Franz Anton Mesmer had the facts right, but the theory wrong. A flattering epitaph for most, but one that would have shamed the vainglorious doctor. He might have been proud, however, to learn that his name has been immortalized in the dictionary, mesmerize meaning to put into a trance. Hypnotism was the result of Mesmerism, but to Mesmer, in the late eighteenth century, it was only a byproduct of animal magnetism, his revolutionary theory that enraged ranking medical men and cured hundreds of peasants and nobles suffering from inexplicable diseases.

Mesmer was born on May 23rd, 1734 in the Swiss town of Iznang on the shores of Lake Constance. He graduated as a Doctor of Medicine from the University of Vienna in 1767, and spent his early years as a physician practicing in Vienna. Later, when his reputation soured, he moved to Paris and then opened a clinic in Spa, France. He died in his eighty-first year, as predicted by a Parisian fortuneteller.

Until his dying day, Mesmer insisted that animal magnetism was the effect of a cosmic fluid that flowed through all matter, living or inanimate. He believed that this fluid ebbed and flowed as tides. A body, whose cosmic fluids were restricted, constricted or slowed, would suffer. Mesmer used his own body, as well as inanimate objects such as magnets and copper rods, as conduits for this cosmic fluid. He could “magnetize” himself and then lay his hands on the patient’s afflicted area to ease the pain or illness. Mesmer says “This property of the human body, which makes it responsive to the influence of the heavenly bodies, and to the reciprocal action of the bodies around it, made me, in view of the analogy with the magnet, call it animal magnetism.” (See Appendix A)

Mesmer’s obsession with animal magnetism began with his doctoral dissertation, before he even graduated as a doctor. But the theory was watered down in that thesis. Mesmer either downplayed his ideas of cosmic fluid or he had not yet fully developed his theory along these lines. This was the era when electrotherapy, bloodlettings and magnet therapy were common. Mesmer’s leap to animal magnetism barely made a ripple in these waters. Only when animal magnetism began to produce prodigious and inexplicable successes in healing, did the reigning medical minds finally turn an eye on Mesmer. At this point, Mesmer made his greatest mistake, one that he would repeat time and again, when confronted with an inquiry into animal magnetism. Instead of focusing on the facts--the tremendous benefits, and cures produced by animal magnetism--Mesmer tried to convince his peers of the veracity of the cosmic fluid that he believed coursed through all matter. Because this fluid could not be proved, many practitioners scoffed at the entire theory of animal magnetism. Mesmer did not take criticism easily, and he made an enemy of anyone who disagreed with him, despite the fact that his own theory of animal magnetism was self-contradictory (See Appendix A for the 27 tenets of animal magnetism). Mesmer could not always affect illnesses that stemmed from physical causes, and he had a logical explanation for why animal magnetism sometimes failed in these cases. He hypothesized that a sort of negative fluid flowed through some people, and this was strong enough to counter-effect the animal magnetism.

At the height of his notoriety, mesmerism was not synonymous with hypnotism. That distinction did not come until long after Mesmer’s death. But in the tumultuous years preceding the French revolution, mesmerism was a scientific doctrine, a theology and a political party. Mesmer disassociated himself with the latter two, but they flourished despite his denigrations. Like many of his contemporaries who were fascinated with the new research into magnets and electricity, Mesmer believed that a body could be magnetized, to control the ebb and flow of this cosmic fluid. He began his experiments using actual magnets, but soon realized that these were unnecessary.  The strength of his own animal magnetism was enough to sway the cosmic tides in his patients. His treatments were revolutionary, unorthodox, and even a bit ridiculous, but he produced results. Mesmer cured blindness, paralysis, digestive and nervous disorders as well as a host of less defined illnesses. Mesmer never turned away a patient for lack of funds. The exorbitant rates that he charged his wealthy clients more than made up for the countless destitute patients who came to Mesmer’s clinic seeking relief.

