I hold a key before the eyes of a person lying in a recumbent position, and command him to fix his gaze on the key continuously. Simultaneously, I repeatedly and gently stroke his brow, pronouncing again and again in rather montonous manner sentences to the effect that he is getting tired, drowsy, sleepy, that he feels a heaviness in his limbs, that he has the sensation of being about to go to sleep, that it is only with difficulty that he succeeds in keeping his eyes open, that he cannot help closing them. In the case of some persons, the eyes will close as a result. In the case of others, it will be necessary to pronounce a definite instruction to close the eyes. The person experimented on is now recumbent like one sleeping. He barely moves, perhaps does not move at all. I now raise the person's arm gently and release it. The arm does not drop back flaccidly, nor remain in its position, but descends in slow degrees until it reaches the original position. I stroke the arm of the person experimented on and repeat in a convincing manner: " You feel that the arm that I am stroking has become warm."I stroke the other arm,simultaneously subject that the arm has lost all sensation. I prick the hand with a needle; the subject winces slightly. I again stroke the brow and say:"You can see a beautiful flower with perfect clearness." I now " wake " the person experimented three you will open your eyes and will feel perfectly sound, fresh, and bright; you will feel no dizziness, no headache." I count three; the subject opens his eyes promptly and makes the following report: He has not been asleep, and has heard all my words. He has felt fatigue and a heaviness in the limbs, but might have opened his eyes and moved about, had he wished. He has felt the sensation of warmth also the prick He has not seen anything. He says he now feels a slight dizziness and a slight headache. This istype of a very superficial hypnosis. In other cases the outcome is the same, with the exception that the patient declares, after awaking, that she cannot remember what was said to her.On hearing the signal to wake up, she may take time in opening her eyes, may glance about in surprise and rub her eyes. To be sure, although this is by no means a rule without its exceptions, such cases very frequently allow the hand that has been raised to drop back in a relaxed and inert manner, or to maintain the hand in a state of cataleptic stiffness in the position to which it has been raised. But has the subject executed the commands issued during the hypnosis or not? It is impossible to resort to questioning in this connection after the waking; questions are asked during the hypnotic procedure. We are given information as to the result of the suggestion by means of nods of the head or more or less subdued speech. We are here pointing out that type of hypnosis in which—in spite of a low degree of suggestibility and perhaps even a paucity of muscular phenomena—amnesia is nevertheless present as to the experiences during the hypnotic state.

In other cases serious muscular phenomena occupy the foreground. Those hypnotized present an extreme laxness of the muscles, or a stiffening of the whole body, catalepsy, although no verbal suggestion has been made to this effect. Sometimes catalepsy and muscular tension can be attained only by the use of suggestion. In spite of the presence of extensive muscular phenomena, suggestibility is not necessarily encountered in other fields; amnesia may be present or absent. During such hypnoses, there may also be inability to speak; not a word is pronounced, and this may in some cases result in a keen sense of fear.

Motor phenomena in the form of twitches, hysteriform tremors, even in the form of more or less pronounced hysterical attacks(*) may also constitute the content or preliminary stage of hypnoses producing the impression of a profound sleep.

(*)A patient who suffered from hysterical hiccoughing first broke out in a crying spell before falling asleep and accepting the suggestion that she relax and stop her hiccoughing. It seemed as though she was unwilling to give up her hysterical conversion act.—Trans.

Hypnotized persons in a " deep sleep " must in many cases be addressed in a summary manner before it is possible to communicate with them again; one has the impression that it will be necessary to waken them at least partially. The voices of persons thus hypnotized at first sound hoarse, low, barely articulate, and do not become cleared until the conversation in hypnosis has continued for some time, gradually approaching the voice while awake. Complete relaxation of muscles is observable in such cases; it may as a rule— but not always—be easily turned into catalepsy by the use of suggestion. Motionlessness is not always recorded. Those hypnotized may make disturbing movements with the entire body and with the extremities. Suggestions of warmth, anesthesia, suggestions of smell and taste are frequently accepted, but not always optical suggestions. The degree of optical suggestibility varies considerably in these cases. Spots, mists, clouds, colors, are more readily accepted than definitely outlined or personified optical images. Persons producing form outlines, frequently will produce only those that are agreeable to them, let us say, images of intimate friends, and refuse to accept hallucinations of indifferent objects, such as flowers, landscapes, etc. If the hallucination involves definitely outlined optical images, such as the flower, for instance, it is usually easy to induce the hypnotized person to reach out for the suggested object, as he might reach out for the real object. Hypnosis of the kind described above may, but need not necessarily, be followed by amnesia. The persons experimented on who do not have amnesia with regard to their experiences during the hypnosis, will communicate varying data on the reality of what was " seen, felt, experienced." Some will describe their experiences in such a way that they may hardly be called more than vivid perceptions, others describe them as seen images, others again give rise to hardly any doubts as to the reality of the objects beheld. In many cases, we are told by the subjects that the hallucinations were quite clear, in other words, actually present in consciousness, but were vague in outline and color, or seemed covered with a veil. The judgment of reality in these cases is to a great extent independent of the degree of corporeal concreteness. Even in cases in which the suggestions made during hypnosis were experienced only as conceptions, there may be a consciousness of the presence of suggested objects, while, in the case of a given observation. the subject does not necessarily believe in the presence of the objects. From patients having amnesias, similar data are obtained if the amnesia has been removed in any way. J. H. Schultz reportsthe formations of layers in hypnotic self-observation. At first, there appear in the field of vision of the hypnotized individual formless sensations of color, of light and dark, as in after-images. Only later does the optical experience become more definite, re-solving itself into a much-stratified band of light, then assuming more rigid forms, and finally again dissolving into experiences of form and color without a tangible content.

