"Let us test a negative hallucination produced by waking suggestion. I give the suggestion that the subject will not see me on awakening. The result is extremely varied, but there is always a parallelism between the deflection and the inhibition which one can discern. The greater the inhibition is, the greater will be the deflection also.

"One person sees me as usual, but does not recognize who I am. Here there is a dissociation between the primary and secondary identification, between the center of the optical picture of the memory and that of the comprehension. This dissociation is a picture of memory which has long since been formed, which has been produced by former excitations, which has since existed latent, and which has now been reawakened. The influence of my suggestion opening up new paths caused this dissociation to appear in the foreground. To quote one possibility, my subject passed me by one day, while he was thinking out a problem, without recognizing me. I then crossed over to him, and found out in conversation that he had not recognized me. At the time when my subject met me stimuli traveled from the center of the problem occupying him along all the deflecting tracks. This also applied to the optic track. We are justified in assuming a direct or indirect connection of every nervous center with all the others. The association fibers leading to the center for the problem are for the time being naturally more easily excitable than any of the other deflecting efferent fibers of the optic center. A large part of the neuro-kyme which called the visual impression of me forth was deflected along this track. As a result, the center for the conception of my person was not sufficiently excited to render the subject conscious of it. The conception of the non-recognition was first connected during the conversation with the center for the conception of my person, and then with the problem by means of simultaneous associations. However, the conception of the non-recognition was further connected to the optical center through the center of the problem. If I now produce the conception of non-recognition of my person in my subject in a sufficiently intense manner, an excitability travels through the center for the problem to the optical center for my person, and forges a new path for itself. The neurokyme, arriving in this situation, which my person has excited in the optic nerve, is thus deflected without arriving in the usual track in sufficient force to produce conceived parallel processes in this place. The secondary identification is wanting. One might state in opposition to this that the subject did not identify any visual impressions secondarily as he went along pondering. Then, why should he not identify now the visual impressions which he received from me? The cause lies in a double opening out of new paths. During the conversation which followed the occurrence the visual picture of me was vividly excited. An association took place in consequence between the center for the problem and the visual impression of me, which was more intimate than the associations between the former and any of the other optical centers. To-day, as I gave him the suggestion not to see me, I awakened in the subject the optical components of the conception of myself very vividly by means of sight directly, as I had done before. A3 the excitation arrived at the optical center through the center for the problem, the association fibers, which were the best conductors, naturally seized a large proportion for themselves. But the track to the center for my person belonged primarily to these, as a result of the stimuli which occurred directly before. This track, which is usually of secondary importance, becomes for the time being the chief track. The visual impression of myself is deprived of its usual associations for the present. It becomes dissociated by the opening up of new paths. That parts of the neurokymes have at the same time reached other portions of the optic center proves that suggestions which are sensorily connected can now succeed much more easily. I only need to ask the subject whether he recognize this person or that object. This suffices frequently to connect the optical center of the object to the deflection system. That this takes place more easily in connection with objects which are closely associated with me naturally depends, again, on the opening up of new paths which can be employed by them at the time when the visual impression of me is excited in the subject. One could argue further in objection to this that such a favorable past history is not usually present in the majority of experiments. That is certainly true. But it is not necessary that it should be present. Every one of us has passed by persons with whom we are acquainted without recognizing them. The conception of me which the subject possessed at the time of the experiment contained that of a person of his acquaintance as an essential component. The track was therefore present. It only wanted strengthening.

"Every dissociation called forth by suggestion depends on the reappearance of earlier conditions of conduction, of earlier constellations, just as in the case dealt with in detail in the preceding paragraph. The form of the dissociation, and hence that of the reception of the suggestion, is therefore connected singly in consequence of the past experiences of the individual. Whichever case is the least latent, and is most easily excitable, now appears in the consciousness, and this takes place so vividly that the subject believes that he is experiencing it at the time. A second subject sees as if he had a mist before his eyes, because the recollection of the not seeing his acquaintance was most easily connected with dusk. A third subject declares that he is blind. The conception of not seeing was associated most strongly in him with the conception of blindness. This, then, became vividly excited. The conditions of conduction became prominent as one of its components in the optic center, which conditions corresponded to an earlier sensation of blackness. The center for black absorbed such a proportion of the neuro-kymes arriving that the latter could not cause any further excitability which could enter into the consciousness.