Imagine a typical visit to Mesmer’s clinic. If you were noble person, you would wait along with the general rabble (there were usually several dozen waiting for the great doctor’s attention), rubbing elbows with the poor and crippled riffraff. Mesmer’s clinic was sumptuously decorated. Noble clients felt at home in Mesmer’s clinic; poorer clients were awed by the rich surroundings. Both reactions suited the initial phases of the doctor-patient relationship. Mesmer interviewed each patient, determining the cause of the illness, as well as the patient’s ability to pay for treatment. The rich were shown into one of three treatment rooms reserved for the well-to-do. The poor clients were given over to the fourth treatment room. Each of these rooms was essentially the same. A large tub dominated the floor. Dozens of metal rods stuck out of the water in the tub. Mesmer appeared bewigged and bedecked, the perfect image of the noble doctor. After magnetizing the water in the great tubs, Mesmer would instruct his patients to press the rods to their afflicted areas. Mesmer would sometimes lay his hands on the patient, drawing and pushing the cosmic fluid to the patient’s poles.

The Mesmer cure was not so simple as this laying of hands would suggest. It required a rapport between the patient and the doctor. Mesmer worked hard to create this relationship, and his most devastating failures occurred when he was expected to produce results impulsively, without the proper psychological preparations. Once a rapport was established with the patient, Mesmer could control his responses with a word or the wave of a hand. Not understanding the power of suggestion, Mesmer mistook this behavior for the influences of animal magnetism. He worked the patient into a state of flux, bringing the illness to a head before it could be expelled into the cosmic fluid. At the height of this painful process, patients were sometimes taken from the treatment rooms into specially designed, padded crisis rooms. Many patients greeted this painful process with devotion, but more than one left Mesmer’s clinic uncured, for fear of the cleansing fire needed to expunge the illness. In any case, a visit to Mesmer’s clinic could be considered the social high of the season.

He had many great triumphs, curing the blind and the paralyzed, that it would seem only natural that other doctors would jump on his bandwagon. But repeatedly, when Mesmer sought the recognition of his medical peers, he was denied. Unfortunately, Mesmer was so wrapped up in proving the existence of his cosmic fluid and animal magnetism, he lost sight of his true discovery, one that would revolutionize psychology and inspire the likes of Freud and Jung. That discovery was the hypnotic trance. Mesmer used this tool with an astonishing degree of success. Neither Mesmer, his followers nor his detractors understood the true source of his healing power. As a result, Mesmerism, at the time of its inventor’s death, crossed the spectrum of ideologies. One could ask ten different people in the street (everyone had an opinion on the subject) about Mesmerism and receive ten different answers. It was an occult, a fashionable diversion, an astonishing medical cure, a theology, a political party, a satirical stage show, a physical manifestation of God on earth, a flawed theory of physics, a dangerous medical practice and a hoax.

The fact that Animal Magnetism did not affect all people (Mesmer himself suffered in silence for years from a painfully dysfunctional bladder) was in direct conflict with Mesmer’s idea that the cosmic fluids permeate all things. In his last years, he published one more treatise on the subject and for the first time, he probed around the question of this discrepancy (see Appendix B for Mesmer’s last queries into Animal Magnetism). Mesmer did not have time to ponder out all these conflicting facts, but he laid the groundwork for others to begin the daunting task of discovering the human psyche.

Appendix A:

Published in Mesmer’s Memoir, the twenty-seven tenets of the theory of animal magnetism.

1 There is a mutual influence between heavenly bodies, the earth and living things.

2 A universally distributed fluid, so continuous as to admit of no vacuum anywhere, rarefied beyond all comparison, and by nature able to receive propagate and communicate all motionthis is the medium of the influence.

3. This mutual influence obeys mechanical laws that have not as yet been explained.

4. This mutual influence causes alternate effects, which we may consider a kind of ebb and flow.

5. This ebb and flow is more or less general, more or less particular, more or less compound, according to the causes that determine it.

