“I should like to understand his power over her a little better. In such cases of biology—how they came to abuse the word, I should like to know—”
“Just as they call table-rapping, &c., spiritualism.”
“I suppose his relation to her must be classed amongst phenomena of that sort?”
“Certainly.”
“Well, tell me, does the influence outlast the mesmeric condition?”
“If by mesmeric condition you mean any state evidently approaching to that of sleep—undoubtedly. It is, in many cases, quite independent of such a condition. Perhaps the degree of willing submission at first, may have something to do with it. But mesmeric influence, whatever it may mean, is entirely independent of sleep. That is an accident accompanying it, perhaps sometimes indicating its culmination.”
“Does the person so influenced act with or against his will?”
“That is a most difficult question, involving others equally difficult. My own impression is, that the patient—for patient in a very serious sense he is—acts with his inclination, and often with his will; but in many cases with his inclination against his will. This is a very important distinction in morals, but often overlooked. When a man is acting with his inclination, his will is in abeyance. In our present imperfect condition, it seems to me that the absolute will has no opportunity of pure action, of operating entirely as itself, except when working in opposition to inclination. But to return: the power of the biologist appears to me to lie in this—he is able, by some mysterious sympathy, to produce in the mind of the patient such forceful impulses to do whatever he wills, that they are in fact irresistible to almost all who are obnoxious to his influence. The will requires an especial training and a distinct development, before it is capable of acting with any degree of freedom. The men who have undergone this are very few indeed; and no one whose will is not educated as will, can, if subjected to the influences of biology, resist the impulses roused in his passive brain by the active brain of the operator. This at least is my impression.
“Other things no doubt combined to increase the influence in the present case. She liked him, perhaps more than liked him once. She was partially committed to his schemes; and she was easily mesmerised. It would seem, besides, that she was naturally disposed to somnambulism. This is a remarkable co-existence of distinct developments of the same peculiarity. In this latter condition, even if in others she were able to resist him, she would be quite helpless; for all the thoughts that passed through her brain would owe their origin to his.—Imagine being forced to think another man’s thoughts! That would be possession indeed! And this is not far removed from the old stories about the demons entering into a man.—He would be ruler over the whole intellectual life that passed in her during the time; and which to her, as far as the ideas suggested belonged to the outward world, would appear an outer life, passing all round her, not in her. She would, in fact, be a creature of his imagination for the time, as much as any character invented, and sent through varied circumstances, feelings, and actions, by the mind of the poet or novelist. Look at the facts. She warned you to beware of the count that night before you went into the haunted bed-chamber. Even when she entered it, by your own account—”
“Entered it? Then you do think it was Euphra who personated the ghost?”