Chapter III: Part 3

Mademoiselle B---- was accordingly magnetised during half an hour, at the distance of a foot and an half, and in a direction opposite to that of the poles, in conformity to the rules taught by M. Deslon, and which the commissioners had seen practised at his house. During the operation she conversed with much gaiety, and, in answer to an enquiry concerning her health, she readily replied, that she was perfectly well: at Passy she had fallen into a crisis in the course of three minutes; in the present instance she underwent the operation of the magnetism without any effect for thirty minutes. The only reason of this difference must be that here she was ignorant of the operation, and that at Passy she thought it had been performed. The inevitable conclusion is, that the imagination singly produces all the effects attributed to the magnetism, and that, where the imagination ceases to be called forth, it has no longer the smallest efficacy.

Only one objection can be suggested to this experiment; it is that mademoiselle B---- might not be prepared to receive the magnetic fluid, and might be less susceptible to its operation than usual. The commissioners foresaw this objection, and for that reason made the following experiment. As soon as they had ceased to magnetise the patient through the paper partition, the same commissioner passed into the other apartment; he found no difficulty in engaging mademoiselle B---- to submit to the magnetical operation. It was accordingly repeated in precisely the same manner as in the former instance, at the distance of a foot and an half, and by the intervention of gestures only, together with the employment of the right finger and the rod of iron. If he had applied the hands, and touched the hypochonders, it might have been objected that any difference of effect, was to be ascribed to the application having been more immediate in the latter instance. But the only difference between the two experiments was, that in the former mademoiselle B---- was magnetised in a direction opposite to that of the poles, and conformable to the rules of the magnetical theory; and in the second she was magnetised in the direction of the poles, or in the transverse line. On this account according to the principles of the magnetism no effect ought to have been produced.

In three minutes however she felt a sensation of dejection and suffocation; to these succeeded an interrupted hiccup, a chattering of the teeth, a contraction of the throat, and an extreme pain in her head; she was restless in her chair; she complained of a pain in the loins; now and then she struck her foot with extreme quickness on the floor; afterwards she stretched her arms behind her, twisting them extremely as at Passy; in a word the convulsive crisis was complete and accompanied with all the regular symptoms. All these accidents appeared in consequence of a process of twelve minutes, though the same process employed for thirty minutes a little before had been ineffectual. The only ground of difference that remains, is the play that was afforded in the latter instance to the imagination; to this therefore the difference of the effects is to be ascribed.

If the crisis originated in the influence of the imagination, it was the imagination also that put a stop to it. The commissioner who magnetised her, observed that it was time to have done; at the same time presenting to her his two forefingers in the form of a cross; and it is proper to observe that in so doing he magnetised her in the direction of the poles, in the same manner as he had done through the whole experiment; no actual alteration had therefore been made, and the process being continued, the impressions ought also to have continued. But the declared intention of the operator was sufficient to dissipate the crisis; her heat and the pain in her head were immediately alleviated. The disorder of her frame was in this manner followed from place to place, announcing at the same time that it was going to disappear. In this manner in obedience to the voice to which the imagination was subjected, the contraction of the throat ceased, then the accidents of the breast, lastly those of the stomach and the arms. The whole required only three minutes; after which mademoiselle B---- declared that she no longer felt any sensation, but was perfectly restored to her habitual state.

These last experiments, as well as several of those that were made at the house of M. Jumelin, have the double advantage of demonstrating at once the efficacy of the imagination, and the impotence of the magnetism, in regard of the symptoms which were operated.

If the symptoms are more considerable and the crises more violent at the public process, it is because various causes are combined with the imagination, to operate, to multiply and to enlarge its effects. They begin with subduing the minds of the patients by the employment of the eyes; this is followed by the touch, the application of the hands; it is proper to develop in this place the physical effects of this method of procedure.

The symptoms are more or less considerable: the less are hiccuppings, qualms of the stomach and purgings; the greater are the convulsions to which they have given the denomination of crises. The parts upon which the touch is employed, are the hypochonders, the pit of the stomach, and sometimes the ovaria, when the patient is a woman. The hands and the fingers are pressed with a greater or less stress upon these different regions.

The colon, one of the larger intestines, runs through both the regions of the hypochonders, and the region of the epigastrium which separates them. It is placed immediately under the integuments. It is therefore upon this intestine that the pressure falls, an intestine full of sensibility and irritability. A repeated voluntary effort, without assistance from any other cause, excites the muscular action of this intestine, and sometimes procures evacuations. Nature, as it were by instinct, indicates this manœuvre to persons hypochondriacally affected. The process of the magnetism is nothing more than this very manœuvre; and the evacuations it is calculated to produce are further facilitated in the magnetical process, by the frequent and almost habitual use of a real laxative, the cream of tartar in their drink.

