Part 21

_Psychic state_: exceedingly variable, varying culturally, with the stages of intoxication, and in the individual himself at different times. Mexican visions sometimes have a frightening tone, sometimes one of hilarity. The writer had marked confirmation of this while still ignorant of this ethnographic fact: in an Oto meeting in 1936 visions were of monstrous animals so ridiculous and hilariously funny that proper self-restraint in meeting was difficult; yet, in a control experiment comfortably conducted in New Haven, the psychic state developed into one of stark, galloping, psychotic terror, quite inexplicable on realistic grounds (later, parallels were found in Winnebago material and in white observations). Curiously enough Dixon noted in a cat photophobia, dilated pupils and a fixed “stare ... [and] most of the physical elements of ‘terror.’ ... The ears were drawn back, the hair over the body, especially the tail, becomes erected, there is twitching of the superficial muscles, the respiration being shallow and hurried, and the heart weak and irregular.” One experimenter’s subject became possessed of the fixed idea that he was being poisoned, when the intoxication had thoroughly developed. This experience, once felt, is so strikingly physiological that one is tempted to wonder if there is any hypersecretion of adrenalin, perhaps in adjustmental reaction to the effect of the alkaloids on the heart. Dixon thought _Lophophora_ differed from _Cannabis indica_ in never provoking merriment; yet Wertham and Bleuler had one subject who achieved a state of to him quite meaningless hilarity. Fear states are present among native users also, to judge from the content of some visions recorded; conceivably these might be the psychic end-results of the intensified reflex-excitability induced by the strychnine-like alkaloids. However, one should bear in mind throughout the antagonistic effect of the alkaloids, which together with individual, cultural and other differences (physiological state, amount eaten, the form in which the drug is taken—infusion or solid, dry or green—the continued eating of it in late stages of intoxication, etc.) contribute to widely variable reactions. The experiments of Wertham and Bleuler are impressive in this connection.[18] This variability for the same subject at different times, Indians explain, is conditioned by what one starts thinking about when the intoxication begins.[19]

PEYOTE AS APHRODISIAC AND ANAPHRODISIAC

We have previously noted the use in Mexico of teo-nanacatl, _Cacalia_ spp. and _Cannabis_ spp. for their supposed aphrodisiac virtues. Peyote too has become involved in this use, but it has been as warmly defended as attacked, some indeed maintaining that it is a specific anaphrodisiac. It can hardly be both. The present writer, as a matter of fact, considers this less a problem of physiology than one of ethnology, psychology or even psychiatry, and is persuaded that in the pharmacological-physiological sense there exist neither aphrodisiacs nor their opposite, anaphrodisiacs.

The matter is not to be settled off-handedly by resort to experiments on white subjects; it is a more intricate question of culture and personality. If white subjects argue heatedly for peyote’s aphrodisiac and anaphrodisiac virtues, this proves nothing physiological. It merely indicates the long notorious fact that given the somewhat anti-sexual tradition of west European culture, the typical anxiety of its culture-bearers is sexual. This is scarcely the case with the Plains Indians I have observed. As expressed in ritual, symbolism and prayer, the typical anxiety of these natives is that about life itself—and the culture-historical background out of which this has grown will be readily recalled by students of Plains ethnography (constant warfare, prestige symbolisms, the coming of the Whites with new diseases, superior weapons, etc.).

We shall merely cite here, therefore, instances showing up the order of “proof” so far adduced to support these contrary stands about peyote. Lumholtz leads the anaphrodisiac school:

Another marked effect of the plant is to take away temporarily all sexual desire. This fact, no doubt, is the reason why the Indians, by a curious aboriginal mode of reasoning, impose abstinence from sexual intercourse as a necessary part of the hikuli cult.[20]

Wertham and Bleuler also write of subjects that[21] “efforts to conjure up an erotic scene were unsuccessful.” Fernberger,[22] however, exhibits a still more naïve sense of evidence:

