The Commission worked for six years, and pronounced a favourable opinion in 1831; but the Academy was evidently not convinced. In spite of several further experiments - for example, those of Berna - no other result was obtained. Particularly because the chief emphasis was laid on the mystical side of the question, the struggle was made substantially easier to the opponents of mesmerism, among whom Dubois was prominent. The candidates for the celebrated Burdin prize for clairvoyance, Pigeaire, Hublier, and Teste, failed to obtain it; and in 1840 the Academy declined to discuss the question further. Nevertheless, animal magnetism retained numerous adherents in France, particularly in lay circles; and in the following years several works were published on the question. I may mention those of Aubin Gautier, who made many valuable contributions to the history of animal magnetism, and Ricard's exhaustive treatise on the theoretical and practical bearing of the doctrine. Baron du Potet, too, must be mentioned.

In brief, the doctrine retained many adherents, not only in Paris but in other French towns as well - for example, Havre.

Meanwhile, in Germany a few investigators still busied themselves with mesmerism. I find that in 1818 the University of Leipzig published a graduation thesis by Wendler, entitled De Magnetismi animalis efficacia rite dijudieanda; and another in 1826, by Volkmann, Observationes biologicae de Magnetistmo animali. But in the main, after about 1820, the belief in animal magnetism declined. This retrogression was caused as much by the rise of the exact natural sciences as by the unscientific and uncritical hankering after mystical phenomena, which could not but revolt serious investigators. Mesmerism flourished relatively the longest in Hamburg and Bremen, where Siemers was its advocate; and also in Bavaria, where Hensler and Ennemoser, between the years 1830 and 1840, still represented it; and as late as 1857 Wurm, a Munich physician, published an enthusiastic book on mesmerism in the treatment of disease. In other towns we likewise find a number of thoughtful inquirers, who allowed themselves to be influenced neither by the passion for the wonderful nor by the attacks of the principal opponents of magnetism, and who sought to defend their position in a thoroughly scientific manner; Most, Fr. Fischer, and Hirschel may be mentioned.

A series of philosophers and philosophical writers also has believed firmly and persistently in the reality of the phenomena, although not much regard has been paid to this fact; for example, Schopenhauer, Carus, Pfnor, and Wirth.

About the middle forties of last century the waning fire of animal magnetism burst somewhat more strongly into flame in several towns simultaneously. In Vienna, on Eisenstein s recommendation, a Commission of Investigation was appointed, on which Guntner, Schuh, Dumreicher, and other Viennese physicians sat; but according to the report published by Gouge, the commission expressed itself as vigorously against the existence of animal magnetism as Czermak had done a short time before. The excitement also caused at that time by Reichen-bach's theory of the "Od" could not help bringing fresh adherents to the cause of animal magnetism. Fechner, in his reminiscences of the last days of the theory of the Od, thus defines the Od itself: - "According to Reichenbach, the Od is an imponderable force, analogous to electricity and to magnetism, but differing more or less from the latter in the phenomena it exhibits, and in following its own special laws." Considering the close relationship that subsists between the theory of the Od and that of animal magnetism, it is easy to understand that the promulgation of the former necessarily brought fresh friends to the latter.

Although magnetism gradually lost nearly all its adherents in the scientific world, among the people the belief in the mysterious force continued prevalent. In Germany, however, as well as Austro-Hungary, where Counts Szapary and Mailath were well known in this connection, but more particularly in France, a whole series of laymen continued to use animal magnetism for healing purposes. The more science drew back, the louder became the clamour of the quacks. But the more intentional fraud and cheating increased, the less inclined were seriously-minded persons to interest themselves in these questions.

In England, in spite of the efforts of many physicians, particularly Elliotson and Ashburner, the theory of animal magnetism could get no footing in the scientific world, as it had done on the Continent. A succession of experimenters and writers, however, actively pursued the matter; for example, Townsend, Scoresby, and Edwin Lee. When the French magnetizer, Lafontaine - a grandson of the poet, according to Ochorowicz - exhibited magnetic experiments in Manchester in 1841, Braid, a doctor of that place, interested himself in the question. He showed, like Faria, that the phenomena exhibited by the person experimented on were of subjective nature, and were not induced by any magnetic fluid. By carefully fixing the eyes on any object a state of sleep was induced, which Braid called "hypnotism." 1 Braid did not straightway consider the hypnotic state to be identical with mesmerism, but for a time, at least, left the latter in an independent position by the side of hypnotism.

In the foregoing I have followed the phenomena of animal magnetism down to the middle of the last century. The historical development, as I have traced it, begins with the popular opinion that, in the first place, there are human beings who can exercise a personal influence over others, and that, in the second place, peculiar psychical conditions can be called forth by means of certain manipulations. The scientific development of hypnotism now begins. In this we see the relationship of modern hypnotism to animal magnetism, in that both are called forth by the influence of one man on another; but nowadays this influence is held to be psychical, and in no way connected either with a magnetic fluid or the mineral magnetism.

1 The name was not, however, altogether new, as already Renin de Cuvillers had talked of "hypnoscope" and "hypnobat," with reference to magnetic states (Max Dessoir).