H Y P N O : )
-- For Ivan (Go Ivan!)
4APh
Chua, Christianne Bernadine
Concepcion, Ivan Aron
Cruz, Mary Caren
Hypnotism
Introduction
Hypnotism is the scientific and clinical use of hypnosis. Hypnosis, or a
hypnotic state, is a temporary condition of altered attention in an individual.
A hypnotist is a person who uses hypnotism. Scientific evidence suggests that
hypnotism is useful when it is practised by qualified professionals. For
example, some professionals use hypnotism to treat patients who have certain
medical or psychological problems.
People have used hypnotic techniques since ancient times. But the practice of
hypnotism has been condemned at times because of its misuse or because of
ignorance, mistaken beliefs, and overstated claims. Today, professional
organizations accept hypnotism when it is used for valid medical or scientific
purposes.
Hypnosis is a mental state (state theory) or set of attitudes and beliefs
(non-state theory) usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic
induction, which is commonly composed of a series of preliminary instructions
and suggestions.[ Hypnotic
suggestions may be delivered by a hypnotist in the presence of the subject, or
may be self-administered ("self-suggestion" or
"autosuggestion"). The use of hypnotism for therapeutic purposes is
referred to as "hypnotherapy".
The
words 'hypnosis' and 'hypnotism' both derive from the term
"neuro-hypnotism" (nervous sleep) coined by the Scottish surgeon James Braid around 1841. Braid based his
practice on that developed by Franz Mesmer and his followers ("Mesmerism" or "animal magnetism"),
but differed in his theory as to how the procedure worked.
Contrary
to a popular misconception - that hypnosis is a form of unconsciousness resembling sleep - contemporary research suggests that it is actually a wakeful
state of focused attention and heightened suggestibility, with diminished
peripheral awareness. In the first book on the subject, Neurypnology (1843), Braid described "hypnotism" as a
state of physical relaxation accompanied and induced by mental concentration
("abstraction").
Characteristics
Skeptics
point out the difficulty distinguishing between hypnosis and the placebo effect,
proposing that hypnosis is so heavily reliant upon the effects of suggestion
and belief that it would be hard to imagine how a credible placebo control
could ever be devised for a hypnotism study.
It
could be said that hypnotic suggestion is explicitly intended to make use of
the placebo effect. For example, Irving Kirsch has proposed a definition of
hypnosis as a "non-deceptive mega-placebo," i. e., a method which
openly makes use of suggestion and employs methods to amplify its effects.
Definition
The
earliest definition of hypnosis was given by Braid, who coined the term
"hypnotism" as an abbreviation for "neuro-hypnotism", or
nervous sleep, which he opposed to normal sleep, and defined as: a peculiar condition of the nervous system, induced by a
fixed and abstracted attention of the mental and visual eye, on one object, not
of an exciting nature.
Braid
elaborated upon this brief definition in a later work:
[...]
the real origin and essence of the hypnotic condition, is the induction of a
habit of abstraction or mental concentration, in which, as in reverie or
spontaneous abstraction, the powers of the mind are so much engrossed with a
single idea or train of thought, as, for the nonce, to render the individual
unconscious of, or indifferently conscious to, all other ideas, impressions, or
trains of thought. The hypnotic sleep, therefore, is the very antithesis or opposite mental and physical
condition to that which precedes and accompanies common sleep [...]
Braid
therefore defined hypnotism as a state of mental concentration which often led
to a form of progressive relaxation termed "nervous sleep". Later, in
his The Physiology of Fascination (1855), Braid conceded that his original terminology was misleading, and argued
that the term "hypnotism" or "nervous sleep" should be
reserved for the minority (10%) of subjects who exhibited amnesia,
substituting the term "monoideism", meaning concentration upon a
single idea, as a description for the more alert state experienced by the
others.
Induction
Hypnosis
is normally preceded by a "hypnotic induction" technique.
Traditionally this was interpreted as a method of putting the subject into a
"hypnotic trance"; however subsequent "nonstate" theorists
have viewed it differently, as a means of heightening client expectation,
defining their role, focusing attention, etc. There are an enormous variety of
different induction techniques used in hypnotism. However, by far the most
influential method was the original "eye-fixation" technique of
Braid, also known as "Braidism". Many variations of the eye-fixation
approach exist, including the induction used in the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility
Scale (SHSS), the most widely-used research tool in the field of hypnotism.
