CURRENT TOPICS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 104, 10 August 1910, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS

TAKING THE OATH. The "Oaths Bill," which wall probably become law this session, and which wiil dispense with the "kissing of the Book." is not absolutely necessary to absolve people from the ordeal of pressing their lips to a much-kissed volume. Any person may obtain exemption from kissing the volume from any magistrate or judge and may make a formal affirmation without even taking the volume in his hand. Long usage, however, has made a Testament an apparent necessity in the Jaw court, in every law office, and to every Justice of the Peace, Commissioner of Oaths, and so on. Most people, in order to avoid giving trouble, affect to "kiss the Book," but, after many years' observance of the custom, we are able to say that not one per cent, of people who take an oath really touch the volume with their lips. Medical men are sworn every day, but no medical man with any respect for himself ever invited transmission of microbes front the mouths of all and sundry. There is no doubt, however, that form and ceremony, apart from the medical aspect, is very necessary and imposing. The carrying out of court or legal business of any kind, robbed of its mystery and solemnity, would cheapen disciplinary proceeding. It is because the ordinary person is impressed with the ceremony of the law that he respects it, and so the thought that in "kissing the Book," the oath is the most solemn that could be taken in a Christian community, may have some useful effect. It cannot be doubted, however, that a man who intends to commit perjury will do so' whether he kissed the Bible or a dictionary, that he will lie after a solemn affirmation without the Book, or will refuse to speak the truth after any form ot administering the oath. But we. also believe that the mere statement of the average man's intention to "■speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" will help him to avoid untruth. The agitation to abandon the practice of "kissing the Book" commenced some years ago, and at that time it was the custom to allow a Bible to be kissed until it was greasy, tattered, and altogether obnoxious. The fact that a copy of the Scriptures could be obtained for sixpence did not affect the authorities up to that time, tout the custom, at least in the larger courts, has been since

to 'keep a fairly new and clean copy. We do not know whether actual disease has been traced to a court Bible any more than to a greasy bank note, a library volume, or telephone receiver, but the idea being repulsive, it is hoped that witnesses and other persons who have to make an affirmation on oath will, when the Oaths Bill is passed, De informed that the practice is quite unnecessary.

OUR DREADNOUGHT . Few people love form and ceremony more than New Zealanders, and Ministers of the Crown are called on to open everything from a railway station to a bazaar or a flower show. It is an excellent idea, because people enjoy form and ceremony, and therefore should be given it, especially as it does them no harm. The progress l of a country is told by the lips of its public 'men, and generally in ceremonial fashion. IPz - emiers make policy speeches at small socials or great banquets, a railway statement is saved for the opening of a bridge, and the turning of a sod is not always the most important matter at an "opening • function." New Zealand gave a Dreadnought to the Navy some time ago. The world rang with the news, and London papers devoted in the aggregate hundreds of columns to the subject. But the other day the keel of that Dreadnought was laid. Nothing happened; there were no shouts of triumph, no speeches, and no Imperial fervor. During the same week the keel of the Australian Dreadnought was laid. Sir George Reid fell over himself in his haste to get to the dock to make a speech, and to tell the people what he meant Imperially, and to demonstrate generally that Australia was not a mere smudge on the map. The builders were glad to see the rotund High Commissioner and his eye-glass, and listened to his jokes and had a great deal of Australian news administered to them. Although one warship more or less not does seem to matter, it gave the Australian High Commissioner a chance to push the barrowi of the Commonwealth. A huge sum of New Zealand money is going into the battleship we gave to Britain,'and even if we don't want a cash return we want to keep the busy Old Country advised that we shall probably need the help of the Navy some day.

A (PRUDENT DEPARTURE. The Borough Council at its meeting on Mondav evening adopted the proposal of the Electric Light Committee to make provision in future for depreciation in connection with this important branch of the Council's activities. The money actually invested in the department up to date amounts to £"26,239. Of this, £21,504 bears a half per cent, sinkmg fund. In the case of ordinary machinery five per cent is usually allowed lor .depreciation. Electrical machinery, it is generally admitted, has a shorter life than ordinary machinery. But the gentlemen who have directed the destinies of this municipality of recent years have, up to now, never thought it desirable to make any allowance for depreciation in estimating the results obtained from the lighting department. The difference between sales of current and working expenditure, plus interest charges, have been treated as "net profit," and the money used for the general work of the borough. The position, of course, was unsound and should never have been countenanced by a business-like council, as we had occasion to repeatedly point out. Nothing "was to be gained by this policy of self-deception. It certainly helped the Council out x)f an awkward financial .hole. Owing to the (heavy in-i crease in the cost of administration, the 'Council had either to annex the money that properly should have gone to provide ' for depreciation, or increase the rates. And the former was the easier course. Thanks, however, to Councillor Wilson, the position is now to be squarely faced, and 5 per cent, allowed for depreciation in future. If any credit is due to the Council for taking a step that was their obvious duty to take when they first assumed office, it should be accorded them. Tbe department is becoming a remunerative concern, but whether it can earn sufficient to pay, besides the £I3OO required for depreciation, the amount which the Council have of late been commandeering from it for street maintenance purposes is another and different'matter.

HYPNOTISM AND CRIME. The other day a message stated that passengers on the steamer Montrose 'believed that Le Neve had been hypnotised by Crippen, to whom she seemed in complete submission. In this connection it is interesting to recall a recent article iu which Professor Hugo Munsterberg, of Harvard University, went into the relation of hypnotism and crime. In his- article Professor Munsterberg described tine case of a girl in a Western State of America who, after years of delightful and unselfish family life, came under the influence of a sham Italian, count to 'whom she felt repulsion, but] whom she finally married and made over all her property to. Finally she began] lawsuitg in,the Courts, and made falsei and cruel' accusations against her aged mother and sisters. Everyone who had, formerly known her felt, from her voice! and expression, that she was not herself any more, but was the passive instru-| meat of an unscrupluous schemer. "To, What degree, then," continues-thc writer, "does the full hypnotic state itself fall within the real of criminal action? One aspect seems to offer itself at once: the hypnotised person may become the powerless instrument of the criminal will of the hypnotiser. He may press the trigger of the gun, may mix the poison into the food, may steal and forge; and yet, the real, responsible actor is not he who commits the deed, but the other one, who is protected, and who directs the crime by hypnotic suggestion. All this Jias apparently been demonstrated by experiment a hundred times. The possibilities of such secret crimes seem to grow, moreover, in almost unlimited numbers through the so-called posthypnotic -suggestions. The opportunity to commit a crime through an unwilling subject in the hypnotic sleep itself is in practical life, of course, small and exceptional; but the hypnotiser can give the order to carry out the act at a later time, a few hours or a few days after awaking. Every experimenter knows that he can make a subject go through a foolish performance long after the hypnosis has ended. Experiments seem to prove that all this is entirely possible, and post-hypnotic suggestions thus plays in literature the convenient part of secret agency for atrocious murder as well as for Trilby's wonderful singing. In contradiction to all this, I have to profess that I have my doubts as to the purity of Trilby's hypnotic singing, and I have more than doubts —yes, I feel practically sure —that no real murder has ever been committed by an innocent man under the influence of post-hypnotic suggestion. It is true, I have seen men killed with paper daggers and poisoning with white flour and shooting with empty revolvers in the libraries of nerve specialists or in laboratory rooms, wan doctors sitting by .and watching the per- | formance; but I have never become convinced that there did not remain in the i mind of the hypnotised a 'background j idea of artificiality, and that this idea overcame the resistance which would be' prohibitive in actual life."