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Restoring the Use of Muscles. Hallucination. Bad Habits. Anaesthesia It is well known that hypnotism may be used to render subjects insensible to pain. Thus numerous startling experiments are performed in public, such as running hatpins through the cheeks or arms, sewing the tongue to the ear, etc. The curious part of it is that the insensibility may be confined to one spot only.
The accepted belief in the phenomena of hypnotism, and of unconscious mental and bodily actions 'automatisms' has expelled the old belief in spirits from many a dusty nook. To examine these historically is to put a touch or two on the picture of 'demoniac affections, which M. Littre desired to see executed.
We know from their records, and inferentially also, that the Egyptians studied the properties of herbs and minerals for magic purposes white magic as well as black. We know that some of the wizards of old could induce from sleep dreams of any given kind. That this purpose was mainly effected by hypnotism, which was another art or science of Old Nile, I have little doubt.
We call this faculty hypnotism now; and physiology seeks to connect it with the nervous affections of hysteria and epilepsy. At all times, and in all quarters of the earth, manifestations of it have not been wanting; and in Africa it has for centuries existed as a so-called religious cult, to which in this country the name of Hoodooism or Voodooism has been applied.
But then he argues that sleep is a necessity of our nature directly intended by the Creator, a normal part of human life. Besides it is a necessary means for the renewal of our strength, and on the plea of necessity the moralist may admit the use of hypnotism when it is needed for the cure of bodily diseases.
She flushed, but shook her head frankly, and answered without evasion, "I haven't forgotten it yet." He was gazing into her face with such a hypnotism of undisguised admiration that she smilingly inquired, "Well, have I changed much?" "You have. You've changed much and radiantly.
A few believe in the antiquated doctrine of electric animal currents, the vast majority are firm in the belief that the influence is a moral one all admit that whatever force, or influence, lies at the root of hypnotism, the effects it can produce are practically unlimited, terrible in their comprehensiveness, and almost entirely unprovided for in the scheme of modern criminal law.
Hypnotism was for her like the visit of a good angel from heaven. It is used as an anæsthetic in place of chloroform, which in many cases cannot be applied without great danger to health, or even life. Thus perfect insensibility may be procured and long continued, allowing sometimes of the performance of protracted surgical operations that would otherwise be almost impossible.
It must be remembered that, in the days of witchcraft, virtually nothing was known of hysteria, epilepsy, the varied forms of insanity, hallucination, hypnotism, or of the possibilities of mal-observation and lapse of memory: while such a matter as first-hand circumstantial evidence seems to have been lost to sight entirely.
These reflections comforted her as she paced the marble floor, and yet Keyork's remark rang in her ears and disturbed her. She knew how vast his experience was and how much he could tell by a single glance at a human face. He had been familiar with every phase of hypnotism long before she had known him, and might reasonably be supposed to know by inspection whether the sleep were natural or not.
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