HYPNOTISM AND ITS PHENOMENA. 75 
opened, the impression produced, we must assume, by light induces some 
new condition by which that side of the body of the patient is thrown 
into a cataleptic state. Now before inquiring what this change is, 
it may be well for us to try and explain the pathological condition 
present in a catalepsy which may attack persons without their first 
passing into the hypnotized state. At the outset we must confess 
to the unsatisfactory information which most of our authors give us 
on the subject. All that even Bristow says is, ‘“ that in cataleptics 
we have a class of cases difficult to classify. and difficult to attach to 
specific lesions or specific conditions of the nervous system.” We 
do find, however, in M. Jaccoud already quoted from something 
which really does aid us. 
He says :—‘“ Catalepsy is a spasmodic paroxysm and is constituted 
of two elements: (1) the suspension of cerebral operations, or their 
external manifestations ; (2) the increase of the spontaneous and 
reflex tonicity (innervation de stabilité) in the muscles of animal 
life. The abolition of cerebral action presents itself under two forms 
(rather degrees) which imply different organic localizations : in one 
(a) there is total loss of consciousness, viz., of sensation, perception, 
ideaism and its consecutive acts, and this can be interpreted only by 
the inertia of the grey substance of the hemispheres ; in the other 
(6) consciousness is not suspended, perception and ideasim are com- 
plete, but lack the last link of the chain, 7. e., the motor intuition 
cannot be communicated to the motor apparatus. Here it is clear the 
‘cortical substance is normal, but the inertia is in the conductive fibres 
which bind together the organizing apparatus and the performing appa- 
ratus. Nevertheless the result is the same; tonic spasm is present, 
keeping various sets of muscles in whatever position placed. And this 
tonic spasm (spasmes du tonics) is a lasting tension. Here we have 
a most noticeable fact in the marked increase in the innervation of 
of stability. The tension keeping up this stable condition of the 
muscles must be looked upon as a reflex phenomenon, provoked by 
the molecular change (elongation or shortening) which the communi- 
cative movements cause the muscles to undergo. It is this molecular 
change which is the centripetal excitation necessary to all reflex 
movements ; and this stimulus repeats itself every time that the 
muscle is moved. One difficulty exists in the constant relation 
which binds the quantity of tension to that of passive movement in 
such a way that the reflex spasm produced by this latter is always 
