It is not likely that a large number of people would simulate perfect insensibility to such pain for the sake of self-aggrandizement, or of making themselves in some way wonderful. Persons suffering the death-agony would hardly profess to have been unconscious for some hours, and that their pain did not exist unless they at least believed what they were saying. That complexus of conditions termed hypnosis is a reality and the fact that we cannot explain it in no way disproves its existence. Because we do not know the law of chemical affinities, why one element is attracted by another, is no reason why our observations in this direction are erroneous. I shall now endeavor to make clear my own conceptions of the hypnotic state. These conceptions, be it understood, are only tentative,

They may change even before this book goes to press. I have, in many ways, as have many others, shown the close resemblance between the hypnotic state and many of the states occurring in the disease known as hysteria. I have mentioned before that I believed every individual possessed the capacity of becoming hysterical in a greater or less degree.

One hysterical phenomenon, such as anaesthesia, may occur and all the rest be absent. They may occur in various combinations. Hysteria can be cultivated. So the susceptibility to hypnosis may be increased with each individual. I know from personal experience that I can at will render apart of my body partially anresthetie. I know that I can bring upon myself at will a state of hypnosis. I have seen this occur in so many ways and under such widely different circumstances, and present such a diversity of appearances, that it has been a marvel to me that medical men have not investigated and studied it more thoroughly. I have seen a man cultivate the power of automatic writing. Another learned to change his personality, while the third would become somnambulic, and the fourth rigid (cataleptic), and the fifth cultivate hallucinations of sense. And so I might enumerate for pages.

These states can he produced either as a resuit of the action of the individual's mind upon himself, independently of the suggestion of another, or they may occur as the result of such a suggestion made to him directly by a person or by some association or environment. Let me make myself clear. In the United States alone there are thousands of individuals who believe in spiritualism. They represent all classes, from the most intelligent and cultivated to the most ignorant. In fact, it is astonishing how many people believe, in one way or another, that they either do or have communicated with those who have died, or, as the spiritualists express it, "who have passed to the other side."

At least 90 per cent, of all these persons when sitting in "circles," or, as frequently is the case, around a table, will give evidence of some form of auto-hypnosis. Even the symptoms of what Charcot calls "le grand hypnotisme" occur with great frequency in some persons sitting in "circles." Now, whether communications are held or not with spirits at these times is not the question under discussion in this book. The solving of that question belongs to another department of psychological experiment. What I do state is this, that let any number of persons, say ten, sit together with the expectation of obtaining certain phenomena, if they will observe the proper conditions, there will be some one or more of the following occurrences take 20 place. In addition to the description of the various sensations, such as feeling an electric current, giddiness, ringing in the ears, sensations of heat and cold, etc., one or more members of the circle will usually become very ecstatic, go into a hypnotic state resembling sleep, write upon paper if a pencil is held in the dark or in the light, or in some other way give evidence by his conduct of being in an unusual condition. Such an assembly does not need to be composed wholly of spiritualists.

It is frequently the case that the one professing the most scepticism will be the most profoundly affected. If any one doubts my statement, and if the doubt is due to want of experience in the matter, let him try it for himself.

Assemble any ten people, appoint a definite hour for meeting, sit down quietly, and do not, for the time at least, ridicule anything that occurs. Let all place their hands upon the table, or join hands, or neither, just as they may prefer, and try the experiment for fifteen sittings, and there are very strong probabilities that some of the phenomena mentioned will be obtained. They will of course differ much.

Now, if the susceptibility of the masses to such states as I have described exists to such an extent, it is worthy of being studied and thoroughly understood, if possible. Many persons sitting in a spiritualistic circle cannot be hypnotized for the reason that they resist it, if that is any reason. (Many people resist hypnotism and yet can be hypnotized). These same subjects will, however, pass into a state which closely resembles hypnosis even to such an extent as to change their personality, to be either unconscious of pain or intensely conscious of everything occurring around them, and some of them will, like subjects hypnotized in the ordinary way, profess to be ignorant of what occurs while they are in the trance state, as it is termed.

Let us again analyze. We wish to hypnotize a man by fixing his gaze upon a bright object. His whole being is placed in an excited state by the very idea that some one is trying to exercise an influence upon his mind which to him is unusual.

In this way one definite mental state is produced. He may be intensely frightened, or by the concentration of his will he may be made for the time oblivious to everything else. He will as a consequence experience one or more unusual sensations. These intensify his mental activity. This mental activity is then further heightened by the suggestion of the operator. The sensations and the suggestion increase the man's belief that something unusual is occurring and he is told to perform a certain act. First, the impulse of obedience is further intensified by the concentration of his faculties; secondly, his faith is in its turn heightened again by the unusual occurrences and situations. In this way a circle is established around which his mind swings. His consciousness is turned inward. That is, he is told to think of one part of his body. He becomes oblivious to the rest. This unusual state of mind, from its very intensity, produces, when suggestion is used, motor and sensory disturbances. These heighten his credulity. More and more his attention is focussed in one or another direction. Dr. Bernheim speaks of the focussing of the nervous energy, whatever this may be.