But while the motion which is produced, excites principally the irritability of the colon, this intestine offers other phenomena. It swells in a greater or less degree, and sometimes distends itself to a considerable volume. At such times it communicates to the diaphragm such an irritation, that this organ becomes more or less convulsed. It is this convulsion to which they have given the appellation of crisis in the animal magnetism. One of the commissioners had occasion to see a woman, subject to a kind of spasmodic vomitings, with which she was seized several times in the course of every day. Her efforts produced nothing but a turbid and viscous water, similar to that which is brought up by the patients in the crisis of the magnetical operation. The convulsion had its seat in the diaphragm, and the region of the colon was so sensible, that the slightest touch upon that part, a strong commotion of the air, the surprise caused by a sudden noise sufficed to excite the convulsion. This woman had therefore regular crises without the assistance of the magnetism, by the single irritability of the colon and diaphragm; and the women who are magnetised, obtain their crises from the same cause and through the same irritability.

The application of the hands upon the stomach has physical effects not less remarkable. The application is made directly upon that organ. Sometimes a strong continuous compression is operated, sometimes a number of slight and successive compressions, sometimes a discomposure of the stomach by a rotatory motion of the rod of iron in contact with the part, or by the successive and rapid passage of the thumbs over it one after the other. These methods convey almost immediately to the stomach an irritation, more or less strong and durable, in proportion as the subject is more or less susceptible. The part is also previously disposed for the reception of this irritation by being first compressed. This compression prepares it to act upon the diaphragm and to communicate to it the impressions it receives. It is irritated, the diaphragm is also irritated, and from thence result, in the same manner as by the action of the colon, the nervous accidents which had been already stated. In women who are peculiarly susceptible, the mere compression of the two hypochonders, without their being acted upon in any other manner, occasions a contraction of the stomach and fits of swooning. This happened in the case of the woman magnetised by M. Jumelin, and it often happens from no other cause than an improper degree of tightness in their dress. These cases are not followed by the crisis, because the stomach is compressed, without being irritated, and the diaphragm remains in its natural state. The same methods employed upon the ovaria in the female sex, beside their particular effects, produce with great force the above accidents. The empire and extensive influence of the uterus over the animal œconomy is well known.

The intimate connection of the colon, the stomach and the uterus with the diaphragm is one of the causes of the effects ascribed to the magnetism. The regions of the lower belly, which are the subject of these operations, answer to the different plexuses which constitute a regular nervous centre in this part, by means of which, leaving every particular system out of the question, there most certainly exists a sympathy, communication or correspondence between all the parts of the body, such an action and reaction, that the sensations excited in this centre affect the other parts of the body, and reciprocally a sensation experienced in any part affects and calls into play the nervous centre, which often transmits the impression back again to all the parts of the body.

The truth thus stated not only explains the effects of the magnetic touch, but also the physical effects of the imagination. It has been constantly remarked, that the affections of the soul make their first corporeal impression upon the nervous centre, which commonly leads their subject to describe himself as having a weight upon his stomach, or a sensation of suffocation. The diaphragm enters into this business, from whence originate the sighs, the tears and the expressions of mirth. The viscera of the lower belly then experience a reaction; and it is by this automatous process that we are enabled to account for the physical disorders produced by the imagination. Surprise occasions the colic, terror causes a diarrhœa, melancholy is the origin of icterical distempers. The history of medicine presents to us an infinity of examples of the power of imagination and the mental affections. The terror occasioned by a fire, a violent degree of desire, a strong and undoubting hope, a fit of choler have restored the use of his limbs to one who has been crippled with the gout or to a paralytic person; a strong and unlooked for degree of joy has dissipated a quartan ague of two months standing; close attention is a remedy for the hiccup; and persons, who by some accident have been deprived of the faculty of speech, have recovered it in consequence of some of the vehement emotions of the soul. This last assertion is supported by the testimony of history, and the commissioners have themselves witnessed a suspension of this faculty, occasioned singly by the imagination. The action and reaction of the physical upon the moral system, and of the moral upon the physical, have been acknowledged ever since the phenomena of the medical science have been remarked, that is, ever since the origin of the science.

Tears, laughter, coughs, hiccups, and in general all the effects which are observed in what have been stiled crises in the animal magnetism, do therefore originate either in the interruption of the functions of the diaphragm by a physical vehicle, such as the touch and the pressure, or from the power with which the imagination is endowed of acting upon this organ and interrupting its functions.

If it be objected that the touch is not always necessary to these effects, it may be replied, that the imagination may be sufficiently fertile in resources to produce them all by its sole instrumentality; especially the imagination exerted in a public process, called into play at once by the methods in which it is itself addressed, and by the effects observed in those who surround it. It has been already seen what were its effects in the experiments made by the commissioners upon isolated subjects; it may easily be conceived in what degree those effects must be multiplied in the case of a number of patients collected together in a public process. These patients are assembled in a narrow space, if the space be compared with the number of patients; the air of the apartment is heated, although care be employed to renew it; and it is always more or less impregnated with mephitic gas, which has the property of acting immediately upon the head and the nervous system. When the introduction of music is added, it affords another means of acting upon and exciting the nerves.

