It would seem, however, that the hypnotic subject is by no means entirely at the mercy of the operator. Thus Dr Milne Bramwell, in "Proceedings," vol. xii. pp. 176-203, cites a number of cases in which suggestions had been refused by hypnotic subjects. He also mentions two subjects who had rejected certain suggestions and accepted others. A Miss F., for example, recited a poem, but would not help herself to a glass of water from the sideboard; while a Mr G. would play one part, but not others, and committed an imaginary crime. Dr Bramwell comes to the following conclusion:—
"The difference between the hypnotised and the normal subject, as it appears to me from a long series of observed facts, is not so much in conduct as in increased mental and physical powers. Any changes in the moral sense, I have noticed, have invariably been for the better, the hypnotised subject evincing superior refinement. As regards obedience to suggestion, there is apparently little to choose between the two. A hypnotised subject, who has acquired the power of manifesting various physical and mental phenomena, will do so, in response to suggestion, for much the same reasons as one in the normal condition.... When the act demanded is contrary to the moral sense, it is usually refused by the normal subject, and invariably by the hypnotised one."
The hypnotic state evinces an extraordinary extension of faculty. Dr Bramwell's remarkable series of experiments on "time appreciation" shows that orders were carried out by the subject at expiration of such periods as 20,290 minutes from the beginning of the order. In her normal state the female subject of this experiment was incapable of correctly calculating how many days and hours 20,290 minutes would make, and even in her hypnotised condition could reckon only with errors; yet, what is singular to relate, even when a blunder was made in the former calculation the order of the hypnotist was none the less fulfilled when the correct period expired. The conclusion is not easy to avoid: that beneath the stratum of human consciousness brought to the surface by hypnotism there is one—perhaps two—"subliminal" strata more alert and more capable than our ordinary workaday ego.
What light this theory of a "subliminal" self will shed on our subject we will see when we come to discuss clairvoyance and the trance utterances of the spiritualistic "medium."
CHAPTER III
PHANTASMS OF THE LIVING
We have seen that the hypnotic agent is able to project from his own brain certain thoughts and images into the mind of the percipient. "When," writes Professor Barrett, "the subject was in the state of trance or profound hypnotism, I noticed that not only sensations, but also ideas or emotions, occurring in the operator appeared to be reproduced in the subject without the intervention of any sign, or visible or audible communication.... In many other ways I convinced myself that the existence of a distinct idea in my own mind gave rise to some image of the idea in the subject's mind, not always a clear image, but one that could not fail to be recognised as a more or less distorted reflection of my own thought. The important point is that every care was taken to prevent any unconscious muscular action of the face, or otherwise giving any indication to the subject."
This presumed mode of communication between one individual and another, without the intervention of any known sense, Professor Barrett, arguing on electrical analogies, is inclined to suggest might be due to some form of nervous induction. But is this faculty restricted in its operation to a hypnotised subject? If it were, the significance of the phenomena would be very much lessened. We should leave telepathy out of our account. But it is not so restricted. The ideas and images are capable of being projected not only to a hypnotised person, but to one who is apparently not under any hypnotic influence whatever. Yet we still must be careful of how we call in the aid of any "supernatural" agency to account for the influences I am about to relate—the translation of ideas and motor impulses from one person to another without the aid of any known sense. The transference of pictures which we described in the last article has been achieved in hundreds of cases by an agent upon a hypnotised percipient. Here we have telepathy apparently at work, but not, however, at any great distance, nor successful in conjuring up really vivid or ominous hallucinations. The scientific term for these is "sensory automatisms," and many instances of these are given by Edmund Gurney, author of "Phantasms of the Living."
At an early period the Society for Psychical Research began a "Census of Hallucinations," which, with Gurney's book, now renders it possible for us to consider these phenomena with some certainty. The net result of all this investigation would seem to demonstrate that a large number of sensory automatisms occur amongst sane and healthy persons. We will later consider what difficulty lies in the way of attributing to telepathy the bulk of these phenomena. There is a widely accepted theory that telepathy is propagated by brain-waves, or, in Sir W. Crooke's phraseology, by ether-waves, of even smaller amplitude and greater frequency than those which carry X-rays. Such waves are supposed to pass from one brain to another, arousing in the second brain an excitation of image similar to the excitation or image from which they start in the first place. It has been pointed out that on this view there is no theoretical reason for limiting telepathy to human beings. Why may not the impulse pass between men and the lower animals, or between the lower animals themselves?