6. Through this agent (the most universal we find in nature), the heavenly bodies, the earth and the parts that compose it mutually influence on another.

7. All properties of matter and of living organisms depend on this agent.

8. The animal body reacts to the alternate effects of this agent, which by entering the substance of the nerves affects them immediately.

9. Certain properties analogous to those of the magnet reveal themselves, especially in the human body. It is possible to distinguish different and opposite poles that may be changed, linked, destroyed or reinforced. Even the declination phenomenon can be observed.

10. This property of the human body, which makes it responsive to the influence of the heavenly bodies, and to the reciprocal action of the bodies around it, made em, in view of the analogy with the magnet, cal it animal magnetism.

11. The action and the properties of animal magnetism can be communicated to other animate and inanimate bodies. These differ in the degree of their susceptibility to it.

12. The action and the properties can be reinforced and propagated by the same bodies.

13. Experience shows a diffusion of matter so subtle that is penetrates all other bodies, apparently without any loss of potency.

14. Its action takes place at a distance, without the need of any intermediate object.

15. It is like light in that it can be reinforced and reflected by mirrors.

16. It can be communicated, propagated and reinforced by the action of sound.

17. This magnetic property can be accumulated, concentrated, and transported from one place to another.

18. I have remarked that not all animate bodies are equally susceptible to it. Some exist, although they are rare, that have properties so opposed as to destroy by their very presence every effect of animal magnetism in other bodies.

19. This contrary property also penetrates all bodies. It can be communicated, propagated, accumulated, concentrated, transported, reflected by mirrors, and propagated by sound. This property is not merely a negation of animal magnetism but a positive and opposite power.

20. The magnet, natural or artificial, is, like other bodies, susceptible both to animal magnetism and to its contrary, without in either case suffering any alteration in its effect on iron or the needlewhich proves that the principle of animal magnetism is essentially different from that of mineral magnetism.

21. This system will produce new explanations of the nature of fire and light, of the theory of gravitation, of ebb and flow in nature, of the magnet and of electricity.

22. It will show that the magnet and electricity only have, as far as illness is concerned, properties common to many other natural agents and that if some useful results have been obtained from their use, these are due to animal magnetism.

23. We can see from the facts that this principle, in accordance with the practical rules I shall set forth, can cure nervous ailments directly and other ailments indirectly.

24. Relying of its aid, the physician learns the proper use of medicines. He strengthens their action as causes and directs beneficial crises in such a manner as to keep control of them.

25. In making my method public, I will demonstrate by a new theory of disease the universal effectiveness of the principle I employ to combat it.

26. Basing himself on this knowledge, the physician will be able to diagnose with certainty of the origin, nature, and progress of diseases, even the most complicated. He will prevent them form becoming worse and devise a cure without ever exposing the patient to dangerous or disagreeable consequences regardless of age, temperament or sex. Women, even in pregnancy and at the time of delivery, will profit from the same advantages.

27. To conclude, this doctrine will make it possible for the physician to diagnose the health of each individual and to shield him from the illnesses to which he may be exposed. The art of healing will then reach its ultimate perfection.

Appendix B:

Mesmer attempted to analyze the facts surrounding animal magnetism. Here is a series of questions that he spent the last years of his life pondering:

1. How can a sleeping man diagnose his won illnesses and even those of other people?

2. How, without having any instruction, can he identify the best means of effecting a cure?

3. How can he see objects at any distance, and how can he predict future events?

4. How can a man receive impressions from a will other than his own?

5. Why is this man not always endowed with these faculties?

6. How can these faculties be perfected?

7. Why is this state more frequent, and why does it appear in its most developed form, when the methods of animal magnetism are employed?

8. What have been the effects of ignorance of this phenomenon, and what are they today?

9. What are the evils resulting from the abuse of it?

See the Memser Book exhibit at the

Bakken Library and Museum