In the public process several women are magnetised at the same time, and they experience at first no effects but such as are similar to those, obtained by the commissioners in various experiments. It is even acknowledged that for the most part the crises do not commence in less than the space of two hours. By little and little the impressions are communicated from one to another, and reinforced, in the same manner as the impressions which are made by theatrical representation, where the impressions are greater in proportion to the number of the spectators, and the liberty they enjoy of expressing their sensations. The applause, by which the emotions of individuals are announced, occasions a general emotion, which every one partakes in the degree in which he is susceptible. The same observation has been made in armies upon a day of battle, where the enthusiasm of courage, as well as the impressions of terror, are propagated with so amazing rapidity. The drum, the sound of the military musical instruments, the noise of the cannon, the musquetry, the shouts of the army, and the general disorder impress the organs, have a uniform effect upon the understanding, and exalt the imagination in the same degree. In this equilibrium of inebriation, the external manifestation of a single sensation immediately becomes universal; it hurries the soldiery to the charge, or it determines them to fly. The same cause is deeply concerned in rebellions; the multitude are governed by the imagination; the individuals in a numerous assembly are more subjected to their senses, and less capable of submitting to the dictates of reason; and where fanaticism is the presiding quality, its fruit is the tremblers of the Cevennes[12]. It has been usual to forbid numerous assemblies in seditious towns, as a means of stopping a contagion so easily communicated. Every where example acts upon the moral part of our frame, mechanical imitation upon the physical part: the minds of individuals are calmed by dispersing them; the same method puts a stop to their spasmodic affections, always contagious in their nature: we have had a recent example of this in the young ladies of Saint Roch, who were in this manner cured of the convulsions with which they were affected when together[13].

The magnetism then, or rather the operations of the imagination, are equally discoverable at the theatre, in the camp, and in all numerous assemblies, as at the bucket, acting indeed by different means, but producing similar effects. The bucket is surrounded with a crowd of patients; the sensations are continually communicated and recommunicated; it ought to be expected that the nerves should be at length worn out with this exercise, they are accordingly irritated, and the woman of most sensibility in the company gives the signal. Immediately the cords, every where stretched to the same degree and in perfect unison, respond to each other; the crises are multiplied; they mutually reinforce each other, and are rendered violent. In the mean time the men, who are witnesses of these emotions, partake of them in proportion to their nervous sensibility; and those with whom this sensibility is greatest and most easily excited become themselves the subjects of a crisis.

This propensity to irritation, partly natural and partly acquired, becomes in each sex habitual. The sensations having been felt once or oftener, nothing is now necessary, but to recal the memory of them, and to exalt the imagination to the same degree, in order to operate the same effects. This will never be difficult when the subject is placed in the same circumstances. The public process is no longer necessary, you have only to touch the hypochonders and to conduct the finger and the rod of iron before the countenance; the signs are well known. Even these are not necessary, it is sufficient that the patients be blindfolded, made to believe that these signs are repeated upon them, and that they are magnetised; the ideas are reexcited, the sensations are reproduced, the imagination, employing its accustomed instruments and resuming its former routes, gives birth to the same phenomena. These cases happen exactly to the patients of M. Deslon, who fall into a crisis without the bucket, and without being excited with the spectacle of the public process.

Compression, imagination, imitation are therefore the true causes of the effects attributed to this new agent, known by the appellation of animal magnetism, this fluid, which is said to circulate through the human body, and to be communicated from individual to individual. Such is the result of the experiments of the commissioners, and the observations they made upon the means employed and the effects produced. This agent, this fluid has no existence. Chimerical however as it is, the idea is by no means novel. Some authors, particularly physicians of the last age, have expressly treated of it in various performances. The curious and interesting enquiries of M. Thouret have convinced the public, that the theory, the operations and the effects of the animal magnetism, proposed in the last age, were nearly the same with those revived in the present. The magnetism then is no more than an old falshood. The theory indeed is now presented, as was necessary in a more enlightened age, with a greater degree of pomp; but it is not less erroneous. Human nature is formed to seize, to quit and to resume the mistake which is flattering to its wishes. There are errors which will be eternally dear to the sublunary state. How often has the pretended science of astrology vanished and reappeared! The magnetism is calculated to lead us back to it. Its professors have been desirous of connecting it with the celestial influences, that it might have the stronger seduction, and attract mankind by the two hopes that are nearest their heart, that of looking into futurity, and that of prolonging their existence.

There is room to believe that the imagination is the principal of the three causes which we have assigned to the magnetism. It appears by the experiments we have related that it suffices alone to produce the crises. The pressure and the touch seem to serve it as preparatives; it is by the touch that the nerves begin to be excited, imitation communicates and extends the impressions. But the imagination is that active and terrible power, by which are operated the astonishing effects, that have excited so much attention to the public process. The effects strike all the world, the cause is enveloped in the shades of obscurity. When we consider that these effects seduced in former ages men, venerable for their merit, their illumination and even their genius, Paracelsus, Van Helmont and Kircher, we cease to be astonished, that persons of the present day, learned and well informed, that even a great number of physicians have been the dupes of this system. Had the commissioners been admitted only to the public process, where there is neither time nor opportunity of making decisive experiments, they might themselves have been led into error. It was necessary to have liberty to insulate the effects, in order to distinguish the causes; it was necessary to see as they have done the imagination act, if we may be allowed the expression, partially, and produce its effects one by one and in detail, to have an idea to what the accumulation of those effects might amount; to conceive the extent of its power, and to account for all its prodigies. Such an examination demanded a sacrifice of time, and a number of systematical researches, which we have not always the leisure to undertake for our private instruction or private curiosity, nor even the power properly to pursue without being like the commissioners charged with the mandates of the sovereign, and honoured with the confidence of the public.

