology at Harvard University was fortunate enough some years ago to find a perfect medium who was not a professional and whose character was such as to preclude fraud This was Mrs. Leona E. Piper of Boston For many years she remained in the special employ of the Society for Psychical Research and the members of that Society were able to study her case under every possible condition through a long period of time Not long ago she resolved to give up her engagement and made a public statement over her own signature which is full of interest A brief history of her life and experiences will go far toward furnishing the general reader a fair explanation of clairvoyant and spiritualistic phenomena Mrs. Piper was the wife of a Miss Taylor and lived on Pigny Street back of Beacon Hill She was married in 1881 and it was not until May 16th 1884 that her first child was born a little more than a month later on June 29th she had her first trans experience says she I remember the date distinctly because it was two days after my first birthday following the birth of my first child she had gone to Dr. J. R. Cock the great authority on hypnotism and a practicing physician of highly scientific attainments During the interview says Mrs. Piper I was partially unconscious for a few minutes on the following Sunday I went into a trance She appears to have slipped into it unconsciously She surprised her friends by saying some very odd things that she remembered when she came to herself not long after she did it again A neighbor the wife of a merchant when she heard the things that had been said assured Mrs. Piper that it must be messages from the spirit world The atmosphere in Boston was full of talk of that kind and it was not hard for people to believe that a real medium of spirit communication had been found The merchant's wife wanted a sitting and Mrs. Piper arranged one and received her first dollar She had discovered that she could go into trances by an effort of her own will She would sit down at a table with her sitter opposite and leaning her head on a pillow go off into the trance after a few minutes of silence There was a clock behind her She gave her sitters an hour sometimes two hours and they wondered how she knew when an hour had expired At any rate when that time came around In describing her experiences she has said At first, when I sat in my chair and leaned my head back and went into the trance state the action was attended by something of a struggle I always felt as if I were undergoing an anesthetic But of late years I have slipped easily into the condition leaning the head forward On coming out of it I felt stupid and dazed At first I said disconnected things It was all a gibberish nothing but gibberish Then I began to speak some broken French phrases I had studied French two years but did not speak it well Once she had an Italian for a sitter who could speak no English and ask questions in Italian Mrs. Piper could speak no Italian Indeed did not understand a word of it except in her trance state but she had no trouble in understanding her sitter After a while her automatic utterance announced the personality of a certain Dr. Finuit who was said to have been a noted French physician who had died long before His spirit controlled her for a number of years After some time Dr. Finuit was succeeded by one Pelham and finally by Imperator and Rector As the birth of her second child approached, Mrs. Piper gave up what she considered a form of hysteria But after the birth of the child, the sittings paid for at a dollar each began again Dr. Hodgson of the London Society for Psychical Research saw her at the house of Professor James and he became so interested in her case that he decided to take her to London to be studied She spent nearly a year abroad and after her return the American branch of the Society for Psychical Research was formed and for a long time Mrs. Piper received a salary to sit exclusively for the Society Their records and reports are full of the things she said and did Everyone who investigated Mrs. Piper had to admit that her case was full of mystery But if one reads the reports through from beginning to end one cannot help feeling that her spirit messages are filled with nonsense at least of triviality Here is a specimen an affair specimen too of the kind of communication Pelham gave He wrote out the message it referred to a certain famous man known in the reports as Mr. Mark Pelham is reported to have written by Mrs. Piper's hand that he Mr. Mark with his keen brain and marvelous He was a very dear friend of X I was exceedingly fond of him Comical weather interests both he and I, me, him, I know it all Don't you see I correct these? Well I am not less intelligent now but there are many difficulties I am far clear on all points and I will shut up in the prison body Prison, prisoning or imprisoned you ought to say No, I don't mean to get it that way See here, H, don't view me with a critic's eye but pass my imperfections by Of course I know all that as well as anybody on your sphere, of course Well, I think so I tell you old fellow it don't do to pick all these little errors too much when they amount to nothing in one way you have light enough and brain enough I know to understand my explanations of being shut up in this body dreaming as it were and trying to help on science some people would say that Pelham had had a little too much whiskey toddy when he wrote that rambling meaningless string of words or we can suppose that Mrs. Piper was dreaming we see in the last sentence a curious mixture of ideas that must have been in her mind she herself says I do not see how anybody can look on all that as testimony from another world I cannot see that it must have been in a conscious expression of my