Braid
himself later acknowledged that the hypnotic induction technique was not
necessary in every case and subsequent researchers have generally found that on
average it contributes less than previously expected to the effect of hypnotic
suggestions (q.v., Barber, Spanos & Chaves, 1974). Many variations and
alternatives to the original hypnotic induction techniques were subsequently
developed. However, exactly 100 years after Braid introduced the method,
another expert could still state: "It can be safely stated that nine out
of ten hypnotic techniques call for reclining posture, muscular relaxation, and
optical fixation followed by eye closure."
Suggestion
When James Braid first described hypnotism, he did
not use the term "suggestion" but referred instead to the act of
focusing the conscious mind of the subject upon a single dominant idea. Braid's
main therapeutic strategy involved stimulating or reducing physiological
functioning in different regions of the body. In his later works, however,
Braid placed increasing emphasis upon the use of a variety of different verbal and
non-verbal forms of suggestion, including the use of "waking
suggestion" and self-hypnosis. Subsequently, Hippolyte Bernheim shifted the emphasis from
the physical state of hypnosis on to the psychological process of verbal
suggestion.
I
define hypnotism as the induction of a peculiar psychical [i.e., mental]
condition which increases the susceptibility to suggestion. Often, it is true,
the [hypnotic] sleep that may be induced facilitates suggestion, but it is not
the necessary preliminary. It is suggestion that rules hypnotism. (Hypnosis
& Suggestion, 1884: 15)
Bernheim's
conception of the primacy of verbal suggestion in hypnotism dominated the
subject throughout the twentieth century, leading some authorities to declare
him the father of modern hypnotism (Weitzenhoffer, 2000). Contemporary
hypnotism makes use of a wide variety of different forms of suggestion
including: direct verbal suggestions, "indirect" verbal suggestions
such as requests or insinuations, metaphors and other rhetorical figures of
speech, and non-verbal suggestion in the form of mental imagery, voice
tonality, and physical manipulation. A distinction is commonly made between
suggestions delivered "permissively" or in a more
"authoritarian" manner. Some hypnotic suggestions are intended to
bring about immediate responses, whereas others (post-hypnotic suggestions) are
intended to trigger responses after a delay ranging from a few minutes to many
years in some reported cases.
Consciousness vs. unconscious mind
Some
hypnotists conceive of suggestions as being a form of communication directed
primarily to the subject's conscious mind, whereas others view suggestion as a
means of communicating with the "unconscious" or
"subconscious" mind. These concepts were introduced into hypnotism at
the end of 19th century by Sigmund Freud and Pierre Janet.
The original Victorian pioneers of hypnotism, including Braid and Bernheim, did
not employ these concepts but considered hypnotic suggestions to be addressed
to the subject's conscious mind. Indeed, Braid actually defines hypnotism as
focused (conscious) attention upon a dominant idea (or suggestion). Different
views regarding the nature of the mind have led to different conceptions of
suggestion. Hypnotists who believed that responses are mediated primarily by an
"unconscious mind", like Milton Erickson,
made more use of indirect suggestions, such as metaphors or stories, whose
intended meaning may be concealed from the subject's conscious mind. The
concept of subliminal suggestion also depends upon this view
of the mind. By contrast, hypnotists who believed that responses to suggestion
are primarily mediated by the conscious mind, such as Theodore Barber and Nicholas Spanos tended to make more use of direct verbal suggestions and instructions.
Ideo-dynamic reflex
The
first neuro-psychological theory of hypnotic suggestion was introduced early on
by James Braid who adopted his friend and colleague William Carpenter's theory of the ideo-motor reflex response to account for the
phenomenon of hypnotism. Carpenter had observed from close examination of
everyday experience that under certain circumstances the mere idea of a
muscular movement could be sufficient to produce a reflexive, or automatic,
contraction or movement of the muscles involved, albeit in a very small degree.
Braid extended Carpenter's theory to encompass the observation that a wide
variety of bodily responses, other than muscular movement, can be thus
affected, e.g., the idea of sucking a lemon can automatically stimulate
salivation, a secretory response. Braid therefore adopted the term
"ideo-dynamic", meaning "by the power of an idea" to explain
a broad range of "psycho-physiological" (mind-body) phenomena. Braid
coined the term "mono-ideodynamic" to refer to the theory that
hypnotism operates by concentrating attention on a single idea in order to
amplify the ideo-dynamic reflex response. Variations of the basic ideo-motor or
ideo-dynamic theory of suggestion have continued to hold considerable influence
over subsequent theories of hypnosis, including those of Clark L. Hull,
Hans Eysenck,
and Ernest Rossi. It should be noted that in
Victorian psychology, the word "idea" encompasses any mental
representation, e.g., including mental imagery, or memories, etc.
