92 ON CERTAIN PHENOMENA OF HYPNOTISM. 



glided amongst them," accompanied by associates expressly chosen 

 for their youth and good looks ; " he affected this one by a touch, 

 another by a look, and a third by making ' passes ' with his hand." 

 wSome patients experienced nothing ; others were slightly affected ; 

 others again were thrown into violent convulsions, during which 

 they shrieked and laughed immoderately, and showed every 

 symptom of hysteria. They " were all so submissive to the will 

 of the magnetiser that even when they appeared to be in a stupor, 

 his voice, a glance, or a sign would rouse them from it."'^ So 

 much excitement was caused by these marvels that the government 

 appointed a commission, taken from members of the Faculty of 

 Medicine and the Academy of Sciences, to enquire what truth 

 there might be in Mesmer's pretensions. The commission, which 

 included Bailly, the celebrated astronomer, Franklin, and 

 Lavoisier, carried on their investigations with scrupulous care, with 

 the result that in their report they declare " that the ' animal 

 magnetic fluid ' is not perceptible by any of the senses ; that it 

 has no action ; . . . that imagination, apart from magnetism, 

 produces convulsions, and that magnetism, without imagination, 

 produces nothing. They have come to the unanimous conclusion 

 that this (magnetic) fluid, since it is non-existent, has no beneficial 

 effect, and that the violent effects observed in patients are due to 

 contact, to the excitement of the imagination, and to mechanical 

 imitation." From this crushing verdict there was but one dissen- 

 tient vote, that of Laurent de Jussieu. With scientific courage 

 de Jussieu published a separate report, containing his convictions 

 on the subject. He had, himself, performed experiments, which 

 could not, he thought, be explained by the imagination. These 

 facts demonstrated, in his opinion, that man produces a sensible 

 action on his fellow man by friction, by contact, and more rarely 

 by simple proximity. This action was ascribed to a universal 

 FLUID NOT YET DEMONSTRATED, which he clsewhcre terms 

 " animalised electric fluid." In short, the idea that Mesmer is on 

 the track of a fruitful truth pervades this report. The intuitions 

 of genius in this instance, as in so many others, proved prophetic ; 

 the rays of the coming truth were seen gilding the mountain-tops 



* Louis Figuier, " Histoire du Merveilleux." Animal Magnetism. 

 International Scientific Series. 



