The Invisible Influence
By Alexander Cannon
Chapter VIII
Some Psychic Phenomena
THE next day we explored the neighbouring country, in which the silence could almost be felt even in the wake of day. Romantic and mystic was the atmosphere: at the same time a feeling of wonder, and of new life, not only physically, but mentally. Unseen powers were indeed fully at work, and we knew that they were working for the betterment of mankind.
Distant Touch
It was not long before we returned to our hermitage, but no meal had been as yet prepared for us, as the house boy remained in the same hypnotic sleep as the Knight Commander had placed him in the early hours of that morning. "Before we wake him," said the Sage, "let me demonstrate the power of distant touch during this state. You know that the senses of temperature and of pressure sometimes become extremely acute and delicate, and hence it is not uncommon to find that a person who is deeply hypnotized can easily recognize [110] things at a distance of from at least half to one inch distant from the skin. You will recall that Braid showed this to be, as he thought, simply due to the increase or decrease of the temperature of the air immediately surrounding the skin; remembering that it is very slightly altered with anything coming rather close to the skin." He then proceeded to demonstrate very cleverly all these facts, and on no single occasion did the subject fail, although it was the very first time he had hypnotized him. Then to show still further the use and power of deep trance states, the Knight Commander decided not to awaken him, but during the sleep state to command him, without awakening, to prepare a meal, which he did with a competency almost superhuman.
Having demonstrated many other interesting phenomena the Messenger of the Upperworld then proceeded to awaken his subject by a single whispered command: "Awaken!" This command was instantly obeyed, and the house boy remained cured of his severe attack of neuritis and neuralgia in his sciatic nerve; and further, he had no recollection whatsoever of the attack, or what happened the preceding night. Never again did he suffer from sciatica.
Thought-Reading by Vibration Sense
In the evening we had a party amongst ourselves and the Sage suggested that we should play the ancient favourite society game of old [111] England, known as the "Willing Game"; which is an interesting phenomenon which well illustrates the hyperacuity of perception even in certain waking states.
The Knight Commander went out of the room, and the Sage was asked to think of some object present in the room, which the Knight had to "spot". The Knight now came into the room again and took hold of the Sage's hand and asked him to think "hard" of where the chosen object was (it was the clock). The Knight also thought very "hard" and intently; it was noticed that the Knight and the Sage went together towards the clock, until the Knight pointing to it said, "You thought of the clock!" The explanation is that the Sage thought intently of the clock and where it was; at the same time he unconsciously produced slight movements of his body, and particularly of the muscles of the hand and arm which the Knight was holding: when they proceeded to any object nothing special happened, but when they proceeded towards the clock which was the object thought of, these movements increased and the Knight followed them; he allowed himself to be directed there by them and hence found his goal.
Fascination and Imitation
I then introduced the phenomenon of fascination and imitation as introduced first of all by Donato of Paris. I asked the Sage to hold his [112] muscles stiff and keep them forcibly contracted, as by so doing the voluntary movements are limited as much as possible. I then fixed the Sage with my eyes, and we each stared at one another, until the Sage began to show a vacant stare. This process lasted a minute or so. (It is of course the first stage of ordinary hypnosis; the glare of my eyes appeared to overcome the Sage, so that he was now obedient to my will: this is very different from the process used in medical hypnosis where the will of the patient is actually greatly strengthened.) The Sage saw my eyes getting larger and larger, brighter and brighter, greener and greener, and still brighter and brighter; and now he looked into the black dilated pupils of my eyes and became dazed and staggering. In this state he imitated everything that I did, even against his own will, for he simply could not help himself. He followed every movement I made, and when I stepped backwards he followed me, and when I went forwards he retraced his steps and so kept his distance from me. When I told him that he would be compelled to do anything which I did, and I signed a letter, he immediately signed a letter with my signature and not his signature; and so accurate was that signature that I know the bank would have passed it as genuine (this is a point for Judges to remember). My gestures counted so much in this state that I had to watch my every pose. In order to make the Sage sit down, I suggested [113] that he should do so, but also at the same time made the necessary gesture with my hands. It must be remembered that the Sage's eyes were wide open all the time. Now by a pure simple gesture of my hands I drew him to me, and with equal ease repelled him. (This is known as the Draw and Repel Phenomenon.) As it was not now necessary that the Sage should see what I did, I turned him round with his back to me; still he imitated very accurately every movement I made, although there were no mirrors in the room and he could not possibly see with his bodily eyes what I was doing. I even closed his eyes for him, but this made no difference. At this stage the Knight Commander asked how this was done. I replied, "My opinion as to how this phenomenon is produced, is that the subject becomes so sensitive to movements of the air and to the minutest noise, that he can detect exactly from this which limb the hypnotist moves and exactly where he moves it to."
