TELEPATHY AND THE
SUBLIMINAL SELF

NATHAN EARLY
Phototype from an Automatic Painting. (See [page 196].)

TELEPATHY
AND
THE SUBLIMINAL SELF

AN ACCOUNT OF RECENT INVESTIGATIONS REGARDING
HYPNOTISM, AUTOMATISM, DREAMS, PHANTASMS,
AND RELATED PHENOMENA

BY
R. OSGOOD MASON, A.M., M.D.
Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine

NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1897

Copyright, 1897,
BY
HENRY HOLT & CO.

PREFACE.

To whatever conclusions it may lead us, there is no mistaking the fact that now more than ever before is the public interested in matters relating to the “New Psychology.” Scarcely a day passes that notice of some unusual psychical experience or startling phenomenon does not appear in popular literature. The newspaper, the magazine, and the novel vie with each other in their efforts to excite interest and attract attention by the display of these strange incidents, presented sometimes with intelligence and taste, but oftener with a culpable disregard of both taste and truth.

The general reader is not yet critical regarding these matters, but he is at least interested, and desires to know what can be relied upon as established truth amongst these various reports. There is inquiry concerning Telepathy or Thought-Transference—is it a fact or is it a delusion? Has Hypnotism any actual standing either in science or common sense? What of Clairvoyance, Planchette, Trance and Trance utterances, Crystal-Gazing and Apparitions?

In the following papers intelligent readers, both in and out of the medical profession, will find these subjects fairly stated and discussed, and to some of the questions asked, fair and reasonable answers given. It is with the hope of aiding somewhat in the efforts now being made to rescue from an uncertain and unreasoning supernaturalism some of the most valuable facts in nature, and some of the most interesting and beautiful psychical phenomena in human experience, that this book is offered to the public.

To such studies, however, it is objected by some that the principles involved in these unusual mental actions are too vague and the facts too new and unsubstantiated to be deserving of serious consideration; but it should be remembered that all our knowledge, even that which is now reckoned as science, was once vague and tentative; it is absurd, therefore, to ignore newly-found facts simply because they are new and their laws unknown; nevertheless, in psychical matters especially, this is the tendency of the age.

But even if upon the practical side these studies should be deemed unsatisfactory, it would not follow that they are without use or interest. It is a truism that our western civilization is over-intense and practical; it is materialistic, hard, mechanical; it values nothing, it believes in nothing that cannot be weighed, measured, analyzed, labelled and appraised;—feeling, intuition, aspiration, monitions, glimpses of knowledge that are from within—not external nor distinctly cognizable,—these are all slighted, despised, trampled upon by a supercilious dilettanteism on the one hand and an uninstructed philistinism on the other, and the result has been a development that is abnormal, unsymmetrical, deformed, and tending to disintegration.

To a few, oriental mysticism, to others the hasty deductions of spiritualism, and to many more the supernaturalism of the various religious systems, offer at least a partial, though often exaggerated, antidote to this inherent vice, because they all contemplate a spiritual or at least a transcendental aspect of man’s nature in contrast to that which is purely material. But even these partial remedies are not available to all, and they are unsatisfactory to many.

As a basis to a more symmetrical and permanent development, some generally recognized facts relative to the constitution and action of these more subtle forces in our being must be certified; and as an introduction to that work, it is hoped that these studies in the outlying fields of psychology will not be found valueless.

A portion of the papers here presented are republished, much revised, by courtesy of The New York Times.

New York, October, 1896.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PSYCHICAL RESEARCH—TELEPATHY OR THOUGHT-TRANSFERENCE.

The status of the old-fashioned ghost story has, within the past ten years, perceptibly changed. Formerly, by the credulous generality of people, it was almost universally accepted without reason and without critical examination. It was looked upon as supernatural, and supernatural things were neither to be doubted nor reasoned about, and there the matter ended.

On the other hand, the more learned and scientific, equally without reason or critical examination, utterly repudiated and scorned all alleged facts and occurrences relating to the subject. “We know what the laws of nature are,” they said, “and alleged occurrences which go beyond or contravene these laws are upon their face illusions and frauds.” And so, with them also, there the matter ended.

In the meantime, while the irreclaimably superstitious and credulous on the one hand, and the unco-scientific and conservative on the other, equally without knowledge and equally without reason, have gone on believing and disbelieving, a large number of people—intelligent, inquiring, quick-witted, and reasonable, some scientific and some unscientific—have come to think seriously regarding unusual occurrences and phenomena, either witnessed or experienced by themselves or related by others, and whose reality they could not doubt, although their relations to ordinary conditions of life were mysterious and occult.

In the investigation of these subjects some new and unfamiliar terms have come into more or less common use. We hear of mind-reading, telepathy, hypnotism, clairvoyance, and psychical research, some of which terms still stand for something mysterious, uncanny, perhaps even supernatural, but they have at least excited interest and inquiry. The subjects which they represent have even permeated general literature; the novelist has made use of this widespread interest in occult subjects and has introduced many of the strange and weird features which they present into his department of literature. Some have made use of this new material without knowledge or taste, merely to excite wonder and attract the vulgar, while others use it philosophically, with knowledge and discrimination, for the purpose of educating their readers in a new and important department of knowledge and thought.

Amongst the more scientific, societies have been formed, reports have been read and published, so that in scientific and literary circles as well as among the unlearned the subject has become one of interest.

The object of these papers will be briefly to tell in connection with my own observations, what is known and what is thought by others who have studied the subject carefully, and especially what has been done by the English Society for Psychical Research and kindred societies.

When an expedition is sent out for the purpose of exploring new and unknown regions, it is often necessary to send forward scouts to obtain some general ideas concerning the nature of the country, its conformation, water-courses, inhabitants, and food supplies. The scouts return and report what they have discovered; their reports are listened to with interest, and upon these reports often depend the movements and success of the whole expedition. It will easily be seen how important it is that the scouts should be intelligent, sharp-witted, courageous and truthful; and it will also be evident that the report of these scouts concerning the new and unknown country is much more valuable than the preconceived opinions of geographers and philosophers, no matter how eminent they may be, who have simply stayed at home, enjoyed their easy-chair, and declared off-hand that the new country was useless and uninhabitable.

The outlying fields of psychology, which are now the subject of psychical research, are comparatively a new and unexplored region, and until within a few years it has been considered a barren and unproductive one, into which it was silly, disreputable, and even dangerous to enter; the region was infested with dream-mongers, spiritualists, clairvoyants, mesmerists, and cranks, and the more vigorously it was shunned the safer would he be who had a reputation of any kind to lose.

Such substantially was the condition of public sentiment, and especially of sentiment in strictly scientific circles, fourteen years ago, when the English Society for Psychical Research came into being. The first movement in the direction of systematic study and exploration in this new field was a preliminary meeting called by Prof. W. F. Barrett, Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and a few other gentlemen on Jan. 6, 1882, when the formation of such a society was proposed; and in the following month the society was definitely organized and officers were chosen. The first general meeting for business and listening to reports took place July 17th of the same year.

The persons associated in this society were of the most staid and respectable character, noted for solid sense, and a sufficient number of them for practical work were also trained in scientific methods, and were already eminent in special departments of science.

Prof. Henry Sidgwick, Trinity College, Cambridge, was President; Prof. W. F. Barrett, F. R. S. E., Royal College of Science, Dublin, and Prof. Balfour Stewart, F. R. S., Owens College, Manchester, were Vice-Presidents, and among the members were a large number of well-known names of Fellows of various learned and royal societies, professional men, and members of Parliament, altogether giving character to the society, as well as assuring sensible methods in its work. Among the subjects first taken up for examination and, so far as possible, for experimental study, were the following:—

(1) Thought-transference, or an examination into the nature and extent of any influence which may be exerted by one mind upon another, apart from any generally recognized mode of perception or communication.

(2) The study of hypnotism and the forms of so-called mesmeric trance.

(3) An investigation of well-authenticated reports regarding apparitions and disturbances in houses reputed to be haunted.

(4) An inquiry into various psychical phenomena commonly called Spiritualistic.

The first report made to the society was concerning thought-reading, or thought-transference, and was a description of various experiments undertaken with a view to determine the question whether one person or one mind can receive impressions or intelligence from another person or mind without communication by word, touch, or sign, or by any means whatsoever apart from the ordinary and recognized methods of perception, or the ordinary channels of communication.

