I can deal briefly with this, and refer the reader further to what has already been aaid. The principal significance of suggestion is a psychological and psychophysiological one. It offers the psychologists a scientific method for experimenting, the like of which they did not. possess hitherto. That it is a wonderfully delicate and many-sided reagent is shown by the fact that it can influence and modify all the characteristics of the mind down to the finest variations of logic, ethics, and aesthetics.1

On looking more closely at it, suggestion is revealed to us as being an invasion into the associative dynamics of our mind. It dissociates that which was associated, and associates that which was not associated before. Its chief invasion is an inhibitory one, is a dissociation of the associated (hypoconceived) automatisms of the mind (brain). The dissociated dynamics of the brain of the hypnotized person are in the condition of weakness or of hypotaxis, as compared with the well-concentrated and associated dynamics of the hypnotist, which press the suggestion into the former by the way of the organs of special sense. Its activity becomes plastically moldable, and is compelled to adapt itself more or less irresistibly to the suggestion. The cause of this subordination does not lie so much in the special strength of the hypnotist as in the feeling and in the conviction of the subjection or the being influenced on the part of the hypnotized person. We are all in the condition of hypotaxis, of weakness, of dissociation during normal sleep, and we then confuse all our thoughts (dreams) with actual occurrences. For this reason sleep is very advantageous for suggestion. During sleep even the more powerful brain must obey the suggestions of an otherwise less powerful brain, which, as it is in a waking condition, is more powerfully associated. But if once a mind A (a brain) has been energetically influenced by another, B, in this way, the possibility of being influenced by the mind B remains by means of the recollection which has called forth the conviction that B is capable of acting on the mind A. Still, it is the activity of the mind (the brain) A which in reality accomplishes the potent action of the suggestion. It is only guided more or less definitely and at will by the mind B - i.e., is incited to dissociation, association, inhibition, or to marked development. Similar processes are at work in the taming of lions and elephants.

1 O. Vogt (see p. 165), and Naeff's thesis on "A Case of Amnesia."

B only uses those dynamisms present in A, which work as idiosyncrasies in the dynamisms of the mind A, and which only follow the suggestions from B because they are no longer capable of inducing a conscious general concentration, and no longer recognize their own power. A's dynamisms are therefore taken unawares more and more by B's suggestions, and always follow them more and more automatically - at all events at first.

The same sort of conditions apply to the influence of persons on one another in political and also in social life generally. One meets with it in the case of the ringleader among children, and among animals; in certain prophets and chiefs; in the white man against the colored races; in Napoleon and Bismarck against Europe; in human beings against the domestic animals; and in the victors against the conquered generally, not only in man, but also in animals. One can even observe similar nerve phenomena in insects (ants), 1 when a large number of larger and stronger insects have been impudently taken by surprise by a few weaker ones, and run away without resistance and without pluck, leaving their larvae and young, whom they usually nurse so carefully, in a cowardly way. This is a very striking suggestion action; but, however tempting they are, one should not attribute a too literal importance to these analogies. They are, after all, only analogous processes.

One must not regard the real influencing of a person by means of pure reasoning as suggestion. But there is a large number of transition stages possible between these actions and those of perfectly unconscious true suggestions.

The historical and ethnological importance of suggestion is much greater than one supposes. I must refer my readers to the estimable work of Professor Otto Stoll, "Suggestion and Hypnotism in the Psychology of the Nations." 2 Its action shows itself in all races, in all grades of culture, and plays an important part especially in religion and mysticism. Stoll has shown that this is so, very strikingly. One can trace it phylo-genetically from the lowest developed races down to the various species of the animal kingdom.

1 Ford: " Foumis de La Suisse," 1877. p. 314, and "The Psychical Capabilities of Ants," p. 37. (Monchen, 1901.)

2 Professor Otto Stoll: "Suggestion and Hypnotism in the Psychology of the Nations," Leipeig, 1905, second edition. (K. F. Koehler. antiquarian?)

An extraordinary historical case, in which autosuggestive hallucination played a part of world-wide importance, is met with in Joan of Arc, the maid of Orleans. I refer the reader to the work of Dr. J. Zuercher on this important subject.1 I am of opinion that Joan of Arc was a genial and ethically disposed hysteric. Her hallucinations did not depend on a mental disturbance, but on continuous autosuggestions, which were produced by her religious and patriotic exaltation.

As we have Been, suggestion is of practical importance for medical therapy. Habits are often induced autosuggestively, and removed suggestively.

