HYPNOSIS

[Sidenote: As to science]

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.

[Sidenote: As to expert testimony]

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.

[Sidenote: All action automatic]

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.

[Sidenote: One thing an impossibility]

_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.

[Sidenote: Matter]

[Sidenote: Definition of thought and idea]

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.

[Sidenote: Matter and form]

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._

[Sidenote: Conception and thinking]

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.

[Sidenote: Law of Nature (?)]

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.

[Sidenote: Proper sense-memories]

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.”

[Sidenote: Lacked a memory]

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.

[Sidenote: The spiritual impossible]

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.

[Sidenote: Building a thought]

[Sidenote: Thoughts forced]

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.

[Sidenote: Thinking]

Man does not “think,” he realizes. Thinking is the transforming of

energy (suggestion). I pinch you; it has happened and is registered

irrespective of your “will power,” and when registered, you realize

it. You see my hand move towards you; you see on my face an expression

which arouses the thought (associated ideas) of being pinched, the

alleged pain and the avoidance of it through the action of withdrawing

your limb, which is but the transforming of the energy (suggestion)

taken in through the eye and voiced in your action, all being done

before you realize it, the transforming being instantaneous and must

be registered before you are conscious of (realize) it. The “mind” is

the realizing intelligence, and the actual mind is like the transformer

of electricity in the main power station that receives one kind of

electric current and sends out another. Into what action the received

current will be transformed, depends on the ideas (currents) previously

associated. The degree of action and its rapidity depends on the number

of senses affected and the degree of force. Therefore, your thoughts

are forced on you by your environment, and are the transformation of

the suggestion; hence, man is a creature of his environment. Now, as

I have defined a suggestion to be anything that arouses an action,

anything that affects any of your five senses must be a suggestion;

therefore, man is ruled by suggestion.

[Sidenote: Man is like a phonograph]

Man is like a phonograph; each thought a wax cylinder; the ideas

associated the indentations thereon (memory). One sense puts the

cylinder in position, the second sense drops the pin into place on the

cylinder where the tune is begun. No thought can be put into action

unless two senses are affected. When a series of ideas are associated

into a thought, and the thought is forced into action, each idea in its

proper place is certain to appear and it is beyond the power of man to

resist it.

I speak to you of a horse, immediately its form (sight), use (feeling),

et cetera, appear to you, unconsciously.

[Sidenote: Words]

A word of itself arouses no action. In conversation, the environment,

the expression on the speaker’s face, and the tone are the attributes

that force the thought into action.

[Sidenote: Words mean nothing]

If one should go into the kitchen and tell Bridget, who is not afraid

of losing her position, to remove the teakettle, she would ask, “Why?”

Were it boiling over she would remove it, not because you told her, for

you simply forced her to look at it; when she did so, seeing it boiling

over, the removal of it was due to the conditions forcing themselves

upon her through the eye. Had she no ideas associated as to a kettle

boiling over, that its removal would stop it, there would have been no

action.

[Sidenote: Tone]

I say to you, “Jump out of your chair,” and you remain seated. I ask

you what was said, and you will reply that I said, “Jump out of your

chair.” I deny saying any such thing. I said just what you _did_,

because a thought is simply the transforming of energy. Thus an

energetic wave affects the eye which is immediately transformed into

the action associated with the expression perceived, or in this case,

sound. If you had thought to jump out of your chair, the action would

have taken place and you could not have avoided it. When I spoke the

words, “Jump out of your chair,” the tone conveyed the opposite action;

the expression on my face conveyed the opposite action, and the two

senses affected put into action the thought of remaining in your seat.

But, if with an expression of fear on my face and a tone of fear in my

voice, I called to you “Jump!” you would have been out of the chair

instantly, then looking at the chair and seeing no reason for jumping,

you would have asked why I told you to jump.

[Sidenote: Everything positive]

Everything in life is positive. Your hand is not “not up,” but is

down. A man who is seated is not “not standing up.” If I say to you,

“You cannot take your hand from your face,” I am really making the

affirmation that you will keep it there. I start a party of hypnotized

subjects at spinning their hands, and then tell them that they cannot

stop. What do they do? They spin the faster, because if they cannot

stop they must go faster. There is where I learned it. Every statement

must necessarily convey and can only convey an affirmation.