What is meant by thought-transference is perhaps most simply illustrated by the common amusement known as the “willing game”; it is played as follows:—

The person to be influenced or “willed” is sent out of the room; those remaining then agree upon some act which that person is to be willed to accomplish; as, for instance, to take some particular piece of bric-à-brac from a table or cabinet and place it upon the piano, or to find some article which has been purposely hidden. The person to be willed is then brought back into the room; the leader of the game places one hand lightly upon her shoulder or arm, and the whole company think intently upon the act agreed upon in her absence. If the game is successful, the person so willed goes, with more or less promptness, takes the piece of bric-à-brac thought of, and places it upon the piano, as before agreed upon by the company, or she goes with more or less directness and discovers the hidden article. Nervous agitation, excitement, even faintness or actual syncope, are not unusual accompaniments of the effort on the part of the person so willed, circumstances which at least show the unusual character of the performance and also the necessity for caution in conducting it.

If the game is played honestly, as it generally is, the person to be willed, when she returns to the room, is absolutely ignorant of what act she is expected to perform, and the person with whom she is placed in contact does not intentionally give her any clue or information during the progress of the game.

In the more formal experiments the person who is willed is known as the sensitive, subject, or percipient; the person who conducts the experiment is known as the agent or operator. The sensitive is presumed to receive, in some unusual manner, from the minds of the agent and the company, an impression regarding the action to be performed, without communication between them in any ordinary manner.

This is one of the simplest forms of thought-transference; it is, of course, liable to many errors, and is useless as a scientific test.

Bishop, Cumberland, and other mind readers who have exhibited their remarkable powers all over the world, were doubtless sensitives who possessed this power of perception or receiving impressions in a high degree, so that minute objects, such as an ordinary watch-key, hidden in a barrel of rubbish in a cellar and in a distant part of an unfamiliar city, is quickly found, the sensitive being connected with the agent by the slightest contact, or perhaps only by a string or wire.

The question at issue in all these cases is the same, namely, do the sensitives receive their impressions regarding what they have to do from the mind of the agent by some process other than the ordinary means of communication, such as seeing, hearing, or touch; or do they, by the exceeding delicacy of their perception, receive impressions from slight indications unintentionally and unconsciously conveyed to them by the agent through the slight contact which is kept up between them?

The opinion of a majority of scientific persons has been altogether averse to the theory of thought-transference from one mind to another without the aid of the senses and the ordinary means of communication; and they have maintained that intimations of the thing to be done by the sensitive were conveyed by slight muscular movements unconsciously made by the agent and perhaps unconsciously received by the sensitive. To explain, or rather to formulate these cases, Dr. William B. Carpenter, the eminent English physiologist, proposed the theory of “unconscious muscular action” on the part of the agent and “unconscious cerebration” on the part of the sensitive; and his treatment of the whole subject in his “Mental Physiology,” which was published twenty years ago, and also in his book on “Mesmerism and Spiritualism,” was thought by many to be conclusive against the theory of mind-reading or thought-transference. Especially was this view entertained by the more conservative portion of the various scientific bodies interested in the subject, and also by that large class of people, scientific and otherwise, who save themselves much trouble by taking their opinions ready made.

It was a very easy way of disposing of the matter, so thoroughly scientific, and it did not involve the necessity of studying any new force or getting into trouble with any new laws of mental action; it was simply delightful, and the physiologists rubbed their hands gleefully over the apparent discomfiture of the shallow cranks who imagined they had discovered something new. There was only one troublesome circumstance about the whole affair. It was this: that cases were every now and then making their appearance which absolutely refused to be explained by the new theory of Dr. Carpenter, and the only way of disposing of these troublesome cases was to declare that the people who observed them did not know how to observe, and did not see what they thought they saw.

This was the state of the question, and this the way in which it was generally regarded, when it was taken up for investigation by the Society for Psychical Research.

Experiments on the subject of thought-transference fall naturally into four classes:

(1) Those where some prearranged action is accomplished, personal contact being maintained between the operator and the sensitive.

(2) Similar performances where there is no contact whatever.

(3) Where a name, number, object, or card is guessed or perceived and expressed by speech or writing without any perceptible means of obtaining intelligence by the senses or through any of the ordinary channels of communication.

(4) Where the same ideas have occurred or the same impressions have been conveyed at the same moment to the minds of two or more persons widely separated from each other.

The first and second of these classes are simply examples of the “willing game” carried on under more strict conditions, but they are not counted as of special value on account of the possibility of information being conveyed when contact is permitted, and by means of slight signals, mere movements of the eye, finger, or lip, which might quickly be seized upon and interpreted by the sensitive, even when there was no actual contact. The third and fourth class, however, seem to exclude these and all other ordinary or recognizable means of communication.

The following are examples of the third class, namely, where some object, number, name, or card has been guessed or perceived without the aid of the senses, and without any of the ordinary means of communication between the operator and the subject.

The first experiments here reported were made in the family of a clergyman, by himself, together with his five daughters, ranging from ten to seventeen years of age, all thoroughly healthy persons, and without any peculiar nervous development. The daughters and sometimes, also, a young maid-servant, were the sensitives, and the clergyman, when alone with his family, acted as agent. The test experiments made in this family were conducted by two competent and well-qualified observers, members of the society, and no member of the family was permitted to know the word, name, or object selected, except that the child chosen to act as sensitive was told to what class the object belonged; for instance, whether it was a number, card, or name of some person or place.

The child was then sent out of the room and kept under observation while the test object was agreed upon, and was then recalled by one of the experimenters; and while giving her answers she “stood near the door with downcast eyes,” and often with her back to the company. The experiments were conducted in perfect silence excepting the child’s answer and the “right” or “wrong” of the agent.

It has been charged that these children, later, were caught signalling during the experiments. This is true by their own confession, but it is also true that there was no signalling during the earlier experiments, also that the signalling when used did not improve the results, and furthermore that after they began signalling the effort to keep the mind consciously active and acute during their trials injured the passive condition necessary for success, and eventually destroyed their sensitiveness and thought-reading power altogether.

Besides, most of the tests were made when only the one child was in the room, and, as will be noticed, many of the tests were of such a nature that signalling would be out of the question, especially with their little experience and clumsy code.

The following results were obtained, the name of the object agreed upon being given in italics:—

A white-handled penknife. Was named and color given on the first trial. A box of almonds. Named correctly. A three-penny piece. Failed. A box of chocolate. A button box. A penknife, hidden. Failed to state where it was.

Trial with cards, to be named:—

Two of clubs. Right. Seven of diamonds. Right. Four of spades. Failed. Four of hearts. Right. King of hearts. Right. Two of diamonds. Right. Ace of hearts. Right. Nine of spades. Right. Five of diamonds. Four of diamonds (wrong); then four of hearts, (wrong); then five of diamonds, which was right on the third trial. Two of spades. Right. Eight of diamonds. Wrong. Ace of diamonds. Wrong. Three of hearts. Right. Four of clubs. Wrong. Ace of spades. Wrong.

The following results were obtained with fictitious names:—

William Stubbs. Right. Eliza Holmes. Eliza H. Isaac Harding. Right. Sophia Shaw. Right. Hester Willis. Cassandra—then Hester Wilson. John Jones. Right. Timothy Taylor. Tom, then Timothy Taylor. Esther Ogle. Right. Arthur Higgins. Right. Alfred Henderson. Right. Amy Frogmore. Amy Freemore, then Amy Frogmore. Albert Snelgrove. Albert Singrore, then Albert Grover.

On another occasion the following result was obtained with cards, Mary, the eldest daughter, being the percipient: In thirty-one successive trials the first only was an entire failure, six of spades being given in answer for the eight of spades. Of the remaining thirty consecutive trials, in seventeen the card was correctly named on the first attempt, nine on the second, and four on the third.

It should here be observed, that according to the calculus of probabilities, the chances that an ordinary guesser would be correct in his guess on the first trial is, in cards, of course, one in fifty-one, but in these trials, numbering 382 in all, and extending over six days, the average was one in three, and second and third guesses being allowed the successes were more than one in two, almost two in three.

The chances against guessing the card correctly five times in succession are more than 1,000,000 to 1, and against this happening eight times in succession are more than 142,000,000 to 1, yet the former happened several times and the latter twice—once with cards and once with fictitious names, the chances against success in the latter case being almost incalculable.

The following experiments were also made among many others, Miss Maud Creery being the percipient:—

“(1) What town have we thought of? A. Buxton: which was correct.

“(2) What town have we thought of? A. Derby. What part did you think of first? A. Railway station. (So did I.) What next? A. The market-place. (So did I.)

