Homo-Culture; Or, The Improvement of Offspring Through Wiser GenerationHolbrook, M. L. (Martin Luther)
Philosophy
Homo-Culture; Or, The Improvement of Offspring Through Wiser Generation
Holbrook, M. L. (Martin Luther)
Eugenics; Heredity
The Hidery tribes of Northern British Columbia and Southern Alaska, who
never flattened their heads, have long been famous for their works of
art, such as elaborate carvings in wood and stone.
_Suggestion as an Aid in the Training of Children._
Within a few years an old subject, that of hypnotism, formerly called
mesmerism, has received new attention under the name of suggestion, or,
in medical language, "suggestive therapeutics." It was used in a rude
way by Mesmer in the cure of disease. Later it was employed much more
effectively by Braid and others for the same purpose, and especially for
the prevention of pain in surgical operations. Want of space forbids our
going into any extended historical detail as to its application for
these purposes, but a few points will be considered, which bear on the
subject.
It was found that when a person had contracted a bad habit, as, for
instance, smoking or drinking, it could often be broken up by placing
him in the mesmeric sleep, and telling him he would no longer desire to
continue the habit, but would even loathe them. The habit of sucking the
thumb, a bad temper, lying, stealing, dullness and lack of ambition,
etc., were amenable to this treatment. To illustrate: A boy fifteen
years old, always at the foot of his class, was put into the hypnotic
sleep, and told that he would be able to study harder and learn his
lessons better, so as to go to the head. This was continued daily for
several weeks, and, sure enough, he accepted the suggestion, and
outstripped every scholar in his class, and kept at the head so long as
these means were used; but, unfortunately, when they were discontinued
he relapsed into his first state. The suggestions had not been
sufficiently thorough to take deep root, and become a part of his
nature, as might have been the case with a better knowledge as to how to
use them. So long ago as in 1892 Dr. Berillon, Editor of _The Revue de
l' Hypnotism_, read a paper before the Second International Congress of
Experimental Psychology, in which he stated that he had observed the
beneficial effects of hypnotism in education in some 250 cases,
including nervous insomnia, night terror, sleepwalking, kleptomania,
stammering, idleness, filthy habits, cowardice and moral delinquency. He
also stated that other observers had similar experience. My friend, Dr.
B. Osgood Mason, of New York, working on the same lines, has had similar
experiences. I will quote a few illustrative cases furnished by him. The
first is of a school-girl fifteen years of age, a pupil in one of the
grammar-schools of New York--intelligent in many ways; a good reader of
such books as interested her--history, biography, and the better class
of novels; but for the routine of school studies she had no aptitude,
and she was constantly being left behind in her classes. She could not
concentrate her mind upon details which did not specially interest her.
If she succeeded in learning a lesson she could not remember it, or if
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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