ZOISTIC 
 
 MAGNETISM 
 
 BEING THE SUBSTANCE OP TWO LECTURES, DESCRIPTIVE OF 
 
 ORIGINAL VIEWS AND INVESTIGATIONS RESPECTING THIS 
 
 MYSTERIOUS AGENCY ; 
 
 DELIVERED, BY REQUEST, AT TORQUAY, ON THE 24th OF APRIL 
 AND 1st OE MAY, 1849. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. W. SCORESBY, D.D., F.R.S., 
 
 MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE J OF THE AMERICAN 
 INSTITUTE, PHILIDELPHIA, &C, &C. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS, 
 
 TORQUAY : COCKREM. 
 
 1849. 
 

 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 An Abstract of one of the Lectures herein, in 
 substance, given, was originally published in the 
 "Torquay Directory" of May 2nd, 1849, from 
 the notes of a friend. This has been revised, 
 extended and cast into the present form by the 
 Author of the Investigations. In so doing he has 
 not scrupled to transpose and combine passages 
 which followed in a different order in the de- 
 livery of the Lectures ; — the order, as originally 
 set forth, being necessarily defective, because of 
 an attempt, which proved unsatisfactory, to em- 
 brace the whole of the subject within the con- 
 tracted limits of one Lecture. 
 
 W. S. 
 
 Torquay, May \2th, 1849. 
 
4?o 
 
 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 ORDINARY PHENOMENA DEVELOPED IN PERSONAL RESEARCHES 
 IN ZOISTIC MAGNETISM, WITH ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS OF 
 THEIR ANALOGY WITH THE APPARENTLY COGNATE PHENOMENA 
 OP MAGNETISM AND ELECTRICITY. 
 
 It required no small amount of moral courage, 
 the Lecturer remarked, to undertake to speak 
 publicly on a subject at which numbers look 
 with suspicion ; some with singular scepticism ; 
 some with horror or scorn ; — a subject, too, the 
 results of which were held by many as imposture, 
 or even akin to mysteries ascribed to unhallowed 
 power ! 
 
 Thus the phenomena which he had undertaken 
 to illustrate under the title of Zoistic Magnet- 
 ism, — a designation which he, (Dr. S.,) had 
 adopted as more applicable to a subject known 
 in remote ages, than that derived from the name 
 of a modern practitioner — had been summarily 
 denounced as unfitting for investigation, by 
 more than one writer, under an apparently pious 
 dread of an intermeddling with inhibited 
 agencies. Thus in a published letter from Char- 
 
 7 
 
4 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 lotte Elizabeth to Miss Martineu, which some 
 person had anonymously sent him, the pheno- 
 mena of Mesmerism, first assumed to be super- 
 natural, are confidently attributed to Satanic 
 agency ; — for if supernatural, it is asserted, they 
 must necessarily be diabolical ! 
 
 Much, however, as he, the Lecturer, estimated 
 the piety of feeling which had urged this publi- 
 cation, and the excellence of character of the 
 writer, — he must, in self-justification when em- 
 barking on a field of investigation so character- 
 ised, say, — that the reasonings in support of the 
 assumptions were as illogical, as the conclusions 
 were devoid of proof. For so far from there 
 being any ground for connecting Zoistic Magne- 
 tism with supernatural agency, or an agency, such 
 as had been asserted, of an unhallowed nature, — 
 the close analogy of its phenomena, with the well 
 known laws of Magnetism and Electricity, brought 
 the subject fairly within the province of the 
 Natural Sciences ; whilst the beneficial nature of 
 the results of Zoistic Magnetism, as far as he had 
 observed, in cases of disease, led him to ascribe 
 these results to influences essentially belonging 
 to the constitution of organized beings, and to an 
 agency implanted by a beneficent Providence. 
 Ami as surli, the phenomena must be worthy of 
 similar consideration as that yielded to other 
 departments of natural knowledge, and must, 
 when duly elucidated, lead to similar results. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 5 
 
 This at least must be the result of all enquiries 
 into the Divine handy-work, humbly and rever- 
 ently pursued, — the elucidation of " the eternal 
 power and Godhead" of the Great Creator : and 
 the subject now under consideration, belonging 
 to the constitution of man, must be associated 
 with the ' works of the Lord, which are great, 
 sought out of all them that have pleasure 
 therein.' 
 
