572 Moral Epidemics and Contagions. [October, 
brain produces yawning. Such yawning is evidently not 
due to contagion ; it is symptomatic of some diredt cause, 
and it might be called spontaneous. 
But this yawning may become transmissible, because the 
cerebral movement under the influence of which it is pro- 
duced may be transmitted to other brains without altering 
its character. It thus gives rise to an indirect reflex 
adtion, and to what is called the contagion of a nervous 
phenomenon. 
This indirect reflex adtion is very remarkable from the 
origin of the movement which determines it, and must be 
specially distinguished from the other. 
In more complex cases the process is not dissimilar. A 
man of strong will, a believer in himself, possessing great 
self-reliance, or at least a great power of self-assertion, 
we mention here no names, — fails under the influence oi 
“ dominant ideas.” We have not here space for the analysis 
of the process, but these dominant ideas are quickly trans- 
ferred to the brains of others, and may become an epidemic, 
local, national, or universal. We may remark that the 
moral contagion from a powerful brain is dangerous in pro- 
portion to its power, just as is perceived in the transmission 
of diseases from one animal species to another. 
M. Rambosson has carefully studied the circumstances 
attendant upon this reflex adtion. Careful and minute ob- 
servations and repeated experiments have led him to the 
following observations : — Many of these results have been 
recognised in ordinary reflex adtion, but they catch a new 
light from the application thus made of them to the trans- 
mission or propagation of nervous phenomena. Others of 
the results have been newly discovered by M. Rambosson. 
i. Those reflex movements which produce contagion are 
sometimes conscious and at other times unconscious. 
They may be automatic, instindtive, or voluntary and 
refledtive. 
Thus, for instance, if any person yawns in our presence 
we may allow ourselves to yawn without being aware of it, 
and may even be surprised to find ourselves yawning. 
At other times we are perfedtly aware that we are about 
to yawn. 
At other times, again, we resist the yawning, and by a 
voluntary refledtive adt we neutralise the reflex movement 
which tends to display itself outwardly in the form of 
yawning. And by frequently repeating this effort we become 
at last able to neutralise the movement without much 
