More About Hypnotism.
Charcot and others, including the whole range of recent hypnotists, have revived this error. The experience of all mesmerists—past and present—worthy of the name is this: the healthier and finer the organization, the more perfect and exalted the manifestations.
There are relative conditions of superiority and inferiority in mesmerists and sensitives only. I have mesmerized men who were my superiors in every way—health, strength of body and mind—the only conditions of difference consisting of this important fact, that for the time being they approached the subject of Mesmerism with open minds—a desire to get at truth—and sat down with a non-resistant attitude of mind, perfectly willing to be mesmerized, and to record their own symptoms in connection therewith, if possible. In the majority of cases the seventh or eighth sitting suffices to overcome all difficulties, and induce sleep in the most healthy and vigorous. There have, however, been exceptions to this. Don’t waste time with a man who makes a bet through pride, vanity, or ignorance, that he can’t be mesmerized. Don’t waste health and energy trying to influence him just then. His manner and words indicate that he will arouse all his faculties to resist you, presenting thereby positive and antagonistic mental conditions for you to overcome. Men have done this. If you really want to mesmerize them the best plan is to throw them off their guard as to your intentions. But as soon as their opposition is cooled down a little, proceed gently and steadily to impress them with what Mesmerism has done and can do. Thus gradually and surely psychologize them, leading up to and preparing them for the final coup. In the end it may not be so difficult to mesmerize them as they at first imagined. The persistent man of business, the advocate of certain views—temperance, anti-slavery, or what not—the man with “a mission,” the doctor of medicine, preacher, and lover, all adopt this method more or less unconsciously, because naturally; the mesmerist, detecting the law, applies it consciously—that is all.
In natural sleep the heart beats slower, the pulses are calmer, there is less blood in the brain than in the waking state. By mesmeric processes you endeavor to bring about a similar physiological condition—every magnetic pass determining the result by retarding the flow of arterial blood to the brain. Also in natural sleep the eyes are turned upward and inward. A brief explanation of the muscles of the eye, and how they influence its movements, will be interesting. There are two sets of muscles. The superior, or oblique muscles, are involuntary in their action, and therefore are not subject to the action of the will. The inferior or straight muscles (of which there are four), are attached at cardinal points to the eyeball, and by their combined action the eyes are moved in every direction required for vision. The latter muscles are voluntary—that is, subject to the will of the individual. Now, when the eyes are withdrawn from the operations of the will, they are controlled involuntarily by the oblique muscles, and turned upward and inward. For instance, in intense joy, in devotion, pain, sorrow, exhaustion, or bodily weakness, the eyes are turned up. This arises from the fact that the straight muscles resign their action, and the oblique muscles operate in their stead, and the eye is rolled upward under the eyelid. In acknowledging the presence of a superior, and in the act of bowing, the eyes are “lifted up.” See a girl in happy thought pondering on the future, a patient suffering from extreme pain, the devotee at worship—be he idolater or Christian, or the wearied one waiting for transition to other and happier scenes on high—the same characteristic is observed. Thus in sleep, in fainting, or in approaching death, the phenomenon is observed in all. The voluntary muscles resign their action, insensibility prevails, and retina loses expression, and the pupil is turned up as described. Whatever contributes to this result, contributes to sleep. The mesmeric operator avails himself of this and the foregoing in his endeavors to induce artificial sleep.
Hypnotists deliberately weary the inferior muscles of the eyes, trusting to automatic inhibition of the nerve centres for the results desired. Success in certain directions indicates they are not far astray. The mesmerist standing above his patient, or sitting in a chair a little higher up than the patient unconsciously leads to the same automatic effect, but much more naturally. The hypnotist will cause the subject to strain his eyes at an object. The mesmerist desires his sensitive to be seated comfortably, to look at him (the mesmerist), and if the sensitive or patient feel inclined to close his eyes, to do so, or to sleep, to do so—the latter process being more in harmony with nature than the former.