Читать книгу The Spirit Land - Samuel B. Emmons - Страница 6

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Ignorance of the influence of the imagination upon the nervous system has given rise to many superstitions. We will give a few statements of facts to establish and illustrate this position. Some time previous to 1784, a gentleman in Paris, by the name of Mesmer, professed to have discovered a universal remedy for all diseases; and this remedy consisted in being magnetized under peculiar forms and circumstances. M. Mesmer became so noted for his discovery, and he performed such extraordinary cures, that, in 1784, the French king appointed a committee, consisting of four physicians and five members of the Royal Academy of Sciences, to investigate this matter. The committee, as soon as they had examined the whole apparatus employed in magnetizing, and taken cognizance of the manœuvres of Mesmer, and his partner, Deslon, proceeded to notice the symptoms of the patients while under the influence of magnetism. These were various in different individuals. Some were calm and tranquil, and felt nothing; others were affected with coughing and spitting, with pains, heats, and perspirations; and some were agitated and tortured with convulsions. These convulsions were sometimes continued for three hours, accompanied with expectoration of a viscid phlegm, ejected by violent efforts, and sometimes streaked with blood. They had involuntary motions of the limbs, of the whole body, and spasms of the throat. Their eyes wandered in wild motions; they uttered piercing shrieks, wept, laughed, and hiccoughed. The commissioners observed that the great majority of those thus effected were females, and that these exhibitions did not begin until they had been under the operation of magnetism one or two hours, and that, when one became affected, the rest were soon seen in the same situation. In order to give the magnetizer the fairest opportunity to exhibit the power of his invention, and to give the most satisfactory evidence to the public, the commissioners all submitted to be operated upon themselves, and sat under the operation two hours and a half, but without the least effect upon them, except the fatigue of sitting so long in one position. They were magnetized three days in succession, but without any sensible effect being produced. The magnetizing instruments were then removed to Dr. Franklin's house, away from public view, parade, and high expectation, and fourteen persons were then magnetized, all of them invalids. Nine of them experienced nothing, five appeared slightly affected, and the commissioners were surprised to learn, in every instance, that the poor and ignorant alone were affected. After this eight men and two women were magnetized, but without the least effect. At length a female servant submitted to the same operation, and she affirmed that she felt a heat in every part where the magnetized finger was pointed at her; that she experienced a pain in her head; and, during a continuation of the operation, she became faint, and swooned. When she had fully recovered, they ordered her eyes to be bandaged, and the operator was removed at a distance, when they made her believe that she was still under the operation, and the effects were the same, although no one operated, either near her or at a distance. She could tell the very place where she was magnetized; she felt the same heat in her back and loins, and the same pain in her eyes and ears. At the end of one quarter of an hour, a sign was made for her to be magnetized, but she felt nothing. On the following day, a man and woman were magnetized in a similar manner, and the result was the same. It was found that to direct the imagination to the parts where the sensations were to be felt, was all that was necessary to produce these wonderful effects. But children, who had not arrived at sufficient maturity of age to be excited by these imposing forms, experienced nothing from the operation.

Mesmer and Deslon asserted that they could magnetize a tree, and every person approaching the tree, in a given time, would be magnetized, and either fall into a swoon or in convulsions, provided the magnetizer was permitted to stand at a distance and direct his look and his cane towards the tree. Accordingly, an apricot tree was selected in Dr. Franklin's garden, at Vassy, for the experiment, and M. Deslon came and magnetized the tree while the patient was retained in the house. The patient was then brought out, with a bandage over his eyes, and successively lead to four trees, which were not magnetized, and was directed to embrace each tree two minutes, while M. Deslon, at a distance, stood pointing his cane to the tree actually magnetized. At the first tree, which was about twenty-seven feet from the magnetized tree, the patient sweat profusely, coughed, expectorated, and said he felt a pain in his head. At the second tree, now thirty feet from the magnetized tree, he found himself giddy, attended with headache, as before. At the third tree, his giddiness and headache were much increased, and he said he believed he was approaching the magnetized tree, although he was still twenty-eight feet from it. At length, when brought to the fourth tree, not magnetized, and at the distance of twenty-four feet from that which was, the young man fell down in a state of perfect insensibility; his limbs became rigid, and he was carried to a grass plot, where M. Deslon went to his assistance and recovered him. And yet, in no instance had he approached within a less distance than twenty-four feet of the magnetized tree.

A similar experiment was soon afterwards made on two poor females, at Dr. Franklin's house. These women were separated from each other. Three of the commissioners remained with one of them in one chamber, and two of them with the other, in an adjoining chamber. The first had a bandage over her eyes, and was then made to believe that M. Deslon came in and commenced magnetizing her, although he never entered the room. In three minutes the woman began to shiver. She felt, in succession, a pain in her head, and a pricking in her hands. She became stiff, struck her hands together, got up, stamped, &c., but nothing had been done to her. The woman in the adjoining chamber was requested to take her seat by the door, which was shut, with her sight at liberty. She was then made to believe that M. Deslon would magnetize the door on the opposite side, while the commissioners would wait to witness the result. She had scarcely been seated a minute before she began to shiver. Her breathing became hurried; she stretched out her arms behind her back, writhing them strongly, and bending her body forwards; a general tremor of the whole body came on. The chattering of the teeth was so loud as to be heard out of the room; and she bit her hand so as to leave the marks of her teeth in it; but M. Deslon was not near the door, nor in either chamber, nor was either of the women touched, not even their pulse examined. We perceive, then, that these effects were produced solely by the imagination, and the above facts exhibit very satisfactorily the power which the mind has over the body. The symptoms were not feigned, but, in the peculiar state of mind of these persons, they were involuntary and irresistible. They believed they should be effected in this manner; the idea was formed in their imaginations, and the nerves were acted upon precisely as though what they conceived was real, and the muscular effects followed. And as the patients themselves could not explain the causes of these effects, they very naturally attributed the whole to magnetism. When the commissioners explained the matter, magnetism ceased to produce these wonderful effects. The minds of persons were enlightened upon the subject, and they no longer expected to be influenced in this manner, and accordingly they were not.

