ORIGIN AND USE OF HYPNOTISM 
The origin of hypnotism, that is to say, the substance of 
hypnotism, like the discovery of fire, is lost in the maze of 
tradition and speculation. It is certain that hypnotic phenom¬ 
ena were known thousands of years ago to the wise men, or 
magicians of Persia and India. There is no doubt that it ex¬ 
isted as far back as our earliest written records go. Tradition 
traces it far beyond that time, but even tradition undertakes 
to establish no definite time or place as its origin. Neither 
does it undertake to say how it originated, whether with man 
or beast. 
There is no doubt but that Egypt, one of the early homes 
of the human race, was well versed in the hypnotic art. It is 
to be found recorded in Egyptian pictures, and by figures drawn 
upon mummy cases, amulets and charms, all of which testify 
loudly of its existence at that time. How proficient they were 
in the art, and to what purpose it was put, we have no definite 
information. We have only to surmise that it was used in their 
medical science, judging from such records as are available to 
us. Doubtless it also exercised a profound religious influence 
in their lives. 
It would appear from history that hypnotism was practiced 
by the saints of the Catholic Church, and the use they made of 
it gave to us the group known as mystics. The practices carried 
on in the monasteries of the Latin Church by the saintly men 
of Christendom claimed to have reached the highest spiritual 
state attainable by men in the flesh, and yet these processes 
were practiced in the far Orient many centuries before the 
Christian era, and they are doubtlessly closely allied with many 
of the phenomena of the hypnotic art. 
Mesmerism, another of the secret arts, and so called from 
Mesmer, by one of its later disciples, was familiar to the an¬ 
cients, and appears to be closely allied with the entire history 
of mystical religious experiences. We are not able to say 
whether there must be conscious co-operation between the per¬ 
former and the subject. The connection between mysticism and 
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