In the case of some hypnotized persons it is possible to obtain hallucinations in the field of all the senses, even when the eyes are open, while real bodies actually present may be rendered nonexistent to the hypnotized subject. The latter will then not see persons who are in the same room, nor—when subjected to the appropriate hypnotic suggestion—will he observe objects actually present in the room (negative hallucination). The subject's behavior is then determined entirely by the objects suggested. To be sure, the hypnotized person must have some sort of knowledge of the negatively hallucinated objects, for he avoids obstacles and will direct his eyes—a fact of great interest—away from the negatively hallucinated objects. Many persons experimented on, when thoroughly questioned after the hypnosis, will nevertheless indicate that they have seen the negatively hallucinated object in some way, perhaps resembling a very indefinitely outlined visual impression in the remotest margin of the field of vision. One of the subjects observed by us, to whom the suggestion had been made—as a post-hypnotic instruction—not to see the hypnotizer for a certain period of time, reported after the lapse of this period that he had seen a human shape of vague outline but had not been able to identify it as the person of the hypnotizer in spite of much effort. Another such person who had received the same post-hypnotic instruction, reported that he had seen only a white spot instead of the face of the hypnotizer. In the acts which they perform within the area of falsified suggestion, some of the hypnotized persons produce the impression of being absent-minded to the point of staggering. They stand insecurely on their feet and sway about; they have a slightly glassy stare, are in danger of falling down; their movements are awkward and vague. Others, on the other hand, perform all actions and motions not differing essentially from those of ordinary life. In the former type, commands uttered are not fully grasped, while in the latter type the power of understanding seems close to that of ordinary life. Even in such complete stages of hypnosis, the subject will not necessarily fail to remember what was experienced during the hypnosis, although, to be sure, such inability may be brought about by command during the hypnosis.

This is our first example to show that commands issued during hypnosis may have effect even after the hypnosis. Post-hypnotic suggestions may logically be divided into two groups. The first group will include such commands as are reasonable from the standpoint of the hypnotized individual; let us say, therapeutic commands. The second group will include those commands which are unreasonable—again from the standpoint of the hypnotized individual— which have no discoverable sense at all: such as the command to clap one's hands at a certain signal, or to knock at the door. Some of these commands are even contrary to reason and require the individual to perform acts that are in contradiction with the individual's sense of decency or of social custom, and may subject him to ridicule; thus, a lady may be asked to put on a hat belonging to another person, etc. Either the immediate execution of the posthypnotic commands may be required, or they may be ordered carried out at a moment lying far beyond the period of hypnosis, even weeks or months later. Finally, the execution of a post-hypnotic command may be connected with a specific condition. For instance, the following may be suggested: " Whenever you hear the word morphine, you will feel ill." It may be said that post-hypnotic commands will in general be obeyed in any type of hypnosis if they are of the class of reasonable commands. Amnesia may of course support even the execution of reasonable commands. Unreasonable commands, it must be said, in general have no prospect of being carried out unless there is an amnesia which protects them from the criticism of a clear consciousness. But this is by no means a rule without an exception. Unreasonable acts may be obtained by the use of suggestion even when amnesia is not present. In general, post-hypnotic commands of the unreasonable variety are accepted only by such persons as evince advanced stages of suggestibility in other respects also. But we had occasion, only recently, to observe another case in which post-hypnotic commands were promptly executed although it was impossible to obtain optical suggestibility. Among these acts was the assumption of a marked gayety after a certain signal, a clapping of the hands, etc. Here again there seems to be no fixed law. On the other hand, even hypnotized subjects who may advance in the hypnotic state to the stage of negative hallucination very frequently will not carry out post-hypnotic suggestions (of the unreasonable kind). In the case of hypnotized individuals who have shown a state of dreamy abstraction during hypnosis, the post-hypnotic command will very often be carried out only incompletely. Thus, experiments have been made on persons of this type who, after having been ordered to clap their hands thrice each time they are asked how they are, will at once clap their hands on emerging from the hypnotic state. Obviously, their conception of the command uttered during hypnosis was an inadequate one. The most perfect execution of post-hypnotic commands may be expected from such hypnotized persons as make the impression of being in full possession of their senses in spite of a high degree of suggestibility. Post-hypnotic indisposition is more pronounced in the case of the more complete degrees of hypnosis as a rule. But an exception must be made for those hypnotized persons who seem to be acting, during hypnosis, and in the world suggested to them, not much differently than in the waking state.