“(3) What town have we thought of? A. Something commencing with L. (Pause of a minute.) Lincoln. (Correct.)

“(4) What town have we thought of? A. Fairfield. What part did you think of first? A. The road to it. (So did I.) What next? A. The triangular green behind the Bull’s Head Inn. (So did I.)”

In seeking an explanation for these remarkable results coincidence and chance may, it would seem, be utterly excluded. Touch and hearing must also be excluded, since the guesser did not come in contact with any person during the experiments, and they were conducted in perfect silence excepting the answers of the percipient or the “yes” or “no” of the agent.

We have left, then, only the unconscious indications which might possibly be given by look, movement of a finger, lip, or muscle by persons who were present especially on account of their desire and ability to detect any such communication, and on account of their ability to avoid giving information in any such manner themselves.

It seems, in fact, quite incredible that information thus conveyed could be sufficient to affect the result in so large a number of experiments, especially where the experiments included the names of places and fictitious names of persons. Even where signalling is successfully carried on, as, for instance, in stage tricks, it is a regular feat of memory accomplished between two people who have studied and practised it assiduously for a long time, while here were simply children, brought in contact, without rehearsal, with strangers, whose object it was to detect the trick if any were practised among them.

We are forced, then, to the conclusion that the knowledge which these sensitives exhibited concerning the objects, names, or cards which were given them as tests, did not come to them by any ordinary sense of perception obtained either legitimately or by trick, but came to them directly from the minds of other persons acting as agents and striving to impress them, and that this knowledge or these impressions were received by some means other than through the ordinary channels of communication.

Another method of demonstrating thought-transference which should be mentioned here, is by means of diagrams. The experiment may be made as follows:—The percipient, being blindfolded, is seated at a table with his back to the operator, without contact and in perfect silence. A diagram—for instance, a circle with a cross in the centre—is distinctly drawn by a third person and so held as to be in full view of the operator, who looks at it in silence, steadily and with concentrated attention.

The impression made by the diagram upon the mind of the operator is gradually perceived by the percipient, who, after a time varying from a few seconds to several minutes, declares himself ready. The bandages are then removed from his eyes, and to the best of his ability he draws the impression which came to him while blindfolded. The results have varied in accuracy, very much as did the results in the experiments with objects and cards already described.

The following diagrams are from drawings and reproductions made in the manner just described. They are from the proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, and were the result of experiments made by Mr. Malcolm Guthrie and Mr. James Birchall, two prominent and cultivated citizens of Liverpool, together with three or four ladies, personal friends of theirs, all of whom undertook the experiments with the definite purpose of testing the truth or falsity of thought-transference.

I. Original Drawing.		I. Reproduction.
II. Original Drawing.		II. Reproduction.
III. Original Drawing.		III. Reproduction.
IV. Original Drawing.		IV. Reproduction.

I will also quote another experiment, which is only a fair example of a very large number, carefully carried out from April to November, 1883. In many of the experiments members of the Committee on Thought-transference from the S. P. R. were present.

April 20th, 1883.—Present, Mr. Guthrie, Mr. Birchall, Mr. Steel, and four ladies:—

Success was different on different occasions, but this represents an ordinary series of experiments at one sitting. In these experiments with objects, the percipient was blindfolded and the object moreover was kept out of range of vision. In some experiments slight contact was permitted, and in some it was not, but it was found that contact had little if any effect upon the result.

Remarkable success was also obtained in the transference of sensation, such as taste, smell, or pain, while the percipient was in a normal condition, that is, not hypnotized.

The following is an average example of the transference of taste:—

The tasters, Mr. Guthrie (M. G.), Mr. Gurney (E. G.), and Mr. Myers (M.). The percipients were two young ladies in Mr. Guthrie’s employ.

Sept. 3, 1883.

Some very striking experiments were made by Mr. J. W. Smith of Brunswick Place, Leeds, as agent, and his sister Kate as percipient. Their success with diagrams fully equalled those already given, and with objects the results have seldom been equalled. The following trials were made March 11th, 1884. The intelligence and good faith of the participants is undoubted.

Agent: J. W. Smith. Percipient: Kate Smith.

The number of facts and experiments bearing upon this division of our subject is well-nigh inexhaustible; those already presented will serve as illustrations and will also show upon what sort of evidence is founded the probability that perceptions and impressions are really conveyed from one mind to another in some other manner than by the ordinary and recognized methods of communication.

It remains to give one or two illustrations of the fourth division of the subject, namely, where similar thoughts have simultaneously occurred, or similar impressions have been made upon the minds of persons at a distance from each other without any known method of communication between them.

The first case was received and examined by the society in the summer of 1885. One of the percipients writes as follows:—

“My sister-in-law, Sarah Eustance, of Stretton, was lying sick unto death, and my wife had gone over there from Lawton Chapel (twelve or thirteen miles off) to see and tend her in her last moments. On the night before her death I was sleeping at home alone, and, awaking, I heard a voice distinctly call me.

“Thinking it was my niece Rosanna, the only other occupant of the house, I went to her room and found her awake and nervous. I asked her whether she had called me. She answered: ‘No; but something awoke me, when I heard some one calling.’ On my wife returning home after her sister’s death she told me how anxious her sister had been to see me, craving for me to be sent for, and saying, ‘Oh, how I want to see Done once more!’ and soon after became speechless. But the curious part was that, about the same time that she was ‘craving,’ I and my niece heard the call.”

In answer to a letter of inquiry he further writes:—

“My wife, who went from Lawton that particular Sunday to see her sister, will testify, that as she attended upon her (after the departure of the minister) during the night, she was asking and craving for me, repeatedly saying, ‘Oh, I wish I could see Uncle Done and Rosie once more before I go!’ and soon after she became unconscious, or at least ceased speaking, and died the next day, of which fact I was not aware until my wife returned on the evening of the Fourth of July.”

Mrs. Sewill, the Rosie referred to, writes as follows:—

“I was awakened suddenly, without apparent cause, and heard a voice calling me distinctly, thus: ‘Rosie, Rosie, Rosie.’ We (my uncle and myself) were the only occupants of the house that night, aunt being away attending upon her sister. I never was called before or since.”

The second case is reported by a medical man of excellent reputation to whom the incident was related by both Lady G. and her sister, the percipients in the case. It is as follows:—

“Lady G. and her sister had been spending the evening with their mother, who was in her usual health and spirits when they left her. In the middle of the night the sister awoke in a fright and said to her husband: ‘I must go to my mother at once; do order the carriage. I am sure she is taken ill.’ The husband, after trying in vain to convince his wife that it was only a fancy, ordered the carriage. As she was approaching her mother’s house, where two roads meet, she saw Lady G.’s carriage approaching. As soon as they met, each asked the other why she was there at that unseasonable hour, and both made the same reply:—

“‘I could not sleep, feeling sure my mother was ill, and so I came to see.’ As they came in sight of the house they saw their mother’s confidential maid at the door, who told them, when they arrived, that their mother had been taken suddenly ill and was dying, and that she had expressed an earnest wish to see her daughters.”

The reporter adds:—

“The mother was a lady of strong will and always had a great influence over her daughters.”

Many well-authenticated instances of a similar character could be cited, but the above are sufficient for illustration, which is the object here chiefly in view, and other facts still further illustrating this division of the subject will appear in other relations.

The foregoing facts and experiments are sufficient to indicate what is understood by thought-transference, or telepathy, and also to indicate what might be called the skirmishing ground between the class of psychologists represented by the active workers in the Society for Psychical Research and kindred societies on the one hand, and the conservative scientists, mostly physiologists, who are incredulous of any action of the mind for which they cannot find an appropriate organ and a proper method, on the other.

It is not claimed that thought-transference as here set forth is established beyond all possibility of doubt or cavil, especially from those who choose to remain ignorant of the facts, but only that its facts are solid and their interpretation reasonable, and that thought-transference has now the same claim to acceptance by well-informed people that many of the now accepted facts in physical science had in its early days of growth and development.

The reality of thought-transference being once established, a vast field for investigation is opened up; a new law, as it were, is discovered; and how far-reaching and important its influence and bearing may be upon alleged facts and phenomena which heretofore have been disbelieved, or set down as chance occurrences, or explained away as hallucinations, is at present the interesting study of the experimental psychologist.

CHAPTER II

MESMERISM AND HYPNOTISM—HISTORY AND THERAPEUTIC EFFECTS.