I now shook hands with the Sage who was still hypnotized, and said "good-bye" to him, and as he walked out of the room, I fixed my eyes on a crack in the earth floor and continued to look at it; during this time the Sage appeared to be glued to that spot and although he tried hard, he could not move a limb. (Donato called this The Evil Eye: it can be seen in this way how much superstition has arisen.) I now commanded the Sage to "wake up", and [114] although he had been conscious of all that had gone on, he said he simply felt he could not help himself, and was compelled to carry out the instructions given against his strong will.
We now had lunch and our Distinguished Guest stated that he would like to be hypnotized in the same way afterwards, if I could succeed. I agreed to this, and during the meal the chief boy played a few records on the portable gramophone. After several had been played, especially one waltz tune, the "Blue Danube", the Sage remarked, "As regards rhythm, as in music, you have no doubt witnessed the hypnotized subject's expression, as he is commanded to listen to different types of music; the person looking sad during melancholic music, joyous during gay music: he will often dance when dance music is played, alternating his steps to waltz, two-step, and one-step as the music changes from the one to the other. You know that this will not occur if the person has no ear for music and no sense of rhythm; but this is so rare as to be almost an unheard-of state of affairs. Nice soothing music will in itself calm the troubled mind, and I have seen its marvellous effects upon the insane. Music can often do what medicine cannot do." Music hath charms.
After lunch I proceeded with the Knight Commander in the same way and with the same case as I had done with the Sage: then at the suggestion of my friend the Sage, I tried a [115] post-hypnotic experiment upon our Distinguished Guest.
Post-Hypnotic Suggestion
For the benefit of the chief boy and the house boy who were allowed the honour of witnessing some of these experiments, we explained: "Post-hypnotic suggestion is suggestion given during hypnosis that the person hypnotized will at a future date during his waking state carry out certain acts. In many cases the time can be very accurately stated, as for example, you will command: 'At nine of the clock on the fourth of August, you will call and see the Governor-General and ask him how I am; and give him this note'. Although the suggestion may be given months ahead, the act will be carried out with very few exceptions; even here the person will feel an almost irresistible impulse to do so, when the time comes. The suggestion can be acted upon at once after awakening from the hypnotic sleep if so directed. I will show you these phenomena now."
Thereupon I proceed first to give the Knight Commander the post-hypnotic suggestion for some months ahead in August and also gave him a note which I wrote there and then, addressed to the Governor-General. Then I commanded, "You will now wake up, take off your coat, and in ten minutes take off your shoes; then you will ask me if I can lend you a [116] coat and shoes as you forgot to put these on, and cannot imagine why you were so absent-minded, as you, in your stately position, never do such silly things." The suggestion was acted upon at once, for as he awakened he immediately took off his coat, and then walked about the cave dwelling, and exactly ten minutes later sat down on the stone chair and proceeded to take off his shoes. Then he looked round the room, and afterwards at me; and now looked at his chest and feet: at once profusely apologized for having come to see me in that undignified fashion, which was strictly contrary to his desires; that he could not understand how he had been so completely absent-minded and prayed that I would forgive him and could I, as an act of grace, loan him, until his return, a nice coat and shoes, likely to fit.
I then continued to explain to the boy, "However, if the suggestion is strongly contrary to the person's outlook on life although he will almost feel an irresistible impulse to do so, he will just manage to control himself from carrying out such an act. Such a person may be told upon awakening, to say, 'My name is Harry Lauder, I sing louder . . . my name is Harry Lauder . . . I will still make you happy . . . so always says the great Sir Harry Lauder,' and he will say this, although he is, in fact, Sir X. all the time. This type of experiment can be added to, almost infinitely.
