This is an age of Mind-Cures as well as an age of confusions - the false prophet age, when the inexperienced pupil would supplant the master, stealing his mantle for the influence of its shadow - the parasite living upon the real. This leads up to a consideration of the various cults and fads so much in vogue at the present day, some of which by their speciousness have misled and deceived thousands of individuals. There are many mind-cures which may be condensed into two classes, the true and the false. The false mind-cures are parasites, imitations, seeking the shadow of the true, in order that they may be able to parade under false colors, so that the people may "imagine a vain thing."

The false mind-cures, like all imitations, are based upon the true, taking as much from it as is necessary for a foundation and the sake of appearance. With a little change in dressing or make-up, and the addition of a few abstruse and abstract names and phrases, a supposedly new system is thrust upon an unsuspecting and gullible public. The false cures, whatever be their names, depend upon the principles involved in the true mind cure for their results, whether they be known as Christian Science, Mental Healing or Prayer Cure.

Chronic invalidism is one of the conditions wherein chronic invalids are sick because they think they are sick. Their sickness is purely imaginary.

Unquestionably many of the so-called mind-cures belonging to the mental science, magnetic healing class. have accomplished wonderful results in chronic invalids, simply by diverting the attention of the invalid. In imaginary diseases all that is necessary to do to accomplish a cure is to divert the attention of the individual from himself and his ailment, and he soon gets well from a disease which had no existence - save in his imagination. This is the reason why the so-called mind-cures have, apparently, performed such wonderful cures. Humanity, at large, has a wonderful imagination for imaginary diseases. This is a fact of which the patent medicine man is fully aware. This, which might be called the mind-cure of the patent medicine man, with his bottle of colored water, is just as efficacious in many instances as the more philosophical forms of the false mind-cures. The cure is even more lasting in the patent medicine instances, where a picture appears in the newspaper showing the once-near-to-death invalid clothed in his dress suit, the very embodiment and picture of health. Imaginary disease can be removed by any form of mind-cure, by a bottle of patent medicine, by a belief or faith in anything; but not so real disease. Real disease cannot be cured by any of them, but only by a compliance with the laws of health.

What may be, for the sake of simplicity, termed a variety of mind-cure, is Hypnotism or Mesmerism, in regard to which a great deal of misconception exists, largely owing to the extensive newspaper notoriety given it, which is usually of an inaccurate and misleading character. No individual can be hypnotized against his will. It is only when the individual voluntarily surrenders his will to that of another that he can be hypnotized. This is really auto-hypnotism or self-hypnotism. Under certain conditions almost anybody can be hypnotized. Experiments have been made in France which go to show that about 95 per cent. of people can be hypnotized if they be willing; the susceptibility to suggestion or hypnotism, depending entirely upon the willingness of the subject and the degree of passivity, as well as the power to concentrate the thought or attention on the intended seance or sleep. Without this willingness or cooperation no one can be hypnotized.

In other words the imagination, the same imagination which builds castles in the air, of the individual who wishes to become hypnotized, is excited to activity by the hypnotizer. Just as an individual can imagine disease or health conditions, so one can imagine when he is under hypnotic influence, that he is going to do or think certain things; by surrendering voluntary control of his own will to follow the suggestions of another.

Hypnotism belongs strictly to the field of the sciences, and as such it should never be brought to the level of a circus-and-clown performance, as frequently occurs in the public hypnotic exhibitions and displays.

These displays or exhibitions should be prohibited by law, as dangerous and degrading, not only to the particular individual, but to the public at large as well.

Hypnotism should never be used under any circumstances, excepting by a thoroughly qualified and conscientious physician, and then only with a definite and specific object in view, with the full concurrence of the patient's friends and relatives. Public exhibitions of hypnotism are one thing, and its use in the hands of an experienced and conscientious physician is quite another.

There are many competent writers who doubt the utility of hypnotism as a curative or therapeutic agent, and think that its results are achieved at the expense of demoralization. My own observations with hypnotism as a therapeutic agent, extending over a period of fifteen years, is that when judiciously used in carefully and well selected cases, it is a most powerful curative agent, and results may be attained by its use which are incapable of achievement by any other known means. This statement refers not only to disease real and false, and disease conditions, but also of the education for the improvement of character and morals.

The basis of the curative powers of hypnotism depend entirely upon the excitation of the powers of imagination.

Suggestion or hypnotism powerfully appeals or excites the imagination, and in one form or another is the influence used by every successful physician in the land. Whether the suggestion be given in the waking or sleeping condition is not of so much material difference as was once thought. Psycho-therapy or true mind-cure as now rationally used by the physician is one of the most powerful influences used for the successful cure of mental diseases. The curative agent is faith in the doctor, with or without his medicine. In France, Charcot, Luys, Bernheim, Liebault and many others, use hypnotism in a purely scientific manner and with marked results. The American temperament is not so easily excited or imaginative as that of the French, so that hypnotism is used with more success-in France than in America.

Whatever agent excites the imagination, whether it be a bottle of colored water, a sugar pellet or a little wooden image, it's all the same: it is faith, belief or hope in something.