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done on hysterical subjects, is the only possible
explanation of his inability to understand the
true nature of these phenomena. If the
statement of the Salpêtrière school that only hysterical
subjects are hypnotizable was correct it would
mean that at least eighty-five per cent of mankind
was suffering from hysteria.
But on one point Charcot was surely right,
whatever the Nancy school, Forel, Moll and
many others may say. Experiments on
hypnotism are not without their danger, to the
subjects as well as to the spectators. Personally I
think public demonstrations of hypnotic
phenomena should be forbidden by law. Specialists
in nervous and mental disorders can no more do
without hypnotism than can surgeons without
chloroform and ether. One need only remember
the thousands and thousands of helpless cases
of shell-shock and traumatic neuroses during the
last war cured as by enchantment by this method.
Hypnotic treatment in the great majority of
cases does not necessitate hypnotic sleep with
abolition of waking consciousness. An operator
well acquainted with its complicated technique
and who knows something about psychology—
both these qualifications are necessary for success
—will as a rule obtain remarkable, often amazing
results, by the mere use of what is called
suggestion à l’état de veille. The Nancy school
maintains that hypnotic sleep and natural sleep
are identical. It is not so. As yet we do not
know what hypnotic sleep is and until we know
more about it we had better refrain from inducing
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