The Illusion of Free-Will
"What these experiments teach us is that no one really has a free-will. Even in everyday life, we dress as others do, because we dare not do otherwise. Where is our free-will, then? These people will make all manner of rationalizations in speech to account for their foolish actions. So do we in ordinary waking life. Although we believe ourselves free, we are really under restraint, as is the hypnotized. We have a mistaken feeling of freedom which really shows the powerlessness of our will. As Spinoza said, the illusion of free-will is nothing but ignorance of the motives of our choice. How true this is of life! The thought that we might have acted otherwise, does not show free-will. For instance, I have not infrequently met with doctors whom I have hypnotized, who were certain that they could have opened their eyes when told that they could not, but said that they merely did not want to open them. They repeatedly made up their minds that the next time I hypnotized them they would make sure that they aid open their eyes, but when the time came, the same feeling came over them, and once more they just did not open their eyes. In my opinion this is a demonstration of the absence of free-will. On the contrary, it must not be forgotten that whilst in hypnotism the element of free-will is still more limited than in waking life, it is nevertheless during this very hypnosis [118] where the hypnologist can by suggestion greatly strengthen the human will, and make it a power for good."
Thinking that perhaps after all we were super-human beings, the chief boy made the bold request that we should hypnotize him and carry out some further experiments upon him. To this we agreed, and the Sage placed him in a mild hypnotic state so that he could at the same time remember everything. He was now told that he would insist on putting his hat tightly pressed downwards on his head and write this direction on a piece of paper. Then he was fully awakened, the paper was handed to him folded, but he was instructed not to look at it until directed to do so. He was then told he could do anything that he wished to do, and that he was free to do just as he liked. He however carried out the Sage's suggestion faithfully, and was greatly surprised when he eventually opened the paper and found that he had just carried out me act directed on that piece of paper: he emphatically told us that he had deliberately made up his mind to do something entirely different from that which had been suggested to him. He nevertheless did it. How frail is the human will! How true is the saying that where there is no will there is no way. How true also, that, where there is a will, there is a way. Will the way!
It should be borne in mind that to carry put post-hypnotic suggestions perfectly, the subject [119] must be deeply hypnotized and in the somnambulic stage of hypnosis. I am convinced that many acts which a person would never otherwise perform, he will carry out with faithful accuracy in the post-hypnotic state. For this reason, I believe that we shall some day, as I am now investigating, be able to show that a mild form of hypnosis, at any rate, reappears in the subject at the time the post-hypnotic suggestion should be carried out.
As it was wise to await the summer before we moved on, we spent much time in discussion and in both perfecting the art of hypnotism and telepathy; for the Sage pointed out that the mild undetectable hypnotic state so far as ordinary means were concerned was a form of telepathy.
Be that as it may, the Knight Commander who by this time was miles and miles away from this hermitage carried out faithfully the post-hypnotic suggestion; and further, he did it by no other means than the transportation phenomenon, because we know of a truth that he was at least two thousand miles away from the Governor-General on August the Fourth, and yet from a note I received later from His Excellency the Governor, there is proof that the Knight Commander at exactly nine of the clock on that very evening, suddenly appeared at Government House; and further it could hardly have been a marvellous hallucination, which the Knight was perfectly capable of [120] producing, for the letter was handed to the Governor, which the General showed me later; hence that could not possibly have been an hallucination. The Messenger of the Higher World had at the given hour transported his body over two thousand miles, and there is further proof that three hours later he had "returned", which is a physical impossibility; it can only possibly be explained by the transportation phenomenon.
Shortly after this, we were walking down the street of a hamlet nearby, when to our surprise we saw ten Latahs. I had seen the Latah, when I was in Malaya, and could only describe them as a degraded type of Malayan people, who imitate apparently against their will, every movement made by the spectator, just as if they were perpetually hypnotized. These people behave similarly to patients or subjects under "fascination and imitation". In China I noted a peculiar people also, as well as in Siberia, to whom Hammond gave the name of Miryachit.
As the Sage was looking at these people whom I was describing, he asked me, "Would these people imitate a murder if they saw a person commit one?" I replied that I thought that they would. Further I added, "A person can commit a criminal act in a state of self-hypnosis like these Latahs without having to first witness such a crime, and it would be well for the Criminal Courts not to lose sight of this all-important fact."
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