BELIEF AND SUGGESTION

The writer has been informed by a prominent physician of Chicago, that for many years he has been in the habit of administering hypodermic injections of distilled water, accompanying the same by the statement that he is injecting morphine. He states that in every case, he has succeeded in inducing a quiet, peaceful sleep, and a cessation of pain after the injection, which can be attributed only to the belief of the patient. The same physician also relates the case of a woman who believed that she had taken strychnine by mistake. When the doctor was called he found the woman manifesting every symptom of strychnine poisoning, even down to the most minute details, and he is of the opinion that death would have ensued in a short time had he not proceeded to administer the regular antidotes and restorative treatment. After the woman was brought out of the condition, it was discovered that the supposed strychnine was nothing but a harmless powder. In relating the case, the physician always adds that the woman had witnessed the death struggles of a dog which had been poisoned by strychnine several months previous, which might have had some effect in enabling her to unconsciously counterfeit the symptoms.

Dr. Max Eastman, in a recent magazine article says: “The mission of this paper is to offer guidance in a matter about which a great quantity of the general public is very much at sea. In this question of ‘mind over matter,’ the reformers have done their work. They have stirred things up. They have bestowed upon the world about a hundred and fifty little religions and a confused idea that there must be some truth in the matter somewhere. The ignorant have done their work. They have persecuted the believers, jeered at them, or damned them with a vacuous smile. The world will never lack ballast. It is only the scientists that have failed of their duty. They have stalked through a routine of elevated lectures, written a few incomprehensible books, and kept the science of psychology, so far as the hungry world goes, sealed up in their own proud bosoms. In all this uproar of faith-cures, and miracles, and shouting prophets, we have heard few illuminating words from the universities. The consequence is that we are without a helm, and the reform blows now one way and now another....

“The law of suggestion, which is one of the great discoveries of modern science, was first formulated by Dr. Liebault at Paris, in a book published in 1866. Since his day the number of physicians who practice ‘suggestive therapeutics’ has steadily increased, until to-day no thorough clinical hospital is without a professional suggestionist. The practice does not involve any metaphysical theories, the passage of any hidden force from one brain to another, any ‘planes of existence,’ or any religious upset, or any poetic physiology, or the swallowing of any occult doctrines whatever. It is one of the simplest and coolest of scientific theories. It is a question of the relation between the brain and the bodily organs. It seems never to have been clearly stated that healing disease by suggestion depends not in the least degree upon any theory of the relation of mind and matter.... The attempt to fix an idea in the mind without reason is suggestion. It is accomplished usually in medical practice by asking the patient to lie down and relax his body and his mind and then vigorously stating to him the desired idea. It may be accomplished in a number of ways. The patient may be told that the operator is a wizard and is about to transfer an idea from his own mind to that of the patient. If the patient believes him he will very likely accept the idea. It may be accomplished by gestures or incantations which the patient regards with superstitious awe, provided it is explained beforehand what these gestures are meant to produce. It may be accomplished by telling the patient he has no body, and sitting with him for awhile in spiritual silence, provided he knows what to expect.

“All these methods, if one believes in them, are good, and they prove by their success the law of suggestion. But the method that is based on a sure truth is the method of the scientist. He reasons with his patient, he stirs in him what moral or religious enthusiasm he can, and to these means he adds tactfully the subtle suggestive powers of his own presence and eloquence. This force, together with the power which is revealed in a man of correcting his own mental habits, is the greatest practical discovery of modern psychology.... Suggestive therapeutics is the use of suggestion to fix in the mind ideas of healthy mental habits....

“Our question is: can the physical conditions of the brain affect the physical condition of the stomach? We know that the brain-building condition which accompanies the idea of raising our hand can affect the condition of the muscles of our arm—and we call that a voluntary function. Now the question is whether the brain condition which accompanies the idea of enlivening our stomach can have an effect upon that involuntary function. Experiments with suggestion have proved that in some cases it can, if it continues long enough. Persons of a very suggestible nature, can, for instance, by concentrating their mind upon a certain part of the body, increase the flow of blood to that part, although the regulation of blood flow is supposed to be entirely involuntary. The action of the heart, also the movements of the digestive organs particularly, and of the organs of elimination, are almost directly affected in suggestible persons by that change in their brains which accompanies certain ideas.... Science has established then, that suggestion can effect to some extent, the so-called involuntary functions of the body; but the extent or limitation of these effects is by no means determined. It could not be determined scientifically without years of diligent experiment and tabulation. Any dogmatic statement upon one side or the other of that question, is therefore premature and against the spirit of science.”

