Arizona republican., 1899-05-06
HOW THOUGHT CURES
Difference of Having a Disease or
 Believing One Has It.

i. } ity by even the m1st. conservative ant material Of scientists. The more ad- vanced and speculative members of the medical profession have experimented aic1g that line for a number of years
 with very interesting results.
 In speaking of the effect Of thought
 on the body I am not exploiting Chris
 tian science, faith cure or anything oi
 that kind, but am merely giving my
 individual opinion, which is based on
 rather wide experience as a general
 practitioner of medicine
 In order to understand how a
 thcught can influence the physical or
 gans it is necessary to have some con- ception of what is called the subcCn-
 scious mind. which is that part of the mentality that carries On such invol- ] untary actions as the circulation of the
 blood, etc. If these obscure functions
 were depCnderis upon the exercise Of
 the conscious will the very necessity
 of drawing the breath in and out sev-
 era times minute during ones life
 time would be such a stupendous eff i fort as to appall the bTavest and most i energetic of creatures. But these mat i ters have all been simp1ifed by a beD- i cfccnt Greater through the action Of 1 the subconscious mind. This mind,
 while distinct from the thought, or in i teEectual faculties, may, however. he affected by them, and that sympathet- | ic foundation Of all phenomena of the 1 faith cu1ist and the mental healer. Though these effects are generally
 unconscious on the part of the subject. | there is nr-l reason why this should be
 necessarily so, and a few simple ex- l periments will convince almost any
 one that the mind may have a con
 scious effect on the body. One of the f simplest experiments, though on5 which is of no use in a practical way
 is to fix the mind int3ntly on certain | part of the skin-say the inside Of the
 wrist. If the mind is not allowed to
 waver from -thJe point in a few minutes l tEe surface of the wrist will be suf-
 fused by a warm glow and an itching. EurRing sensation will appear One of the most general effects of this con
 Centration of thought cn some part of the body is the restlHssness which en- sues and the consequent difficulty of holding the part still for any length Of time. It is, therefore, easy to under stand hCiH the constant dwelling of the mind upon some slight CT imaginary i'll may aggravate the condition if ex- iste1t CT even cause it to appear if im- aginary.
 A curious case of this kind came un- der my observation not long ago. A
 young woman patient 'cf mine con- suited me about hard lump in her throat, which had been gradually get ting larger for some time. She seemed
 very much troubled about it, and con-
 fessed to me that there were few mo- ments in the day in which the fear of its developing into malignant growth
 was absent from her mind. On exam ination 1 found in her throat the pur- pie congestion which is frequently en-
 coundered in connection with cancer. After clG2su-.ing another physician 1 decided that, on account of her fear of cancer, it would be r,-it only useless but cruel to enlighsen ht-- as to the real condition Of her throat. So we con stantly referred 'tci the swelling as a simple and common enlargement of the gland. The patient, thus reas- suTed, ceased thinking about her threat, and after a few weeks the swelling actually began tct diminish in size, and at Hast completely disap- pcaIed. Hers was doubtless an eXcep- tiona. case, but it goes to show that such fear-thoughts may have tangible effects on the physical plane.
 There is an old superstition. which doubtless originated among people who understood the principles of men, tai therapeutics, that if child of stunted growth is placed beside a young sapIing and a peg driven into the sapling on a leve, with the top Of the childfs head. as the young tree grows and the distance between the ground and the peg increases the child will also begin to grow if thu child really were to bec-me interested in the procedure and should earnestly watch the growth Of the sapling, 1 can under stand hcey sudh attention cn it's part might impress it's subcon5cious mind with the idea of growth so strongly tl1at :l,s body wciuld respond to the irn- pulse and actually begin to grow.
 I think that the rapid growth of a child has Cften been augmented by the constant exclamations of it's relatives and friends of: Why, how that child is growing" Nervous children become more nerY CHS when their attention is called to their condition by doctors consu .tatiCGls with anxious parents in their presence, while the little suffer- CTS from St. VitCs' dance, or chorea, bec-ene much worse In seeing that their antics attract the pitying atten- tion of their elders. Most doctors have found that a child whose parents are terrified when a case of measles O. scarlet fever breaks out in the hood is much mcre apt to cen tract the disease than is the little raga- muffin who comes and goes when he pleaseS, without thought or fear of measles.
 Every physician will rcmcmbor the great number of dysontcric and diar- rheal cases he w1s ca,l2d upon to treat during the ch.clera scare a few years