Post-hypnotic suggestion
It has
been alleged post-hypnotic suggestion can be used to change people's behaviour
after emerging from hypnosis. One author wrote that "a person can act,
some time later, on a suggestion seeded during the hypnotic session". A
hypnotherapist told one of his patients, who was also a friend: 'When I touch
you on the finger you will immediately be hypnotised.' Fourteen years later, at
a dinner party, he touched him deliberately on the finger and his head fell
back against the chair."
Susceptibility
Braid
made a rough distinction between different stages of hypnosis which he termed
the first and second conscious stage of hypnotism; he later replaced this with
a distinction between "sub-hypnotic", "full hypnotic", and
"hypnotic coma" stages. Jean-Martin Charcot made a similar distinction
between stages named somnambulism, lethargy, and catalepsy. However, Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault and Bernheim introduced
more complex hypnotic "depth" scales, based on a combination of
behavioural, physiological and subjective responses, some of which were due to
direct suggestion and some of which were not. In the first few decades of the
20th century, these early clinical "depth" scales were superseded by
more sophisticated "hypnotic susceptibility" scales based on
experimental research. The most influential were the Davis-Husband and
Friedlander-Sarbin scales developed in the 1930s. Andre Weitzenhoffer and Ernest R. Hilgard developed the Stanford Scale of Hypnotic Susceptibility in 1959, consisting of
12 suggestion test items following a standardised hypnotic eye-fixation
induction script, and this has become one of the most widely-referenced
research tools in the field of hypnosis. Soon after, in 1962, Ronald Shor and Emily Carota Orne developed a similar group scale called the Harvard Group Scale of Hypnotic
Susceptibility (HGSHS).
Whereas
the older "depth scales" tried to infer the level of "hypnotic
trance" based upon supposed observable signs, such as spontaneous amnesia,
most subsequent scales measure the degree of observed or self-evaluated responsiveness to specific suggestion
tests, such as direct suggestions of arm rigidity (catalepsy).
History
Precursors
According
to his writings, Braid began to hear reports concerning the practices of
various Oriental meditation techniques immediately after the publication of his
major book on hypnotism, Neurypnology (1843). Braid first discusses hypnotism's historical precursors in a series of
articles entitled Magic, Mesmerism,
Hypnotism, etc., Historically & Physiologically Considered. He draws
analogies between his own practice of hypnotism and various forms of Hindu yoga
meditation and other ancient spiritual practices. Braid’s interest in
meditation really developed when he was introduced to the Dabistān-i Mazāhib, the
“School of Religions”, an ancient Persian text describing a wide variety of
Oriental religious practices.
Last
May [1843], a gentleman residing in Edinburgh, personally unknown to me, who
had long resided in India, favored me with a letter expressing his approbation
of the views which I had published on the nature and causes of hypnotic and
mesmeric phenomena. In corroboration of my views, he referred to what he had
previously witnessed in oriental regions, and recommended me to look into the
“Dabistan,” a book lately published, for additional proof to the same effect.
On much recommendation I immediately sent for a copy of the “Dabistan”, in
which I found many statements corroborative of the fact, that the eastern
saints are all self-hypnotisers, adopting means essentially the same as those
which I had recommended for similar purposes.
Although
he disputed the religious interpretation given to these phenomena throughout
this article and elsewhere in his writings, Braid seized upon these accounts of
Oriental meditation as proof that the effects of hypnotism could be produced in
solitude, without the presence of a magnetiser, and therefore saw this as
evidence that the real precursor of hypnotism was to be sought in the ancient
practices of meditation rather than in the more recent theory and practice of
Mesmerism. As he later wrote:
In as
much as patients can throw themselves into the nervous sleep, and manifest all
the usual phenomena of Mesmerism, through their own unaided efforts, as I have
so repeatedly proved by causing them to maintain a steady fixed gaze at any
point, concentrating their whole mental energies on the idea of the object
looked at; or that the same may arise by the patient looking at the point of
his own finger, or as the Magi of Persia and Yogi of India have practised for
the last 2,400 years, for religious purposes, throwing themselves into their
ecstatic trances by each maintaining a steady fixed gaze at the tip of his own
nose; it is obvious that there is no need for an exoteric influence to produce
the phenomena of Mesmerism. […] The great object in all these processes is to
induce a habit of abstraction or concentration of attention, in which the
subject is entirely absorbed with one idea, or train of ideas, whilst he is
unconscious of, or indifferently conscious to, every other object, purpose, or
action.