Dr. Leith, in his Edinburgh lectures in 1896, said: “I am inclined to doubt whether the benefits of Nauheim (a treatment for the heart) is not after all to be explained largely, if not entirely, by the influence of the mental factor.” Tuke says that: “John Hunter says he was subject to spasm of his ‘vital parts’ when anxious about an event; as, for instance, whether his bees would swarm or not, whether the large cat he was anxious to kill would get away before he could get the gun. After death it was found that he had some heart disease.... Lord Eglinton told John Hunter how, when two soldiers were condemned to be shot, it was arranged the one who threw the number with the dice should be reprieved; the one who proved successful generally fainted, while the one to be shot remained calm.” Dr. Schofield says: “During the rush of Consumptives to Berlin for inoculation by Dr. Koch’s tuberculin, a special set of symptoms were observed to follow the injection and were taken as being diagnostic of the existence of tuberculosis; among others, a rise of temperature after so many hours. These phenomena were eagerly looked for by the patients, and occurred accurately in several who were injected with pure water. The formation of blisters full of serum from the application of plain stamp and other paper to various parts of the bodies of patients in the hypnotic state, is well attested and undoubtedly true.”

Dr. Krafft-Ebing has produced a rise from 37 degrees centigrade to 38.5 degrees centigrade in patients by fixing their minds by suggestion. In the same way Binet lowered the temperature 10 degrees centigrade. The latter authority says: “How can it be, when one merely says to the patient: ‘Your hand will become cold,’ and the vaso-motor system answers by constricting the artery? C’est ce que depasse notre imagination.” Schofield commenting on the above, says: “Indeed there is no way of accounting for such a phenomena but by freely admitting the presence of unconscious psychic forces in the body, capable of so influencing the structures of the body as to produce physical changes.” Tuke says: “A lady saw a child in immediate danger of having its ankle crushed by an iron gate. She was greatly agitated, but could not move, owing to intense pain coming on in her corresponding ankle. She walked home with difficulty, took off her stocking and found a circle around the ankle of a light red color, with a large red spot on the outer side. By the morning her whole foot was inflamed, and she had to remain in bed for some days. A young woman witnessing the lancing of an abscess in the axilla immediately felt pain in that region, followed by inflammation. Dr. Marmise of Bordeaux tells us of a lady’s maid, who when the surgeon put his lancet into her mistress’s arm to bleed her, felt the prick in her own arm, and shortly after there appeared a bruise at the spot.”

It is related that St. Francis d’Assisi dwelt so long in concentrated meditation upon the thought and picture of the Crucifixion that he suffered intense pain in his hands and feet, at the points corresponding to the place of the nails in the hands and feet of Christ, which was afterward followed by marked inflammation at those points, terminating in actual ulceration. The phenomena of the stigmata in the cases of religious enthusiasts and fanatics has been mentioned elsewhere in this book. Prof. Barrett says of the phenomenon: “It is not so well known, but it is nevertheless the fact, that utterly startling physiological changes can be produced in a hypnotized subject merely by conscious or unconscious mental suggestion. Thus a red scar or a painful burn, or even a figure of a definite shape, such as a cross or an initial, can be caused to appear on the body of the entranced subject solely through suggesting the idea. By creating some local disturbance of the blood-vessel in the skin, the unconscious self has done what would be impossible for the conscious to perform. And so in the well-attested cases of stigmata, where a close resemblance to the wounds of the body of the crucified Saviour appears on the body of the ecstatic. This is a case of unconscious self-suggestion, arising from the intent and adoring gaze of the ecstatic upon the bleeding figure on the crucifix.”

Dr. Schofield says: “The breath is altered by the emotions. The short quiet breath of joy contrasts with the long sigh of relief after breathless suspense. Joy gives eupnoea or easy breathing, grief or rather fear tends to dyspnoea or difficult breathing. Sobbing goes with grief, laughter with joy, and one often merges into the other. Yawning is produced by pure idea or by seeing it, as well as by fatigue. Dr. Morton Prince says a lady he knew always had violent catarrh in the nose (hay fever) if a rose was in the room. He gave her an artificial one and the usual symptoms followed. How many cases of hay-fever have a somewhat similar origin in the unconscious mind?... The hair may be turned grey and white by emotion in a few hours or sooner. With regard to the stomach and digestion, apart from actual disease, we may notice one or two instances of unconscious mind action. A man who was very sea-sick lost a valuable set of artificial teeth overboard, and was instantly cured. If the thoughts are strongly directed to the intestinal canal, as by bread-pills, it will produce strong peristaltic action. Vomiting occurs from mental causes, apart from organic brain disease. Bad news will produce nausea; emotion also, or seeing another person vomit, or certain smells or ideas, or thoughts about a sea-voyage, etc., or the thought that an emetic has been taken.... The thought of an acid fruit will fill the mouth with water. A successful way of stopping discordant street music is to suck a lemon within a full view of a German band. Fear will so dry the throat that dry rice cannot be swallowed. This is a test in India for the detection of a murderer. The suspected man is brought forward and given a handful of dry rice to swallow. If he can do this he is innocent; if he cannot he is guilty, fear having dried up his mouth.... A young lady who could not be cured of vomiting was engaged to be married. On being told that the wedding day must be postponed till cured, the vomiting ceased.... A mother nursing her child always found the milk secreted when she heard the child crying for any length of time. Fear stops the secretion of milk, and worry will entirely change its character, so as to become absolutely injurious to the child.”

