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"The subject only preserves the spontaneity and will that his hypnotizer leaves him, who at his pleasure makes him sad, gay, angry, or tender, and plays with his soul as with an instrument." "But that is frightful." "Curious, at least. It is certain that there is a local paralysis of such or such a cell, the study of which is the starting-point of many interesting discoveries."
It takes little reflection to convince any one that hypnotism for amusement, either on the public stage or in the home, is highly obnoxious, even if it is not highly dangerous. If the hypnotizer is an honest man, and a man of character, little injury may follow. But we can never know that, and the risk of getting into bad hands should prevent every one from submitting to influence at all.
There are three leading theories, known as that of 1. Animal Magnetism; 2. Neurosis; and 3. Suggestion. We will simply state them briefly in order without discussion. Animal Magnetism. This is the theory offered by Mesmer, and those who hold it assume that "the hypnotizer exercises a force, independently of suggestion, over the subject.
Still, in this latter case the evil would be greater, for in drunkenness there is contained a lower degradation, inasmuch as the baser passions are then left without all control, and are apt to become exceedingly vile in their licentious condition. The hypnotic subject has at least the mind and will of the hypnotizer to direct him.
Yet more than one treatment is usually necessary for the higher degrees. Much less importance for therapeutic purposes belongs to that hypnoid state which is reached without the idea of sleep where the subject comes with open eyes into a kind of fascination, produced perhaps by a sudden flash of light or by the firm eye of the hypnotizer.
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