846 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



tion on topics that are of current interest. 

 Mr. Hart frankly states that he hopes the 

 volume will serve a useful purpose in dissi- 

 pating some popular errors and a good deal 

 of pseudo-scientific superstition, superim- 

 posed on a slender basis of physiological 

 and pathological phenomena. 



His first chapter has the suggestive title 

 of Hypnotism and Humbug, and in it he re- 

 fers to the fact that hypnotism has come 

 down to us through the ages, the lineal de- 

 scendant of many ancient beliefs. He very 

 truly says that the term " animal magnet- 

 ism" applied to any of the phenomena of 

 induced sleep, human automatism, hypnotic 

 suggestions, or faith cures is a pure misno- 

 mer, being an example of that tendency 

 satirized by Voltaire when he speaks of the 

 custom of " mystics and charlatans to conse- 

 crate their ignorance and to impress its con- 

 clusions upon others by giving a name that 

 has no meaning to phenomena that they do not 

 understand.' 1 '' Briefly and lucidly the physio- 

 logical explanation of that more or less com- 

 plete suspension of the will, known as in- 

 duced sleep, is portrayed ; and reference is 

 made to the various phenomena that may be 

 displayed by an individual under the influ- 

 ence of suggestion. But Mr. Hart empha- 

 sizes the fact that the allegation that an in- 

 dividual under the influence of suggestion 

 has powers of clairvoyance, can predict fu- 

 ture events, has insight into hidden things, 

 or, in a few words, has developed new pow- 

 ers, is, under any and all circumstances, im- 

 posture. 



The second chapter briefly refers to the 

 ancient employment of the magnet in medi- 

 cine, to Mesmer and his methods, to the 

 " possessed " and the " demoniacs," and Mr. 

 Hart shows that all these influences are the 

 result of a condition of disturbed equilibrium 

 of the nervous system and brain apparatus 

 of the person operated on or affected there- 

 with. A number of illustrations of postures 

 and facial expressions of patients in the 

 Salpetriere Hospital in Paris are inserted 

 and lend force to the author's thesis that 

 most of the phenomena characteristic of the 

 extreme degrees of hypnotization and sug- 

 gestibility may occur in that condition of 

 disturbed equilibrium of the patient, male or 

 female, known as hysteria. In the latter 

 condition there is often an auto-suggestion 



that, like the hetero-suggestion inducing hyp- 

 notism, abolishes the power of the will ; and 

 the brain losing its restraining and control- 

 ling powers, emotions may be excited, feelings 

 induced, and intellectual operations set in 

 motion, independently of the will of the in- 

 dividual as well as without individual con- 

 sciousness being alive to what is going on. 

 As to the treatment of disease by means of 

 what has been termed " suggestive therapeu- 

 tics," Mr. Hart cites Charcot, Ricker, Ba- 

 binski, and Dejerine, who agree that for 

 curative purposes hypnotism is very rarely 

 useful, generally entirely useless, and often 

 injurious. 



The third chapter is one of the most in- 

 teresting in the volume, dealing as it does 

 with Luys's experiments at La Charite Hospi- 

 tal in Paris, that have been given wide pub- 

 licity in general literature and that have 

 served to originate many misconceptions re- 

 garding the phenomena of hypnotism. 



Dr. Luys defines hypnotism as an extra- 

 physiological experimental state of the nerv- 

 ous system, or a pseudo-sleep which is im- 

 posed and during which the subject under 

 experiment loses the notion of his or her 

 own existence and of the external world. 

 He professes to create experimentally many 

 of the disorders of mental pathology in 

 certain stages of hypnotism, and thus to 

 give a factitious representation of some of 

 the disorders of madness. He presented for 

 Mr. Hart's observation five patients that 

 were, Mr. Hart states, profoundly neuro- 

 pathic. These patients were extremely sen- 

 sitive, when hypnotized, to feeble magnetic 

 currents, to residual magnetic impressions, 

 to magnetic effluvia, to the perception of col- 

 ored luminous atmospheres radiating from 

 and playing around the poles of a magnet or 

 of a faradaic machine, and to flames and ef- 

 fluvia of like character proceeding from the 

 features, the fingers, and the hands of the 

 human subject. These subjects would caress 

 with various manifestations of delight the 

 "north pole" of the magnet, about which 

 they saw blue flames playing, while dread 

 and terror were produced by presenting the 

 " south pole," about which red flames played. 

 Even photograph paper having an impression 

 of the "north" or "south" pole produced 

 similar phenomena in these persons. Around 

 the head of one of the hypnotized persons a 



