R. S. HYER-LAW OF HYPNOTISM. 
11 
so much? From the time of Franklin many investigators of hypnotism have 
pointed out the necessity for recognizing the subject’s imaginations or 
beliefs as being its most important factor. The same is apparent in the 
kindred arts of “faith cures,” “magnetic healing,” and “spiritualism.” 
No view of these is complete that does not recognize their existence in 
all ages and among all people. According to Taylor, the “ highly devel¬ 
oped trance medium” is found among the Figians, the hill tribes of 
Burmah, in New Zealand, China and Siberia. Mr. Lang declares, “the 
power which produces hypnotism has always been known, even among 
people in a low state of civilization.” Let us see to what agent we must 
ascribe these closely allied phenomena in that period when they were 
most extensive, varied and intense. This period was the Middle Ages. 
All historians declare that during this age the brightest intellects were 
dominated by imagination, and every department of life subject to the 
wildest fancies. The philosopher whose experiment failed at the critical 
moment when he expected the base metal to change to gold, was as prone 
to ascribe his ill luck to the presence of an evil spirit as was the “ breath¬ 
less housewife” when her churn was “ bootless ” and “ the drink bore no 
barm.” At this period an all-powerful Church, under the reaction of 
older beliefs, had filled the earth with contending spirits, and had con¬ 
structed formulae for their exorcism. Under this powerful stimulus there 
were nightly encounters with fiends and monsters, witches and spirits. 
Compacts were made with the devil in human form. Accusations and 
confessions of witchcraft were common. For all of these encounters, 
apparitions, visions and epidemics of imaginary diseases, we can assign 
no reason, save that they were “shadows cast by human hopes and fears,” 
which ecstacy and despair made subjective realities. The same continues 
to be done in our own day. If encounters with devils and witches have 
ceased, it has only been to give place to visitations in bodily form of 
dead relatives and friends. Why the mind should thus make real its 
beliefs will doubtless ever remain in the “substratum of unexplained 
facts” upon which all knowledge rests. 
This creative dynamic power of belief is seen in other phenomena not 
usually classified with those of hypnotism. As Mr. Bain has stated it, 
“an idea always tends to act out itself.” Though usually finding its 
highest manifestation in hypnotism and spiritualism, it is by no means 
limited to these. A lady well known to me was treated for rheumatism 
with a patented apparatus supposed to be electrical. Its application re¬ 
sulted in “shocks” of such intensity that she was soon prostrated. Its 
use was discontinued because it was apparent that the treatment was too 
severe. To one at all familiar with the conditions necessary for the pro¬ 
duction of appreciable amounts of electricity, it was quite apparent that 
these shocks had been caused by no agent save the belief that they would 