No department of psychical research is at present exciting so widespread an interest as that which is known under the name of Hypnotism; and inquiries are constantly made by those to whom the subject is new, regarding its nature and effects, and also how, if at all, it differs from the mesmerism and animal magnetism of many years ago.

Unfortunately, these questions are more easily asked than answered, and well-informed persons, and even those considered experts in the subject, would doubtless give different and perhaps opposing answers to them. A short historical sketch may help in forming an opinion.

From the remotest periods of human history to the present time, certain peculiar and unusual conditions of mind, sometimes associated with abnormal conditions of body, have been observed, during which unusual conditions, words have unconsciously been spoken, sometimes seemingly meaningless, but sometimes conveying knowledge of events at that moment taking place at a distance, sometimes foretelling future events, and sometimes words of warning, instruction, or command.

The Egyptians and Assyrians had their magi, the Greeks and Romans their oracles, the Hebrews their seers and prophets, every great religion its inspired teachers, and every savage nation had, under some name, its seer or medicine-man.

Socrates had his dæmon, Joan of Arc her voices and visions, the Highlanders their second sight, Spiritualists their mediums and “controls.” Even Sitting Bull had his vision in which he foresaw the approach and destruction of Custer’s army.

Until a little more than a hundred years ago all persons affected in any of these unusual ways were supposed to be endowed with some sort of supernatural power, or to be under external and supernatural influence, either divine or satanic.

About 1773 Mesmer, an educated German physician, philosopher, and mystic, commenced the practice of curing disease by means of magnets passed over the affected parts and over the body of the patient from head to foot. Afterward seeing Gassner, a Swabian priest, curing his patients by command, and applying his hands to the affected parts, he discarded his magnets, concluding that the healing power or influence was not in them, but in himself; and he called that influence animal magnetism.

Mesmer also found that a certain proportion of his patients went into a sleep more or less profound under his manipulations, during which somnambulism, or sleep-walking, appeared. But Mesmer’s chief personal interest lay in certain theories regarding the nature of the newly-discovered power or agent, and in its therapeutic effects; his theories, however, were not understood nor appreciated by the physicians of his time, and his cures were looked upon by them as being simply quackery.

Nevertheless, it was he who first took the whole subject of these abnormal or supranormal conditions out of the domain of the supernatural, and in attempting to show their relation to natural forces he placed them in the domain of nature as proper subjects of rational study and investigation; and for this, at least, Mesmer should be honored.

Under Mesmer’s pupil, the Marquis de Puysegur, the facts and methods relating to the magnetic sleep and magnetic cures were more carefully observed and more fully published. Then followed Petetin, Husson, and Dupotet, Elliotson in England and Esdaile in India. So from Mesmer in 1773 to Dupotet and Elliotson in 1838 we have the period of the “early mesmerists.”

During this period the hypnotic sleep was induced by means of passes, the operators never for a moment doubting that the influence which produced sleep was a power of some sort proceeding from themselves and producing its effect upon the patient.

In addition to the condition of sleep or lethargy, the following conditions were well known to the “early mesmerists”; somnambulism, or sleep-walking, catalepsy, anæsthesia, and amnesia, or absence of all knowledge of what transpired during the sleep. Suggestion during sleep was also made use of, and was even then proposed as an agent in education and in the cure of vice.

This was the condition of the subject in 1842, when Braid, an English surgeon, made some new and interesting experiments. He showed that the so-called mesmeric sleep could be produced in some patients by other processes than those used by the early mesmerists; especially could this be accomplished by having the patient gaze steadily at a fixed brilliant object or point, without resorting to passes or manipulations of any kind.

He introduced the word hypnotism, which has since been generally adopted; he also proposed some new theories relating to the nature of the hypnotic sleep, regarding it as a “profound nervous change,” and he still further developed the idea and use of suggestion. Otherwise no important changes were made by him in the status of the subject. It was not looked upon with favor by the profession generally, and its advocates were for the most part still considered as cranks and persons whose scientific and professional standing and character were not above suspicion.

The period of twenty-five years from 1850 to 1875, was a sort of occultation of hypnotism. Braidism suffered nearly the same fate as mesmerism—it was neglected and tabooed. A few capable and honest men, like Liébeault of Nancy and Azam of Bordeaux, worked on, and from time to time published their observations; but for the most part these workers were neglected and even scorned.

To acknowledge one’s belief in animal magnetism or hypnotism was bad form, and he who did it must be content to suffer a certain degree of both social and professional ostracism. The field was given over to town-hall lectures on mesmerism, by “professors” whose titles were printed in quotation marks even by the local papers which recorded their exploits.

But a change was about to be inaugurated. In 1877 Prof. Charcot, then one of the most scientific, most widely-known, and most highly-esteemed of living physicians, not only in France but in all the world, was appointed, with two colleagues, to investigate the treatment of hysteria by means of metallic disks—a subject which was then attracting the attention of the medical profession in France.

So, curiously enough, it happened that Charcot commenced exactly where Mesmer had commenced a hundred years before. He experimented upon hysterical patients in his wards at La Salpêtrière, and, as a result, he rediscovered mesmerism under the name of hypnotism, just a century after it had been discovered by Mesmer and disowned by the French Academy.

But Charcot, after having satisfied himself by his experiments, did not hesitate to announce his full belief in the facts and phenomena of hypnotism, and that was sufficient to rehabilitate the long-neglected subject. The attention of the scientific world was at once turned toward it, it became a legitimate subject of study, and hypnotism at once became respectable. From that time to the present it has formed one of the most conspicuous and interesting subjects of psychical study; it has become to psychology what determining the value of a single character is to reading an ancient inscription in a lost or unknown language—it is a bit of the unknown expressed in terms of the known and helps to furnish clues to still greater discoveries.

With the scientific interest in hypnotism which was brought about through the great name and influence of Charcot, all doubt concerning the reality of the phenomena which it presents disappeared. Hypnotism was a fact and had come to stay.

Charcot, who conducted his experiments chiefly among nervous or hysterical patients, looked upon the hypnotic condition as a disease, and considered the phenomena presented by hypnotic subjects as akin to hysteria. In addition to the method of producing the hypnotic condition used by Braid, he used, among others, what he called “massive stimulation,” which consisted in first fully absorbing the subject’s attention and then producing a shock by the loud sounding of a concealed gong, or the sudden display or sudden withdrawal of an electric light. By this means hysterical subjects were often thrown into a condition of catalepsy, from which somnambulism and other hypnotic phenomena were sometimes deduced.

I have myself seen nervous patients thrown into the cataleptic state by the “massive stimulation” of a huge truck passing by, loaded with clanging rails or building iron, or by other sudden shock, but I did not consider the process therapeutic nor in any way useful to the patient. Indeed, I have considered the present method of transporting those beams and rails of iron through our streets and past our dwellings, without the slightest attempt to modify their shocking din and clangor, a piece of savagery which should at once be made the subject of special legislation looking to the prompt punishment of the perpetrators of the outrage.

As a matter of fact, neither the methods employed, the psychical conditions induced, nor the therapeutic effects attained at La Salpêtrière, where most of these experiments were at that time carried on, were such as to particularly commend themselves to students of psychology. Nevertheless the great name and approval of Charcot served to command for hypnotism the attention and the favorable consideration of the scientific world.

Soon after the experiments of Charcot and his associates in Paris were published, Prof. Bernheim commenced a most thorough and important study of the subject in the wards of the hospital at Nancy. These studies were made, not upon persons who were already subjects of nervous disease, as was the case with Charcot’s patients, but, on the contrary, upon those whose nervous condition was perfectly normal, and even upon those whose general health was perfect.

The result of Bernheim’s experiments proved that a very large percentage of all persons, sick or well, could be put into the hypnotic condition. He claimed that suggestion was the great factor and influence, both in bringing about the condition, and also in the mental phenomena observed, and the cures which were accomplished.

He claimed, moreover, that the hypnotic sleep did not differ from ordinary sleep, and that no magnetism nor other personal element, influence, or force entered in any way into the process—it was all the power and influence of suggestion.

Four distinct and important periods then are found in the history of hypnotism:

First, the period of the early mesmerists, extending from the time of Mesmer, 1773, until that of Braid, 1842—nearly seventy years—during which the theory of animal magnetism, or of some actual force or subtle influence proceeding from the operator to the subject, prevailed.

Second, the period of thirty-five years during which the influence of Braid’s experiments predominated, showing that other methods, and especially that by the fixed gaze, were efficient in producing the hypnotic sleep.

Third, the short period during which the influence of Charcot and the Paris school prevailed.