Franz Mesmer
Franz Mesmer (1734-1815) believed that there was a magnetic force or "fluid"
within the universe which influenced the health of the human body. He
experimented with magnets to influence this field and so cause healing. By
around 1774 he had concluded that the same effects could be created by passing
the hands, at a distance, in front of the subject's body, referred to as making
"Mesmeric passes." The word mesmerize originates from the name of
Franz Mesmer; and was intentionally used to separate its users from the various
"fluid" and "magnetic" theories embedded within the label
"magnetism".
In
1784, at the request of King Louis XVI, a series of French scientific
committees, one of which included the American ambassador to France, Benjamin Franklin,
scrutinized Mesmer's theories. They also investigated the practices of a
disaffected student of Mesmer, one Charles d'Eslon (1750-1786), and despite the
fact that they accepted that Mesmer's results were valid, their placebo-controlled
experiments following d'Eslon's practices convinced them that Mesmerism's were
most likely due to belief and imagination rather than to any sort of invisible
energy ("animal magnetism") transmitted from the body of the
Mesmerist.
In
other words, despite accepting that Mesmer's practices seemed to have efficacy,
both committees totally rejected all of Mesmer's theories.
James Braid
Following
the French committee's findings, in his Elements
of the Philosophy of the Human Mind (1827), Dugald Stewart,
an influential academic philosopher of the "Scottish School of Common Sense",
encouraged physicians to salvage elements of Mesmerism by replacing the
supernatural theory of "animal magnetism" with a new interpretation
based upon "common sense" laws of physiology and psychology.
Braid quotes the following passage from Stewart:
It
appears to me, that the general conclusions established by Mesmer’s practice,
with respect to the physical effects of the principle of imagination [...] are
incomparably more curious than if he had actually demonstrated the existence of
his boasted science [of "animal magnetism"]: nor can I see any good
reason why a physician, who admits the efficacy of the moral [i.e.,
psychological] agents employed by Mesmer, should, in the exercise of his
profession, scruple to copy whatever processes are necessary for subjecting
them to his command, any more than that he should hesitate about employing a
new physical agent, such as electricity or galvanism.
In
Braid's day, the Scottish School of Common Sense provided
the dominant theories of academic psychology and Braid refers to other
philosophers within this tradition throughout his writings. Braid therefore
revised the theory and practice of Mesmerism and developed his own method of
"hypnotism" as a more rational and "common sense" alternative.
It may
here be requisite for me to explain, that by the term Hypnotism, or Nervous
Sleep, which frequently occurs in the following pages, I mean a peculiar
condition of the nervous system, into which it may be thrown by artificial
contrivance, and which differs, in several respects, from common sleep or the
waking condition. I do not allege that this condition is induced through the
transmission of a magnetic or occult influence from my body into that of my
patients; nor do I profess, by my processes, to produce the higher [i.e.,
supernatural] phenomena of the Mesmerists. My pretensions are of a much more
humble character, and are all consistent with generally admitted principles in
physiological and psychological science. Hypnotism might therefore not inaptly
be designated, Rational Mesmerism, in contra-distinction to the Transcendental
Mesmerism of the Mesmerists
Despite
briefly toying with the name "rational Mesmerism", Braid ultimately
emphasised his approach's uniqueness, carrying out informal experiments
throughout his career to refute the arguments invoking supernatural practices,
and demonstrate instead the role of ordinary physiological and psychological
processes such as suggestion and focused attention in producing the observed
effects.
Braid
worked very closely with his friend and ally the eminent physiologist Professor
William Benjamin Carpenter, an early
neuro-psychologist, who introduced the "ideo-motor reflex" theory of
suggestion. Carpenter had observed examples of expectation and imagination
apparently influencing involuntarily muscle movement. A classic example of the
ideo-motor principle in action is the so-called "Chevreul pendulum"
(named after Michel Eugène Chevreul). Chevreul claimed that
a pendulum can be made to swing by appropriate concentration alone.
Braid
soon assimilated Carpenter's observations into his own theory, realising that
the effect of focusing attention was to enhance the ideo-motor reflex response.
