You've seen it on television, or paid a visit to the local cinema where you've watched this film about a man who wants his wicked way with this lovely young girl.
He has deep set, mesmeric eyes from which you can't look away.
He commands her to lie on his couch, says a few arcane words over her and proceeds to ravish her! Either that, or you switch on the TV just in time to see a dozen people on the stage being told to do the strangest thing by this man dressed in a cloak and silk top hat.
One man's running around the stage on all fours, barking like a dog.
A woman's gurgling like a baby.
They must be stooges, simply acting for the audience, who are having a high old time laughing at their expense.
After all that, do you believe in hypnosis? It's highly unlikely, and you have a right to be skeptical.
Is it any wonder, then, that hypnosis has a bad name? Why people think it's a load of drivel or if there really is such a thing, then the people who fall under a hypnotic spell must be very weak-willed indeed.
Hypnosis, though, has been used for thousands of years, although no-one's been absolutely certain what it is.
The ancients found they could put people into trance-like states and help them with pain and other ailments.
It wasn't until Anton Mesmer came along in the 18th.
century, that hypnosis made its appearance into modern times.
Now of course we've met Mesmer before, haven't we? Dear old Mesmer and his magnets.
He cured quite a number of fashionable people in 18th.
century Europe, by hypnosis and psychosomatic means.
The problem was that he didn't have a clue why it worked.
He thought it was because of some universal fluid that's within us all.
His name for it was 'animal magnetism.
' If only he'd realized the truth, that hypnosis is perfectly natural and that this 'external power' of his had absolutely nothing to do with it.
A number of scientists were commissioned, (among them Benjamin Franklin), to look into the veracity of Mesmer's claims.
They themselves were pretty skeptical to begin with, and not surprisingly they threw out all the claims made by the poor old chap.
They didn't throw them out because he made false claims of effecting cures.
They found they were perfectly valid.
But scientists must have a reason for acceptance and since they could find no indication whatever of this 'universal fluid,' indeed, no reason at all as to how these cures were effected, they threw everything out.
Mesmerism, or whatever he liked to call it, must be a load of rubbish.
Most people today don't have any idea what hypnotism is or why it works and that includes some hypnotists! Is it any wonder, then, that the general public are suspicious of it? Oh yes.
You have a right to be skeptical.