A practical manual of animal magnetism : containing an exposition of the methods employed in producing the magnetic phenomena, with its application to the treatment and cure of diseases

Front matter

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Chap. I. — Historical Survey 1

§ I. Mesmer and his Theory ib.

Reflections on the Report of Bailly 9

Conclusions of the Report of Jussieu 11

Effect produced by the work of Thouret, entitled Recherches et Doutes sur le Mag-

netisme Animal ib.

§ II. Magnetism among the Egyptians ib.

§ III. Magnetism among the Hebrews 12

§ IY. Magnetism among the Greeks 13

§ V. Magnetism among the Romans 14

§ VI. Magnetism among the Gauls 15

§ VII. Magnetism in the Middle Ages ib.

§ VIII. Magnetism in our Times 17

Letter of the Marquis de Puysegur to one of the members of the Societe de l'Har-

monie ib.

Transactions of the Royal Academy of Medicine relative to Magnetism 20

§ IX. Conclusions of M. Husson's Report in

1831 22

V1U CONTENTS.

Page Chap. II. — Or the Causes which have retarded the

Propagation of Magnetism 31

Chap. III. — Conditions necessary to the Production or the Magnetic Phenomena .... 35

§ I. Of Sex 37

§ II. Of Age . . 38

§ III. Of the Temperament 41

§ IV. Of the Physiological State 42

§ "V. Moral Conditions 44

§ VI. Phrenological Conditions 45

§ VII. Of Places, Witnesses3 &c ib .

Chap. IV. — Classification and Description of the Magnetic Phenomena 47

§ I. Precursory Signs of Sleep 48

§ II. Of the Magnetic Sleep 55

§ III. Of Somnambulism 56

§ IV. Of Somnambulism properly so called .... ib. § V. Intelligence and Moral Faculties during

Somnambulism 58

§ VI. Of Isolation 61

§ VII. Of Physical Insensibility , 65

Case of Madame Plaintain ib

Case communicated to the Academy

by M. Oudet 67

§ VIII. Of Incomplete Isolation 69

Of the Functions of Organic Life during Somnambulism 70

Chap. V. — On Lucid Somnambulism 71

1. Vision without the Aid of the Eyes 74

CONTENTS. IX

Page

Case of Madame Hortense *** 75

1st Sitting . 79

2d Sitting 82

3d Sitting 85

4th Sitting (at which MM. Bousquet, Amedee Latour, Ch. d'Orbigny, &c.

assisted) ib.

5th Sitting (witnesses, MM. Bouillaud

and Cornac) 88

6th Sitting (witnesses: MM. Frapart,

Latour, Jeanselme, d'Epagny, &c.) . . 91 Eeading a Paper enclosed in a Box 95

2. Intuition 96

3. Of Interior Prevision 99

Case of Miss Clary D*** 101

4. On External Prevision 105

Remarkable Case 107

Case of Madame B 112

5. Of the Penetration of Thought 117

Case of M. Barrier 118

Case of Callixte . . , , 122

6. Transposition of the Senses 126

7. Of certain other Particularities remarked, or

supposed to he remarked, during Somnambulism 133

Letter written to the Sacred Penitentiary, under the direction of the Bishop of Lausanne 137

8. On Awaking , 140

Case of Pradhier 145

X CONTENTS.

Page Chap. VI. — Of the different Methods of Magnetising , 149

Ordinary Method according to Deleuze 151

Magnetisation by the Head 154

by means of the Look 157

by the mere Will 158

Experiments made at the Hotel-Dieu of Paris,

by M. Dupotet ib.

Method of Faria 164

Of Insufflation 165

Magnetising one Somnambulist by another

Somnambulist ib.

Of Faith 170

Of the Number and the Hour of the Sittings 171

Chap. VII. — Of the processes to be adopted to

awaken Somnambulists 175

Chap. VHI. — Of the Magnetic Fluid 178

Chap. IX. — Of the Fatigue felt by Magnetisers — of Somnambulism occasioned by certain Medicines — some Considerations on the nature of Magnetism 185

Chap. X. — On the Magnetisation of Food, of Drinks, of Rings, and of Inanimate Substances in general 192

Letter of M. Clocquet relative to the Treatment at Busancy 193

1st Experiment on Magnetised Water 201

CONTENTS. XI

Page

2d Experiment 204

3d Experiment 206

Considerations on Magnetised Water 207

Experiment of M. Foissac 209

Manner of Magnetising Water '. 210

Trees. 211

Tubs.... ib.

