One must agree with Delboeuf that Liegeois has exaggerated the forensic dangers of suggestion greatly, and the facts - i.e., the small number of actually proved crimes induced by hypnotism (suggestion) - seem to bear him out in this. But Delboeuf generalizes a great deal too much in his negations. He admits that he does not render his somnambulists amnesic, and does not suggest a deep sleep to them. Now, this is a matter of taste, but he gives all these persons the suggestion of a light sleep, and neglects the experiments of deep sleep with amnesia and anaesthesia. There is no doubt that a large number of somnambulists are so enormously suggestible that they can be rendered almost completely at the mercy of the suggestions of the hypnotist. These persons are the dangerous instruments for the carrying out of crimes, and also may become the easiest victims of the same. For this reason they need not be necessarily bad or weak-minded persons; they are frequently weak in this one respect only. I am acquainted with some of them who are even quite good characters. The fact that such persons have in former times been misused by cunning criminals for their own purposes, even without hypnosis, has been made use of by Delboeuf somewhat narrowly. Delboeuf recognizes that a full hypnosis is not necessary for suggestive influencing. Consequently, he ought not to reproach the Nancy school for having erroneously ascribed these cases to suggestion, but he ought to blame those former judgments which did not realize that suggestion was playing a part. Liegeois, on the other hand, was mistaken, according to the views of all level-minded specialists, in imagining that in the celebrated murder committed by Gabriele Bompard this morally defective person had told the truth about the circumstances of the murder during the hypnosis. Delboeuf is quite justified in opposing him in this particular. Although she has never stated it, it is quite possible, and not improbable, that, as she was so very easily influenced, Bompard acted in obedience to Eyraud.

The matter assumes quite another appearance if one places one's self in the position of the judge, and regards Bompard as an undoubtedly ethically defective, hysterical subject. This was, in all probability, true. The absurdity of the legal logic lies in sentencing such a person. I have repeatedly tried to express myself in this direction. 1 Delboeuf expresses himself in favor of a sentence, 2 "because Society has only to protect herself, and not to punish a crime or improve the criminal; and because people like Bompard are dangerous, and it is especially dangerous to encourage this class by leniency or by acquitting the prisoner." But in this the fine old logician and investigator has made an error which I cannot allow to pass. For, following out his reasoning, one ought to punish all dangerous lunatics for the same reasons. I agree with him, with the exception of the punishment, but only in the opposite sense. One should render all criminals harmless, just as one does lunatics (Society is undoubtedly bound in duty to do so), but one ought not to inflict the odium of criminal sentences on irresponsible brain3 with such an amount of pomp. 3 I am convinced of the fact that a good somnambulist may commit serious crimes during hypnotic sleep in response to suggestion, and that, under certain circumstances, he may not know anything about it later on.

1 Forel. Journal of swiss Jurisprudence, 2nd year, vol, i,, 1889; and Cot-responding Journal for Swiss Practitioners, 1890, etc.

2 Delboeuf. Hypnotic Review, January, 1891.

3 Vide also Delboeuf, "The Pathological Lie" and the "Textbook on Foren-sic Psychopathology."

The best proof that a good somnambulist believes that he has intentionally carried out those acta which he has committed poathypnotically is to bo found in the way in which he is ashamed of them, and in which he shows his embarrassment and tries to conceal the act. I induced a hypnotized person who was ethically rather weakly developed to steal a knife lying on the table posthypnotically. As soon as she left the room she went to my cook and told her with some embarrassment that she had taken the knife with her by mistake; she did not know how she came to do it, and requested the cook to replace the knife without saying anything to me, as "she felt very awkward about it."

One of the most insidious tricks of suggestion might be met with in the employment of suggestion as to time (Termineingeb-ung), which is always possible, together with the suggestion of amnesia and of resolution of free-will, in order to cause a person to carry out an act to serve a selfish purpose or to commit a criminal deed.

In former times one often noticed that the hypnotized were afraid of the hypnotist, and that they concealed themselves from him, as they would from an "evil spirit." This was due to the fact that the "magnetizers" of that time did not understand their own art in its psychological sense, and induced the hypnosis with all sorts of humbug having the appearance of mystery. Hypnosis is achieved by Liebeault's method with the assistance of comforting, quieting, natural, and friendly words. The hypnotist does not now appear like a Mephistopheles with his apparition; he gives the impression of being a helpful doctor, or, at least, of being a trustworthy man of science, who applies natural and not supernatural remedies. Apart from this, he has it in his power to make the hypnosis beloved and desired by the hypnotized by means of suggestion. He can suggest to them the feeling of being well, good spirits, good sleep, appetite, etc. The fact that persons hypnotized in this way for the most part gladly come again, and regard the hypnotist as their friend, can be explained by this. And in this fact lies the greatest forensic danger of suggestion. One catches flies with honey, and not with vinegar. It is true that it is not a recent development, as we have already seen; that certain siren-like persons possess the gift of transforming other persons into their blind tools, for their own egotistical purposes. But undoubtedly much more may be done in this respect in the future with the help of well-directed, regular suggestion.