In our description of those subject to visual suggestibility, we have already mentioned that the hypnotized individual may have a will of his own with regard to the things he will consent to have suggested to him. There is no stage of hypnosis which requires that all signs of resistance be absent. A very frequent form of hypnosis is that in which the hypnotized person falls into a slumber which cuts off all relations between subject and hypnotizer. Other hypnotized persons, excellent subjects of visual suggestibility, will not awake on the given signal, but only after the use of more emphatic methods. It may almost be stated as a rule that the hypnotized person emerges with reluctance and resistance from the state of sleep. In extreme cases, hypnotized individuals cannot be awakened from their sleep for several days. Not infrequently the hypnotized individual will pass from hypnosis into a state in which he lives for his own interests alone, connection with the hypnotizer having been more or less completely broken, with a more or less definite consequence of a hysterical condition, which may—in unfavorably or awkwardly managed cases—last for days. We have seen a case in which, a few hours after one of the customary public demonstrations of hypnosis, in which the patient (a woman) had been used as a medium, there ensued—as an hysterical reaction to this condition of public hypnosis which had much affected the woman—a state of sleep lasting for twenty-four hours, during which it was impossible to wake her and which made it necessary to transfer her to the psychiatric clinic. We have already mentioned the fact that hysterical attacks may serve as the beginning of the hypnotic state, for even during an hysterical attack, the individual is expressing his own natural desires.(*) Even in the later course of profound hypnosis, hysterical attacks of the most varied forms may ensue.

(*) In a recent case of hysterical blindness, in which I succeeded with the suggestion that she would be able to open her eyes and see, the recovery of sight was followed by a marked hysterical crying spell, the significance of which was revealed in later psychoanalysis.—Trans.

The profounder the degree of the hypnosis, the easier the transition to phenomena in the domain of hysteria. Profoundly hypnotized persons who have full possession of their senses during hypnosis are here again the exception. The manner in which the profound hypnosis is brought about varies considerably. Sometimes the first few strokings are sufficient to bring about such a profound state of hypnosis. In other cases it will transpire after a number of stages, beginning with a more superficial hypnosis. Sometimes a profound hypnotic state will not result until repeated attempts have been made in the same seance, sometimes only after a lapse of several days, and after a number of hypnotic seances. The degree of susceptibility to profound hypnosis customarily increases when the hypnosis is repeated. Furthermore, the consciousness becomes clearer in the later profounder hypnosis, until finally, after repeated hypnoses, the condition is attained in which the trained medium will carry out even the most idiotic orders. But it must, of course, be admitted, that the process of training has no direct connection with the hypnosis as such. We are here concerned with transition stages approaching the state of waking suggestion. For all the phenomena of an enhanced suggestibility may be retained, independently of the condition of sleep, and independently of all the phenomena of fatigue, dizziness, etc.

It becomes apparent how large a variety of possibilities exists with regard to the phenomenology of hypnosis. A systematic distribution of the various degrees of hypnosis is therefore precluded by the nature of the case. Forel distinguishes the following types: 1. Somnolence. The subject may, by the exertion of a certain amount of energy, resist the suggestion and open his eyes. 2. Light slumber or hypotaxis, or charme. The subject can no longer open his eyes, and is in fact obliged to comply with some of the suggestions or all the suggestions excepting amnesia. He does not become amnesic. 3. Profound sleep, or somnambulism, characterized by amnesia after awaking, and by post-hypnotic phenomena. (This distribution, like all others, is by no means adequate to the wealth of phenomena involved, but will suffice for a superficial orientation.)