Baths 212

Facts tending to prove the Existence of a Magnetic Fluid 215

Chap. XI. — Magnetisation or Animals 226

Chap. XII. — Influence op Animal Magnetism on

the System 227

Chap. XIII. — Of Magnetism, considered as a Therapeutic Agent 229

1st Case.— Asphyxia in an Infant, &c, by M.

Thiriat . 233

2d Case. — Paralysis and Atrophy of the two

fore-arms, &c. 235

3d Case. — Paralysis, &c 237

4th Case. — Paralysis of the Thighs and Legs,

5th Case. — Chlorosis 241

6th Case. — Exhaustion, sweats, &c 251

7th Case. — Occult Cancer \ 252

8th Case.— Gout 255

9th Case. — Sciatica, Headachs, &c 257

] 0th Case. — Rheumatism 258

1 1th Case. — Partial Convulsions 261

Xll CONTENTS.

Page

12th Case. — Epilepsy 264

13th Case.— Epilepsy 268

14th Case.— Madness 270

General Reflections on the Therapeutic Action of Magnetism , 272

Chap. XIV. — Or Magnetic Treatment 280

Case of Madame Comet 286

15th Case. — Fistulse and Ulcers 303

16th Case. — Chronic Deafness cured in two

months 320

Of some Peculiarities in the Therapeutics of

Somnambulists 324

Case of Madame Teste 337

Chap. XV. — Medicine or Somnambulists 368

Of External Prevision 376

Of the Instinct of Remedies 378

Of the Sensations experienced by Somnambulists on the Contact of Patients 385

Of the Manner in which Consultations ought

to be given , 388

Important Remark ib.

Case 390

Chap. XVI. — On the Necessity op Morality in

Magnetisers . . 397

Chap. XVTL— Conclusion 403

Postscript -. 405

OCT 29 1917 ANIMAL MAGNETISM.

Chapter I. Historical Survey

§ I. Mesmer and his Theory.

It is now well-nigh sixty-five years since animal magnetism made its entree into the world. Its discovery is generally attributed to Mesmer, a physician of Vienna.* The nature and limits of this work will not allow us to give in this place a detailed history of this discovery, with all the changes it underwent in Germany from the first practical attempts of Mesmer in 1773 to 1778, in which year he came to France. It may be well to mention, however, that it was in almost total despair of the cause that Mesmer left his

* F. Antoine Mesmer was born at Weiler, near Stein, on the Rhine, in 1734 ; died at Mersburg, near the Lake of Constance, on the 5th of March, 1815. He studied medicine under Van Swieten and de Haen, and was admitted a doctor at the Faculty of Vienna in 1766. His inaugural dissertation was well calculated to indicate the bias of his mind ; it was entitled, Of the Influence of the Planets on the Human Body.

country, where the artful misrepresentations of Father Hell* and of Ingenhousz had brought discredit on it. However, he was indebted for several cases of success to the employment of his new method; and in the year 1775 he published, in his Letter to a Foreign Physician, the complete exposition of his theory. We shall present to our readers the twenty-seven propositions which comprise it, under the form of aphorisms : f —

1. There exists a mutual influence between the heavenly bodies, the earth, and living bodies.

2. A fluid universally diffused and continued, so as to admit no vacuum, whose subtilty is beyond all comparison, and which, from its nature, is capable of receiving, propagating, and communicating all the impressions of motion, is the medium of this influence.

3. This reciprocal action is subject to mechanical laws unknown up to the present time.

4. From this action result alternate effects which may be considered a flux and reflux.

5. This flux and reflux is more or less general, more or less particular, more or less compound, according to the nature of the causes which occasion it.

6. It is by this operation (the most universal of those presented to us by nature) that the relations of activity occur between the heavenly bodies, the earth, and its constituent parts.

7. The properties of matter and of organised body depend on this operation.

8. The animal body experiences the alternate effects of

* Of the Society of Jesus, and Professor of Astronomy in Vienna, f Memoir on the Discovery of Animal Magnetism. Paris, 1799.

MESMER AND HIS THEORY. 3

this agent ; and it is by insinuating itself into the substance of the nerves that it immediately affects them.

