Animal Magnetism - Definition and Meanings of Animal Magnetism

Definition and Meanings of Animal Magnetism

According to Adam Crabtree, more than 1500 books have been published on animal magnetism and related subjects until 1926. Many other books have been published after this date and/or are not included in his bibliography.

Therefore there are naturally many variations for the use of the terms animal magnetism and mesmerism. According to various researchers, the term animal magnetism has at least four different levels of meaning: a general universal principle, a specific method of vitalistic cure, a specific state of being and of consciousness (the somnambulism) and a cultural aspect.

• Firstly, animal magnetism as a general vital universal principle: animal magnetism is for Mesmer a principle that touches both man and the universe at all levels: psychological, human and cosmological. For Mesmer, animal magnetism is mainly a theory to describe the entanglement between man and universe. Mesmer's theory is based on the concept of something through which everything in the universe is interconnected. It is something before matter. Lacking other terms, he called it a "universal fluid". For him this subtle fluid or energy, source of life and health, fill the cosmos and moves in it. This fluid is also the basis of the cosmos as it is the basis of which matter is constituted. This fluid is also a sort of energy or life force. When this fluid circulates, living beings are healthy. When it is blocked we experience sickness. This theory is largely inspired by ancient doctrines and Renaissance concepts. Scholars such as Meheust say that it would be interesting to compare it with the Chinese concept of Chi, or "vital energy".

• Secondly, animal magnetism as a system of cure: Animal magnetism is defined by Mesmer in an even more restricted sense. For him, it is the capability present in all men, (but mostly developed in those working as magnetists), to use the vital fluid or life force for therapeutical purposes. According to this theory, the magnetizer is able to direct his vital fluid toward the sick person, and heal him. This second definition was often adopted even by those magnetists who did not accept the preceding larger theory. For example baron DuPotet says:

  the fluid is not a substance that can be weighted, measured, condensed, it is a vital force (Du Potet)

• There is also a variation of this second complementary definition with a subjective meaning: Animal magnetism as a subjective sensitivity. Mesmer says that as the fluid (or life force) can only be perceived by the senses in a subjective way, animal magnetism is also this sensibility, that he calls "a sixth sense". He says:

  Magnetism can be compared to a sixth sense. The senses are neither defined nor described. They are rather felt. One cannot explain to a blind man what colours are. One would need for him to be able to “feel”, them, that is, to see them. The same holds true for magnetism. It must be mainly transmitted through inward feeling. It is only feeling that can make the theory of it understandable (Mesmer).

This subjective approach is also used by Deleuze: Mr. Mesmer showed in us something that we didn't suppose: let's try to use this faculty to help other people without worrying about the system.

• Thirdly, after 1784, and following the workings of Puysegur, who developed "magnetic somnambulism", the words "animal magnetism" were also being used for the concepts relating to the phenomena of "somnambulism" that de Puysegur firstly described; in this case in English the expression is even more misleading, in that "mesmeric state" or "mesmeric sleep" is used to define the state of somnambulic consciousness developed through the help of the magnetizer. In this case the term mesmerism, even if validated by use, contains an anachronism. In fact, even if Mesmer acknowledged the state as somnambulism, it wasn't he who produced it, and moreover he has never claimed to have discovered it. He simply considered it as one of the many manifestations (crises) in which animal magnetism could manifest itself but did not consider it as a specific state. And it is a paradox, but the term animal magnetism and even more so "mesmerism" found in English literature, are instead more frequently used to indicate techniques utilized neither by Mesmer nor his theory, but for indicating this kind of somnambulism and this specific somnambulic state

• Finally, the expression animal magnetism is used for defining all cultural phenomena that originated from Mesmer and the reflections about somnambulism.