Braid extended Carpenter's theory to encompass the influence of the mind upon
the body more generally, beyond the muscular system, and therefore referred to
the "ideo-dynamic" response and coined the term
"psycho-physiology" to refer to the study of general mind/body
interaction.
In his
later works, Braid reserved the term "hypnotism" for cases in which
subjects entered a state of amnesia resembling sleep. For the rest, he spoke of
a "mono-ideodynamic" principle to emphasise that the eye-fixation
induction technique worked by narrowing the subject's attention to a single
idea or train of thought ("monoideism") which amplified the effect of
the consequent "dominant idea" upon the subject's body by means of
the ideo-dynamic principle.
Hysteria vs. Suggestion
For
several decades, Braid's work became more influential abroad than in his own
country, except for a handful of followers, most notably Dr. John Milne Bramwell. The eminent neurologist
Dr. George Miller Beard took Braid's theories to
America. Meanwhile his works were translated into German by Wilhelm T. Preyer,
Professor of Physiology at Jena University.
The psychiatrist Albert Moll subsequently continued German research, publishing
Hypnotism in 1889. France
became the focal point for the study after the eminent neurologist Dr. Étienne Eugène Azam presented Braid's research
to the French Academy of Sciences. Azam also translated
Braid's last manuscript (On Hypnotism,
1860) into French. At the request of Azam, Paul Broca,
and others, the French Academy of Science, who had
examined Mesmerism in 1784, examined Braid's writings shortly after his demise.
Azam's
enthusiasm for hypnotism influenced Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault, a country
doctor. Hippolyte Bernheim discovered Liébeault's
enormously popular group hypnotherapy clinic and subsequently became an
influential hypnotist. The study of hypnotism subsequently revolved around the
fierce debate between Jean-Martin Charcot and Hippolyte Bernheim, the two most influential
figures in late 19th century hypnotism.
Charcot
operated a clinic at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital (thus, also
known as the "Paris School" or the "Salpêtrière School"),
while Bernheim had a clinic in Nancy (also known as the "Nancy School"). Charcot, influenced more by the
Mesmerists, argued that hypnotism was an abnormal state of nervous functioning found
only in certain hysterical women. He claimed that it manifested in a series of
physical reactions which could be divided into distinct stages. Bernheim argued
that anyone could be hypnotised, that it was an extension of normal
psychological functioning, and that its effects were due to suggestion. After
decades of debate, Bernheim's view dominated. Charcot's theory is now just a
historical curiosity.
Pierre Janet
Pierre Janet (1859-1947) reported studies on a hypnotic subject in 1882. Charcot subsequently appointed him director of the psychological laboratory at the Salpêtrière in 1889, after Janet completed his doctorate in philosophy which dealt with
psychological automatism. In 1898 Janet was appointed psychology lecturer at
the Sorbonne,
and in 1902 became chair of experimental and comparative psychology at the Collège de France. Janet reconciled elements of
his views with those of Bernheim and his followers, developing his own
sophisticated hypnotic psychotherapy based upon the concept of psychological dissociation which, at the turn of the century, rivaled Freud's attempt to provide a more
comprehensive theory of psychotherapy.
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud,
the founder of psychoanalysis, studied hypnotism at Paris school and briefly
visited the Nancy school.
Initially,
Freud was an enthusiastic proponent of hypnotherapy, and soon began to
emphasise hypnotic regression and ab reaction (catharsis) as therapeutic
methods. He wrote a favorable encyclopedia article on hypnotism, translated one
of Bernheim's works into German, and published an influential series of case
studies with his colleague Joseph Breuer entitled Studies on Hysteria (1895). This became
the founding text of the subsequent tradition known as
"hypno-analysis" or "regression hypnotherapy."
However,
Freud gradually abandoned hypnotism in favour of psychoanalysis, emphasizing
free association and interpretation of the unconscious. Struggling with the
great expense of time that psychoanalysis required, Freud later suggested that
it might be combined with hypnotic suggestion to hasten the outcome of
treatment,
It is
very probable, too, that the application of our therapy to numbers will compel
us to alloy the pure gold of analysis plentifully with the copper of direct
[hypnotic] suggestion.
However
only a handful of Freud's followers were sufficiently qualified in hypnosis to
attempt the synthesis. Their work had a limited influence on the
hypno-therapeutic approaches now known variously as "hypnotic
regression", "hypnotic progression", and
"hypnoanalysis".