9. There are manifested, more especially in the human body, properties analogous to those of the magnet ; there are distinguished in it poles equally different and opposite, which may be communicated, changed, destroyed, and restored ; even the phenomenon of inclination is observed therein.

10. The property of the animal body which renders it susceptible of the influence of the heavenly bodies, and of the reciprocal action of those which surround it, manifested by its analogy to the magnet, has made me to call it animal magnetism.

11. The action and virtue of animal magnetism, thus characterised, may be communicated to other bodies, animate and inanimate : both, however, are more or less susceptible of it. .

12. This action and this virtue may be reinforced and propagated by the same bodies.

13. There is observed by experiment the discharge of a matter whose subtilty penetrates all bodies, without perceptibly losing its activity.

14. Its action takes place at a remote distance, without the aid of any intermediate body.

15. It is increased and reflected by ice, like light.

16. It is communicated, propagated, and increased by sound.

17. This magnetic influence may be accumulated, concentrated, and transferred.

18. I have said that animate bodies were not equally susceptible of it ; there are some even, though very few,

HISTORICAL SURVEY.

which possess a property so opposite, that their mere presence destroys all the effects of this magnetism in bodies.

19. This opposite virtue also penetrates all bodies ; it may also he communicated, propagated, accumulated, concentrated, and transferred, reflected by ices, and propagated by sound ; a circumstance which constitutes not only a privation, but a positive opposite virtue.

20. The magnet, whether natural or artificial, as well as other bodies, is susceptible of animal magnetism, and even of the opposite virtue, without, either in the one case or in the other, its action on iron or on the needle undergoing any change ; which proves that the principle of animal magnetism differs essentially from that of the mineral.

21. This system will furnish new illustrations with respect to the nature of fire and light, as well as in the theory of attraction, of flux and reflux, of the magnet and electricity.

22. It will shew that with respect to diseases the magnet and artificial electricity have merely common properties with several other agents presented to us by nature ; and that if any useful effects have resulted from these, they are owing to animal magnetism.

23. It will be seen by facts, from the practical rules which I shall establish, that this principle is capable of curing diseases of nerves immediately, and other diseases mediately.

24. That with its aid the physician is instructed with respect to the use of medicines ; that he perfects their action, and excites and directs their salutary crisis so as to make himself complete master of them.

25. By communicating my method, I shall prove by a

MESMER AND HIS THEORY. 5

new theory of diseases the universal utility of the principle which I oppose to them.

26. With this knowledge the physician shall judge with certainty of the origin, nature, and progress of diseases, even the most complicated; he will arrest their increase, and attain their cure, without ever exposing the patient to dangerous effects or fatal consequences, whatever be the age, temperament, and sex. Women, even in the state of pregnancy, and at the time of their accouchement, will enjoy the same advantage.

27. This doctrine, finally, will enable the physician to judge accurately of the degree of health of each individual, and to preserve him from the diseases to which he might be exposed. The art of healing will attain its ultimate perfection.

Heaven grant that this hope may one day be realised ; but we much fear, for the sake of humanity, that Mesmer's prophecy is still far removed from the period of its accomplishment. Be this as it may, the propositions which have been just read, a true imbroglio where we meet a little of everything, of the absurd and the true, of facts and of metaphysics,— these propositions, I say, met but little sympathy in the learned world of the time ; and their author, from being too refined in his theory, passed as an eccentric in his practice. Besides Mesmer had no right to claim to himself the honour of his doctrine, since we find all the elements of it scattered through works more than a century anterior to his birth ; an assertion whose truth may be readily appreciated by turning over the writings of Paracelsus, Van Helmont, Santanelli, and especially of Maxwell ; we may say further, that the philosopher of Weiler shews himself, in more places than one, a rather servile copjast ; for, as we might prove by comparing with the enunciation of his principles certain texts quoted from the work of Bertrand,* he does not scruple to transcribe his models almost literally.

