A case of vivid after-images explained on Hering's theory / by David Fraser Harris.

  • Fraser-Harris, David Fraser, 1867-1937.
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A case of vivid after-images explained on Hering's theory / by David Fraser Harris. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    69G frequent sources of error in clairvoyant experiments :—(1) The hyperajsthesia of the organs of special sense, which enabled im- pressions to be perceived through the ordinary media that would pass unrecognised in the waking condition. (2) The docihty and sympathy of the subjects, which tended to make them imitate the action of others. (3) The extraordinary revival of memory by which they could recall things long forgotten in the waking state. (4) The remarkable effect of contact in arousing memory. (5) The condition of double consciousness or double personality. (6) The vivid state of the imagination, which instantly invested every suggested idea, or remembrance of past impressions, with the attributes of present realities. (7) The tendency of the human mind, in those with a great love of the marvellous, to erroneously interpret the subject's replies in accordance with their own desires, (8) Deductions rapidly drawn by the subject from un- intentional suggestions given by the opei'ator. According to Braid, the belief in thought-transference was also the result of careless experiment, and he had never met with a subject who could divine his thoughts when their transmission by the recognised media had been rigorously excluded. Braid did not believe that mesmeric subjects possessed intui- tive powers. Doubtlessly some of them successfully predicted their own hysterical attacks, but the prophecy simply produced its own fulfilment through self-suggestion. According to Mr. Waite, it has been rightly observed that Braid, the discoverer, so to speak, of suggestion, by no means realised the possibilities of suggestion of the unconscious kind. Bernheim, and other writers unacquainted with Braid's later works, had previously made similar statements. It is difficult, however, to understand how Mr. Waite could commit a similar error. Braid repeatedly, clearly, and emphatically pointed out that unconscious suggestion accounted for all the phenomena which the mesmerists attributed to magnets, metals, and occult fluids. Sometimes, he said, the suggestions were given in their most obvious form by the operator verbally predicting in the sub- ject's hearing the nature of the phenomena which ought to appear. At others they were given less directly by passes, manipulations, excitation of the muscles of expression, &c. ; but these owed their power, not to their physical influence, but to the ideas they excited in the subject's mind. When all forms of suggestion were rigorously excluded, the mesmeric phenomena did not appear. This, Braid asserted, proved the influence was a mental one; were it electric, suggestions were as unnecessary in the case of the subject as in that of a galvanic battery. Apparently Mr. Waite beheves in animal maguetism, metallo- therapeutics, phrenology, and clairvoyance. All these things Braid successfully combated, and to attribute to him any behef in their existence shows an absolute failure to grasp the spirit and significance of his teaching. J. Milne Bramwell.