REPORT ON ANIMAL MAGNETISM. 135 



The commissioners, magnetized by Deslon, felt no 

 effect. After the healthy people, some ailing ones fol 

 lowed, taken of all ages, and from various classes of 

 society. Among these sick people, who amounted to 

 fourteen, five felt some effects. On the remaining nine, 

 magnetism had no effect whatever. 



Notwithstanding the pompous announcements, mag 

 netism already could no longer be considered as a cer 

 tain indicator of diseases. 



Here the reporter made a capital remark : magnetism 

 appeared to have no effect on incredulous persons who 

 had submitted to the trials, nor on children. Was it 

 not allowable to think, that the effects obtained in the 

 others proceeded from a previous persuasion as to the 

 efficacy of the means, and that they might be attributed 

 to the influence of imagination ? Thence arose another 

 system of experiments. It was desirable to confirm or 

 to destroy this suspicion ; &quot; it became therefore requisite 

 to ascertain to what degree imagination influences our 

 sensations, and to establish whether it could have been 

 in part or entirely the cause of the effects attributed to 

 magnetism.&quot; 



There could be nothing neater or more demonstrative 

 than this portion of the work of the commissioners. 

 They go first to Dr. Jumelin, who, let it be observed, 

 obtains the same effects, the same crises as Deslon and 

 Mesmer, by magnetizing according to an entirely differ 

 ent method, and not restricting himself to any distinction 

 of poles ; they select persons who seem to feel the mag 

 netic action most forcibly, and put their imagination at 

 fault by now and then bandaging their eyes. 

 What happens then ? 

 When the patients see, the seat of the sensations is 