Fourth, the period since Bernheim began to publish his experiments, and which may be called the period of suggestion.

With this brief sketch in mind, we are prepared to examine some of the more important phenomena of hypnotism, both in its early and its later developments. A simple case would be as follows:—

A patient comes to the physician’s office complaining of continual headaches, general debility, nervousness, and unsatisfactory sleep. She is willing to be hypnotized, and is accompanied by a friend. The physician seats her comfortably in a chair, and, seating himself opposite her, he takes her thumbs lightly between his own thumbs and fingers, asks her to look steadily at some convenient object—perhaps a shirt-stud or a specified button upon his coat. Presently her eyelids quiver and then droop slowly over her eyes; he gently closes them with the tips of his fingers, holds them lightly for a moment, and she is asleep.

He then makes several slow passes over her face and down the front of her body from head to foot, also some over her head and away from it, all without contact and without speaking to her. He lets her sleep ten or fifteen minutes—longer, if convenient—and then, making two or three upward passes over her face, he says promptly: “All right; wake up.”

She slowly opens her eyes, probably smiles, and looks a little foolish at having slept. He inquires how she feels. She replies:

“I feel remarkably well—so rested—as though I had slept a whole night.”

“How is your head?”

(Looking surprised.) “It is quite well—the pain is all gone.”

“Very well,” he says. “You will continue to feel better and stronger, and you will have good sleep at night.”

And so it proves. Bernheim or a pupil of his would sit, or perhaps stand, near his patient, and in a quiet but firm voice talk of sleep.

“Sleep is what you need. Sleep is helpful and will do you good. Already, while I am talking to you, you are beginning to feel drowsy. Your eyes are tired; your lids are drooping; you are growing more and more sleepy; your lids droop more and more.”

Then, if the eyelids seem heavy, he presses them down over the eyes, all the time affirming sleep. If sleep comes, he has succeeded; if not, he resorts to gestures, passes, the steady gaze, or whatever he thinks likely to aid his suggestion.

When the patient is asleep he suggests that when she awakes her pains and nervousness will be gone, and that she will have quiet and refreshing sleep at night. What is the condition of the patient while under the influence of this induced sleep? Pulse and respiration are little, if at all, changed; they may be slightly accelerated at first, and later, if very deep sleep occurs, they may be slightly retarded. Temperature is seldom changed at all, though, if abnormally high before the sleep is induced, it frequently falls during the sleep.

If the hand be raised, or the arm be drawn up high above the head, generally it will remain elevated until it is touched and replaced, or the patient is told that he can let it fall, when he slowly lowers it.

In many cases the limbs of the patient may be flexed or the body placed in any position, and that position will be retained for a longer or shorter period, sometimes for hours, without change. Sometimes the condition is one of rigidity so firm that the head may be placed upon one chair and the heels upon another, and the body will remain stiff like a bridge from one chair to the other, even when a heavy weight is placed upon the middle of the patient’s body or another person is seated upon it. This is the full cataleptic condition.

Sometimes the whole body will be in a condition of anæsthesia, so that needles may be thrust deep into the flesh without evoking any sign of pain or any sensation whatever. Sometimes, when this condition of anæsthesia does not appear with the sleep, it may be induced by passes, or by suggesting that a certain limb or the whole body is without feeling. In this condition the most serious surgical operations have been performed without the slightest suffering on the part of the patient.

From the deep sleep the patient often passes of his own accord into a condition in which he walks, talks, reads, writes, and obeys the slightest wish or suggestion of the hypnotizer—and yet he is asleep. This is called the alert stage, or the condition of somnambulism, and is the most peculiar, interesting, and wonderful of all.

The two chief stages of the hypnotic condition, then, are, first: the lethargic stage; second, the alert stage.

The stage of lethargy may be very light—a mere drowsiness—or very deep—a heavy slumber—and it is often accompanied by a cataleptic state, more or less marked in degree.

The alert stage may also vary and may be characterized by somnambulism, varying in character from a simple sleepy “yes” or “no” in answer to questions asked by his hypnotizer, to the most wonderful, even supranormal, mental activity.

From any of these states the subject may be awakened by his hypnotizer simply making a few upward passes or by saying in a firm voice, “All right, wake up,” or, again, by affirming to the patient that he will awake when he (the hypnotizer) has counted up to a certain number, as, for instance, five.

Generally, upon awakening, the subject has no knowledge or remembrance of anything which has transpired during his hypnotic condition. This is known as amnesia. Sometimes, however, a hazy recollection of what has happened remains, especially if the hypnotic condition has been only slight.

Up to the present time hypnotism has been studied from two separate and important standpoints and for two well-defined purposes: (1) For its therapeutic effects, or its use in the treatment of disease and relief of pain; (2) for the mental or psychical phenomena which it presents.

The following cases will illustrate its study and use from the therapeutic standpoint—and, first, two cases treated by the old mesmerists, 1843-53. They are from reports published in The Zoist:—

(1) Q. I. P., a well-known artist, fifty years ago, had been greatly troubled and distressed by weak and inflamed eyes, accompanied by ulceration of the cornea, a condition which had lasted more than four years. He was never free from the disease, and often it was so severe as to prevent work in his studio, and especially reading, for months at a time. He had been under the care of the best oculists, both in New York and London, for long periods and at different times, but with very little temporary and no permanent relief.

He was urged, as a last resort, to try animal magnetism, as it was then called. Accordingly, he consulted a mesmeric practitioner in London, and was treated by passes made over the back of the head and down the spine and from the centre of the forehead backward and outward over the temples and down the sides of the head.

All other treatment was discontinued. No mesmeric phenomena of any kind were produced, not even sleep, but from the first day a degree of comfort and also improvement was experienced.

The treatment was given one hour daily for one month. The improvement was decided and uninterrupted, such as had never before been experienced under any form of medical or surgical treatment, no matter how thoroughly carried out. The general health was greatly improved, and the eyes were so much benefited that they could be relied upon constantly, both for painting and reading, and the cure was permanent.

(2) A case of rheumatism treated by Dr. Elliotson of London. The patient, G. F., age thirty-five years, was a laborer, and had suffered from rheumatism seven weeks. When he applied to Dr. Elliotson, the doctor was sitting in his office, in company with three friends—one a medical gentleman, and all skeptics regarding mesmerism.

They all, however, expressed a desire to see the treatment, and, accordingly, the patient was brought in. He came with difficulty, upon crutches, his face betokening extreme pain. He had never been mesmerized.

The doctor sat down opposite his patient, took his thumbs in his hands, and gazed steadily in his eyes. In twenty minutes he fell into the mesmeric sleep. Several of the mesmeric phenomena were then produced in the presence of his skeptical friends, after which he was allowed to sleep undisturbed for two hours. No suggestions regarding his disease are reported as having been made to the patient during his sleep.

He was awakened by reverse passes. Being fairly aroused, he arose from his chair, walked up and down the room without difficulty, and was perfectly unconscious of all that had transpired during his sleep; he only knew he came into the room suffering, and on crutches, and that he was now free from pain and could walk with ease without them. He left one crutch with the doctor and went out twirling the other in his hand. He remained perfectly well.

Dr. Elliotson afterward tried on three different occasions to hypnotize him but without success. Others also tried, but all attempts in this direction failed.

I will here introduce one or two cases from my own notebook:—

(1) A. C., a young girl of Irish parentage, fifteen years old, light skin, dark hair and eyes, and heavy eyebrows. Her father had “fits” for several years previous to his death. I first saw the patient Dec. 4, 1872; this was five years before Charcot’s experiments, and nearly ten years before those of Bernheim.

She was then having frequent epileptic attacks, characterized by sudden loss of consciousness, convulsions, foaming at the mouth, biting the tongue, and dark color. She had her first attack six months before I saw her, and they had increased in frequency and in severity until now they occurred twenty or more times a day, sometimes lasting many minutes, and sometimes only a few seconds; sometimes they were of very great severity.

She had received many falls, burns, and bruises in consequence of their sudden accession. They occurred both day and night. On my second visit I determined to try hypnotism. Patient went to sleep in eight minutes, slept a short time and awoke without interference. She was immediately put to sleep again; she slept only a few minutes, and again awoke.

Dec. 7.—Her friends report that the attacks have not been so frequent and not nearly so violent since my last visit. Hypnotized; patient went into a profound sleep and remained one hour; she was then awakened by reverse passes.

Dec. 8.—The attacks have been still less frequent and severe; she has slept quietly; appetite good. Hypnotized and allowed her to sleep two hours, and then awoke her by the upward passes.