subliminal self writing such stuff as dreams are made of in another place Mrs. Piper makes the following direct statement I have never heard of anything being said by myself while in a trance state which might not have been flattened in one my own mind two in the mind of the person in charge of the sitting three in the mind of the person who was trying to get communication with someone in another state of existence or some companion present with such person or four in the mind of some absent person alive somewhere else in the world writing in the psychological review in 1898 professor James says Mrs. Piper's trance memory is no ordinary human memory and we have to explain its singular perfection either as the natural endowment of her solitary subliminal self or as a collection of distinct memory systems each with a communicating spirit as its vehicle the spirit hypothesis exhibits a vacancy triviality and incoherence of mind painful to think of as the state of the departed and coupled with a pretension to impress one a disposition to fish and face around and disguise the essential hollowness which is if anything more painful still Mr. Hodgson has to resort to the theory that although the communicants probably are spirits they are in a semi-common host or sleeping state while communicating and only half aware of what is going on while the habits of Mrs. Piper's neural organism largely supply the definite form of words, etc in which the phenomenon is closed after considering other theories Professor James concludes the world is evidently more complex than we are accustomed to think it the absolute world ground in particular being farther off than we are wont to think it Mrs. Piper is reported to have said of what occurs after I enter the trans-period I remember nothing nothing of what I said or what was said to me I am but a passive agent in the hands of powers that control me I can give no account of what becomes of me during a trans the wisdom and inspired eloquence of which of late has been conveyed to Dr. Hodgson through my mediumship is entirely beyond my understanding I do not pretend to understand it and can give no explanation I simply know that I have the power of going into a trans when I wish and says the Piper Phenomena are the most absolutely baffling thing I know Professor Hodgson Ph.D.L.L.D. author of The Law of Psychic Phenomena comes as near giving an explanation of spiritualism so called as anyone he begins by saying all things considered Mrs. Piper is probably the best psychic now before the public for the scientific communication of spiritualism and it must be admitted that if her alleged communications from discarnate spirits cannot be traced to any other source the claims of spiritism have been confirmed then he goes on a few words however will make it clear to the scientific mind that her Phenomena can be easily accounted for on purely psychological principles thus Phenomena is endowed with a dual mind or two minds or states of consciousness designated respectively as the objective and the subjective the objective mind is normally unconscious of the content of the subjective mind the latter is constantly amiable to control by suggestion and it is exclusively endowed with the faculty of telepathy and a trans psychic is exclusively by her subjective mind and reason is in advance hence she is controlled by suggestion and consequently is compelled to believe herself to be a spirit good or bad if that suggestion is in any way imparted to her and she automatically acts accordingly she is in no sense responsible for the vagaries of a Phinuit for that eccentric personality of suggestion but she is also in the condition which enables her to read the subjective minds of others hence her supernormal knowledge of the affairs of her sitters what he knows or has ever known consciously or unconsciously subjective memory being perfect is easily within her reach thus far no intelligent psychical researcher will gain say what I have said it sometimes happens that the psychic obtains information that neither she nor the sitter could ever have consciously possessed does it necessarily follow that discarnate spirits gave her the information spiritists say yes for this is the last ditch of spiritism psychologists declare that the telepathic explanation is as valid in the latter class of cases as it obviously is in the former thus telepathy being a power of the subjective mind messages may be conveyed from one to another at any time neither of the parties being objectively conscious of the fact it follows that a telepathist at any following seance with the recipient can reach the content of that message if this argument is valid and its validity is self-evident it is impossible to imagine a case that may not thus be explained on psychological principles professor hudson's argument will appeal to the ordinary reader is good it may be simplified however thus we may suppose that mrs. piper voluntarily hypnotizes herself perhaps she simply puts her conscious reason to sleep in that condition the rest of her mind is in an exalted state and capable of telepathy and mind reading either of those near hand or at a distance her reason being asleep she simply dreams and the questions of her sitter are made to fit into her dream if we regard mediums as persons who have the power of hypnotizing themselves and then of doing what we know persons who have been hypnotized by others sometimes do we have an explanation that covers the whole case perfectly at the same time as professor james warns us we must believe that the mind is far more complex than we are accustomed to think it end of chapter 16 recording by elliott miller oswego illinois june 2009 end of complete hypnotism mesmerism mind reading and spiritualism by a alpheus