M. Deslon is not much averse to the admission of these principles. He declared in our session held at the house of Dr. Franklin the 19th of June, that he thought he might lay it down as a fact, that the imagination had the greatest share in the effects of the animal magnetism; he said that this new agent might be no other than the imagination itself, whose power is as extensive as it is little known: he affirmed that he always acknowledged the concern of this faculty in the treatment of his patients, and he affirmed with equal confidence that many persons have been either entirely cured or infinitely amended in the state of their health under his direction. He remarked to the commissioners that the imagination thus directed to the relief of suffering humanity, would be a most valuable means in the hands of the medical profession[14]; and persuaded of the reality of the power of the imagination, he invited the commissioners to embrace the opportunity which his practice afforded to study its procedure and its effects. If therefore M. Deslon be still attached to his first idea, that these effects are to be ascribed to the agency of a fluid, which is communicated from individual to individual by the touch or under the guidance of a conductor, he cannot however avoid conceding to the commissioners that only one cause is requisite to one effect, and that since the imagination is a sufficient cause, the supposition of the magnetic fluid is useless. It cannot be denied that we are surrounded with a fluid which peculiarly belongs to us; the insensible perspiration forms around us an atmosphere of insensible vapours: but this fluid has no agency but such as is common to other atmospheres; cannot be communicated by the touch but in infinitely small quantities; is not capable of being directed either by conductors, or by the eyes, or by the will; is neither propagated by sound, nor reflected by mirrors; and is in no case susceptible of the effects ascribed to it.

It remains for us to enquire, whether the crises or convulsions, excited by the methods of the pretended magnetism in the assemblies round the bucket, be capable of any utility, or be calculated to cure or relieve the patients. The imagination of sick persons has unquestionably a very frequent and considerable share in the cure of their diseases. With the effect of it we are unacquainted otherwise than by general experience; but, though it has not been traced in positive experiments, it should seem not to admit of a reasonable doubt. It is a known adage, that in physic as well as religion, men are saved by faith; this faith is the produce of the imagination: in these cases the imagination acts by gentle means; it is by diffusing tranquility over the senses, by restoring the harmony of the functions, by recalling into play every principle of the frame under the genial influence of hope. Hope is an essential constituent of human life; the man that yields us one contributes to restore to us the other. But when the imagination produces convulsions, the means it employs are violent; and such means are almost always destructive. There are indeed a few rare cases in which they may be useful; there are desperate diseases, in which it is necessary to overturn every thing for the introduction of an order totally new. These critical shocks are to be employed in the medical art in the same manner as poisons. It is requisite that necessity should demand, and œconomy employ them. The need of them is momentary; the shock ought to be single. Very far from repeating it, the intelligent physician exerts himself to invent the means of repairing the indispensible evil which has thus been produced; but in the public process of the magnetism the crises are repeated every day, they are long and violent. Now since the state introduced by these crises is pernicious, the habit cannot be other than fatal. How indeed can it be conceived, that a woman, attacked for instance with a pulmonary distemper, can undergo with impunity a crisis, some of whose symptoms are a convulsive cough and compulsory expectorations; or can safely fatigue, perhaps shatter the lungs by violent and repeated efforts, when so great pains are necessary to convey to the wounded frame the sanative and the balsamic? How can we imagine that a man, be his disorder what it will, can need in order to his recovery the intervention of crises, in which the sight appears to be lost, the members stiffen, he strikes his breast with precipitate and involuntary motions; crises in a word, that are terminated by an abundant spitting of viscous humours and even blood? The blood thus discharged is neither vitiated nor corrupted, it flows from vessels from which it is torn by the violence of effort and contrary to the intention of nature; these effects are therefore to be regarded as a real not a salutary evil, an evil additional to the distemper be it what it will.

Nor is this the only danger with which they are attended. Man is incessantly enslaved by custom; nature is modified by habit only in a progressive manner, yet she is often so completely modified, as to suffer an entire metamorphosis, and to be scarcely capable of being known for the same. Who will assure us that this state of crises, at first voluntarily induced, shall not become habitual? And should the habit thus contracted frequently reproduce the same symptoms, in spite of the will, and almost without the assistance of the imagination, how dreadful the fate of an individual, subjected to so violent effects, tormented, as well morally as physically, with their unfortunate impression, whose days should be divided between apprehension and agony, and whose life should be an uninterrupted state of suffering! Nervous distempers of this description, even when natural, are the opprobrium of the medical science; how little ought it to be the object of art to produce them! The art, which thus interferes with all the functions of the animal œconomy, urges nature out of her proper course, and multiplies the victims of irregularity, is to be regarded as pernicious. Its effects are the more to be apprehended, since it not only aggravates the disorder of the nerves by renewing their symptoms, and causing them to degenerate into habit; but if a distemper of this kind be contagious, as it may be suspected to be, the method of provoking nervous convulsions and of exciting them in public assemblies is a means to diffuse them in great towns, and even to afflict with them generations to come, since the diseases and the habits of parents are transmitted to their posterity.