[An ethnographer] reports that in the Peyote Cults investigated there is no actual, implied or even symbolic eroticism[23] which marks these ceremonies off from practically every other known American Indian ceremony of any tribe or group [!]. In order to test the validity of some of these reports, nine mature members of the faculty ... submitted together to extreme peyote intoxication.[24] [The experiment was performed in a group _because_ it] gave the opportunity for suggestion of one observer upon another [and permitted a ceremony complete with rattles and drum. Consequently[25]] one unexpected and unforeseen result of this investigation is the evident strongly anti-aphrodisiac[26] effect of the drug. This would again explain, for social psychology and for anthropology, the purely and totally unerotic character[27] of the ceremonies of the Peyote Cults so unusual to American Indian ceremonies.[28]

It seems alike profitless to enter into a discussion of those who argue the aphrodisiac properties of peyote.[29] These have often enough been missionaries and administrators whose use of the argument in bitter attacks on the Native American Church shows them to be scarcely disinterested. Certainly from the evidence so far at hand we can only heartily endorse the opinion of Klüver[30] that “the drug apparently does not influence the sexual sphere in any specific way.”

THERAPEUTIC USES OF PEYOTE

From the physiological relation of the peyote alkaloids to strychnine and morphine, considerable enthusiasm was early shown about their pharmacodynamics and possible therapeutic uses. Jolly[31] in 1896 experimented on pellotine [= peyotline] as a hypnotic and soporific, for when used in small doses in man the fall of the pulse initially is accompanied by sleepiness. Heffter[32] likewise reports a marked heaviness of limbs and eyelids. Loaeza,[33] apparently using pan-peyotl preparations, maintained that peyote and _Cereus serpentinus_ (organillo) had value as tonics or cardiac regulators, but variable action and individual idiosyncrasy is marked. Henry[34] says the therapeutic dose of pellotine is one-third to two-thirds of a grain, but that it is only “slightly narcotic.” The high toxicity of lophophorine discourages its therapeutic use. Rouhier[35] wrote in 1926 that “properly speaking, therapeusis by peyote does not yet exist. Although the drug was introduced in the American pharmaceutical market[36] for twenty years, from which it has since disappeared, it is still unknown to the great medical public.” On the whole, however, the therapeutic possibilities of _Lophophora_ seem unimpressive.[37]

USES IN PSYCHIATRY

Because peyote produces what has been described as a “mescal psychosis,” it has been suggested that it might be a useful approach for the psychiatrist in the study of schizophrenia. The production of “horrible depressions” in a subject of Prentiss and Morgan and “fear that his life was leaving him,” as well as the unaccountable hilarity of Wertham and Bleuler’s subject, suggests a similar value, if any, in the study of manic-depressive psychoses too. No doubt psychoses may be exteriorized with increased facility in peyote intoxication, but this strikes one as a crude method and subject to the introduction of extraneous factors over which there is no control.[38]

Hutchings used pellotine as a hypnotic on psychotic patients in the St. Lawrence State Hospital. Pilcz likewise reports this use of peyote as a sedative for the insane, but Warburg states that these experiments have met with little success, on account of the by-effects of the alkaloids. Dr. Goodall of the Carmarthen Asylum, according to Havelock Ellis, tried peyote on melancholic and stuporous patients, but “beyond dilation of pupils and rapidity [!] of heart action, the results were nil.” Martindale and Westcott report that formerly peyote was used in neurasthenia, hysteria and asthma; it is hard to see in some cases where the cure is any superior to the disease, however. Briau employed peyote in “anxiety states,” but the extremely variable emotional states under peyote intoxication make even tentative conclusions precarious.[39] Indeed, peyote would be calculated to aggravate asthma and anxiety states under some circumstances!

Bensheim found different mescal reactions in cycloids and schizoids, but Wertham and Bleuler somewhat surprisingly discovered both reactions in a single person, and argued for the inconstancy of the formal structure of the “personality.” Probably, however, peyote had no definitive importance in either case though the former used only mescaline and the latter pan-peyotl. Zucker induced mescaline intoxication in the hallucinated insane, but far too many variables appear to be involved here. Zador conducted experiments on the blind and patients with disordered vision, using mescaline, the chief hallucination-producing alkaloid of peyote. Klüver discussed color predominance in reported visions (red-green in the initial phases, blue-yellow later). This suggests selective action of the alkaloids on various regions of the retina, evidence bearing on the Ladd-Franklin phylogenetic theory of color vision. Possibly, too, colors predominant in peyote-symbolisms of natives may have a physiological meaning. Klüver’s “form-constants” in peyote-intoxication may have similar significance, but he dealt largely with White visions only.[40]

PEYOTE AS A DRUG

Of more concern, however, to those who interest themselves in the welfare of Indians is the possible ill effect or habit-forming nature of the drug. On this point we quote the opinions of those better qualified than the writer to speak.