However, if we think we can dispute with Mesmer the glory of having discovered animal magnetism, we cannot refuse him the merit of having made a dexterous and able display of it. It is still a disputed point whether this man possessed genius ; but certain it is that his philanthropy was never denied. Some arch persons assure us even, that he sold it very dearly ; witness the two hundred and fifty thousand crowns which he received, it is said, from his pupils in Paris. But this is not all : to the honour of teaching his method to the physician d'Eslon, and several other persons, Mesmer joined the still more profitable honour of treating, whether sick or not, all the great noblemen at the court of Louis XVI. It is plain, that in order to excite the enthusiastic population of our new Athens, there would have been no necessity for such strange and such extraordinary innovations as the therapeutic processes which he employed. We may form an opinion of them by the description which the reporters of 1784 have left us of them : —

" They (the commissioners) saw in the midst of a large room a round oak chest, raised about a foot or a foot and half, called the baquet (tub) ; the upper part of this chest was perforated with a great number of holes, through which came branches bent at an angle and movable. The patients were placed in rows around this baquet, and each with his

* Du Magnetisme Animal en France. 8vo. Paris, 1826.

MESMER AND HIS THEORY. 7

iron branch, which by means of the bend might be applied directly to the affected part; a cord, passed around their body, united them one to another. Sometimes a second chain was formed by their joining hands, — that is, by each applying the thumb between the thumb and index finger of his neighbour ; then the thumb thus held is pressed ; the impression thus made on the left is transmitted by the right hand, and it is thus circulated.

" A pianoforte was placed in a corner of the room, and according to the different movements different airs were played on it. The sound of the voice and singing were sometimes joined to it."

To complete the picture, it may be added, that all those who magnetised were armed with an iron rod from ten to twelve inches long ; and that the patients, besides the fluid which they received from the common reservoir, were again magnetised directly, either by means of the look of the magnetiser, or with the finger or the rod held out before their face or over their head, or by the application of the hands and the pressure of the fingers over the hypochondria and abdomen.

From the combined and sufficiently prolonged action of these different agents there occurred in some of the individuals who submitted to them (especially in the case of delicate women) phenomena of a variable kind, but always more or less unusual, such as fits of coughing, spasm, vomiting, sweating, pains, local or general, convulsions, &c. These were the famed artificial crises from which Mesmer and his followers augured the certain and immediate cure of all diseases without the exception of a single one. God only knows whether Mesmer himself believed in the promises which he made to his patients ; but if Germany carried her ingratitude so far as to recognise in him nothing hut a barefaced, avaricious charlatan, we are almost tempted at the present day, magnetisers as we are, to join our judgment to that of his countrymen.

However, setting aside the so-called miracles of Mesmer, it was scarcely possible to refuse admitting, that there really existed something beneath the prestige with which the true manifestation of facts was so adroitly veiled ; and one might even suspect that in Mesmer's tub, and in the Mesmerism of that day, there lay a mighty science in its cradle.

Widely different, however, was the judgment formed of it by the commission of 1784 ; we must make bold to say, that, notwithstanding the great merit and imposing names of the men who composed it, there cannot be a doubt but that the obvious incorrectness in the conclusions of their report must be attributed solely and exclusively to their injudicious manner of observing delicate facts against which also they were already prejudiced.

Borie, Sallin, d'Arcet, and the celebrated Guillotin, were the medical men appointed members of the first commission. At their request it was that the five members of the Academy of Sciences were added, Franklin, Leroi, Bailly, de Bory, and Lavoisier. *

Mesmer had then quitted France (March 12, 1784) ; he went to take the Spa waters for his health (what contradictions in the life of a man !) and he had given up his practice in Paris to his pupil d'Eslon, one of the most dis-

* Borie having died at the very commencement, Majault was elected in his stead.

MESMEB AND HIS THEORY. 9

tinguished members of the Faculty, but in disrepute with his confreres since his conversion to magnetism.

There are few physicians, and no magnetisers, who have not read Bailly's report. It is the regular trial of the Mesmerian doctrine; and, most certainly, the conclusions which terminate it were well calculated to settle definitively the question of magnetism, if the judgments of men could subvert truth. But truth is eternal as God himself; we may malign or honour it, proclaim or proscribe it; this, however, produces no change in its existence.