Émile Coué
Émile Coué (1857-1926) assisted Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault for around two
years at Nancy. After practicing for several years as a hypnotherapist
employing the methods of Liébeault and Bernheim's Nancy School, Coué developed
a new orientation called "conscious autosuggestion."
Several years after Liébeault's death in 1904, Coué founded what became known
as the New Nancy School, a loose collaboration of practitioners who taught and
promoted his views. Coué's method did not emphasise "sleep" or deep
relaxation and instead focused upon autosuggestion involving a specific series
of suggestion tests. Although Coué argued that he was no longer using hypnosis,
followers such as Charles Baudouin viewed his approach as a form of light
self-hypnosis. Coué's method became a renowned self-help and psychotherapy technique, which contrasted with psychoanalysis and prefigured self-hypnosis and cognitive therapy.
Clark L. Hull
The
next major development came from behavioral psychology in American university
research. Clark L. Hull, an eminent American psychologist, published the
first major compilation of laboratory studies on hypnosis, Hypnosis & Suggestibility (1933),
in which he proved that hypnosis and sleep had nothing in common. Hull
published many quantitative findings from hypnosis and suggestion experiments
and encouraged research by mainstream psychologists. Hull's behavioural
psychology interpretation of hypnosis, emphasizing conditioned reflexes,
rivaled the Freudian psycho dynamic interpretation emphasizing unconscious
transference.
Milton Erickson
Milton H. Erickson, M.D. was one of the most
influential post-war hypnotherapists. He wrote several books and journal
articles on the subject. During the 1960s, Erickson popularized a new branch of
hypnotherapy, known as Ericksonian hypnotherapy,
primarily characterised by indirect suggestion, "metaphor" (actually
analogies), confusion techniques, and double binds in place of formal hypnotic inductions. However, the difference between
Erickson's methods and traditional hypnotism led contemporaries such as André Weitzenhoffer, to question whether
he was practicing "hypnosis" at all, and his approach remains in
question.
Erickson
had no hesitation in presenting any suggested effect as being
"hypnosis", whether or not the subject was in a hypnotic state. In
fact, he was not hesitant in passing off behaviour that was dubiously hypnotic
as being hypnotic.
Cognitive-behavioural
In the
latter half of the twentieth century, two factors contributed to the
development of the cognitive-behavioural approach to hypnosis. 1) Cognitive and behavioural theories of the nature of
hypnosis (influenced by the theories of Sarbinand Barber) became increasingly
influential. 2) The therapeutic practices of hypnotherapy and various forms of cognitive-behavioural therapy overlapped
and influenced each other. Although cognitive-behavioural theories of hypnosis
must be distinguished from cognitive-behavioural approaches to hypnotherapy, they share similar
concepts, terminology, and assumptions and have been integrated by influential
researchers and clinicians such as Irving Kirsch,
Steven Jay Lynn, and
others.
At the
outset of cognitive-behavioural therapy during the
1950s, hypnosis was used by early behaviour therapists such as Joseph Wolpeand
also by early cognitive therapists such as Albert Ellis.
Barber, Spanos & Chaves introduced the term
"cognitive-behavioural" to describe their "nonstate" theory
of hypnosis in Hypnotism: Imagination
& Human Potentialities (1974). However, Clark L. Hull had introduced a behavioural psychology as far back as 1933, which in turn was
preceded by Ivan Pavlov.[27] Indeed, the earliest theories and practices of hypnotism, even those of Braid,
resemble the cognitive-behavioural orientation in some respects.
Church Stand
The Church has not waited for the verdict of science to put the faithful on their guard against the dangers of
magnetism and hypnotism, and to defend the rights of human conscience; but, ever prudent, she has condemned only abuses, leaving
the way free for scientific research. "The use of magnetism, that is to
say, the mere act of employing physical means otherwise permissible, is not
morally forbidden, provided that it does not tend to an illicit end or one
which may be in any manner evil" (Response of the Holy Office, 2 June, 1840). The
encyclical letter of the Sacred Penitentiary, Tribunal of August, 1856, only
confirms this, and Père Coconnier has referred to it in his famous work
"L'Hypnotisme franc", in which he studies the subject apart from all
extraneous considerations. Taking up the latest teachings of Rome, Canon Moureau, of Lille, writes: "Hypnotism is tolerated, in theory and in
practice, to the exclusion of phenomena which would certainly be
preternatural." This is the opinion of most theologians, and it is the utterance of reason.