Dec. 9.—There has been still more marked improvement; the attacks have been very few, none lasting more than half a minute. Hypnotized and allowed her to remain asleep three hours. Awoke her with some difficulty, and she was still somewhat drowsy when I left. She went to sleep in the afternoon and slept soundly four hours; awoke and ate her supper; went to sleep again and slept soundly all night.

Dec. 10.—There has been no return of the attacks. A month later she had had no return of the attacks. She soon after left town, and I have not heard of her since. In this case no suggestions whatever were made.

(2) B. X., twenty-four years of age, a sporting man; obstinate, independent, self-willed, a leader in his circle. He had been a hard drinker from boyhood. He had been injured by a fall three years before, and had been subject to severe attacks of hæmatemesis. I had known him for three or four months previous to June, 1891. At that time he came into my office one evening somewhat under the influence of alcoholic stimulants. After talking a few moments, I advised him to lie down on the lounge. I made no remarks about his drinking, nor about sleep. I simply took his two thumbs in my hands and sat quietly beside him. Presently I made a few long passes from head to feet, and in five minutes he was fast asleep.

His hands and arms, outstretched and raised high up, remained exactly as they were placed. Severe pinching elicited no sign of sensation. He was in the deep hypnotic sleep.

I then spoke to him in a distinct and decided manner. I told him he was ruining his life and making his family very unhappy by his habit of intemperance. I then told him very decidedly that when he awoke he would have no more desire for alcoholic stimulants of any kind; that he would look upon them all as his enemies, and he would refuse them under all circumstances; that even the smell of them would be disagreeable to him. I repeated the suggestions and then awoke him by making a few passes upward over his face, I did not inform him that I had hypnotized him, nor speak to him at all about his habit of drinking. I prescribed for some ailment for which he had visited me and he went away.

I neither saw nor heard from him again for three months, when I received a letter from him from a distant city, informing me that he had not drank a drop of spirituous liquor since he was in my office that night. His health was perfect, and he had no more vomiting of blood.

June, 1892, one year from the time I had hypnotized him, he came into my office in splendid condition. He had drank nothing during the whole year. I have not heard from him since.

The following case illustrates Bernheim’s method:—

Mlle. J., teacher, thirty-two years old, came to the clinique, Feb. 17, 1887, for chorea, or St. Vitus’s dance. Nearly two weeks previous she had been roughly reprimanded by her superior which had greatly affected her. She could scarcely sleep or eat; she had nausea, pricking sensations in both arms, delirium at times, and now incessant movements, sometimes as frequent as two every second, in both the right arm and leg.

She can neither write nor attend to her school duties. Bernheim hypnotizes her by his method. She goes easily into the somnambulic condition. In three or four minutes, under the influence of suggestion, the movements of the hand and foot cease; upon waking up, they reappear, but less frequently. A second hypnotization, with suggestion, checks them completely.

Feb. 19th.—Says she has been very comfortable; the pricking sensations have ceased. No nervous movements until nine o’clock this morning, when they returned, about ten or eleven every minute. New hypnotization and suggestion, during which the motions cease, and they remain absent when she wakes.

21st.—Has had slight pains and a few choraic movements.

25th.—Is doing well; has no movements; says she is cured.

She returned a few times during the next four months with slight nervous movements, which were promptly relieved by hypnotizing and suggestion.

Bernheim, in his book, “Suggestive Therapeutics,” gives details of over one hundred cases, mostly neuralgic and rheumatic, most of which are described as cured, either quickly or by repeated hypnotization and suggestion.

The Zoist, a journal devoted to psychology and mesmerism nearly fifty years ago, gives several hundred cases of treatment and cure by the early mesmerists, some of them very remarkable, and also many cases of surgical operations of the most severe or dangerous character painlessly done under the anæsthetic influence of mesmerism before the benign effects of ether or chloroform were known. These cases are not often referred to by the modern student of hypnotism. Nevertheless, they constitute a storehouse of well-observed facts which have an immense interest and value.

It will thus be seen that throughout the whole history of hypnotism, under whatever name it has been studied, one of its chief features has been its power to relieve suffering and cure disease; and at the present day, while many physicians who are quite ignorant of its uses, in general terms deny its practicability, few who have any real knowledge of it are so unjust or regardless of facts as to deny its therapeutic effects.

CHAPTER III.

HYPNOTISM—PSYCHICAL ASPECT.

As before remarked the phenomena of hypnotism may be viewed from two distinct standpoints—one, that from which the physical and especially the therapeutic features are most prominent, the standpoint from which we have already viewed the subject; the other is the psychical or mental aspect, which presents phenomena no less striking, and is the one which is especially attractive to the most earnest students of psychology.

The hypnotic condition has been variously divided and subdivided by different students and different writers upon the subject; Charcot, for instance, makes three distinct states, which he designates (1) catalepsy, (2) lethargy, and (3) somnambulism, while Bernheim proposes five states, or, as he designates them, degrees of hypnotism, namely, (1) sleepiness, (2) light sleep, (3) deep sleep, (4) very deep sleep, (5) somnambulism.

All these divisions are arbitrary and unnatural; Bernheim’s five degrees have no definite limit or line of separation one from the other, and Charcot’s condition of catalepsy is only lethargy or sleep in which the subject may, to a greater or less degree, maintain the position in which he is placed by his hypnotizer.

There are, however, as already stated, two distinct and definite conditions, namely, (1) lethargy, or the inactive stage, and (2) somnambulism, or the alert stage, and if, in examining the subject, we make this simple division, we shall free it from much confusion and unnecessary verbiage.

When a subject is hypnotized by any soothing process, he first experiences a sensation of drowsiness, and then in a space of time, usually varying from two to twenty minutes, he falls into a more or less profound slumber. His breathing is full and quiet, his pulse normal; he is unconscious of his surroundings; or possibly he may be quiet, restful, indisposed to move, but having a consciousness, probably dim and imperfect, of what is going on about him.

This is the condition of lethargy, and in it most subjects, but not all, retain to a greater or less degree whatever position the hypnotizer imposes upon them; they sleep on, often maintaining what, under ordinary circumstances, would be a most uncomfortable position, for hours, motionless as a statue of bronze or stone.

If, now, he speaks of his own accord, or his magnetizer speaks to him and he replies, he is in the somnambulic or alert stage. He may open his eyes, talk in a clear and animated manner; he may walk about, and show even more intellectual acuteness and physical activity than when in his normal state, or he may merely nod assent or answer slowly to his hypnotizer’s questions; still, he is in the somnambulic or alert stage of hypnotism.

The following are some of the phenomena which have been observed in this stage. It is not necessary to rehearse the stock performances of lecture-room hypnotists. While under the influence of hypnotic suggestion a lad, for instance, is made to go through the pantomime of fishing in an imaginary brook, a dignified man to canter around the stage on all fours, under the impression that he is a pony, or watch an imaginary mouse-hole in the most alert and interested manner while believing himself a cat; or the subject is made to take castor oil with every expression of delight, or reject the choicest wines with disgust, believing them to be nauseous drugs, or stagger with drunkenness under the influence of a glass of pure water, supposed to be whisky.

All these things have been done over and over for the last forty years, and people have not known whether to consider them a species of necromancy or well-practiced tricks, in which the performers were accomplices, or, perhaps, a few more thoughtful and better-instructed people have looked upon them as involving psychological problems of the greatest interest, which might some day strongly influence all our systems of mental philosophy.

But whether done by the mesmerist of forty years ago or the hypnotist of the past decade, they were identical in character, and were simply genuine examples of the great power of suggestion when applied to persons under the mesmeric or hypnotic influence. Such exhibitions, however, are unnecessary and undignified, if not positively degrading, to both subject and operator, whether given by the self-styled professor of the town-hall platform or the aspiring clinical professor of nervous diseases before his packed amphitheatre of admiring students.

One of the most singular as well as important points in connection with hypnotism is the rapport or relationship which exists between the hypnotizer and the hypnotized subject. The manner in which the hypnotic sleep is induced is of little importance. The important thing, if results of any kind are to be obtained, is that rapport should be established.

This relationship is exhibited in various ways. Generally, while in the hypnotic state, the subject hears no voice but that of his hypnotizer; he does no bidding but his, he receives no suggestions but from him, and no one else can awaken him from his sleep.