Dr. Sigault, an eminent physician of Paris, professed to be an adept in the art of Mesmer. Being at a great assembly one day, he caused it to be announced that he could magnetize. The voice and serious air he assumed had a very sensible effect upon a lady present, although she endeavored at first to conceal the fact. But having carried his hand to the region of the heart, he found it palpitating. She soon experienced difficulty in respiration. The muscles of her face were affected with convulsive twitches; her eyes rolled; she shortly fell down in a fainting fit, vomited her dinner, and experienced incredible weakness and languor. This seemed to corroborate the remarks of Burton, in his Anatomy of Melancholy, where he says, "If, by some soothsayer, wise man, fortune teller, or physician, men be told they shall have such a disease, they will so seriously apprehend it that they will instantly labor of it—a thing familiar in China, (saith Riccius, the Jesuit.) If they be told they shall be sick on such a day, when that day comes they will surely be sick, and will be so terribly affected that sometimes they die upon it."

A late English paper states that a young woman, named Winfield, who had been on a visit to Derby, returned home to Radborn, taking a little dog with her by a string. On arriving there, she informed her friends she had seen a gypsy on the road, who told her, that if she led her dog by the string into the house, she would soon be a corpse. Singular to relate, the young woman expired on the following morning! It was thought she died from the effect of imagination, aided by a debilitated constitution.

A missionary among the New Zealanders says, "There is a class of people in New Zealand, called by the natives Areekee, and whom we very improperly call Priests. These men pretend to have intercourse with departed spirits, by which they are able to kill, by incantation, any person on whom their anger may fall. And it is a fact, that numbers fall a prey to their confidence in the efficacy of the curses of these men, and pine under the influence of despair, and die."

In less than fifteen years after the trial of the pretensions of Mesmer and his coadjutors, in regard to magnetism, there was originated in America, by a Mr. Perkins, a cause of delusion of precisely the same nature. It prevailed in all the United States, in Great Britain, Scotland, and Ireland, and to considerable extent on the continent of Europe. Mr. Perkins prepared two small pieces of different kinds of metal drew them to a point, and polished them. These Metallic Tractors, as they were denominated, were said to have, in their joint operation, great power over the electric fluid; and by moving these points gently over the surface of an inflamed part, the heat was extracted, the swelling subsided, and, in a short time, the patient was relieved. After a while, thousands and tens of thousands were ready to certify to the happy influence of these Tractors. Mr. Perkins went to England and obtained the royal letters patent, for the purpose of securing to him the advantages of his discovery; and it has been asserted by the best authority, that he returned from England possessed of ten thousand pounds sterling, which he received for the use of his Tractors.

But Dr. Haggarth, an eminent physician and philosopher, recollecting the development of animal magnetism at Paris, wrote to Dr. Falconer, surgeon of the General Hospital at Bath, (England,) and stated his suspicion concerning the Tractors; that their efficacy depended wholly on the imagination of the patient; and recommended the experiment of wooden Tractors in the place of the metallic.

Accordingly, five persons were selected for the experiment, who were laboring under chronic rheumatism in the ankle, knee, wrist, and hip. Wooden Tractors were prepared and painted in such a manner that the patients could not discover but that they were metal; and on the 7th of January, 1799, these wooden Tractors were employed for the first time. All the patients except one, were relieved. Three were very much benefited. One felt his knee warmer, and he could walk much better, as he showed the medical gentlemen present. One was easier for nine hours, till he went to bed, and then his pain returned. The next day, January 8th, the metallic Tractors were employed with the same effect as that of the preceding day. This led to further experiments of a similar kind, and they were continued, until the physicians became fully satisfied that the wooden Tractors were of the same utility with the metallic, provided the patients supposed them metallic. Similar experiments were soon after made at Edinburgh, and the result was the same. A servant girl, afflicted with a most acute headache, which had rendered her nights altogether restless for a fortnight, readily submitted to be pointed at with these wooden Tractors. The operator moved them about her head, but did not touch her. In four minutes she felt a chilliness in the head. In a minute or two more, she felt as though cold water was running down her temples, and the pain was diminished. In ten minutes more, she declared that the headache was entirely gone; and the next day she returned to express her thanks to her benefactors for the good sleep she enjoyed through the night. By similar experiments, the intelligent citizens in America soon ascertained the true cause of the deception, and when these facts came to be developed, the Tractors lost all their influence on the human system, and have since been spoken of only in derision.

Here, again, we behold the astonishing power of the imagination over the human system, and witness the miracles that have been performed on the ignorant and unsuspecting. Even in the modern practice of the mesmeric art, a great deal of the success depends upon this tendency of the mind. A very respectable operator assures us, that he cannot magnetize persons unless he can first impress them with the belief that they are actually to become magnetized. They must have faith in order that the effect may be produced. A public lecturer may hang up his watch before his auditors, and tell them to look upon that watch, and they will become magnetized. Those who expect to be affected are thrown into the magnetic state. Those who have little faith and expectation are seldom, if ever, influenced by such experiments. We, however, do not mean to avow a disbelief in the science of magnetism. On the contrary, we look forward with much interest to its perfection, unencumbered with the false pretensions of its zealous and mistaken friends.