The Mind and the Body.

Otago Witness, Issue 2896, 15 September 1909, Page 88

The Mind and the Body.

That the mind has a definite and positive effect on the body is now one of the commonplaces of science. Since the discovery of the vaso-motor nexvee we know that the brain, by their means, acts on all th© organs. The beat of the heart may be affected, slowed, accelerated, or even stopped, by the effect of the emotions. Anger and fear have an effect on the body which is noticeable by the most unobservant. As M. Finot points out, intone© attention, concentrated on one point of our body, causes chamre.« in it. In this way it is possible to cause local swellings, redness or pallor, though thi« power is most often ?een in highly nervous subjects. Charcot, th© well-known experimentalist in hypnotism, gives numerous cases of this kind, v\here the phenomena of burns or scalds I'aw appeared on people's bodies as a result of his suggestions. We thus £«c that it is possible to cause disorders of the bodily functions as well as to cure them by means of this action of the mind on the body, although the beneficent 6ide of this power is that most frequently exercised. The cases which yield most readily to such treanncnt are spitting of blcod, bleeding at the nose, and bleeding from wounds That auto-suggestion in some form has been employed Co* the latter purpose from the earliest and most primitive times is shown by the survival of many of the old formulas, wh>'ch. under the name of charms, were used as aids to 6elf-hypnotism, and the consequent stoppage of hemorrhage. As fai back as the days of Homer we "find the wise Odysseus employing a special incantation to stop the flow of blood from a wound inflicted by the tusk of a wild boar It is a curious thing that these survivals of the dim, far back ages, after having been discredited for so many hundred year 6, should be rehabilitated and restored to the realm of actual fact by the latest discoveries of recent science.