Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 75.djvu/370

366 of the church, as an organized body, into new and untried and disputed fields of activity.

One thing should be clear at the outset, and it is emphatically set forth in the introduction to Dr. Worcester's book.

The church should not undertake this work without the cooperation and assistance of the best possible medical advisers. It is a scientific work, based on the knowledge derived from the study of medicine and psychology, and its favorable results are not miracles, to be exploited for the glory of religion. They can be obtained only in cases in which no organic pathology is found to exist, in cases carefully selected, after rigid and strictly scientific examinations.

Remember that the goal is reeducation into right habits of thinking and living; and in this process of reeducation, judged by their results, there is little to choose, between the efficiency of the agnostic Dubois and the ecclesiastical Worcester.

That this process of reeducation can not be accomplished by hypnotic suggestion is the firm belief of the medical profession, especially the neurologists. That a state of hypnotic susceptibility can be induced in most people by a will that is stronger than their own is not doubted; but that it is safe, or that its results justify its use as a therapeutic measure, is stoutly denied.

Hypnotism has been known since Braid in 1842, and every now and then it rises up on a new wave of interest and popularity, often in a new guise; but so far as its therapeutic value is concerned, we have as yet derived from it no safe practical assistance.

If not by hypnotism, then how shall we seek to accomplish this reeducation—shall it be by an appeal to reason, or to faith? Unless by faith is meant religious faith, it has been and will always be done by medical men, acting through both agencies; by strong men, confident in their own powers, and able to impress others with the same confidence and faith in the truth, sincerity and accuracy of their opinions.

Examples of this use of psycho-therapeutics have been common enough in the practise of every successful physician. That he has been working at an increasing disadvantage is probably true; due partly to the growth of specialism, and also to the complexity of modern life, which, as has been already indicated, means the loss of that personal relation and sympathy between patient and physician which used to be common; but to an even greater extent is this disadvantage the result of the extraordinary development of the more material and scientific side of disease.

For example, Dr. Cabot complains, and with too much reason, that the psychological side of tuberculosis has been largely disregarded. “We have tried to have our patients live almost by bread alone—actually by milk and eggs alone, in some cases.