The Hypnotic Evasion: A Clinical Observation

Psychoanalysis stems from hypnosis. It developed out of it under the hands of Freud, at the rate at which his therapeutic procedure became less regressive. The hypnotic state, 'well founded in an unconsciously preserved disposition [stemming] from the earliest history of the human family' was gradually relinquished in favor of one 'component phenomenon' (1) of it: suggestion; and the latter was assigned an objective attainable only if the patient remained awake. Some of the measures once employed to induce hypnosis were, consequently, discarded. Others, suitable for the support of the suggestive effect, were retained.

To regard suggestion, as did Freud, as a 'component phenomenon' (Teilerscheinung) of hypnosis is to characterize it qualitatively and to imply that the disposition for it, as for hypnosis, may have roots in the 'earliest history' (Urgeschichte) of mankind. Since this history is unknown, any disposition deriving from it is unknown, and the phenomena based upon it remain in part unexplained. The analyst must therefore be prepared to encounter certain effects of suggestion which he cannot understand. Common to all of these is their archaic nature, the most familiar of them, mentioned here but introductorily, being the avidity with which the patient 'repeats' or, more accurately, transfers his repeating into the analytic situation. One need do nothing to have him do it, and one is therefore apt to forget that, without doing anything, one does much. The analyst is immobile as was the hypnotist, while the patient lies on the couch as did the subject, and the analyst acquires, by sitting behind him, the hypnotist's 'invisibility' after the subject has closed his eyes. Thus enough of the