[Sidenote: Sleep]

[Sidenote: Attributes of sleep]

If everything in life is a combination of attributes, sleep also must

be a combination, but can man artificially induce sleep? No. Man never

went to sleep, but sleep gathers round him. No two things in the

world are the same, many things are similar. There are two matches on

the table. Are these matches the same? They have the same form(?),

the same name, the same use, but the material of which they are made

is not the same. If it was, they would be one match. Therefore,

real sleep can only be produced in one way, that way I do not know.

What is called sleep I can pick apart, and find: First, that under

ordinary circumstances, a person to be asleep must be in what is to

them an easy position. Next, I find that in sleep “mind” is inactive.

Next, the eye is either rolled up or converged, and then the eye is

closed. The bringing together of these four attributes will result

in what? If a thing is made up of four parts, and we bring the four

proper parts together, we will have the whole. If we bring but three

together we will accomplish but three-fourths. An inactive “mind” I

want; therefore, I must have a very “small” thought, and as thought

is all action, if I can pre-supply the action of the thought and have

the subject maintain it, I then will have an inactive thought. As all

of the attributes of a thought are certain to take place, and I am

trying to induce a condition similar to sleep, the thought of sleep is

the thought required. Consequently, if I could lock in the “mind” the

thought of sleep, I would be able to accomplish my purpose.

NOTE.—I call the thought of sleep and the thought that pain

has ceased, blank thoughts, as they give forth no perceptible action.

[Sidenote: Thought is action]

If I tell you to sit up, the thought of sitting up is active to the

extent of “sitting up,” after which the only action is that of holding

or retaining the muscles in their present tension, which action is

imperceptible.

[Sidenote: As to inducing hypnosis]

The dimmer a sound grows to the ear, the dimmer will be the thought of

it. The dimmer an object grows to the sight, the dimmer will be the

thought of it. Therefore, if I place my subject in an easy position and

hold an object for him to look at in such a location that his eyes are

either turned up or take the proper converged position, I will have two

attributes of sleep. If I hold the object in such a way as to tire the

nerves of accommodation, and _not the eye_ (because I would then

be losing the easy position), the thought of his environment would

pass out of his “mind” through his eye as the nerves of accommodation

failed to perceive the object gazed at. While that thought is fading

away through the eye, if I would supplant it through the ear with the

thought of sleep, the moment that I have succeeded in doing so, and

have brought together an easy position, upturned eye, closed eye,

the thought of sleep, we will have a simulated sleep, differing from

real sleep only in this: In real sleep there is _no_ thought;

in hypnosis there is the thought of sleep, which nothing but the

operator’s voice can change.

[Sidenote: Difference between sleep and hypnosis]

[Sidenote: As to motion]

To show the mental difference between hypnosis and sleep, I have drawn

a wheel (See Fig. 1) to represent the “mind,” each spoke representing

a thought, which is made up of ideas (actions associated). When you

are doing one thing you cannot do the second until you _stop_ the

first, otherwise you would continue doing the first all your life.

The moment you stop the first, just before beginning the second, your

muscles are positively inactive. This point in mechanics is known as

the “dead center.” The eye can distinguish (comprehend) no object in

motion. There must be a point of rest, or the eye must move with the

object which relatively produces a point of rest. This is demonstrated

by the moving picture machine.

Our scientists tell us that a wheel never stops in making a revolution.

I always have and do still maintain that one-half of the wheel must

stop going down before it can go up, and _vice versa_. If we will

take a sixteen foot fly-wheel and lay off on it a square, we can see

it stop. The piston of the engine that moves it stops, and I maintain

that when we can see the spokes of a bicycle wheel as it revolves

slowly, is when the eye can measure the stoppage, but when the stoppage

is so brief that the eye fails to perceive it, we fail to see the

spokes. When you are thinking of one thing you must stop thinking of

that before you can think of the second, for no man can do or think of

two things at the same time.

[Illustration: