Part 3

Will (will power), I cannot comprehend it, though everyone prides himself on possessing IT.

Instinct, a word used to express intelligence in animals, in contra-distinction from intelligence in man. Man reasons! Animals do not. (?)

Law of Nature, a phrase that conveys no meaning. If you can comprehend the phrase “Law of Nature” then you will know the Law of Suggestion, and it will be a useless waste of time to read the following pages.

THE LAW OF SUGGESTION

HYPNOSIS

Since man began assembling, some few have spent their lives in trying to comprehend the most incomprehensible of all beings,—man. The net result of all their work and discoveries has resulted in nothing but theory, and that not worth the candle. With all of our alleged knowledge the few truths we have are of but little value. The myriads of theories are so impracticable that I often wonder why and how the “authorities” obtain their titles. The authorities of a hundred years ago are the laughing stock of to-day.

Up to fifty years ago man was bled as a cure for every disease; to-day they claim he is full of bugs that require slaughtering and try to make of him a bacilli abattoir. They write tomes of books on “mind,” yet nowhere can I find it comprehensively defined. Everyone prides himself on his will power, yet I must own that such a thing which is so ambiguously defined is incomprehensible to me. Volumes are written as to hearing, seeing, smelling, feeling and tasting, and yet no one seems to be able to grasp the true significance of these terms.

Crime is punished, yet more penitentiaries are yearly required. Our alienists, truly foreigners to their subjects, know all (?) about the brain and with the greatest assurance pronounce upon man’s sanity, yet offer us no cure, and our institutions for the insane are too small for the ever increasing demands upon them. We know the effect, need no experts, why does not some one demonstrate the cause.

In all sensational murder trials our most learned(?) and wise doctors(?) go on the stand as experts(?)—whatever that may mean—swearing directly opposite to one another, and still maintain their standing in their profession and the community. If they know anything, how is it possible for the truth to be in both of two contradictory assertions. They study in the same schools, from the same books and from the same “authorities,” yet one says “yes,” the other “no.” Verily, gentlemen, you must lack a true premise.

Effect, man comprehends fairly well, but as to cause our most learned scientists seem to have no conception. Now, dear reader, if you would know a bit of truth follow me. I am a graduate of no great college; am professor in no great institution; have been exposed(?) many times, yet truth is, was, and always will be, and year after year my following increases. If you will follow through the ensuing pages, unsophisticated as I am, I will try to teach you something about man—a mere machine; his every thought and action forced, possessing no will power, and in no way responsible for his actions. For twelve years I have studied nightly from ten to twenty-five hypnotized subjects and have found that they are ruled by the same general law as the non-hypnotized man. In other words, a hypnotized subject is a slowed-down machine which one knowing how, can watch each and every movement of, and thereby comprehend cause and effect. Through a hypnotized subject we can learn how “normal” man is forced to act. Consequently, we can thoroughly analyze the whys and wherefores of every act performed by a subject while in hypnosis, during which time I believe the cerebrum to be entirely inactive.

The cerebrum is like the receiving or correlating mechanism of the phonograph; after the thought is registered in the ganglion of the Abdominal Brain it is then purely automatic and free from the cerebrum, which is the realizing brain. Everything we do and say is purely automatic—an effect. The babe at birth fails to withdraw its foot when tickled. After that action is associated with the peculiar sensation, the action always takes place when the sensation is produced, it being purely automatic, otherwise, a result or transformation of the cause. After the babe has learned to speak the word “papa,” whenever the environment forces the desire for father, automatically the word is said without any predetermination.

Everything in life is a combination of attributes; i. e., one thing an impossibility.

The attributes of which any object is composed are of interest to us only as they affect our senses. The word “tree,” if disassociated with our sense-impressions, would mean nothing, but when its form (sight) and use (feeling) are associated with its name (sound), we for the first time have a comprehension of what in the English language is known as a tree. A foreigner, unable to understand our language, coming to this country and being asked for a match would have no conception of what we were talking about; after we have associated in his “mind” its form (sight), its use (feeling) and its name (sound), he would for the first time understand what was meant by the word match.

