ris in the eye and
reaffirmed by some pseudotests of the muscle reflexes. All that is not
very edifying and the decent physician, who justly feels somewhat
dragged down to the level of the quack in applying such means
frequently, will abstain from them wherever possible. He knows that in
the long run, even the psychasthenics are best treated with frankness
and sincerity and he will therefore only in exceptional cases resort to
such short-cut treatment by making believe. Yet that it is sometimes
almost the only way to help the patient cannot be denied.

A neater way to secure the sufferer's belief in the possibility of a
cure is by securing the desired effect at least once through little
devices. As soon as it is once reached, the patient knows that it can be
reached and this knowledge works as a suggestion. The hysteric who
cannot speak when he thinks of his words, or who cannot walk when he
thinks of his legs, may by the skillful physician be brought to a few
words or steps before he himself is aware of it by completely turning
his attention to something else and producing the stimulus toward the
movement in a reflex-like way. Still more successful is the effort to
resolve the inhibited action into its component parts and to show to the
patient who cannot perform the action as a whole that he can go through
the parts of it after all. As soon as he has passed through a few times,
a new tactual-visual image of the whole complex is secured for his
consciousness and this image works then as a new cue for the entire
voluntary action, overcoming the associated counter-idea.

Another excellent way to overpower a troublesome idea or impulse or
emotion is to reenforce the opposite idea by breaking open the paths for
its motor expression. The effort to hold the counter-idea before
consciousness may be unsuccessful so long as it is only an idea which
tries in vain to produce any motor effect; but if the action itself has
been repeatedly gone through, the idea will find it easier to settle and
it becomes vivid in proportion to the openness of the channels of motor
discharge. This holds true even for emotional states. A certain word
perhaps picked up by the psychasthenic in a particular experience may
produce whenever it is seen a shock and a depressing emotion. If we ask
the patient to go artificially through the movements which express joy
and hilarity, make him intentionally grin and open wide the eyes and
expand the arms and i