D-Q401611

Item:Q401611

Commentary

Praises the present era: though fraud is rampant (Cagliostro etc.) we are living in an era of unprecedented progress and in the continent which God has privileged (p.5) and we can hope to see further improvements. p.6: Animal magnetism resembles the mysterious and supernatural arts (which we should leave behind), but it is different - the number of supporters is also far smaller than the number of people involved in magical practices. p7: Mesmerism and Mesmer himself found a very different reception in France and Germany - Germany has proven to be more manly.

The entire concept is ridiculed in its premises: Why is it that only practitioners of best moral precepts should be able to exert this power? How does this power determine who is exerting it?

Was ist ferner allen unseren bisher erworbenen Kenntnissen der Natur, und den darauf gegründeten, und unserm Wesen gleichsam einverleibten Denkarten widersprechender, als daß ein cörperlicher, wenn gleich noch so feiner Stoff existire, der nicht den bekannten physischen, sondern nur moralischen Gesetzen geborche, oder um mich deutlicher auszudrücken, der sich nur auf die Winke und Bewegungen von frommen und rechtschaffenen Menschen äußere als wenn er eine genauere und sicherere Unterscheidungskraft, als die scharffinnigsten unter den Menschen besäße [...]<p.11>

The same mysterious problem occurs <p.13> on the side of the patients: They fall in trances, but that turns out to be the situation in which they can suddenly show a far better judgement even in the sciences than scientists who are fully awake. Just as peculiar that practitioners should be allowed to touch girls and women on their most delicate parts. It is not a miracle that we have presently more satires against Mesmerism than true rebuttals. This is the only option we have to argue against it, before we better understand what is going on.

Those reports which Meiners has read are all cases of women who were in most of these cases educated and p.19. able to get an ide of the practice before they were first treated. p.24 the only patient who did not have prior knowledge could receive this very knowledge in the weeks in which she was magnetised without visible effects. (She learned o play the game during the cure...)

The most peculiar aspect of the case studies was in Meiners's view p.12 that patients became able to predict the cure and the time that was needed to restore them:

Unter alten Symptomen aber die man an den Schlafredenden Kranken bemerkte, fiel den Magnetisirern keine so sehr auf, als die scheinbare Weissagungsgabe, die sie wenigstens in Ansehung der Zufälle, die ihnen selbst zustoßen würden, und in Ansehung des Fortgangs, und der gänzlichen Vollendung ihrer Besserung ausübten. <p.41>

The patients did not extend their gift of prognosis beyond their own condition. Talking in their magnetic sleep they would know what happened before, when they were awake. Later, however, they would not be able to recall what they said in the "sleep".

The case studies are given without clearer statements that discredit them but Meiners focuses on interesting reoccurring aspects that need an explanation.

p.52 part II.

Observations on sleep: it has been possible to reach the mind of sleeping persons with words - and even to make them dream of certain things that were whispered into their ears. The magnetic sleep resembles, so Meiners, regular sleep more than the ecstasies and raptures that have been observed in Indian fakirs. p.60 ff a theory of different forms of ecstasies. p.70-114: On nervous disorders, "Nervenkrankheiten". Nothing is more normal here than sleep as integral part of the restoration.

p.114 part III.

Wehther we can actually claim that the treatments are utterly harmless.

Der scharffinnige Vertheidiger des Magnetismus, dessen Gedanken ich so eben mitgetheilt habe, fürchtet von den Manipulationen und den dadurch erregten Ekstasen und Zuckungen keine nachtheilige Folgen weder für den Geist noch für den Cörper der Kranken. Durch die Manipulation geschehe weiter nichts, als daß unvollkommene Bestrebungen der Natur, wodurch sie sich helfen wolle, in vollkommne verwandelt, oder das die Convulsionen im Zustande der Ekstase verstärkt wurden, um im Wachen abzunehemen und zu verschwinden. p.118

p.126 ff. on fantasies and what they were able to do with patients.