How to Hypnotize

Part 1

Transcriber’s Notes:

Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (italics).

Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end.

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PRICE 5 CENTS.

HOW TO HYPNOTIZE.

The Science of Controlling the Minds of Others.

MULTUM IN PARVO LIBRARY.

Entered at Boston Post Office as second class matter. Published by A. B. Courtney, Room 74, 45 Milk Street, Boston.

Vol. 3. APRIL, 1896. Published Monthly. No. 28

Subscription Price, 50 Cents Per Year.

Introduction.

This little work has been written in a hurry amid the worry and pressure of professional duties. It has also been ruthlessly cut down to compress it within the space allotted by the publisher. Neither profundity of matter, nor perfection of style is aimed at. It is written in every-day language, and may limp a little here and there. For none of these faults do I offer an apology to my readers. I ask them to take it as it is--as something more than a mere introduction to a most interesting and important subject.

How to Mesmerize.

It is generally believed that only weak-minded, soft, and hysterical persons can be successfully mesmerized--that persons of robust health, will, and character cannot be so affected. There never was a greater mistake. Reichenbach for many years selected his sensitives from delicate and hysterical persons while pursuing investigations into odylic force. He, however, soon discovered his error, and found that healthy men and women made the best sensitives for his investigation. Dr. Braid fell into the same error.

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.

How to Induce Sleep.

Make your patient feel at home, disabuse his mind of fear, doubt, anxiety, and scepticism. (Mesmerise no one without the presence of some one interested in the patient’s welfare--parents, relatives, guardians, or medical adviser). Remove, if possible, all elements which are likely to arouse or excite the patient’s mind. To succeed, the patient must either be naturally sensitive of your influence--i. e., passive and receptive--or he must be made so. Everything you do must tend to that condition. By action and speech--in everything you must show you know fully what you are about; there must be no timidity, hesitancy or half-heartedness exhibited in your manner. You must create the instinctive feeling in the mind of your patient, “that is a man I can trust; that man or person will do me good,” and you will do it. You can proceed to mesmerize by any of the processes already recorded, or you can adopt this method, viz.--Let your patient be comfortably placed or seated; sit or stand before him, or just at his side. Ask him to pay no attention to his friends or surroundings, but resign himself to your care. He can either close his eyes, or look to yours. Inform him if he feels any strange or peculiar feelings--a sinking sensation, darkness of vision, nervous tremulousness, drowsiness or an inclination to sleep, not to resist but give way. It will be all right, and you will see him through.

Next, for five minutes or so, take hold of his hands in an easy, comfortable manner, or he can place his hands upon his knees, and you can lay yours with a just perceptible physical pressure on the top of them. Remain thus in contact until there is no apparent difference in temperature between your hands and his. Direct your eyes to his, or, rather, to the organ of “Individuality,” or that portion of the head just situated between the two eyebrows, at the root of the nose. Exercise your will calmly and steadfastly toward the desired end--sleep. Gradually remove your hands from his, and place them on his head for two or three minutes, covering his forehead at each temple with the hollow of your hand, with fingers resting on head and your thumbs converging toward “Individuality.” Slight pressure with the hands on the temples is desirable, as it tends to check the inflow of blood to the head per the temporal arteries. You will now proceed to further charge the brain with your influence by passes directed to that end, always downward over the head and face,--forehead, tophead, sidehead, and backhead,--all coming under your direction, so far as such passes can be made with direct intent and with ease and comfort. You will also facilitate your purpose by pointing the tips of your fingers toward the eyes and temples, but throughout there must be neither vulgar staring nor thumb pressure. You will continue making these movements until the eyelids tremble, become heavy, or close. In some cases it is advisable to close the eyelids and fasten them by downward passes, and thus hasten the result desired. When I say hasten the result--viz., the mesmeric sleep of the person operated on--I do not mean the mesmerist to hasten; he should never be in a hurry. When the patient has exhibited the signs mentioned, you now proceed with both local and by general passes at distance to abstract your influence (but not to awaken your now-sensitive) by moving your hands with fingers extended slowly from his head to his fingers, both inside and outside the arms, also from the forehead down in front of the body to the pit of stomach, and then toward the knees. At the termination of each pass raise the hands (as described in practicing the passes) and commence again. Continue these passes for some time after he or she has apparently fallen asleep.

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