If another person interferes, trying to impose his influence upon the sleeping subject, or attempts to waken him, distressing and even alarming results may appear. The degree to which this rapport exists varies greatly in different cases, but almost always, perhaps we should say always, the condition exists in some degree. In some rare cases this rapport is of a still higher and more startling character, exhibiting phenomena so contrary to, or rather, so far exceeding, our usual experience as to be a surprise to all and a puzzle to the wisest.

One of these curious phenomena is well exhibited in what is known as community of sensation, or the perception by the subject of sensations experienced by the operator. The following experiment, observed by Mr. Gurney and Dr. Myers of the Society for Psychical Research, will illustrate this phase of the subject.

The sensitive in this experiment is designated as Mr. C., and the operator as Mr. S. There was no contact or any communication whatsoever of the ordinary kind between them. C. was hypnotized, but was not informed of the nature of the experiment which was to be tried. The operator stood behind the hypnotized subject, and Mr. Gurney, standing behind the operator, handed him the different substances to be used in the experiment, and he, in turn, placed them in his own mouth.

Salt was first so tasted by the operator, whereupon the subject, C., instantly and loudly cried out: “What’s that salt stuff?” Sugar was given. C. replied, “Sweeter; not so bad as before.” Powdered ginger; reply, “Hot, dries up your mouth; reminds me of mustard.” Sugar given again; reply, “A little better—a sweetish taste.” Other substances were tried, with similar results, the last one tasted being vinegar, when it was found that C. had fallen into the deeper lethargic condition and made no reply.

Another experiment is reported by Dr. William A. Hammond of Washington. The doctor said:

“A most remarkable fact is, that some few subjects of hypnotism experience sensations from impressions made upon the hypnotizer. Thus, there is a subject upon whom I sometimes operate whom I can shut up in a room with an observer, while I go into another closed room at a distance of one hundred feet or more with another observer. This one, for instance, scratches my hand with a pin, and instantly the hypnotized subject rubs his corresponding hand, and says, ‘Don’t scratch my hand so;’ or my hair is pulled, and immediately he puts his hand to his head and says, ‘Don’t pull my hair;’ and so on, feeling every sensation that I experience.”

This experiment, it must be borne in mind, is conducted in closed rooms a hundred feet apart, and through at least two partitions or closed doors, and over that distance and through these intervening obstacles peculiar and definite sensations experienced by one person are perceived and definitely described by another person, no ordinary means of communication existing between them. This is an example of the rapport existing between the operator and hypnotized subject carried to an unusual degree.

The following experiments are examples of hypnotizing at a distance, or telepathic hypnotism, and while illustrating still further the rapport, or curious relationship, existing between hypnotizer and subject, are also illustrations of the rarer psychic phenomena of hypnotism.

The first series of experiments is given by Prof. Pierre Janet of Havre and Dr. Gibert, a prominent physician of the same city. The subject was Mme. B., a heavy, rather stolid, middle-aged peasant woman, without any ambition for notoriety, or to be known as a sensitive; on the contrary, she disliked it, and the experiments were disagreeable to her. She was, however an excellent example of close rapport with her hypnotizer.

While in the deep sleep, and perfectly insensible to ordinary stimuli, however violent, contact, or even the proximity of her hypnotizer’s hand, caused contractures, which a light touch from him would also remove. No one else could produce the slightest effect. After about ten minutes in this deep trance she usually passed into the alert, or somnambulic stage, from which also no one but the operator could arouse her. Hypnotization was difficult or impossible unless the operator concentrated his thoughts upon the desired result, but by simply willing, without passes or any physical means whatsoever, the hypnotic condition could be quickly induced.

Various experiments in simply willing post-hypnotic acts, without suggestion through any of the ordinary channels of communication, were also perfectly successful. Dr. Gibert then made three experiments in putting this subject to sleep when she was in another part of the town, a third of a mile away from the operator, and at a time fixed by a third person, the experiment also being wholly unexpected by the subject.

On two of these occasions Prof. Janet found the subject in a deep trance ten minutes after the willing to sleep, and no one but Dr. Gibert, who had put her to sleep, could rouse her. In the third experiment the subject experienced the hypnotic influence and desire to sleep, but resisted it and kept herself awake by washing her hands in cold water.

During a second series of experiments made with the same subject, several members of the Society for Psychical Research were present and took an active part in them. Apart from trials made in the same or an adjoining room, twenty-one experiments were made when the subject was at distances varying from one-half to three-fourths of a mile away from her hypnotizer. Of these, six were reckoned as failures, or only partial successes; there remained, then, fifteen perfect successes in which the subject, Mme. B., was found entranced fifteen minutes after the willing or mental suggestion. During one of these experiments, the subject was willed by Dr. Gibert to come through several intervening streets to him at his own house, which she accomplished in the somnambulic condition, and under the observation of Prof. Janet and several other physicians.

Another series of experiments was made with another subject by Dr. Héricourt, one of Prof. Richet’s coadjutors. The experiments included the gradual extension of the distance through which the willing power was successful, first to another room, then to another street, and a distant part of the city.

One day, while attempting to hypnotize her in another street, three hundred yards distant, at 3 o’clock P. M., he was suddenly called away to attend a patient, and forgot all about his hypnotic subject. Afterward he remembered that he was to meet her at 4:30, and went to keep his appointment. But not finding her, he thought possibly the experiment, which had been interrupted might, after all, have proved successful. Upon this supposition, at 5 o’clock he willed her to awake.

That evening, without being questioned at all, she gave the following account of herself: At 3 P. M. she was overcome by an irresistible desire to sleep, a most unusual thing for her at that hour. She went into an adjoining room, fell insensible upon a sofa, where she was afterward found by her servant, cold and motionless, as if dead.

Attempts on the part of the servant to rouse her proved ineffectual, but gave her great distress. She woke spontaneously and free from pain at 5 o’clock.

By no means the least interesting of the higher phenomena of hypnotism are post-hypnotic suggestions, or the fulfilment after waking of suggestions impressed upon the subject when asleep.

A few summers ago at a little gathering of intelligent people, much interest was manifested and a general desire to see some hypnotic experiments. Accordingly, one of the ladies whose good sense and good faith could not be doubted, was hypnotized and put into the condition of profound lethargy. After a few slight experiments, exhibiting anæsthesia, hallucinations of taste, plastic pose, and the like, I said to her in a decided manner:

“Now I am about to waken you. I will count five, and when I say the word ‘five’ you will promptly, but quietly and without any excitement, awake. Your mind will be perfectly clear, and you will feel rested and refreshed by your sleep. Presently you will approach Mrs. O., and will be attracted by the beautiful shell comb which she wears in her hair, and you will ask her to permit you to examine it.”

I then commenced counting slowly, and at the word “five” she awoke, opened her eyes promptly, looked bright and happy, and expressed herself as feeling comfortable and greatly rested, as though she had slept through a whole night. She rose from her chair, mingled with the company, and presently approaching Mrs. O., exclaimed:

“What a beautiful comb! Please allow me to examine it.”

And suiting the action to the word, she placed her hand lightly on the lady’s head, examined the comb, and expressed great admiration for it; in short, she fulfilled with great exactness the whole suggestion.

She was perfectly unconscious that any suggestion had been made to her; she was greatly surprised to see that she was the centre of observation, and especially at the ripple of laughter which greeted her admiration of the comb.

To another young lady, hypnotized in like manner, I suggested that on awaking she should approach the young daughter of our hostess, who was present, holding a favorite kitten in her arms, and should say to her, “What a pretty kitten you have! What is her name?”

The suggestion was fulfilled to the letter. It was only afterward that I learned that this young lady had a very decided aversion to cats, and always avoided them if possible.

Suggestions for post-hypnotic fulfilment are sometimes carried out after a considerable time has elapsed, and upon the precise day suggested.

Bernheim, in August, 1883, suggested to S., an old soldier, while in the hypnotic sleep, that upon the 3d of October following, sixty-three days after the suggestion, he should go to Dr. Liébeault’s house; that he would there see the President of the Republic, who would give to him a medal.

Promptly on the day designated he went. Dr. Liébeault states that S. came at 12:50 o’clock; he greeted M. F., who met him at the door as he came in, and then went to the left side of the office without paying any attention to any one. Dr. Liébeault continues:—

“I saw him bow respectfully and heard him speak the word ‘Excellence.’ Just then he held out his right hand, and said, ‘Thank your Excellence.’ Then I asked him to whom he was speaking. ‘Why, to the President of the Republic.’ He then bowed, and a few minutes later took his departure.”

