Franz Mesmer | |
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 Print of Franz Anton Mesmer (Musée de la Révolution française) | |
| Born | Franz Anton Mesmer 23 May 1734 (1734-05-23) Iznang,Bishopric of Constance(nowMoos, Baden-Württemberg) |
| Died | 5 March 1815(1815-03-05) (aged 80) |
| Alma mater | University of Vienna |
| Known for | Animal magnetism |
Franz Anton Mesmer (/ˈmɛzmər/MEZ-mər;[1]German:[ˈmɛsmɐ]; 23 May 1734 – 5 March 1815) was a Germanphysician with an interest inastronomy. He theorized the existence of a process ofnatural energy transference occurring between all animate and inanimate objects; this he called "animal magnetism", later referred to asmesmerism. Mesmer's theory attracted a wide following between about 1780 and 1850, and continued to have some influence until the end of the 19th century.[2] In 1843, the Scottish doctorJames Braid proposed the term "hypnotism" for a technique derived from animal magnetism; today the word "mesmerism" generally functions as a synonym of "hypnosis". Mesmer also supported the arts, specifically music; he was on friendly terms withHaydn andMozart.[citation needed]
Mesmer was born in the village of Iznang (now part of the municipality ofMoos), on the shore ofLake Constance inSwabia. He was a son of master forester Anton Mesmer (1701–after 1747) and his wife, Maria Ursula (née Michel; 1701–1770).[3] After studying at theJesuit universities ofDillingen andIngolstadt, he took up the study ofmedicine at theUniversity of Vienna in 1759. In 1766 he published adoctoral dissertation with theLatin titleDe planetarum influxu in corpus humanum (On the Influence of the Planets on the Human Body), in which he discussed the influence of themoon and theplanets on the human body and disease.
Building largely onIsaac Newton's theory of the tides, Mesmer expounded on certain tides in the human body that might be accounted for by the movements of the sun and moon.[4] Evidence assembled byFrank A. Pattie suggests that Mesmer plagiarized[5] most of his dissertation from other works,[6][7] includingDe imperio solis ac lunae in corpora humana et morbius inde oriundis (1704) byRichard Mead, an eminent English physician and Newton's friend. However, in Mesmer's day doctoral theses were not expected to be original.[8]
In January 1768, Mesmer married Anna Maria von Posch, a wealthy widow, and established himself as a doctor in Vienna. In the summers he lived on a splendid estate and became a patron of the arts. In 1768, when court intrigue prevented the performance ofLa finta semplice (K. 51), for which the twelve-year-oldWolfgang Amadeus Mozart had composed 500 pages of music, Mesmer is said to have arranged a performance in his garden of Mozart'sBastien und Bastienne (K. 50), a one-act opera,[9] although Mozart's biographerNissen found no proof that this performance actually took place. Mozart later immortalized his former patron by including a comedic reference to Mesmer in his operaCosì fan tutte.[10]
In 1774, Mesmer produced an "artificial tide" in a patient, Francisca Österlin, who suffered fromhysteria, by having her swallow a preparation containing iron and then attaching magnets to various parts of her body. She reported feeling streams of a mysterious fluid running through her body and was relieved of her symptoms for several hours. Mesmer did not believe that the magnets had achieved the cure on their own. He felt that he had contributedanimal magnetism, which had accumulated in his work, to her. He soon stopped using magnets as a part of his treatment.
In the same year Mesmer collaborated withMaximilian Hell.
In 1775, Mesmer was invited to give his opinion before the Munich Academy of Sciences on theexorcisms carried out byJohann Joseph Gassner (Gaßner), apriest andhealer who grew up inVorarlberg, Austria. Mesmer said that while Gassner was sincere in his beliefs, his cures resulted because he possessed a high degree of animal magnetism. This confrontation between Mesmer's secular ideas and Gassner's religious beliefs marked the end of Gassner's career and, according toHenri Ellenberger, the emergence ofdynamic psychiatry.
The scandal that followed Mesmer's only partial success in curing the blindness of an 18-year-old musician,Maria Theresia Paradis, led him to leave Vienna in 1777. In February 1778, Mesmer moved to Paris, rented an apartment in a part of the city preferred by the wealthy and powerful, and established a medical practice. There he would reunite with Mozart, who often visited him. Paris soon divided into those who thought he was a charlatan who had been forced to flee from Vienna and those who thought he had made a great discovery.