The commissioners having convinced themselves, that the animal magnetic fluid is capable of being perceived by none of our senses, and had no action either upon themselves or upon the subjects of their several experiments; being assured, that the touches and compressions employed in its application rarely occasioned favourable changes in the animal œconomy, and that the impressions thus made are always hurtful to the imagination; in fine having demonstrated by decisive experiments, that the imagination without the magnetism produces convulsions, and that the magnetism without the imagination produces nothing; they have concluded with an unanimous voice respecting the existence and the utility of the magnetism, that the existence of the fluid is absolutely destitute of proof, that the fluid having no existence can consequently have no use, that the violent symptoms observed in the public process are to be ascribed to the compression, to the imagination called into action, and to that propensity to mechanical imitation, which leads us in spite of ourselves to the repetition of what strikes our senses. And at the same time they think themselves obliged to add as an important observation, that the compressions and the repeated action of the imagination employed in producing the crises may be hurtful, that the sight of these crises is not less dangerous on account of that imitation which nature seems to have imposed upon us as a law, and that of consequence every public process, in which the means of the animal magnetism shall be employed, cannot fail in the end of producing the most pernicious effects[15].

Paris, the 11th day of August, 1784.

(Signed) B. FRANKLIN,
MAJAULT,
LE ROY,
SALLIN,
BAILLY,
D’ARCET,
DE BORY,
GUILLOTIN,
LAVOISIER.

FINIS.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] “It must be confessed however, that the manner of directing the pretended magnetism, is different in these systems. The ancients, as well as M. Mesmer, regarded this fluid as universally diffused, as pervading the bodies of animals, and as capable of being rendered the vehicle of the most salutary influences. But, in order to call it into action, they did not, like M. Mesmer, desire to touch, or so much as to approach the patient. Their method consisted in a different order of proceeding. To give a suitable direction to the universal spirit, they were obliged to employ real parts, either extracted or evacuated, of the individual upon whom they proposed to direct the magnetism. The different humours of the human body, whether natural, as the blood, the urine, the excrements, or contrary to nature, as the pus bred in wounds; in fine, the solid parts of the frame, as the flesh, the nails, the hair, in a state of separation from the body, afforded, according to the ancient doctrine, the suitable and necessary means of employing the magnetism. These different parts, so long as they remained in a state of integrity, were supposed to be united in the link of a common vital principle with the individual who had furnished them. The union was operated by the intervention of the universal spirit, and in acting upon them, the physician was said to act also upon the person to whom they had belonged; an action, which, as it was independent of contact, and was not superseded by distance, was regarded as magnetic.” _Thouret._

[2] “Far be it from me,” says Maxwel, “to lead you to improper actions. If from the perusal of my works, you become acquainted with the means of such actions, you will do me the justice not to divulge them.--I have seen,” adds he, “the most incredible effects, and the greatest advantages from a right use of this method. I have also seen infinite evils occasioned by the abuse of it.--Indeed, it is scarcely prudent to treat of these subjects, on account of the dangers that may result from it. If we were to express ourselves in a manner universally intelligible, fathers could never be sure of their daughters, nor husbands of their wives; women would be deprived of their self-government in spite of the most judicious and obstinate resistance.” _Maxwel, de medicina magnetica, apud Thouret._

[3] Paracelsus Arecolus Philippus Theophrastus Bombastus de Hohenheim is to be regarded as the inventor of the magnetical system. He was born at a village near Zurich in Switzerland in 1493, and died in 1541. His profession was that of a physician, and he obtained great reputation by the use of mercury and opium, medicines that were unknown, or not employed by the physicians of those times. But beside this, he was a proficient in alchymy, astrology, and magic. He was acquainted with the philosopher’s stone, and the universal medicine. And he invented an elixir, in the use of which a man could not fail to live to the age of a thousand years.

Van Helmont was the immediate successor of Paracelsus in the pursuit of the magnetical science, and wrote an express treatise De Magnetica Vulnerum Curatione.

All the other persons enumerated, lived in the seventeenth century.

“To Maxwel, we are particularly indebted for the most complete and copious treatise upon the subject, in which he has endeavoured to support its declining credit by calling in the assistance of that theory of the universal spirit, which he derived from the earliest philosophers of antiquity, and in which we are presented with the exact counterpart of the system of M. Mesmer.