The report of Bailly, spread with profusion, and probably with ostentation, throughout all the schools and all ranks of society, produced scarcely any other effect than that of souring minds already convinced, and of exciting among the partisans of the condemned doctrine recriminations more or less bitter against their judges. It is in the nature of the human mind to cherish independence and to feel exasperated by opposition; let power adopt and prescribe a creed, it will create a schism ; let it proscribe this creed, it will create apostles for it ; let it persecute it, it will gain martyrs to it. It would have gone as far as this in the case of magnetism, if power had wished it ; power, however, would have had too much to do. Magnetism, in fact, now reckoned too many partisans on its side, and among them men of too much weight; it had found a defender even in the very bosom of the Royal Academy, into which it had made its entree under the auspices of one of the greatest geniuses of the day. The report of Ant. L. de Jussieu, drawn up with the minute exactness of an honest and strict observer, was the counterpart of Bailly's report. It is only weak minds that dread contradiction in a cause of which they are sure, and which are afraid to put themselves in collision with the strong and the majority. Jussieu closed his report thus : — " The theory of magnetism cannot be admitted so long as it will not be developed and supported by solid facts. The experiments instituted to ascertain the existence of the magnetic fluid prove only that man produces on his like a sensible action by friction, by contact, and more rarely by simple approximation at some distance. This action, attributed to a universal fluid not demonstrated, certainly appertains to animal heat existing in bodies, which constantly emanates from them, is carried to a considerable distance, and is capable of passing from one body into another. Animal heat is developed, increased, or diminished in a body by moral as well as by physical causes. Judged by its effects, it participates in the property of tonic remedies, and like them produces salutary or injurious effects according to the quantity communicated, and according to the circumstances in which it is employed. A longer use of this agent will make its real action and degree of usefulness to be better understood. Every physician may follow the methods which he thinks advantageous in the treatment of diseases, but only on condition that he publishes his mode of cure when they happen to be new or opposed to the ordinary practice. Those who have established, propagated, or followed the treatment called magnetic, and who propose to themselves to continue it, are accordingly bound to publish their discoveries and observations ; and all treatment of this kind should be proscribed the processes of which shall not be made known by immediate publication."

Even though Jussieu had not pointed out to mag-

MAGNETISM AMONG THE EGYPTIANS. 11

netisers their obligation to publish an account of their works, such a duty would have been imperative on their part. Ardent and disinterested innovators, they desired nothing so much as the propagation of their creed. Accordingly we see memoirs, polemical works, and dogmatic books, developing new facts, rapidly succeeding each other.

Thouret's works entitled, Recherches et Doutes sur le Magnetisme Animal, published in 1784 for the sole object of stripping Mesmer of a celebrity which was beginning to give annoyance, produced a diametrically opposite effect. The vast erudition displayed by the author excited emulation, and opened a new road. History was consulted, old chronicles were searched, and all the facts which, in the annals of antiquity or of the middle ages, presented any analogy with the magnetic facts, were explained by a reference to the new doctrine. Hence the origin of those numberless erudite bibliographical researches which, thanks to the efforts of MM. Deleuze, Abrial, &c, united to the writings of the Germans, enable us at the present day to trace magnetism among nations now extinct or altogether changed, as also among all modern nations.

We shall now present to our readers a summary of these historical researches of a new kind.*

§ II. Magnetism among the Egyptians.

Charlatans, according to Celsus, performed extraordinary cures by the mere apposition of the hands, and cured patients by blowing.

* Nowadays magnetism is practised every where : in the deserts of Louisiana as in France, at Pekin as at Paris. Even in Auvergne and in Limousin there are somnambulists who never awake.

Arnobius, who confirms the same fact,* states the reproaches which the Pagans addressed to Jesus in these terms : " He is a magician," said they, " who has done all these things by a clandestine art : he has furtively taken from the Egyptian temples the name of the powerful angels, and has robbed them of their ancient customs, their secret doctrines."

Finally, the supposed intervention of the goddess Isis,f who, according to the Egyptian priests, inspired the faithful during their dreams with a knowledge of the means of curing themselves of their diseases, seems to us nothing else than the instinct of those remedies with which our somnambulists are endowed.

§ III. Magnetism among the Hebrews.

The prophets of Israel, designated by the name of seers, were as well consulted for the ordinary events of life as for sacred things. We read, for example, in the ninth chapter of the Book of Kings, that Saul went to consult Samuel to learn from him what had become of his father's asses, which had been astray for several days.

Ahab, king of Israel, wishing to know if he should make war to take Ramoth in Gilead, assembled his prophets to the number of four hundred. \

God speaks during dreams in the visions of the night' to warn man of the evil which he doeth, and to instruct him in that which he should know.§

The son of the widow of Sarepta became sick, and his

J Kings, b. iii. chap, xxviii. § Job, chap, xxxiii.