A patient of my own, a young man with whom I occasionally experiment, exhibits some of the different phases and phenomena of hypnotism in a remarkable manner. He goes quickly into the stage of profound lethargy; after allowing him to sleep a few moments, I say to him: “Now you can open your eyes and you can see and talk with me, but you are still asleep, and you will remember nothing.”

He opens his eyes at once, smiles, gets up and walks, and chats in a lively manner. If I say: “Now you are in the deep sleep again,” and pass my hand downward before his eyes, immediately his eyes close and he is in a profound slumber. If five seconds later I again say, “Now you can open your eyes,” he is again immediately in the alert stage.

For experiment I then take half a dozen plain blank cards, exactly alike, and in one corner of one of the cards I put a minute dot, so that upon close inspection it can be recognized. Holding these in my hand, I say to him:

“Here are six cards; five of them are blank, but this one (the one I have marked, he only seeing the plain side) has a picture of myself upon it. It is a particularly good picture, and I have had it prepared specially for this occasion. Do you see the picture?”

“Of course I do,” he replies. “What do you think of it?” I ask him. He looks at me carefully and compares my face with the suggested picture on the card and replies, “It is excellent.”

“Very well, give me the cards.”

He hands them to me and I shuffle and disarrange them as much as possible. I then show them to him, holding them in my hand, and say:

“Now show me the card which has my picture upon it.”

He selects it at once. I only know it is correct by looking for the dot upon the back, which has all the while been kept carefully concealed from him.

I then say to him: “Now, I am going to awaken you, and when awake you will come to the desk, select from the cards which I now place there the one which has my picture, and show it to me.”

He awakes at my counting when I reach the word five, as I have suggested to him. He remembers nothing of what has passed since he was hypnotized, but thinks he has had a long and delightful sleep. I sit at my desk; he walks up to it, examines the six cards which are lying there, selects one, and showing it to me, remarks, “There is your picture.” It was the same marked card.

On another occasion, while he was asleep and in the alert stage, Mrs. M. was present. I introduced her, and he spoke to her with perfect propriety. Afterward I said: “Now, I will awake you, but you will only see me. Mrs. M. you will not see at all.”

I then awoke him, as usual. He commenced talking to me in a perfectly natural and unrestrained manner. Mrs. M. stood by my side between him and myself, but he paid not the slightest attention to her; she then withdrew, and I remarked indifferently:

“Wasn’t it a little peculiar of you not to speak to Mrs. M. before she went out?”

“Speak to Mrs. M!” he exclaimed, with evident surprise. “I did not know she had been in the room.”

One day when Drs. Liébeault and Bernheim were together at their clinic at the hospital, Dr. Liébeault suggested to a hypnotized patient that when she awoke she would no longer see Dr. Bernheim, but that she would recognize his hat, would put it on her head, and offer to take it to him.

When she awoke, Dr. Bernheim was standing in front of her. She was asked: “Where is Dr. Bernheim?” She replied: “He is gone, but here is his hat.”

Dr. Bernheim then said to her, “Here I am, madam; I am not gone, you recognize me, perfectly.”

She was silent, taking not the slightest notice of him. Some one else addressed her; she replied with perfect propriety. Finally, when about to go out she took up Dr. Bernheim’s hat, put it on her head, saying she would take it to him; but to her Dr. Bernheim was not present.

To the number of curious phenomena, both physical and mental, connected with hypnotism, it is difficult to find a limit; a few others seem too important in their bearing upon the subject to be omitted, even in this hasty survey.

Some curious experiments in the production of local anæsthesia were observed by the committee on mesmerism from the Society for Psychical Research.

The subject was in his normal condition and blindfolded; his arms were then passed through holes in a thick paper screen, extending in front of him and far above his head, and his ten fingers were spread out upon a table. Two of the fingers were then silently pointed out by a third person to Mr. S., the operator, who proceeded to make passes over the designated fingers.

Care was taken that such a distance was maintained between the fingers of the subject and operator that no contact was possible, and no currents of air or sensation of heat were produced by which the subject might possibly divine which of his fingers were the subject of experiment. In short, the strictest test conditions in every particular, were observed. After the passes had been continued for a minute, or even less time, the operator simply holding his own fingers pointed downward toward the designated fingers of the subject, the two fingers so treated were found to be perfectly stiff and insensible. A strong current of electricity, wounding with a pointed instrument, burning with a match—all failed to elicit the slightest sign of pain or discomfort, while the slightest injury to the unmagnetized fingers quickly elicited cries and protests. When told to double up his fist the two magnetized fingers remained rigid and immovable, and utterly refused to be folded up with the others.

A series of one hundred and sixty experiments of this character was made with five different subjects. Of these, only seven were failures. In another series of forty-one experiments this curious fact was observed. In all these experiments the operator, while making the passes in the same manner and under the same conditions as in the former series, silently willed that the effect should not follow; that is, that insensibility and rigidity should not occur. In thirty-six of these experiments insensibility did not occur; in five cases the insensibility and rigidity occurred—in two cases perfectly, in three imperfectly.

That some quality is imparted even to inanimate objects by some mesmerizers, by passes or handling, through which a sensitive or subject is able to recognize and select that object from among many others, seems to be a well-established fact. The following experiments are in point:—

A gentleman well known to the committee of investigation, and who was equally interested with it in securing reliable results, was selected as a subject. He was accustomed to be hypnotized by the operator, but in the present case he remained perfectly in his normal condition.

One member of the committee took the subject into a separate room on another floor and engaged him closely in conversation. The operator remained with other members of the committee. Ten small miscellaneous articles, such as a piece of sealing wax, a penknife, paperweight, card-case, pocketbook, and similar articles were scattered upon a table. One was designated by the committee, over which the mesmerist made passes, sometimes with light contact.

This was continued for one or two minutes, and when the process was completed the mesmerist was conducted out and to a third room. The articles were then rearranged in a manner quite different from that in which they had been left by the operator, and the subject from the floor above was brought into the room. The several objects were then examined by the sensitive, who upon taking the mesmerized object in his hand, immediately recognized it as the one treated by his mesmerizer.

The experiment was then varied by using ten small volumes exactly alike. One volume was selected by the committee, over which the operator simply made passes with out any contact whatsoever. Three or four other volumes of the set were also handled and passes made over them by a member of the committee.

The operator then being excluded, the sensitive was brought in and immediately selected the magnetized volume. This he did four times in succession. In reply to the question as to how he was able to distinguish the magnetized object from others, he said that when he took the right object in his hand he experienced a mild tingling sensation.

My own experiments with magnetized water have presented similar results. The water was treated by simply holding the fingers of both hands brought together in a clump, for about a minute just over the cup of water, but without any contact whatsoever. This water was then given to the subject without her knowing that she was taking part in an experiment; but alternating it or giving it irregularly with water which had not been so treated, and given by a third person, in every case the magnetized water was at once detected with great certainty. In describing the sensation produced by the magnetized water one patient said the sensation was an agreeable warmth and stimulation upon the tongue, another that it was a “sparkle” like aerated water; it sparkled in her mouth and all the way down into her stomach. Such are a few among the multitude of facts and phenomena relating to hypnotism. They suffice to settle and make sure some matters which until lately have been looked upon as questionable, and, on the other hand, they bring into prominence others of the greatest interest which demand further study.

Among the subjects which may be considered established may be placed,

(1) The reality of the hypnotic condition.

(2) The increased and unusual power of suggestion over the hypnotized subject.

(3) The usefulness of hypnotism as a therapeutic agent.

(4) The perfect reality and natural, as contrasted with supernatural, character of many wonderful phenomena, both physical and psychical, exhibited in the hypnotic state.

On the other hand, much remains for future study;

(1) The exact nature of the influence which produces the hypnotic condition is not known.

(2) Neither is the nature of the rapport or peculiar relationship which exists between the hypnotizer and the hypnotized subject—a relationship which is sometimes so close that the subject hears no voice but that of his hypnotizer, perceives and experiences the same sensations of taste, touch, and feeling generally as are experienced by him, and can be awakened only by him.

(3) Nor is it known by what peculiar process suggestion is rendered so potent, turning, for the time being, at least, water into wine, vulgar weeds into choicest flowers, a lady’s drawing-room into a fishpond, and clear skies and quiet waters into lightning-rent storm-clouds and tempest-tossed waves; turning laughter into sadness, and tears into mirth.

In dealing with the subject of hypnotism in this hasty and general way, only such facts and phenomena have been presented as are well known and accepted by well-informed students of the subjects. Others still more wonderful will later claim our attention.

CHAPTER IV.

LUCIDITY OR CLAIRVOYANCE.