“Another inhabitant of this island, the learned and illustrious sir Kenelm Digby, is well known for his invention of the sympathetic powder; which it was only necessary to apply to the linnen which had imbibed the blood or pus of a wound, or to the arm or sword of him who inflicted it, provided they were still stained with the blood of the wounded person. It was necessary however, that the wound should be kept perfectly clean, and protected from the air.

“There was a sympathetic sweating powder, invented so lately as the year 1745. The means of applying it was, by mixing it with the urine of the person diseased, and keeping it boiling over a fire, as long as you wished the perspiration to continue. During the operation, the patient was to keep his bed, to be covered up warm, and to drink several large basons of tea. This medicine was never known to fail of its effect.” _Thouret._

[4] The experiments of the ring and sword, are to be found in Kircher’s Magnes, sive de arte magnetica. They are both well known. “That of the sword consists in the balancing it upon the point of one of the fingers, the consequence of which will be a very rapid rotatory motion, _provided the person be properly magnetised_. That of the ring is performed by a person initiated in the animal magnetism, holding it suspended by a thread in the inside of a wine glass, when it will invariably strike the hour of the day.” _Thouret._

[5] “Valentine Greatrakes, esq; was a native of Afane, in the kingdom of Ireland. We are told, that one day he was conscious to a wonderful internal revolution, and at the same time heard a voice like that of a genius, which cried incessantly for a long time: “I endow you with the faculty of curing diseases.” Importuned by this salutation, from which he could in no way distract his attention, he determined to make an experiment of the truth of the intelligence. The voice had first announced to him the gift of curing the king’s evil. He made an experiment upon this distemper, and succeeded. He afterwards touched persons attacked with an epidemical fever, that raged in his neighbourhood; the voice had announced to him the gift of curing this disease. In fine, he was enabled to cure every species of disease; and he succeeded in all cases, except where, as he observed, the malady was too deeply rooted, or the patient laboured under a particular indisposition to this method of cure. The exterior of this man was extremely simple. His cures were accompanied with no degree of pomp and ceremony, unless we should call such, his ascribing his success to God, publicly expressing his gratitude, and inviting the patient to join with him in the act of thanksgiving. But he made a very extensive use of the operation of touch. The distemper fled before him, and he was able, we are told, to dislodge it from its seat, and remove it to parts the least useful. If its progress appeared to be suspended in any part, he redoubled his frictions upon that part, to remove the obstacle. In this operation nature, excited by the stroking, seemed frequently to operate crises, and it produced stools, vomitings and perspirations.” _Thouret._

“Greatrakes cured not only internal diseases, but also external ones, such as wounds and ulcers. The second Villiers, duke of Buckingham, was one of his patients. His attestations were signed by Boyle, Wilkins, Whichcot, Cudworth and Patrick. He was born in 1628, received the gift of healing 1662, and removed to London 1666.” _Des Maizeaux, Vie de St. Evremond_.

“The cures of Gassner are of a much later date, and are not above ten or twelve years old. This German, having in his youth been afflicted with an ill state of health, which resisted the efforts of all the physicians, suspected that his distemper might have a supernatural cause, and derive from the influence of the devil. His conjecture was verified by his success in expelling the devil, having adjured him in the name of Jesus Christ. From that moment he enjoyed the most perfect health for sixteen years. Encouraged by this event, he laid aside the study of medicine, to which his distemper had prompted him, and procured all the authors who had treated of exorcism. He began with healing his parishioners in an obscure town upon the borders of Switzerland and the Tirol, and his reputation increased so much, that, in the two last years of his residence there, he had between four and five hundred patients who applied to him. He then made a progress through several of the Swiss cantons, and settled at Ratisbon in 1774. He distinguished diseases into two classes, the natural and the demoniac, the last of which were much the most numerous. Over the former he pretended to no power. His cures were performed with much pomp and solemnity; and it was observed, that he constantly rubbed his hands upon his girdle and handkerchief previously to his touching the patient. He performed his cures in the name of Christ, and by the faith of the diseased in his holy name; if their faith failed, the cure did not take place. He gave the sick, when he dismissed them, balm and oil, which he considered as spiritual medicaments, together with certain waters and powders, and a little ring, inscribed with the name of Jesus, to prevent a relapse.” _Thouret._

Thouret considers the system of Gassner as having had an influence on that of M. Mesmer. Astrology and possessions were extremely current in Germany; and as Gassner had taken possession of, and ruined the latter pretension, Mesmer had recourse to the former. It should however be remembered, that Mesmer had written and published his thesis upon astrology before the pretensions of Gassner were heard of.

These instances are produced by Thouret, as distinguished proofs of the efficacy both of the touch and the imagination. In proof of the contagion of convulsive affections, he cites the convulsions of Saint Medard, and the possessions of Loudun. “The former of these took place in 1732, and made their appearance as soon as any of the religious were approached to the tomb of their patron saint. They were exposed in the most triumphant manner, and covered with ridicule by Hecquet, in his Natural History of Convulsions. The pretended possessions of Loudun (1740) originated in an infamous scheme of avarice and revenge against the unfortunate Urbain Grandier, rector of Loudun, who became the victim of the machinations of his enemies. The physicians of Montpelier, charged with the examination of the affair, discovered the whole secret of the possessions to consist in factitious and pretended convulsions.” _Thouret._

[6] Memoir by M. Mesmer, upon the Discovery of the Animal Magnetism, 1779, pages 74 and following.

