![]() The effects of mesmerism, they pronounced, might be attributed to the imagination. The commission’s unfavorable report found no evidence of magnetic fluid. American ambassador Benjamin Franklin served on this commission. ![]() Mesmer attracted many followers, which led King Louis XVI to appoint a commission from the Faculty of Medicine and the Royal Academy of Sciences to investigate the phenomenon of animal magnetism. When Mesmer moved to Paris in 1778, events followed a similar trajectory. Research successfully inducing and harnessing electricity, another invisible force, only served to substantiate mesmerists’ claims.īriefly fashionable in Vienna, mesmerism declined in popularity after several scandals and unsuccessful attempts at healing. As Mesmer’s practices gained popularity in Europe, “mesmerism” became synonymous with the radical healing practices attributed to “animal magnetism.” Mesmer claimed a rational method behind his work and developed his theory of universal fluid from Isaac Newton’s electromagnetic aether and laws of attraction, lending his work scientific credibility, however tenuous. The use of magnets evolved into the practice of a healthy person passing his hands over a sick individual to redistribute “magnetic fluid” and pull out any disease. He likened this invisible force to magnetism and even used magnets to align the forces within individuals with the forces of nature. In his writings from the 1770s and 1780s, Mesmer describes an invisible and universal “fluid,” or energy, that exists in all people and helps sustain good health when kept in equilibrium. While recorded occurrences of the trance state date back millennia, the term and official practice of mesmerism emerged from the work of Franz Anton Mesmer, an Austrian physician and astrologer. During its heyday, mesmerism straddled lines between popular culture and scientific discovery, religion and science, lowbrow and highbrow culture. In time, some aspects of mesmerism would be forgotten, while others would lead to work on spiritual enlightenment and even the science of psychology itself. Despite its evident entertainment value-and its entrepreneurial nature-mesmerism had roots in 18th-century science.
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