Briau,[41] in his psychiatric study, emphasized

the innocuousness of peyote.... No signs of grave intolerance were ever exhibited, nor any accident more disagreeable than vomiting, all too frequent at the beginning of a treatment with opiates. There was no notable organic upsetment produced during the time of action of the medicament. The effects on the circulation, respiration, digestive system and excretory functions have not appeared noxious. We have frequently examined urine for the existence of abnormal constituents revealing some derangement of the liver or the kidneys. In short, never during our researches have distressing secondary phenomena been manifested (headache, obnubilation, confusion, psychic and physical depression, or gastro-intestinal disturbances).... No brutality in the action [of pan-peyotl] can be remarked.

Briau believes the drug non-habit forming. Rouhier expresses himself more guardedly:

That peyote-mania can sometimes exist, we will not dispute. We merely remark, to explain our optimism on the subject, that the drug does not seem to provoke that irresistible physiological appetite, nor that “state of need,” purveyors of the great toxicomanias which opium, cocaine, heroine or alcohol create.

Havelock Ellis expresses himself as follows:

The few observations recorded in America and my own experiments in England do not enable us to say anything regarding the habitual consumption of mescal in large amounts. That such consumption would be gravely injurious I cannot doubt. Its safeguard seems to lie in the fact that a certain degree of robust health is required to obtain any real enjoyment from its visionary gifts.

The last statement is somewhat gratuitous, if not erroneous.[42]

Hrdlička[43] writes as follows:

My views ... are that any substance which is capable of producing such effects on the brain and nervous system if abused is bound to produce harm. Fortunately peyotl is rather scarce, is used on special occasions only—in a large majority of cases—and thus it is probably quite free from any permanent injury.[44] The drug can perhaps be likened to nicotine, and like the latter will doubtless not affect different individuals to the same degree. Also, as with nicotine, it may be quite impossible with our present means to detect the harm it has done. Besides which it is quite possible that the system may build up some resistance or safeguard against it and thus prevent any substantial injury. I should by no means join myself to those who see in it any _great_ danger.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Rouhier, _Monographie_, 231.

[2] Kobert, _Lehrbuch_, 1008-1009; Rouhier, _op. cit._, 227; Henry (T. A.), _The Plant Alkaloids_, 199: Dixon (W. E.), _The Physiological Action_, 71. Rouhier (_op. cit._, 228, 231) places peyotline in the strychnine group; it has a narcotic and tetanic effect on animals, to be sure, but in man, according to Jolly, it causes slight hypnosis, but no anaesthesia. Schmiedeberg puts it in the morphine group, which we have followed (cf. Kobert, _Lehrbuch_, 1009).

[3] Henry (T. A.), _The Plant Alkaloids_, 199; Rouhier, _op. cit._, 238; Dixon (W. E.), _The Physiological Action_, 71.

[4] Condensed from Rouhier, _op. cit._, 227-32. Note “pellotine” is the same as “peyotline.”

[5] Henry, _loc. cit._ Staub and Grassmann (_Über die Wirkungsgrenze_, 336) state, in dogs, increased heart-beat and pressure.

[6] Rouhier, _op. cit._, 231. I have modified and added to Rouhier’s classifications. Ellis (_Mescal: A New Artificial Paradise_) describes the effects on the central nervous system as “acute cerebrasthenia.” The lethal dose of anhalonine hydrochloride for rabbits is 0.16 to 0.2 grams per kilogram of body weight; lophophorine kills frogs by a dose of only 0.011 grams per kilogram of body weight. (Henry, _op. cit._, 199).