All matter to be conceived must affect two senses; to be comprehended it must affect three or more. A cigar cannot be thoroughly comprehended with less than five. It has form, equaling sight; use, equaling feeling; a name, equaling sound; taste and smell. It is not necessary for man to comprehend the material of which it is made, or the skill that made it. The last two are inconsequential to him, other than in producing the desired effect on the senses. Therefore, all matter equals in comprehension the degree to which it affects man’s different senses, and if man can only comprehend through the effect on his senses, that comprehension which is called a thought, must likewise be a combination; hence, I will define a thought to be two or more associated ideas, an idea being a percept through any of the senses. The more ideas associated the more comprehensive the alleged thought.

Matter is comprehensible only in the degree to which it affects the senses; to be conceived it must affect two, to be comprehended, three. Form is comprehensible (when acquired) only when it affects sight and feeling, and a child must not only hear the word “round” but also feel of the object. The same with “straight,” “square,” et cetera. The round object through sight must transform itself into a feeling memory. Form is the outline of matter, and as nothing but matter is appreciable by man, the form of it conveys no impression except of the matter (feeling) within its boundary.

Nothing but matter is comprehensible to man.

The five senses to be impressed must be stimulated, and nothing but matter will produce the excitation necessary. Energy can move only through matter by disturbing matter; or, in other words, “nothing” is impossible and incomprehensible. Therefore, there is nothing appreciable but matter. Man can conceive of nothing that he has not experienced, and as all so-called thinking is but the correlation or passing through one’s mind the experiences associated, and as they have necessarily been the product of matter, nothing else is comprehensible. Consequently, man can conceive of nothing greater nor less than his individual experiences. It is impossible to lift him to your comprehension, you must drop to his.

If I speak to you of the “Law of Nature,” what sense-experience have you a memory of to be aroused by the utterance of the phrase “Law of Nature”? None. But if I tell you that the farmer ploughed the ground, sowed the seed, the Heavens gave forth rain; he then hoed around the seed, a sprout came up, and by more cultivation the sprout matured into a stalk of corn, the corn was then harvested; you would say “Ah, well, the farmer did all that. I fail to see what the ‘Law of Nature’ did,” because you can comprehend nothing that does not affect your senses.

While lecturing in New York City two years ago, a very estimable lady, whose children were reared in a nursery and lacked many of the usual experiences of children of middle-class families, came to me and said:

“Mr. Santanelli, can you cure my boy of a very vicious habit?”

“Madam, what is the habit?”

“He enjoys putting the cat on the hot stove to see it dance.”

“Yes, madam.”

“How long will it take you?”

“One-quarter of a minute.”

My good reader, can you tell me what was done; if so, why? What ideas were associated in this lad’s mind as to the stove and cat? The different actions of the cat and nothing else. The stove being the force (suggestion) and the dancing of the cat the result, thereby arousing only a sight memory. The lad lacked a memory. The moment there was given him a feeling memory, he no longer cared to see the cat dance on the stove. His finger was held on the stove until it was blistered, which associated in his “mind” through the proper sense that heat produced pain, and substituted a memory of pain for the memory of the pleasure of seeing the cat dance.

While in New York City, on Sunday mornings I attended an independent church, whose minister or lecturer is beyond all question one of the cleverest logicians of the day. On one Sunday in particular he preached a sermon claiming that the right religion has yet to be offered man; that the foundation of all doctrines so far offered us has been based upon a material premise; that the right founder will offer us one built entirely upon a spiritual basis. Such a thing is an impossibility, inasmuch as the spiritual is incomprehensible. The moment that one begins speaking of the spiritual he is using mere idle words, inasmuch as the spiritual has never affected any of his senses, hence he has no memory of its action; therefore, no ideas are properly associated, and the word possesses no meaning—his utterances are purely conjectural.

I speak to you of a “thingamagig,” which is mere sound, arousing no thought in your “mind.” I show it to you and thereby associate sound—thingamagig—with sight—its form. I then teach you its use—feeling—and you comprehend it. The two ideas will give you a conception, but it requires the third to get a comprehension. I touch you. Can you help thinking of it? I show you my watch, and you think of it. You hear a sound, you think of it; you smell or taste something, and think of it; you have no control nor in any manner can you prevent the consciousness or the realization of the senses so affected.