MIND CURES FOR PHYSICAL ILLS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16738, 20 May 1922, Page 4

MIND CURES FOR PHYSICAL ILLS.

WHAT IS THE TRUTH P At the Wigmore Hall, London, M. Coue- the French apostle of aut-o-sug-gestion, is to deliver the first of five public lectures on this subject, (writes a Harlev Street doctor in the “ Dailv Mail/’). Most people know that he bases his system on the use and guidance of the imagination, and discards any employment of will or effort in effecting" an auto-suggestion. There is nothing new in suggestion and auto-suggestion. and there is nothing unusual in brilliant results obtained in various functional nervous conditions by this means. But what is creating a fluttering in the. professional dovecots of Mayfair and in the* profession generally is the startling successes that M. Cone has apparently reached in substantial organic diseases. Indeed be says. “ Contrary to common opinion, physical diseases are generally far more easily cured than mental ones. Hitherto we doctors have been accustomed to “ turn down ” all organic cases as far as psychic treatment is concerned. except in those instances in which there is a large “ functional ” (that is, nervous or mental) element as well. Now we have to face a formidable list of apparently more or less pure physical abnormalities which have been treated and curved bv suggestion or auto-suggestion alone. Such various conditions as consumption, enteritis, eczema, fibrous tumours. varicose veins, various ulcers, tubercular sores, chronic bronchitis, incarnations, diabetes, glaucoma (eve trouble), and the like-—all these individual cases are quoted at length by M. Ooue, and in. many instances vouched for bv the regular medical attendant. All these claims demand critical examination. There are many organic cases that get well without treatment, and it does not follow that they get well on account of a specific treatment simply because recovery follows on that treatment. Again, some organic troubles that hare received physical treatment will only show result* some time later, and that may coincide with a period of mental treatment. Then life is so complex that a change in the patient's circumstances or environment, a change of occupation, a change of air, a change of habits, may all contribute to the amelioration or cure of an abnormal organic state. One inust remember that M. Coue’s name is one to conjure with at Nancy, where he lives. His personal influence his philanthropy, his transparent honesty are very bin- factors. One would like M. Ooue to put in 6 or 12 months of his clinical werk at one of our London hospitals. One would like a sure and definite diagnosis of each case, notes carefully recorded, and results and after-history independently ascertained. This could Hot _ but prove deeply interesting. Nevertheless, M, Coue’s experience has been so lengthy and diverse and well attested and hi s results so wonderful on the organic side that the medical profession dare not dismiss them as n»worthy of investigation