Suppose, madam, that your husband had relied upon argument to convince you that you ought to marry him. Of course he did have to plead long and hard—that is conceded; but suppose that while doing so he had always worn green spectacles. Or suppose that in all his long and arduous courtship he had never looked you squarely (and impudently) in the eyes—gloated upon you. I deem it certain, madam, that you would now be the wife of a wiser man, probably a deaf mute. In our present stage of controversial progress speech is not without a certain clumsy utility. It enables you to apprise your opponent of the views to which you invite his allegiance. But for the purpose of inducing him to accept them it is destitute of effect—is not at all superior to the plunk-plunking of a banjo, or that favorite political argument, the braying of a brass band. Your success in convincing another person depends upon (1) the degree of your hypnotic power, (2) your opportunities of exerting it and (3) his susceptibility to it. In brief, the business of converting the several kinds of heathens is a thing which, like checking the too rapid increase of population, cannot be done by talking. I have tried to show you how it can be done if you have the gift. If you have not, be thankful, for you will escape much defamation from those who believe hypnotism a kind of sorcery liable to the basest abuses and practised only for purposes of sin. Is it possible so to practice it? Why, yes, if I can hypnotize a thief I can make him steal. If I can hypnotize a bad girl—but that would be needless. Whatever in one’s normal state one is willing to do, or wants to do, one can be made to do by hypnotic control. That is as far as the power can go; it cannot make a sinner out of a saint, a demagogue out of a gentleman, nor a mute out of Theodore Roosevelt. AT THE DRAIN OF THE WASH-BASIN The Prohibitionists, good souls, are funny. They are all “down upon” license—high or low—because it is a legal “recognition” of the liquor trade. As reasonably they might condemn fines for misdemeanor as legal recognition of misdemeanor. Until the liquor trade is forbidden it is legally recognized, whether licensed or not. Why can not militant aquarians accustom themselves to think of a license fee as an _ante facto_ fine? I am not loaded down with controversial weapons for the fray between liquor and water; I love neither the one liquid nor the other; but I enjoy the quarrels of others, am enamored of effective means in battle and should be miserable if I had failed to point out to any combatant in any contention how he could obtain an honest advantage.