MAGNETISM AMONG THE GREEKS. 13

disease became so severe, that he no longer retained a breath of life. Elijah took the child in his arms, carried him into the apartment where he resided, and laid him on his bed. He then extended himself thrice over the child, measuring himself by his little body, and he cried out, — " Lord, my God, grant, I pray thee, that the soul of this child may re-enter his body;" and the child was restored to life.*

In nearly the same manner Elisha cured the child of the Shunammite.

§ IV. Magnetism among the Greeks.

The Greeks had derived most of their customs from India and Egypt. Medicine with them was a species of priesthood, the mysteries of which the initiated could not reveal to the profane under pain of sacrilege. Thus we see the first Greek physicians employ, for the cure of their patients, certain magic processes, which can only be compared to the acts of our magnetisers.

Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, cured persons suffering from the spleen by touching them slowly, and for a long time, on the painful side.f

iElian says that, on approaching the Psylle, persons were struck with stupor as if they had drunk a soporific potion, and that they continued deprived of their senses until the Psylle was removed.^

The affections suffered by the body, says Hippocrates,§ the soul sees quite well with shut eyes.

* Kings, book iii. chap. xvii. f Plut. in Pyrrho.

% iElian. Hist. Animalium, lib. xvi. c. 28. § De Regimine, lib. iii.

According to Strabo, there was between Nepa and Fralea a cavern consecrated to Pluto and Juno, in which the priests slept for the sake of the patients who came to consult them. Lastly, according to M. Foissac, the familiar spirit, the demon of Socrates, that interior voice, which apprised him of that which was to happen, and of that which he should do, was nothing, but a state of crisis or of natural somnambulism, with which this godlike genius was frequently affected, whom our countryman, M. Lebut,* has in vain sought to represent to us as labouring under in- • sanity.

§ V. Magnetism among the Romans.

Esculapius delivered oracles in a dream for the cure of his patients.f

" I will not suffer persons," says Varro,| " to deny that the Sibyl has given men good counsel during her life, and that she left after death predictions which are still eagerly consulted on all difficult emergencies."

We read in Saint Justin " that the sibyls spoke many great things with justice and truth, and that when the instinct which animated them ceased to exist, they lost the recollection § of all that they had declared." ||

According to Celsus,^[ Asclepiades put to sleep by means of frictions those affected with frenzy. It happened even

* Le Demon de Socrate, specimen d'une application de la science de la psychologie a celle de l'histoire. Paris, 1836. In-8.

f Cicero de Divin. lib. iii. J De Re Rustica.

§ We shall presently see that this is one of the characteristic traits of the magnetic sleep. || Justin. Adm. ad Grsecos.

f De Medicina. Paris, 1834. Lib. iii. p. 147.

MAGNETISM IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 15

rather frequently, according to the same author, that too much friction might plunge the patient into a state of lethargy. These facts, to which several others of a similar kind might be added, leave no doubt with respect to their identity with the magnetic phenomena observed at the present day,

§ VI. Magnetism among the Gauls.

There is not probably throughout all antiquity a people among whom the power of magnetism held a more prominent station than among the Gauls. "Women, brought up and instructed by the Druids, delivered oracles, foretold the future, and cured diseases. The accounts given by Tacitus, Lampridius, and Vopiscus, regarding the Druids, bear testimony to the confidence they had in the accuracy of their predictions. -

" Endowed with extraordinary talents, they (the Druid - esses) cure diseases deemed incurable, know the future, and announce it to the people."*

Lastly, Pliny designates the Druids this way, This description of prophets and physicians, — Hoc genus vatum medicorumque.

§ VII. Magnetism in the Middle Ages.

In all times as well as in all countries, extraordinary things have passed for supernatural, from the moment they no longer admitted of explanation ; and as it is natural to refer and attribute supernatural things to a divine power, the history of magnetism in the middle ages, in the

* Pomp. Mela, t. iii. chap. vi.

same way as in pagan antiquity and among the Gauls, is inextricably mixed up with the history of religion.

" The churches," says M. Mialle, " succeeded the temples of the ancients, in which the traditions and processes of magnetism were consigned. The same habits of passing whole nights in them, the same dreams, the same visions, the same cures. The true miracles performed on the tombs of saints are recognised by characters which it is not in the power of man to imitate ; but we must exclude from the list of the ancient legends a multitude of very extraordinary cures, where religion and faith interfered only so far as to produce dispositions eminently favourable to the natural action of magnetism.*