[7] Ibid. Advertisement, page vi.

[8] _Baquet._ The diameter of this box is usually large enough to admit of fifty persons standing round its circumference. _Translator._

[9] The observation of this fact was laid in detail before the faculty of medicine at Paris, in an assembly de prima mensis, by M. Bourdois de la Mothe, physician of the charity of Saint-Sulpice, who visited the sick person regularly every day.

[10] M. Mesmer, Historical Abridgement, pages 35, 37.

[11] M. Sigault, doctor of the faculty of Paris, well known for his invention of the operation of the symphysis of the ossa pubis, made a number of experiments, tending to prove that the magnetism is merely an imaginary power. The following is the detail which he made in a letter, dated July the 30th, 1784, and addressed to one of the commissioners.

“Having given the persons who inhabited a large house in the Marais, to understand that I was a pupil of M. Mesmer, I produced various effects upon the woman of the house. The magisterial tone and the serious air I affected, together with certain gestures, made a very great impression upon her, which she at first was desirous to conceal from me; but having guided my hand upon the region of the heart, I felt that it palpitated. The state of oppression in which she appeared likewise indicated a contraction of the chest. Other symptoms were connected with these; her face became convulsed, her eyes wandered, she at length fell into a swoon, then threw up her dinner, had several stools, and was reduced to a state of weakness and sinking, perfectly incredible. I repeated the same trick upon several persons, and succeeded more or less, according to their different degrees of sensibility and credulity.

“A celebrated artist, master of design to the children of one of our princes, complained for several days of an extreme head-ach; he acquainted me with it upon the Pont-royal; having persuaded him that I was initiated in the mysteries of M. Mesmer, I expelled his head-ach almost instantaneously by the means of a few gestures, to his great astonishment.

“I produced the same effects upon the apprentice of a hatter in the same distemper. The lad felt nothing in consequence of my first gestures; I then laid my hand upon his false ribs, bidding him at the same time look in my face. He immediately felt a contraction of the chest, palpitations of the heart, yawnings, and an extreme dejection. He doubted no longer of the power I possessed over him. I then guided my finger over the part affected, and asked him what he felt. He replied that his pain dislodged itself and descended. I assured him that I would guide it towards his arm, and make it come out at his thumb, at the same time squeezing it with considerable force. He took me at my word, and was perfectly well for two hours. At that period he stopped me in the street to tell me that his pain was returned. This effect seems to be the same with that produced by certain dentists upon the mental faculties of those, who go to them to have a tooth drawn.

“Further lastly, being in the parlour of a convent, rue du Colombier, fauxbourg Saint Germains, a young lady said to me: I understand, sir, that you are a pupil of M. Mesmer. I am so, replied I; and I can perform the magnetical operation upon you, notwithstanding the intervention of the grate. At the same time I presented my finger; she was terrified, trembled extremely, and besought me for God’s sake to proceed no farther. Her emotion was such, that, if I had persevered in my experiment, she would infallibly have fallen into convulsions.”

M. Sigault relates that he had himself felt the power of imagination. One day, the operator having undertaken to perform upon him the magnetical operation to convince him of its reality, at the moment he had determined to touch him, he felt a contraction of the chest, and a palpitation of the heart. But having immediately composed himself, the gestures and the process of the magnetism were employed in vain, and made no impression upon him.

[12] Marshal Villars, who was employed in appeasing the troubles of the Cevennes, says: “I saw things in this kind, which I should not have believed, if they had not passed before my eyes; I saw a considerable town, of which the whole female part without exception appeared to be possessed by the devil. They trembled and prophesied publicly in the streets. One had the rashness to tremble and prophesy for an hour together in my presence. But of all these absurdities the most surprising was that, which was related to me by the bishop of Alais, and which I wrote to M. de Chamillard in the following terms.

“‘A M. de Mandagors, lord of the manor of that name, mayor of Alais, possessing the first appointments in the town and county, and having even been for some time subdelegate to M. de Bàville, was the subject of this relation. He was sixty years of age, temperate in his manners, possessed of a fine understanding, and had written and published many performances. Some of them I have read, and, before I knew what I have just learned respecting him, I considered them as distinguished by a very vigorous imagination.

“‘A prophetess, aged twenty seven or twenty eight years, was taken up about eighteen months ago and carried before the bishop of Alais. He interrogated her before several ecclesiastics. The creature, after having heard what he said, replied with a modest air, exhorted him no longer to torment the true children of God, and then addressed him for an entire hour in an uncouth language of which he could not understand a word: just as we have formerly seen the duke de la Ferté, when he had drank a few glasses, talk English before the inhabitants of that country. I have heard them say, I understand very well that he speaks English, but I cannot comprehend a word that he says. It would have been somewhat difficult that they should have done so, for he never knew a word of English in his life. This girl talked Greek and Hebrew in the style of the duke de la Ferté.

