A Short History of Hypnosis
Hypnosis has been with us ever since man acquired a reasoning, thinking, evaluating and planning part of the mind which we now call the conscious mind. As soon as the need for suggestion and persuasion developed, so developed hypnosis.
The soothing, relaxing, lullaby humming of a mother to her baby to induce sleep, or the mother kissing or blowing upon the skinned or bruised knee and telling her child that it no longer hurts (analgesia) are examples of earliest hypnosis.
Ancient holy men, medicine men, witch doctors, and priests, all practiced a form of hypnosis. The ancient Greeks and Egyptians had sleep temples where suggestions were given to subjects in trance to be healed of their ailments and afflictions. Trance inductions were accomplished by chants, drum beats, rhythmic passes, and dancing, in the early cultures.
The patron saint of the modern hypnotist would be Franz Anton Mesmer. He began his work in 1773. He first believed that magnets passed over an ailing patient produced healing. Later he found that making passes over the subject with only his hands produced the same trance states and the healings that he thought had been brought about by the mysterious magnet.
This new idea or concept was Animal Magnetism. He felt that it was a God given power, given to only favored persons. Mesmer did not realize as later hypnotists, such as Dr. Liebault and Dr. Bernheim, that these phenomena could be brought about by suggestion alone.
Dr. Mesmer first practiced in Vienna then moved to Paris where people flocked to him by the hundreds to experience these wonderful and mysterious healings. He was eminently successful. One account tells of a salon in which he had four huge tubs that would hold thirty-five patients
He was thus able to treat one hundred forty patients at one time. Mesmer was said to have worn ornate robes to create the proper atmosphere. He would walk about the tubs that were provided with rods or electrodes. He would make passes over some of the patients and would touch the rods in order to re-magnetize the waters.
One of the tubs had been set aside exclusively for the benefit of charity patients. His success was most amazing. And this tremendous success, naturally, was upsetting to his French colleagues. Mesmer was anxious to have his work approved by the French Academy of Science and other doctors.
In 1784 a committee was formed by the academy to investigate Mesmerism. Among the committeemen was our own beloved and esteemed Benjamin Franklin. No denial was made that there were healings by the hundreds obtained by Mesmerism. However, the verdict was that the cures came about only because of the imagination of the patients.
What a shame that the verdict of this committee was not analyzed and evaluated. Had it been analyzed it could have brought untold blessing to the healing arts. Imagination means to image. In this case to picture in one's mind that one would again be whole or well.
Psychosomatic medicine could and would have been advanced by one hundred fifty years. All Positive Thinking, the Christian Science religion, the Power of the Subconscious Mind, and Power of Suggestion, and the doctor's Placebo are based on the premise of picturing in your mind the state of Well Being, Health, Happiness and Success.
Poor Mesmer died in disgrace never knowing the impact his discovery would have on the world.
Dr. James Braid is often credited with being the father of modern hypnotism. He experimented with Mesmerism in the 1840's. From demonstration and experiments he concluded that the trance was effective. Not only did Braid use passes of the hands to produce anesthesia but also found it useful in the treatment of rheumatism, epilepsy, paralysis, neuralgias, etc.
He coined the word hypnosis to indicate the trance state and to remove it from the stigmatism of the term mesmerism. Most hypnotists today feel that it is an unfortunate coinage or term because it does not adequately tell what hypnosis is.
Around 1845, Dr. Esdale, another British surgeon, worked in India in a prison hospital. His success using Mesmerism to produce analgesia for major surgical operations was phenomenal.
You must remember that this was before the discovery of ether, chloroform, or any other anesthetic. The "germ theory" had not even been formulated. The mortality rate among the patients receiving operations ran about 50%.
Dr. Esdale performed over 3000 operations with Mesmerism, 250 of these were documented major operations, such as limb amputations and the removal of tumors. An amazing side effect was that Dr. Esdale's mortality rate dropped to about 5%.
Yet when Dr. Esdale returned to England his license was revoked by the British Medical Association. They stated that it was blasphemous for abolishing pain, for God intended that people suffer.
About 1860, a young Dr. Liebault of Nancy, France, read some of the case histories and papers by Dr. Braid on hypnotism. He was very much impressed. He found that he could also produce the trance by passes, and was quite successful.
He also found that he did not have to make passes but that all the phenomena produced by Dr. Braid's method could be produced by suggestions alone. Dr. Liebault did not have very good rapport with his medical colleagues, but he went blithely on his way. He was accomplishing healings. He was helping the poor from whom he accepted no fee.
Next on the scene came the eminent French physician, Dr. Hippolyte Bernheim. He had been embarrassed by having a patient that he had been unable to cure go to Dr. Liebault and the patient became well. Liebault had used hypnosis in effecting the cure. Records state that Bernheim was furious and went to Nancy to denounce Liebault as a fraud.
During the investigation Dr. Bernheim was impressed and became an avid convert to hypnosis. Dr. Bernheim and Dr. Liebault became associates. They set The set up the famous Hypnoclinic at Nancy.
Doctors from all over the world came to study hypnotherapy. Among them was Dr. Sigmund Freud. There were many, many healings, yet as in all phases of the healing arts there were also some failures. After all, hypnosis did not guarantee nor was it able to insure eternal life.
Freud studied under Bernheim, Charcots, and Breuer. Dr. Breuer was an excellent hypnotist and could readily induce the deep trance. However, Freud was a timid man and was unable to induce the deep trance that he mistakenly felt was effective treatment.
This embarrassed and frustrated Freud. He could not tolerate the rivalry with Breuer and then sought other methods. thus he developed his psychoanalysis, free association, and dream interpretation.
Freud concluded from his study of hypnosis the existence of the inner or subconscious mind. It was a tragedy that Freud turned back on hypnosis, for it set back the study and development of hypnotherapy many years. It was not until 1958 that the American Medical Association endorsed hypnosis as being a valuable tool to aid in the accelerating the treatment of the patient.
During World Wars I and II, hypnosis was again given a boost. It was discovered that it could quickly restore battle shocked soldiers and pilots to normalcy and again send them back to the front as efficient fighting personnel.
One statistic reported that a battle shocked causality required 350 to 700 hours of treatment by psychoanalysis and psychiatry to restore to normalcy - - however, by the use of hypnotherapy only a few sessions of treatment were required and the subject was restored again to the front lines as a valuable fighter in 30 days or less.
The years were lean at times and the art of hypnosis was kept alive by the stage hypnotists. The image left behind by these people was rather shady but enough information was passed on to the laymen and a few doctors to start a new national interest in the art over the several decades.
We look at hypnosis through the eyes of a layman in presenting this material and see how we can improve ourselves and our outlook on life. Medical practice is something you should be aware of but not be involved in. Let the doctors do the healing.