METAPHYSICAL RESEARCH SOCIETY.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17420, 3 April 1922, Page 3

METAPHYSICAL RESEARCH SOCIETY.

Tie fortnightly meeting of the Metaphysical Research . Society was held at tho' Y.M.C.A. on Thursday evening, when an interesting .address on "The Power of Suggestion in tho Treatment and Development of Defective Children and tho Overcoming of Abnormal Conditions" was given by Mr W. J. Michie. The meeting was well attended, aoveral visitors being present in addition to a full muster of members.

The lectuior said a tremendous responsibility was laid upon parents in regard to the training of children. The ohild mind was very plastic and -easily impressed, and it was impossible to start too eariy to build it up along right lines. Suggestion of love, health, and courage should be continually implanted and negative ideas such as fear, hatred, and Jiseaso carefully avoided. Generally Breaking, much better results could bo obluincd in the treatment of a wayward child by a tactful appeal to the higher sido of its nature. than by a continuous repetition of "don'ts" or corporal punishment. An important duty of parents, and one which was usually sidestepped, often with eerious consequences, was tho education of children in matters relating to sex. Hundreds of cases had come to'the speaker's notice where ignorance -in this regard had been tho causa of untold mental and physical suffering. It was a fallacy to bring children up in a state of so-called "innocence." They had a right to know the truth about all those questions of life which most concerned their future welfare. They should bo instructed in Nature's laws, which were God's laws, and the consequences of tho violation of these laws should bo explained and constantly iterated, so that habits of thought and action would be formed that wotud ultimately make them conquerors in life. Mr Michie then gave definite instructions as to tho manner in which parents should treat their children by suggestion in Buch troubles as nervous excitability, deficient reasoning powers, stammering, weak will power, and various bad habits. He showed how it was possible to get "en rapport" with the child while it was sleeping, which time was the beat of all to plant suggestions in the child's subconscious mind as at that time there was no opposition on the part of the conscious mind to contend with. At the conclusion of his address, Mr Michie was accorded a hearty vote of thanks. A lesson from Dr. Parkin's course in suggestive therapeutics was read by tho secretary (Mr G. H. Bartlett), the reading giving rise to a profitable discussion. A motion that the society should meet weekly instead of fortnightly was defeated.