Hypnosis*

This monograph by outstanding masters of hypnotic technic is the most concise, yet thorough presentation of the subject that has appeared in recent years. Throughout the work an attempt has been made to correlate the psychological and biological points of view and much of the experimental material has been acquired through investigations in psychoanalysis and in epidemic encephalitis.

In discussing the fundamentals of hypnosis they adhere closely to demonstrable biological facts. For instance, “The innervation of the heart and of the vessels depends very much, of course, on the emotions. Much has been said about the bodily expression and bodily effects of feeling, and not always with reason, for there are no feelings that are not related with some conceptional, perceptional, or ideological content or other. It would therefore be more reasonable to speak of the bodily effect of the emotions.” … “The importance of the effects of emotions and suggested emotions on the vascular system cannot be overestimated when we remember that every organ of the body is supplied with blood vessels and that the most remote regions of the body are therefore accessible to suggestion by way of the vascular system.” … “This attitude simultaneously furnishes us with the general formulation that every conception, every perception, every idea has its appropriate vasovegetative consequences, and that in order to attain a certain result within the vasovegetative system it is necessary to ascertain the content of the corresponding conception.”

In the chapter on the “Effects of Hypnosis” the authors have pointed out many remarkable instances of the influence of hypnosis on chemical and physiological factors, e. g., the production of fever, changes in basal metabolism, alterations in the calcium index of the blood, nystagmus, vertigo and past pointing. From these experiments, from the investigations on sleep, and from the supportive evidence in research literature they conclude that there is a cere