Maudsley says: “Perhaps we do not as physicians consider sufficiently the influence of mental states in the production of disease, their importance as symptoms; or realize all the advantages which we take of them in our efforts to cure disease. Quackery seems to have got hold of a truth which legitimate medicine fails to appreciate or use adequately.” Dr. Buckley says: “A doctor was called to see a lady with severe rheumatism, and tried to extemporize a vapor bath in bed, with an old tin pipe and a tea-kettle; and only succeeded in scalding the patient with the boiling water proceeding from the overful kettle through the pipe. The patient screamed: ‘Doctor, you have scalded me,’ and leaped out of bed. But the rheumatism was cured, and did not return.” Tuke relates an amusing instance of the effect of suggestion and faith upon warts. He had been considering the subject of the various “pow-wows” or “wart-cures” of the old women, and determined to try some experiments in order to see whether these cures were not due simply to mental influences and expectant attention. On an official tour he visited an asylum, where he was regarded as a great personage by reason of his office. He noticed that several of the inmates were afflicted with warts, and muttering a few words over the excresences, he told the owners that by such and such a day the warts would have completely disappeared. He forgot the circumstances, owing to the press of his official duties, and was agreeably surprised when, on his next round of visits, he was told that his patients had been cured at the time he had predicted. Nearly everyone has had some personal acquaintance with some of these “pow-wow” wart cures, in one form or another. Tying a knot in a piece of cord, then rubbing the wart with it, and burying the string, has cured thousands of cases of warts—the suggestion being the real cause behind the mask.

Ferassi cured fifty cases of ague by a charm, which consisted merely of a piece of paper with the word “Febrifuge” written on it. The patient was directed to clip off one letter of the word each day until cured. Some patients recovered as soon as the first “F” was clipped from the paper. The writer hereof knows personally of a number of people having been cured of fever and ague by means of a written “charm” which an old man in Philadelphia sold them at a dollar a copy. The old man informed him that he, “and his father before him” had cured thousands of people in this way, making a comfortable living from the practice. Dr. Gerbe, of Paris, cured 401 out of 629 cases of toothache by masked suggestion administered in the form of causing the patients to crush a small insect between their fingers, after having strongly impressed upon them the fact that this was an infallible cure.

Dr. Schofield reports the following interesting cases of cures by auto-suggestion and faith: “A surgeon took into a hospital ward some time ago, a little boy who had kept his bed for five years, having hurt his spine in a fall. He had been all the time totally paralyzed in the legs, and could not feel when they were touched or pinched; nor could he move them in the least degree. After careful examination, the doctor explained minutely to the boy the awful nature of the electric battery, and told him to prepare for its application the next day. At the same time he showed him a sixpence, and sympathizing with his state, told him that the sixpence should be his if, notwithstanding, he should have improved enough the next day to walk leaning on and pushing a chair, which would also save the need of the battery. In two weeks the boy was running races in the park, and his cure was reported in the ‘Lancet.’ ... A young lady who had taken ether three and a half years before, on the inhaler being held three inches away from the face, and retaining a faint odor of ether, went right off, and becoming unconscious without any ether being used or the inhaler touching her face. A woman was brought on a couch into a London hospital by two ladies, who said she had been suffering from incurable paralysis of the spine for two years, and having exhausted all their means in nursing her, they now sought to get her admitted, pending her removal to a home for incurables. In two hours I had cured her by agencies which owed all their virtue to their influence on the mind, and I walked with the woman half a mile up and down the waiting-room, and she then returned home in an omnibus, being completely cured. An amusing case is that of a paralyzed girl, who on learning that she had secured the affections of the curate, who used to visit her, got out of bed and walked—cured; and soon afterwards made an excellent pastor’s wife. A remarkable instance of this sort of cure is that of a child afflicted with paralysis, who was brought up from the country to Paris to the Hotel Dieu. The child, who had heard a great deal of the wonderful metropolis, its magnificent hospitals, its omnipotent doctors, and their wonderful cures, was awe-struck, and so vividly impressed with the idea that such surroundings must have a curative influence, that the day after her arrival she sat up in bed much better. The good doctor just passed around, but had not time to treat her till the third day; by which time when he came round she was out of bed, walking about the room, quite restored by the glimpses she had got of his majestic presence.”

Having now shown by numerous disinterested authorities, the majority of whom belong to the medical profession, that the mental states of belief, faith and expectancy, and their negative aspects of fear, apprehension, and false-belief, may, and do, influence physical conditions, functioning and activities, irrespective of the particular theory, creed, or explanation accepted by the patient himself, or herself, we see the necessity of seeking for the common principle of cure manifesting in the various forms of phenomena. And before this common principle may be grasped, we must needs acquaint ourselves with the physical organism involved in the process of cure. Accordingly the several succeeding chapters will be devoted to that phase of the general subject.