“‘You will take it for granted that M. d’Alais sent the girl to prison. After several months, the girl appearing to be entirely ridded of her absurdities by the attention and advice of the sieur de Mandagors, who frequently visited her in her confinement, she was set at liberty, and the consequence of that liberty, and of the liberties that the sieur Mandagors had taken with her, was an immediate pregnancy.

“‘But the fact which I was about to relate is the resignation made by the sieur Mandagors of all his employments in favour of his son, at the same time saying to several individuals, and among others to the bishop, that it was by express commission from God that he had had carnal knowledge of the prophetess, and that the child which should be born would be the true saviour of the world. The consequence of all this in any other country than France, would have been merely the sending M. the mayor and his fair patroness to bedlam. The bishop suggested to me to have him arrested. I proposed previously to confer with M. de Bàville, intendant of the province, ordering in the mean time that he and the prophetess should be closely watched, so that they might not be able to escape. My opinion was, that, in the midst of a country of madmen, what relates to a madman of such importance ought to make as little noise as possible; and that it was therefore necessary to endeavour to get him out of the country by gentle means, and then to take him into custody. Your lordship will easily conceive that to declare publicly for a prophet a mayor of Alais, the lord of an extensive manor, an ancient subdelegate of the intendant, an author, and a man hitherto esteemed for his penetration and sagacity, in the midst of a country accustomed to venerate and respect him, was a measure better calculated to revolt the minds of the inhabitants than to correct them. It would the rather have had this tendency, that, except the folly of believing that God had commanded him to have carnal knowledge of this young woman, his conversation is as full of reason and good sense, as was that of Don Quixote upon all other subjects but that of knight-errantry. M. de Bàville was of my opinion. The children of M. Mandagors conducted him without noise to one of his châteaux, where he was confined, and the prophetess taken from him and sent to prison.’” Vie du Maréchal Duc de Villars, tome I., pages 325 and following.

[13] On the day of the ceremony of the first communion, celebrated in the parish church of Saint Roch a few years ago (1780), after the evening service they made according to custom the procession through the streets. Scarcely were the children returned to the church, and had resumed their seats, before a young girl fell ill and had convulsions. This affection propagated itself with so much rapidity, that in the space of half an hour fifty or sixty girls from twelve to nineteen years of age were seized with the same convulsions; that is, with a contraction of the throat, an inflation of the stomach, suffocation, hiccups and spasms more or less considerable. These accidents reappeared in some instances in the course of the week; but the following Sunday, being assembled with the dames of Sainte Anne, whose business it is to teach the young ladies, twelve of them were seized with the same convulsions, and more would have followed, if they had not had the precaution to send away each child upon the spot to her relations. The whole were obliged to be divided into several schools. By thus separating the children, and not keeping them together but in small numbers, three weeks sufficed to dissipate entirely this epidemical convulsive affection. See for other instances of the same kind the Natural History of Convulsions by M. Hecquet.

[14] M. Deslon had already said in 1780. “Granting for a moment that M. Mesmer possesses no other secret than that of employing the imagination in the extensive production of the most salutary effects, will it not still be true, that his invention is an extremely valuable one? For in reality, if the physic of the imagination be more salutary than the other kinds of medicine, what good reason can be alledged, why the physic of the imagination should not be brought into general use?” Observations on the Animal Magnetism, pages 46 and 47.

[15] If it be objected to the commissioners that this decision concludes respecting the magnetism in general, instead of relating singly to the magnetism practised by M. Deslon, the commissioners reply that the intention of the king was to have their opinion upon the animal magnetism, and that in consequence they have not exceeded the bounds of their commission. Again they reply that M. Deslon has appeared to them acquainted with what are called the principles of the magnetism, and that he certainly possesses the means of producing the effects and exciting the crises which are ascribed to it.

The principles of M. Deslon are the very same with those included in the twenty seven propositions disseminated from the press by M. Mesmer in 1779. If M. Mesmer now announces a more extensive theory, it was not necessary for the commissioners to be acquainted with the theory to decide upon the existence and utility of the magnetism, it was sufficient to estimate the effects. It is by the effects that the existence of a cause is established, it is by the effects also that its utility must be demonstrated. The phenomena are learned from observation long before we can arrive at the theory which connects and explains them. The theory of the loadstone does not yet exist, and its phenomena are ascertained by the experience of successive ages. The theory of M. Mesmer is in this case indifferent and superfluous; the methods employed, the effects produced, this is what it was necessary to examine. Now it is easy to prove that the essential practice of the magnetism is known to M. Deslon.

M. Deslon was for many years the pupil of M. Mesmer. Constantly during that time he saw the process of the animal magnetism, and the means employed in exciting and directing it. M. Deslon himself administered the magnetism in the presence of M. Mesmer; separated from him he operated the same effects. Being afterwards reconciled they united their patients; the one and the other without distinction undertook the management of them, and of consequence the methods were the same. The method which is followed at this day by M. Deslon can be no other than the method of M. Mesmer.