Litchfield enquirer., 1837-11-30
ANrMAL. MAGNETISM


 already been done in relation 10 it l: this Is irs history. In 1777 or '78, German physician by the name of Mesmcr, got his head turned by staI-gazing, and went b~- yond the old astr"logers in some iancirs about planetary influence. From, this, he launched out into theory of magnetism. He considered it as a finid ofnatnre almost ethereal, and capable, from it's lcnuiIy, of filling, cven tu .he minu,est pores, every part of the universe mol already preoccupird by erosser matter. He regarded it as the primary source of motion aud sensation; he deemed human bodies to be capable of receiving and of accumulating it; and of transmitting it to distance from one to without the necessity of any sort of connecting medium; and that by means of it wonderful cures might be wrought.- Nevertheless, he admitted that it requiTGd some pcculiaritv of constitution to receive its effect, and that there were persons over whom it could exercise no power. Mes- mcr could nut manage the Germans upon this matter; so he went to France, and reached Paris at the very time when that city was maddest for new systems of every sort. He gave out that he could cure dis eases by applying magnetism to the body, or by exciting its action in bodies where it already existed, but was dormant. He gathered around him all the apparatus of charlatanisnn. He had piano in action, and sometime caused it 10 be accompanied with the voice; considering sound as an exciter or concenirator of the magnetic wire tue. He placed his patients around sort of chest, with iron rods so movable IS to be directed towards avery part of the human frame. He made them take chain in their hands; and then paved them, or fig ured around them, or pointed at them thus producing the same species of effect as pointing the finger produces upon a person who has just been tickled.
 These manouvrcs brought about ex,raor- dinary results. Some wept, some laughed, some shrieked, some were supplied, some convulsed; but what is strangest of all, some were actually cured. Perhaps the cures by the queer conior,ions of the In- dian doctors with their mystical robes, and rattles, and shouts, are wrought upon the same principle. We recommend this idea to the scrutiny of MT. Catln. Bus what. ever might have been the cause, of one great effect there was no room left for doubiing. Mesmer made vast fortune.- All other doctors were deserted. The new miracle was brought under tho notice of the French government. A remon- strance produced the appointment of eight commissioners, to examine tlie subject; tho most prominent among whom, wero five members ofthe academy of science, Bailly, Le Roy, De Boey, Lavoisier. aud eur own Franklin.
 Tho results of their investigation were published at tho time in an able memoir, which was attributed to Franklin. Mes mer was indignant about tho course which had been taken in appointing commission, and would not personally aid the scrutiny. A pupil of his, however, Deslon, afforded the examiners every facility. They found that the effects promised were actually pro- duccd. They found even that hemor' rhage from the lungs and the stomach. in some cases, arose from the process. Blu. they found also, by means of the magnetic needle and the elec,romoter, that no prop CT magnetism, or electricity was actually evolved that there wss,' says the ac- count, no perceptible operation upon any of the senses, nor wero they, as bystanders. affected in any way whatever They no. ticed at the same time, that the PatieAts most violently affected, were generally hys- terical and ignorant women. The con,inis- sioners allowed themselves to be magnet isrd, but without tho process producing any effect. They bandaeed the eyes of,he pa- ,ients, and observed that when they could not see the magnetic rods, they were no longer conscious even of their being point ed at them, although invariably strongly affected in former instances at whatever point inc rods were turned 10, when visible. They observed, too, that it not unfrequent- ly happened that the eonvulslons and other critical changes, were induced, or at least had begun to manifest themselves, before the operator had entered upon his manip- ulations.' Repeated experiments led them ,o the decision, will, which the admirable report winds Hp in the following words : s Man possesses the power of acting upon his fellow creatures, of agilatiDg their nerves, and of even throwing them into convulsions 1; but this action is not to be considered as of a physical nature. We cannot perceive that ii depends upon any communicated fluid but it appears to be entirely of a moral nature, and to operate through the medium of the imagination. Ii is an ac- lion which is almost always productive of dangerous consequences, which ca'i never be admitted into philosophy, and which it is useful to be acquainted with merely for the purpose of being able to guard agains, its effects. Magnetism will noi, ho~ ever, be wi,hnni its advantages to that rhiloso- ply whTh condemns il, as it furnishes us with an additional fact in Ih,' history of the errors of ,I,n hn,nan mind, and exhibits q