[7] Dixon (W. E.), _The Physiological Action_, 79-81. Rouhier (_op. cit._, 268-69): “Intoxication by peyote in man comprises two very distinct phases, one, general superexcitement, contentment; euphoria, the other of nervous sedation, of more or less accentuated physical indolence, and of hypocerebrality; this last phase is almost entirely filled with the production of color-visions.” Henry (_op. cit._, 199) likens this preliminary stage to alcoholic intoxication.

[8] Fernberger (_Observations_, 270) mentions “a very clear but rapidly changing focus of attention”; see also his _Further Observations_, 367. Crichtly (_Some Forms_, 102) notes the “rapidity of change,” though visions “lasted many hours.” It is in this that the “indescribability” of the visions lies (Ellis, _Mescal: A New Artificial Paradise_).

[9] Fernberger (_Observations_, 269) notes “distortion of time and space”; and (_Further Observations_, 367) a “grave upsetting of space and time ... space was extremely extended and time extremely slowed.” Maggendorfer (_Intoxikationspsychosen_, 355-56) notes for mescaline a time and space derangement, similar to those in other “intoxikationpsychosen.” Crichtly (_op. cit._, 105) describes micropsia and megalopsia, or gravely deranged perception of size.

[10] In these careful statements by Dixon (on a subject not notable for the accuracy of all observers) many physiological bases for ethnographic observations I have made may be found, e.g., the mistaking in a Kiowa meeting of the medicine-man Tonakat by an informant for a hideous alligator-like monster; he believed then he had seen this witch “for what he was.”

[11] The writer testifies to the accuracy of Dixon’s somewhat amazing statement. So marked have been the physical effects of the first stage of intoxication, that when these pass off to give rise to the feeling of physiological normality (introspectively), one almost has a distrust of the existence of these spectacular mental displays particularly if the observer is of a markedly non-“psychic” or skeptical cast of mind. The visions arise in the midst of a psychological state I can only describe as one of perfectly plausible “epistemological orientation,” sometimes acutely felt in alcoholic intoxication. The feeling of dissociation with this unfamiliar and spectacular side of one’s peyote-intoxication experience has suggested to some observers incipient schizoid psychoses. Small wonder natives often exhibit curiously ambivalent attitudes toward their visions, and sometimes explicitly reject and disclaim them as “bad,” the result of trickery by the peyote power (“he’s testing me”) or by some human witch present. Hoebel in conversation has insisted on the Northern Cheyenne attitude of suspicion of peyote’s “trickiness.” But I wholly disagree with Havelock Ellis and others who have argued for the “ineffability” of visions, and even less do I see in peyote-intoxication any approach to the mystical state of the epistemological _convincingness_ of the _visions_. It is this _concomitant_ state of seeming objectiveness and reality-orientation which accounts for the marked feeling of duality. On this point, cf. Drs. Monakow and Morgue: “[Peyote produces] a particular state of dreaming, without losing, relatively, the idea of orientation, accompanied by pseudo-hallucinatory phenomena.”

[12] Ellis (_Mescal: A Study of a Divine Plant_, 60) reports a “vague olfactory hallucination”; Fernberger (_Observations_, 269) and the writer have noticed kinaesthetic derangements which have parallels in native visions. Hearing is very acute (Fernberger, _ibid._; _Further Observations_, 371), but subject to hallucination and synaesthetic derangement.

[13] Some fifty native peyote “visions” were collected in the original dissertation from which this paper is derived.

[14] Rouhier, _op. cit._, 315, fig. 44; Ellis, _Mescal; A Study_, 68; Crichtly, _Some Forms_, 106.

[15] Dixon (W. E.), _The Physiological Action_, 81.

[16] Based largely on Dixon and Rouhier, with additional data from Jaensch, Wiley, Crichtly, Prentiss and Morgan, Ellis, Fernberger, Wertham and Bleuler, Lewin, Maggendorfer, Staub and Grassmann.

[17] Rouhier, _op. cit._, 232. But Dixon writes, “In man the nervous effects are extremely interesting, but on account of the respiratory depression which is liable to occur it is not desirable to experiment too freely; it is necessary to remember that this substance, like Indian hemp, varies considerably in its effects on different individuals, and that the element of idiosyncrasy is marked.”

