Complete Hypnotism, Mesmerism, Mind-Reading and Spritualism | Page 5

phenomena of hypnotism,
and created a school of writers who made use of the word
"electro-biology."
In 1850 Braid's ideas were introduced into France, and Dr. Azam, of
Bordeaux, published an account of them in the "Archives de
Medicine." From this time on the subject was widely studied by
scientific men in France and Germany, and it was more slowly taken up
in England. It may be stated here that the French and other Latin races
are much more easily hypnotized than the northern races, Americans
perhaps being least subject to the hypnotic influence, and next to them
the English. On the other hand, the Orientals are influenced to a degree
we can hardly comprehend.
WHAT IS HYPNOTISM?
We have seen that so far the history of hypnotism has given us two
manifestations, or methods, that of passes and playing upon the
imagination in various ways, used by Mesmer, and that of physical
means, such as looking at a bright object, used by Braid. Both of these
methods are still in use, and though hundreds of scientific men,
including many physicians, have studied the subject for years, no
essentially new principle has been discovered, though the details of
hypnotic operation have been thoroughly classified and many minor
elements of interest have been developed. All these make a body of
evidence which will assist us in answering the question, What is
hypnotism?
Modern scientific study has pretty conclusively established the
following facts:
1. Idiots, babies under three years old, and hopelessly insane people
cannot be hypnotized.
2. No one can be hypnotized unless the operator can make him
concentrate his attention for a reasonable length of time. Concentration
of attention, whatever the method of producing hypnotism, is
absolutely necessary.

3. The persons not easily hypnotized are those said to be neurotic (or
those affected with hysteria). By "hysteria" is not meant nervous
excitability, necessarily. Some very phlegmatic persons may be
affected with hysteria. In medical science "hysteria" is an irregular
action of the nervous system. It will sometimes show itself by severe
pains in the arm, when in reality there is nothing whatever to cause pain;
or it will raise a swelling on the head quite without cause. It is a
tendency to nervous disease which in severe cases may lead to insanity.
The word neurotic is a general term covering affection of the nervous
system. It includes hysteria and much else beside.
On all these points practically every student of hypnotism is agreed. On
the question as to whether any one can produce hypnotism by pursuing
the right methods there is some disagreement, but not much. Dr. Ernest
Hart in an article in the British Medical Journal makes the following
very definite statement, representing the side of the case that maintains
that any one can produce hypnotism. Says he:
"It is a common delusion that the mesmerist or hypnotizer counts for
anything in the experiment. The operator, whether priest, physician,
charlatan, self-deluded enthusiast, or conscious imposter, is not the
source of any occult influence, does not possess any mysterious power,
and plays only a very secondary and insignificant part in the chain of
phenomena observed. There exist at the present time many individuals
who claim for themselves, and some who make a living by so doing, a
peculiar property or power as potent mesmerizers, hypnotizers,
magnetizers, or electro-biologists. One even often hears it said in
society (for I am sorry to say that these mischievous practices and
pranks are sometimes made a society game) that such a person is a
clever hypnotist or has great mesmeric or healing power. I hope to be
able to prove, what I firmly hold, both from my own personal
experience and experiment, as I have already related in the Nineteenth
Century, that there is no such thing as a potent mesmeric influence, no
such power resident in any one person more than another; that a glass
of water, a tree, a stick, a penny-post letter, or a lime-light can
mesmerize as effectually as can any individual. A clever hypnotizer
means only a person who is acquainted with the physical or mental

tricks by which the hypnotic condition is produced; or sometimes an
unconscious imposter who is unaware of the very trifling part for which
he is cast in the play, and who supposes himself really to possess a
mysterious power which in, fact he does not possess at all, or which, to
speak more accurately, is equally possessed by every stock or stone."
Against this we may place the statement of Dr. Foveau de Courmelles,
who speaks authoritatively for the whole modern French school. He
says:
"Every magnetizer is aware that certain individuals never can induce
sleep even in the most easily hypnotizable subjects. They admit that the
sympathetic fluid is necessary, and that each person