Bernheim (1840-1918) was a pioneer of hypnotic therapy and the theory of suggestion, and thus by extension of psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud translated this book into German, and although it is

Charcot's name that is now better known, Freud learned from Bernheim and his colleague of the Nancy School, A. A. Liébeault, as well. (Freud's introduction to another of Bernheim's works is to be found in Volume I of the Standard Edition.) This is, then, a sort of ur-text, part of what might be called the pre-history of psychoanalytic thought. This is its first appearance in English.