HYPNOTISM, hip'no-tism, the process by which one person, called a hypnotist, obtains, holds and exercises control of the will, volun tary powers and sensory organism of another person, the subject (or victim). The charac ter of hypnotism has been a matter of long dispute, and the literature of the subject is very contradictory, but the facts have finally been demonstrated, and come to the knowledge of a number of advanced physicians, who are endeavoring to promulgate them. Hypnotism has been known and practised through the ages, and is referred to in early writings as the •evil eye.° There is no reason to doubt that the sorcerers and wizards of olden times were in many cases hypnotists, whose bewitching consisted in hypnotizing others and taking ad vantage of the supremacy thus gained over them. Dr. James Braid of England, originator of the word hypnotism, in 1£341, gave public exhibitions of hypnotism, brought on by in viting the subjects to blank their minds and gaze on a bright object, and then by exer cising his will to overcome their wills. Be cause he made no conscious use of animal magnetism, Braid thought he had discovered something different from mesmerism — the name given to hypnotic therapewics as prac tised by Franz A. Mesmer at Por4 'late in the 18th century. But it is now apparent that mesmerism and hypnotism are identical, except in the method of inducing the state of artificial somnambulism. It has also been demonstrated that the mediumistic trance is accomplished on the same underlying principle—that of robbing the subject or victim of his will power by a partial or total paralysis of the brain. It is also now known Alit hypnotism is amM the harmless pastime -W&• the wonderful curative agent which it has long been sioposed=trimise. It is granted by all authorities on the subject that one person may surrender his will, and be put into an abnormal hypnotic sleep through exertion of the will of a hypnotist, and that in this condition the subject or victim can be made to' do very many foolish and ridiculous things for the amusement of spectators, or he may be put into such a deep coma that a surgical operation can be performed without his knowledge or feeling any pain, the hypnosis serving the purpose of an anwsthetic. 'The dis
covery that hypnotism could be used to put patients to sleep for severe operations was hailed by the surgical profession with delight, as the anwsthetics generally used are not wholly satisfactory. It led to the practice of hypno tism by various medical men, and some of them undertake to use it to cure bad habits, such as the liquor habit, by so-called to the patient while he is under hypnotic in fluence.
That all practice or experiment with hypno tism is wrong and harmful is not at first ap parent, and has been suspected only by a minority. Those stage exhibitors who found money in it, and those physicians who found it an interesting addition to their stock of methods of cure, have generally been loud in defending the practice when attacked, and un questionably most of the physicians have been honest in such defense. The continued de lusion on the subject has been due largely to the misuse of the simple word Fsuggestion°— there being so many suggestions which are harmless, and which are employed legitimately to effect cures by stimulating the faith of the patient. Faith is indeed a powerful curative agent, according to views held by many physi cians.
But the so-called 1 su gge s t i on )) of hypnotism is a very different thing, because what the hypnotist really does is to paralyze the normal , action of the brain of his victim, and rob him of his will power; and then to give him, while i this helpless state continues, imperative com mands which he is pulvelless-te`-resist, because, he is for the time— in just so far as he is con trolled —a slave to the will of his hypnotist. To call this "suggestionF is somewhat like ap plying the term suggestion to the act of the highwayman who orders one to hand out his money at the point of a revolver.