And thus I am brought to the consideration of the pedagogic importance of suggestion. Those who do not understand suggestion will be terrified by the thought of this. But he who has completely grasped it will know how to employ it peda-gogically in two ways:

Firstly, symptomatically, one might almost say medically, in order to combat bad and harmful habits and perverse qualities of character. In this case it must be applied in the same way as in therapeutic hypnosis, and, as in the latter case, one must contrive to only use it as long as it is necessary, and not ad infinitum. One will have to use all means to make the result a lasting one, which will propagate itself by properly guided autosuggestions.

Secondly, the suggestion regarded from another point of view becomes one of the most interesting of the future problems of pedagogism and of developmental psychology. Every one is aware that some teachers, parents, guardians, etc, can achieve anything they please with children, while others attain just the reverse, and only reap disobedience and contradictions. This depends simply on the fact that the children are subjected to the unconscious suggestion action of the first-named, but not of the latter. Repeated unskillful threats, dissatisfaction and complaints that the authority (e.g., of a father) is not respected, powerless exhibition of feelings, especially of the feeling of anger - in short, revealing of weaknesses - are things which, as is well known, produce disobedience, the spirit of contradiction, and, in consequence, obstinacy toward education in children. On the other hand, the man who knows how to teach obedience as a natural, unavoidable thing, and who puts what he teaches above all possibility of dispute, does nothing else than suggest instinctively. He will be instinctively obeyed. Exaggeration of this method, especially continuation of it in children up to an advanced age, breeds the danger of fostering the belief in authority and dependence on others. Reasonable discussion must be introduced into the mind at a suitable time and in a proper place. Once one has grasped that the key of these mental actions and reactions in children is to be found in the proper application of suggestion, pedagogism will learn to use that which has hitherto been applied unconsciously and irregularly with consciousness and system, and will derive enormous benefits from it. Above all, one must suggest in the atmosphere of the school an awakening of interest for the school to the children by means of love and enthusiasm, just as the hypnotist wins his patients over for himself. The secret of the successes of Dr. Lietz's new reform school in Ilsenburg-Haubinda, of Dr. Reddie's school in Abbotsholme, and Messrs. Zuberbuehler and Frei's school in Glarisegg (Switzerland), depends in part on this, while the old school system, on the contrary, often suggests antipathy for the school and teachers to the pupils.

1 Dr.Josephine Zuercher (Leipzig Oswald Mutse, 1895).

In order to obtain a clear idea of the pedagogic value of suggestion, one must remember that the character of a person at every epoch of his existence is the product of two component complexes, inheritance and adaptation. One usually makes the mistake of attempting to trace everything from one or other only of those two complexes. The inherited disposition forms the deeper, more tenacious power; but it may be implanted at times more deeply, and at times less deeply. In the latter case, it is possible to tackle it by means of consistent educational (adapted) action all the more successfully, so that on being repeated over again these actions may become habit or secondary automatisms. Suggestion can step in here and work successfully, I must refer in this place to the important social side of suggestion. One realizes, generally speaking, that good manners are destroyed by bad company, and that young people and women are especially easily corrupted. One recognizes the power of the press, of fashion, of public opinion, of ridicule, of political and religious fanaticism, of trashy novels, etc. But. one overrates the capability of the "freewill" of the "free man" to protect himself against these mass suggestions. A closer and deeper study of the conditions shows up the terrible weakness of the majority toward the power of such suggestions. How can a poor girl escape the insidious, cunning traps which the accomplices of the trading procurer sets, assisting himself with every psychological lever of deception, seduction, want of money, alcohol, and intimidation? How does the conceited mass of voters stand toward superficial gossip, and the frequently systemized perversion of the half-educated, who so often take upon themselves, as journalists, to judge customs and to teach the world ? And how does it stand toward the machinations of political cliques? We know by experience that a few cleverly chosen words, and not the argument of reason, nor even the simple truth, suggest to the great mass, who are just like a herd of sheep, better than anything else; and that the few more reasoning independent people who will not follow are left in the lurch. When will the contra-suggestion of a healthy human morality gain the upper hand over the destructive suggestions of our immoral politics and literature on the one hand, and of the out-of-date religious mysticism on the other? After all, suggestion does not act in its pure, true form in all these cases; it is combined largely with more or less conceived, misunderstood arguments of reason, and, above all, with feelings and sensations, so that it is, as a rule, difficult to distinguish between these various elements.