[18] Wertham and Bleuler, _Inconstancy of the Formal Structure of the Personality_. The general thesis of these experimenters was that personality types might be studied as they were exteriorized in mescaline intoxication via the Rorschach test. One of the observers described two personalities in a normal subject in two periods of intoxication, not knowing that it was the same person. They conclude, interestingly: “It is suggested that these observations indicate that the form of a personality is not a constant, but that it may be influenced by outer circumstances, and that the usual psychologic ‘type’ of a person does not necessarily exhaust the description of the formal structure of his personality.”

[19] “What an excellent use for a medical congress,” Sir Francis Galton dryly wrote Havelock Ellis (_Mescal: A Study_, 71, note), “to put one half of their members under mescal, and to make the other half observe them.”

[20] Lumholtz, _Unknown Mexico_, 1: 359; cf. _Explorations in Mexique_, 181-82. It is a curious west-European mode of reasoning that leads one to expect in all psychic upsetments such as this the emergence of the sexual anxiety—more particularly in the case of peyote intoxication, which provokes marked fall of heart-beat, physical and mental depression at one stage, uncomfortable “stomach fullness” and acute nausea!

[21] Wertham and Bleuler, 60. The presence of prior suggestion is blatantly obvious. Cf. Karwoski, 212: “To the sexologist an easy way of obliterating temporarily the genital response is offered since mescal is a powerful anaphrodisiac.... My own experience confirms the anaphrodisiac properties of mescal, but the fact that under its influence I found my imagination turning to erotic situations, although temporarily impotent, is an illustration of the persistence of conditioning that offers an interesting suggestion with reference to the extirpation experiments reported in the controversy over the James-Lange theory of emotions.” Unfortunately, _culture_ cannot be extirpated.

[22] Fernberger, _Further Observations_, 368. But Fernberger misunderstood his informant, Petrullo, who (_The Diabolic Root_, 8, note) of course disclaims this statement from “which” on.

[23] Field workers protest privately, but not often enough explicitly, against the projection of these culturally- and personally-subjective values into other cultures. The envisaging of primitive cultures as unspoiled Arcadias where one’s frustrated dreams for one’s own culture come true, is at least as old as Tacitus’ “Germania,” and is still going on, not alone among laymen.

[24] We repeat that results _either positive or negative_ for white observers have no bearing on the problem as regards natives, as this problem is cultural.

[25] Fernberger, _Further Observations_, 377.

[26] All but one vomited.

[27] It is scarcely surprising that one does not find in Indian ceremonies what is not there.

[28] Had Fernberger investigated such of his predecessors as Lumholtz, the novelty of his results would have impressed him less. And had his experiments been more critical he would not be superfluously supplied with an “explanation” to a problem where no data to be explained exist (compare the a-priorism of the “parapsychologists”). But Fernberger continues: “For every one of the observers the anti-aphrodisiac effect of the drug was marked and continued, in most cases, for at least 24 hours after the period of intoxication. Efforts at erotic stimulation proved ineffective. In several cases physical automanipulation of the genitals failed to produce the usual physiological effect. The calling up of erotic images—visual and verbal—were equally ineffective.”

[29] An able and sincere field worker has told the writer of an experience at a meeting which ended for him in orgasm. But he would agree that detailing of similar White “aphrodisiac” experiences is edifying more as regards individuals than the drug. This paper aims to deal with the _native_ peyote cult.

[30] Klüver, _Mescal, the Divine Plant_, 101; but peyote is a complex of physiologically antagonistic drugs of quite variable reaction.

[31] Jolly, _Über die schlafmachende; Über Pellotine_, 375-76. This effect is all the more remarkable since Heffter in similar experiments noted that pellotine produced in the frog excitability and reflex tetanus.

[32] Heffter, _Über Pellotin_, 327-28.

[33] Loaeza, in del Campo, _Peyote_, 145. Koang-Hobschette (_Les Cactacées_, 41) says cactine, the active element of _Cereus grandiflorus_ Mill. is used like digitalis as a cardio-tonic, strengthening the systole and diminishing the diastole like strychnine.

[34] Henry (T. A.), _The Plant Alkaloids_, 199.

[35] Rouhier, _Monographie_, 340.

[36] Parke Davis and Co. formerly manufactured the drug. See their _Newer Pharmacology_.