Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 7.djvu/671

 HYPNOTISM

605

HYPNOTISM

of a fluid emanating from the stars and placing living beings in communication, as well as a power of at- traction which enables persons in sound health to draw the sick to them; this force he compares to that of the loadstone and calls it magnale. And this is the original, fundamental constituent of "magnetism". The doctrine of Paracelsus is later on taken up and developed by a number of writers — Bartholin, Hahne- mann, Gocl^nius, Roberti, and Van Helmont, the champion of "magnetic medicine", Robert Fludd, Father Kircher, author of a famous treatise "De arte magnetica ",Wirdig, Maxwell, Greatrakes, Gassner, and others. They do not all experiment in the same way; some use muniea (talismans, or magic boxes) to direct the fluid, others operate directly by touch, rubbing, or "passes".

But no complete theory is found until we come to Mesmer (1733-1815). The Viennese physician sup- poses that there exists a universally diffused fluid, so continuous as to admit of no void, a fluid subtile beyond comparison and of its own nature cjualified to receive, to propagate, and to communicate all the sensible effects of movement. He proposes to apply the name of animal magnetism to that property of the living body which renders it susceptible to the influence of the heavenly bodies and to the reciprocal action of those that surroimd it, a property which is mani- fested by its analogy with the magnet. " It is by means of this fluid", he says, "that we act upon nature and upon other beings like ourselves; the will gives motion to it and serves to communicate it" (M(Smoire sur la docouverte du magnetisme animal). Mesmer came to Paris in 1778, publicly expounded his system, and soon gained name and fame. He next set up as a healer, and obtained some successful results; the sick soon flocked to him in such numbers that he could not treat them individually, but had to group a number of them around a baqiict and mag- netize them all together. The magnetic baquet worked admirably. It was an ordinary tub, closed with a lid, from which issued a number of polished iron rods, bent back, and each ending in a dull point. These iron rods, or branches, conducted the mag- netic fluid to the patients who stood in the circle. The baquet was the most famous and most popular means of producing the magnetic condition, but not the only one. Mesmer used other methods very much like those employed by hypnotizers to-day: movements of the finger or a small iron rod before the face, fixing the patient's eyes on some object, applica- tion of the hands to the abdomen, etc. Mesmer, unfor- tunately, dealt with sick people, and around his baquet he had the opportunity of observing more fits and hys- terical convulsions than somnaml>ulistic states. But these " convulsionaries " of a new kind, far from injur- ing the magnetizer or discrediting his method, added to his credit and his renown. The Academy, prejudiced against the innovator, and ill-pleased at the noisy advertisement he was receiving, could not remain heedless of the results he produced; it soon had to yield to the pressure of an excited and enthusiastic public opinion. A commission was named in 1784 to examine Mesmer's theory and practice; among its members were the most illustrious savants of the time — Bailly, Lavoisier, Franklin, de Jussieu. To surrender to the evidence presented, and to recognize the reality of the facts, was inevitable; but all the members of the commission, with the single exception of de Jussieu, refused to attribute the facts to any cause but imagination or imitation.

This direct blow at Jlesmerism did not retard its progress. It made many adepts, among whom must be mentioned Deslon, Pere Hervier, and aliove all the Marquis de Puys^gur, founder of the "Harmonic", one of the most celebrated magnetic societies. It was on his estate of Busancy, under the " magnetized tree ", that M. de Puyscgur achieved his most splendid

successes and renewed the marvels of his master's baquet. He did better; he discovered the curious phenomenon of somnambuhsm. But the hour of this science had not yet come, and, in spite of positive results and incontestable cures, magnetism did not recover its vogue; it was neglected or forgotten during the Revolution and the Empire. It was reserved for an Indo-Portuguese priest, a man of strange bearing, the Abbe Faria, to recall public attention to animal magnetism and to revive the science. The Abbe Faria was the first to effect a breach in the theory of the " magnetic fluid ", to place in relief the importance of suggestion, and to demonstrate the existence of "auto-suggestion"; he also established the truth that the nervous sleep belongs only to the natural order. From his earliest magnetizing stances, in 1814, he boldly developed his doctrine. Nothing comes from the magnetizer, everything comes from the subject and takes place in his imagination. Mag- netism is only a form of sleep. Although of the moral onler, the magnetic action is often aided by physical, or rather by physiological, means — fixedness of look and cerebral fatigue. Here the Abb6 Faria showed himself a true pioneer, too little appreciated by his contemporaries, and even by posterity. He was the creator of hypnotism; most of the pretended dis- coveries of the scientists of to-day are really his. We need only recall here that he practised suggestion in the waking state and post-hypnotic suggestion, (ieneral Noizet, who was the immediate disciple of the .\bbe Faria, hail for his intimate friend a young magnetizer. Dr. Alexandre Bertrand, who believed in the existence of the magnetic fluid. Between the extreme and mutually exclusive doctrines of his master and of his friend, he had the intelligence and the courage to form his own opinion half-way, recog- nizing equally the share of the imagination and that of the magnetic fluitl. We are inclined to think that his view of the matter was a just one, and apt to lead up to the definitive solution.

Thanks to the labours of those just mentioned, the revival of magnetism was assured. A number of writers — Virey, Deleuze, the Baron du Potet, Ro- bouam, Georget, and others — aroused contemporary thought by their published works, their lectures, and their experiments; one of them. Dr. Foissac, in 1826, succeeded in bringing about the appointment by the Academy of Medicine of a commission to examine and register the strange, but positive, facts of mag- netism. This second commission of the Academy took its work seriously and for five years conscien- tiously studied the question. Dr. Husson was charged with the preparation of the report, which appeared in June, 1831. He describes the properties of mag- netism at length and with great impartiality, pro- claims its virtues, and concludes by asking the Acad- emy to encourage the study of the subject as one of importance for physiology and therapeutics. This victory of magnetism, in a quarter where it had untO then met only with disdain and rebuffs, was highly prized, but it had no sequel. The academicians were afraid of the truth, they preserved an obstinate silence, and the report of Husson was thrust away in the archives without being accorded the honours of type. Shortly after this, a violent attack on mag- netism by Dubois (of Amiens) met with a cordial re- ception from the Academy, in spite of Husson's protests. At last, on 1 Oct., 1840, aftersome unprofit- able tests, the learned assembly definitively buried the question, declaring that thenceforward no reply would be given to communications on animal mag- netism. Cast out by science, magnetism fell, by inevitable necessity, into commerce on the one hand and spiritism on the other. Clever adventurers ex- ploited it, opening deposits of the fluid in Paris and in the country to heal the ills of hinnanity. Others had recourse to "table-turning" to know the past