ucceed in making a kleptomaniac
think that he will not steal any more, he will cease to steal, etc., etc.

This training which perhaps seems to you an impossibility, is,
however, the simplest thing in the world. It is enough, by a series of
appropriate and graduated experiments, to teach the subject, as it
were the A. B. C. of conscious thought, and here is the series: by
following it to the letter one can be absolutely sure of obtaining a
good result, except with the two categories of persons mentioned
above.

_First experiment_.[*] _Preparatory_.--Ask the subject to stand
upright, with the body as stiff as an iron bar, the feet close together
from toe to heel, while keeping the ankles flexible as if they were
hinges. Tell him to make himself like a plank with hinges at its base,
which is balanced on the ground. Make him notice that if one pushes
the plank slightly either way it falls as a mass without any resistance,
in the direction in which it is pushed. Tell him that you are going to
pull him back by the shoulders and that he must let himself fall in
your arms without the slightest resistance, turning on his ankles as
on hinges, that is to say keeping the feet fixed to the ground. Then
pull him back by the shoulders and if the experiment does not
succeed, repeat it until it does, or nearly so.

[*] These experiments are those of Sage of Rochester.

_Second experiment_.--Begin by explaining to the subject that in
order to demonstrate the action of the imagination upon us, you are
going to ask him in a moment to think: "I am falling backwards, I
am falling backwards. . . ." Tell him that he must have no thought but
this in his mind, that he must not reflect or wonder if he is going to
fall or not, or think that if he falls he may hurt himself, etc., or fall
back purposely to please you, but that if he really feels something
impelling him to fall backwards, he must not resist but obey the
impulse.

Then ask your subject to raise the head high and to shut his eyes,
and place your right fist on the back of his neck, and your left hand
on his forehead, and say to him: "Now think: I am falling backwards,
I am falling backwards, etc., etc. . ." and, indeed, "You are falling
backwards, You . . . are . . . fall . . . ing . . . back . . . wards,
etc." At the same time slide the left hand lightly backwards to the
left temple, above the ear, and remove very slowly but with a
continuous movement the right fist.

The subj