In his first years in Paris, Mesmer tried and failed to get either theRoyal Academy of Sciences or theRoyal Society of Medicine to provide official approval for his doctrines. He found only one physician of high professional and social standing,Charles d'Eslon, to become a disciple. In 1779, with d'Eslon's encouragement, Mesmer wrote an 88-page book,Mémoire sur la découverte du magnétisme animal, to which he appended his famous 27 Propositions. These propositions outlined his theory at that time. Some contemporary scholars equate Mesmer's animal magnetism with the qi (chi) of Traditional Chinese Medicine and mesmerism withmedical Qigong practices.[11][12]
According to d'Eslon, Mesmer understood health as the free flow of the process of life through thousands of channels in our bodies. Illness was caused by obstacles to this flow. Overcoming these obstacles and restoring flow produced crises, which restored health. WhenNature failed to do this spontaneously, contact with a conductor of animal magnetism was a necessary and sufficient remedy. Mesmer aimed to aid or provoke the efforts of Nature. To cure aninsane person, for example, involved causing a fit of madness. The advantage of magnetism involved accelerating such crises without danger.
Mesmer treated patients both individually and in groups. With individuals he would sit in front of his patient with his knees touching the patient's knees, pressing the patient's thumbs in his hands, looking fixedly into the patient's eyes. Mesmer made "passes", moving his hands from the patient's shoulders down along their arms. He then pressed his fingers on the patient'shypochondrium (the area below thediaphragm), sometimes holding his hands there for hours. Many patients felt peculiar sensations or had convulsions that were regarded as crises and were supposed to bring about the cure. Mesmer would often conclude his treatments by playing some music on aglass harmonica.[13]
By 1780, Mesmer had more patients than he could treat individually, and he established a collective treatment known as the "baquet." An English doctor who observed Mesmer described the treatment as follows:
In the middle of the room is placed a vessel of about a foot and a half high which is called here a "baquet". It is so large that twenty people can easily sit round it; near the edge of the lid which covers it, there are holes pierced corresponding to the number of persons who are to surround it; into these holes are introduced iron rods, bent at right angles outwards, and of different heights, so as to answer to the part of the body to which they are to be applied. Besides these rods, there is a rope which communicates between the baquet and one of the patients, and from him is carried to another, and so on the whole round. The most sensible effects are produced on the approach of Mesmer, who is said to convey the fluid by certain motions of his hands or eyes, without touching the person. I have talked with several who have witnessed these effects, who have convulsions occasioned and removed by a movement of the hand...[14]
In 1784, without Mesmer having requested it, KingLouis XVI appointed four members of the Faculty of Medicine as commissioners to investigate animal magnetism and Mesmerism. At the request of these commissioners, the king appointed Baron de Breteuil, minister of the Department of Paris, to establish investigative commissions. One was composed of individuals from the Royal Academy of Sciences, and the other of individuals from the Academy of Sciences and the Faculty of Medicine. The investigative teams included the chemistAntoine Lavoisier, the doctorJoseph-Ignace Guillotin, the astronomerJean Sylvain Bailly, and the American ambassadorBenjamin Franklin.[15][16]
The commission conducted a series of experiments aimed not just at determining whether Mesmer's treatment worked, but whether he had discovered a new physical fluid. The commission concluded that there was no evidence for such a fluid. Whatever benefit the treatment produced was attributed to "imagination". One of the commissioners, the botanistAntoine Laurent de Jussieu took exception to the official reports, authoring a dissenting opinion.[6]
The commission did not examine Mesmer specifically, but instead observed the practice of d'Eslon. They usedblind trials, blindfolding the subjects, in their investigation, and found that Mesmerism seemed to work only when the subject was aware of it. Their findings are considered the first observation of theplacebo effect.[17] Even d'Eslon himself was convinced by the commission, stating that, "the imagination thus directed to the relief of suffering humanity would be a most valuable means in the hands of the medical profession."[15]
Mesmer was driven into exile soon after the investigations on animal magnetism. However, his influential student,Amand-Marie-Jacques de Chastenet, Marquis of Puységur (1751–1825), continued to have many followers until his death.[18]
Mesmer continued to practice in Frauenfeld, Switzerland, for a number of years. He died in 1815 inMeersburg, Germany.[19]
In Mozart's 1790 opera buffaCosì fan tutte, a humorous scam involves the "Albanian" visitors staging a suicide attempt with poison, so "Doctor" Despina can demonstrate a piece of "Mesmer's magnet" as a miracle cure.[10]
InGregory Ratoff's 1949 filmBlack Magic, Mesmer was portrayed byCharles Goldner.[20] InRoger Spottiswoode'sMesmer (1994), he was portrayed byAlan Rickman.[21]
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