ootnote 4: "Elements of Hypnotism," p. 99.]

I venture to call attention to the grim smile worn by Charles Kingsley in
the portrait which prefaces the large edition of his Life and Letters.
Charles Kingsley suffered from frequent fits of exhaustion; these are
often the results of excessive hypnotism after the limit (at the fifth or
sixth effort) of the hypnotist's power has been reached. His brother
Henry, we learn from Mr. Kegan Paul's "Memoirs," was excessively
hypnotisable. His character was weaker perhaps than Charles's, but the
geniality of his writings bears testimony to his remarkable ability.

He was only rescued from a condition little better than a tramp's by a
kind friend. Charles's life was perhaps shortened by hypnotism. One of
Kingsley's neighbours at Eversley was the late Sir W. Cope. The elder son
of this gentleman, when Secretary of Legation at Stockholm, came to a
tragic end. He suddenly, when out walking with a friend, although his
health had been apparently perfect, began to shout and wave his umbrella.
He was put under the care of attendants, as he was considered to be
temporarily insane. He jumped out of a window and was killed. Voices
insulting or threatening him, and with such scoundrels speech would be of
something dreadful, would provoke or frighten the unhappy man.

About two years later a distinguished priest, well known in London, also
suddenly waved an umbrella and behaved as if he were angry. But he showed
hardly any sign of insanity, and on applying to the proper court for
release from supervision, was declared sane by a jury.

Strength of mind and religious feeling doubtless saved him from the fate
of Mr. Cope. A brave man can resist such an attack under favourable
circumstances.

It is well known to those who have read the Biography of Lawrence
Oliphant, and that of Dr. Anna Kingsford by Professor Maitland, that
Lawrence Oliphant, who became a Shaker (a member of a sect who employ
hypnotism, as Mr. H. Vincent describes, to bind their neophytes to
them),[5] wrote commonplace vulgar verse on religious subjects, although
himself a highly cultivated literary man.

[Footnote 5: "Elements of Hypnotism," Appendix, _note_ 3, p. 270.]

Hypnotism doubtless led to this; the verse thought out in some vulgar
Shaker's mind was transferred to Oliphant. Not only was Oliphant induced
to become a Shaker, but his wife became one also, and both sacrificed
much money to the society and agreed to live