Note 513 — Chapter XXVII

It should be said that the methods of leaving the patient to himself, and that of the simple verbal suggestion of sleep (the so-called Nancy method introduced by Liébeault of that place), seem, wherever applicable, to be the best, as they entail none of the after-inconveniences which occasionally follow upon straining his eyes. A new patient should not be put through a great variety of different suggestions in immediate succession. He should be waked up from time to time, and then rehypnotized to avoid mental confusion and excitement. Before finally waking a subject you should undo whatever delusive suggestions you may have implanted in him, by telling him that they are all gone, etc., and that you are now going to restore him to his natural state. Headache, languor, etc., which sometimes follow the first trance or two, must be banished at the outset, by the operator strongly assuring the subject that such things never come from hypnotism, that the subject must not have them, etc.