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CHAPTER VIII.

NEW METHODS IN DETAIL-CONTINUED.

The Theory of Auto-Suggestion.

This

The power of suggestion which proves so effectual when employed by another in one's behalf can be used with even greater effect upon one's self. This may sound like an extravagance, but it is not. It seems incredible to some that one may talk to one's self with pronounced effect; and yet it is true. is one of the evidences of our duality of mind. "An affirmation made even perfunctorily at first," says Dr. M. Woodbury Sawyer, "if one can do no more, does tend to unite with feeling and to become a thing of life. A genuine willingness to try the experiment is all that is necessary to prove the truth. If one persistently and cheerfully whistles to keep up courage' there comes a time when the bugle call to arms becomes a pean of joy for an accomplished fact. But the affirmation without expectancy, or, worse still, positively fearing the opposite, is building with one hand and tearing down with the other, or starting the engine forward and immediately reversing it."

But there is force in method and it is of considerable importance to observe the proper formula. For the necessary instruction of the physician himself, and, through him, of his patients, reference is made to Part II.

The reader will understand that the votaries of psychic healing believe most emphatically that ALL CURES ARE ESSENTIALLY SELF CURES. No matter what the particular formula set, the real process

of restoration is effected by the subconscious faculties of the patient. In all suggestion the appeal is to the subjective. At the same time it will be understood that the subconscious is approached most commonly and most easily through the conscious, as will be shown in the succeeding chapter on "The Vehicles of Suggestion.'

The subject of auto-suggestion has been introduced for two specific reasons, the force of which cannot fail of recognition.

First: That it is needed by the physician in order that he may develop in himself the health, the self-control, the strength, the poise, the energy, the wisdom, the courage, the persistency, the faith, the altruism and the constancy required in one who seeks to become an efficient physician and surgeon-a true healer.

Second: In order that the essential factors involved in cure may be faithfully applied. One cannot well be a good teacher without first passing through the curriculum.

The more we have of the same qualities that in our patients are recognized as conducive to mental and physical health, the more efficient we become in the work, which, to be of the right quality, must be to us a vocation rather than a mere avocation.

One ship sails east and another sails west,

In the very same winds that blow;
'Tis the set of the sails, and not the gales,

That determines the way they shall go.

New Methods in Detail

(CONTINUED)

"Washington Irving could write well, but he could not make a speech. Patrick Henry could make a speech that would carry men off their feet by its eloquence, but he could not write a creditable report."-Leavitt.

"It is to be reckoned a piece of good fortune for a bright and talented youth to fall under the dominating influence of a master mind. In endeavoring to walk in the footsteps of an intellectual giant, to comprehend his theories and specu lations and to carry the burden of his thought, unexpected strength and power are developed, and when the day of emancipation comes-as it always does come in the case of gifted youth-the learner will find that he has entered a higher sphere of intellectual activity and will henceforth rank among the world's productive thinkers."-Nathan C. Schaeffer, Thinking and Learning to Think."

"Pluck wins! It always wins!

Though days be slow

And nights bo dark 'twixt days that come and go.
Still pluck will win; its average is sure;

He gains the prize who can the most endure

Who faces issues, he who never shirks

Who waits and watches, and who always works."

CHAPTER IX.

NEW METHODS IN DETAIL-Continued

THE VEHICLES OF SUGGESTION.

"Thought is feeling," says Carpenter.. It is a sensory product. To produce feeling there must be either actual or recalled contact. All thought springs from stimuli. These stimuli at one time find entrance through the auditory canal, at other times through the eye, often through the touch and so on. Even taste exercises a similar thought-creative influence. Besides the recognized five senses it is quite probable that there are occult senses-unknown and unclassified.

Patients no doubt differ in their receptivity, owing in great measure to the difference in permeability of their thought channels.

In passing it may be said that a corresponding inequality is found in healers, arising from the difference in degree of their powers of thought concentration and ideality. An imperfectly formed and wavering concept cannot be driven home with precision and penetration.

The principal vehicles of suggestion are the voice and the touch. To these may be added the physical expression of the operator and his written thought. The suggestion itself is, of course, a thought.

Nor ought I to omit mention of the atmospheric ether, by means of which it is claimed that the thoughts themselves can be conveyed bodily from one to another, as in "thought-trans

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