CURED BY SUGGESTION.

Clutha Leader, Volume XXXV, Issue 2126, 29 January 1909, Page 1

CURED BY SUGGESTION.

AN INTERESTING SUBJECT,

On a recent Sunday in America 30 sermons were preached proclaiming what is called the "Emmanuel treatment," which consists of a "judicious blending of religion and mental suggestion for the cure of disease." In

the case of the Emmanuel movement, only functional diseases of the nervous system are treated, and that mental suggestion is often useful in these cases has been proved by Dr Fechner in Germany and Dr Charcot in France. Dr Worcester (writes a New York correspondent) does not even claim to have discovered a panacea for all ills, and he is merely responsible for the organising at nis church of such a combination of religious and scientific treatment under clerical and medical supervision *as seems best fitted to meet the requirements of nervous derelicts, & class more numerous in America than any other civilised country. Undoubtedly there have been numerous wellauthenticated cures, and this fact is largely responsible for the popularity of mental suggestion as a cure in America to-day. It is not yet so fashionable us pin-firing and thought-read-ing were in the times of the mesmerism crazo on your side of the Atlantic, but things are rapidly tending that way. The trouble is that so many amateurs are trying their luck at healing by suggestion, and the question is raised whether as much harm as good may not have been done as the result of rank inexperience. Some disciples of the Emmanuel movement, which has recently been transplanted to England.. France, and Uermaany, go a trifle fur* ther than the originators. For example, the Rev. Henry Rose, a popular New Jersey pastor, preaching recently at Newark, * declared not only that wives had a chance of reforming their husbands, but that every fault, sin, and crime in children can be prevented, and every bad habit cured by mental suggestion given in homoepatnic doses while the patient slept. Mr Rose cited an instance in which he and Dr Worcester, pastor of the Emmanuel Protestant Episcopal Church, of Boston, engaged jointly, and in which 100 children were treated for depravity, with the result that 35 were absolutely reformed, 45 were greatly benefited, and only 12 failed to respond. "While the mind of a child is more susceptible to mental suggestion during >s)eep than that of an adult," continued Mr Rose, "an adult can be reformed by persistency. I know of women whoso homes were made unhappy who reformed their husbands by waiting until the latter slept, and then sitting down beside their beds and talking to theni. One whose hudband drank told me that she spoke as follows:—'l'm going to have a little talk with yon, Henry. You will not awake because I am going to tell you pleasant things. To-morrow when you have finished your work you will not go to the club and drink and carouse; you will return home, where you will find a good dinner, and a happy family evening you will spend with me because 1 will entertain you, so you will not want to leave.' Next day the husband came home as his wife said he would, forgot his club, and soon after, persisting in the treatment, the wife entirely cured him." Obviously, if_ the treatment is good for husbands it is equally good for wives, and, being cheap, they are experimenting along the linos of mental suggestion to-day throughout America.