 But the objections made to the results asserted 
 of Zoistic Magnetism, were only correspondent 
 with frequent experience in other cases. The 
 early history of science presented many similar 
 examples ; evidence was rejected because the 
 facts seemed inexplicable ; and persecution, was, 
 in some cases, resorted to as the readiest process 
 for disproving them. It was the characteristic 
 of a comparatively barbarous age, to ascribe to 
 witchcraft, the triumphs of superior intelligence, 
 or to commit to the inquisition men of soaring 
 genius who dared to adventure on new and better 
 expositions of existing phenomena, and the cor- 
 rection of existing errors. 
 
 Every successive step, however, in inductive 
 science, was a rebuke to popular scepticism, as 
 to truth and fact. And many of the results in 
 the scientific enterprize of modern times, had not 
 only rebuked the questionings of multitudes, but 
 had exhibited the most splendid examples of the 
 triumph of human genius over pre-conceived ideas 
 
6 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 of the impossible. To catch a shadow was pro- 
 verbial, even in our own recollection, as an im- 
 possibility ; now, in the Daguerotype process, the 
 shadow is actually caught, and indelibly im- 
 pressed on a surface of metal ! " Swift as 
 thought," was a recent idea of progress with 
 which no agency available by man could compete ; 
 yet as quick as thought, by means of the electric 
 telegraph, may now our ideas be communicated 
 from sea to sea across our island! And still 
 discovery is advancing ; none can fix the limits 
 of the possible. 
 
 Various objections, indeed, were wont to be 
 urged against experimenting on Zoistic Magne- 
 tism, which, so far as they apply to useless exhi- 
 bitions, might be well founded ; for it is neither 
 fitting, nor may it always be safe, to perform such 
 experiments for mere amusement. The story of 
 a Phaeton, as to the disastrous result of an 
 attempt to manage, with unskilful and presump- 
 tuous hands, the chariot of his father, — was here- 
 in shown, as to the moral of it, not to be fiction. 
 Presumptuous adventurers in the departments of 
 Zoistic Magnetism had sometimes, he believed, 
 succeeded in evoking powers, which, to their 
 dismay they found, they had not skill nor discre- 
 tion to manage or controul. 
 
 In many departments of science and know- 
 ledge, indeed, the power of evoking an agent 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 7 
 
 might exist without the skill to regulate or 
 controul it. A child could kindle a flame which 
 might defy the power of man to quench. In 
 Magnetism, too, we could thus illustrate the point 
 referred to. We shew a person, previously ignor- 
 ant of Magnetics, the process of Magnetizing a 
 bar or instrument of steel. He imitates our pro- 
 cess, and succeeds in making the instrument 
 Magnetic. But he will try in vain, unless pecu- 
 liarly skilled, to reduce it again to a perfectly 
 neutral state. 
 
 But what may be unmeet for idle amusement, 
 may be very proper for purposes of utility. For 
 for objects of utility, — whether as to the investiga- 
 tion of the physiology of the human system ; 
 or whether as to the determining of the power 
 of this agent in the relieving of human suffering, 
 or curing of disease, — we had abundant grounds 
 for justifying, yea for commending and extend- 
 ing, experiments in this particular department of 
 mysterious research. For all the arguments 
 against Zoistic Magnetism, which have real found- 
 ation, on account of dangers, or liabilities to 
 abuse, go only, legitimately to shew, — the impor- 
 tance of acquiring a correct knowledge of the 
 laws under which such a powerful agent acts, in 
 order to the administration of its influence bene- 
 ficially, and, to secure, in such administration, 
 against any probable dangers. 
 
 The power referred to was, no doubt, of a 
 
8 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 wonderful and mysterious character. But the 
 works of the Creator, in every department of 
 observation and science, presented not only 
 mysteries, but a world of wonders. Yet the 
 reality of these wonderful things, mysterious as 
 they might be, was not, could not, be denied. 
 
 In illustration, in one department of science to 
 which he had devoted much attention, of the 
 reality of a wonderful and unseen agency, and 
 its mysterious operations, he exhibited an experi- 
 ment of his own with a plate of iron. The iron on 
 being struck with the hand w T hilst held in a cer- 
 tain direction, became magnetic, and would 
 attract the north pole of the needle ; if struck 
 whilst held in another direction, or pointed 
 downwards, it would repel it, and if struck in 
 a horizontal position would again loose all its 
 powers, — phenomena, which being contemplated 
 without knowledge of the cause, were involved 
 in mystery as great as was the subject he had to 
 bring before them ; but which, being referred to 
 the inductive influence of terrestrial magnetism, 
 became reasonably intelligible. 
 
 It had been urged, again, as an objection to 
 Zoistic Magnetism, being regarded as a science, 
 that its results were not invariable, or reducible 
 to fixed laws ; but this was readily explained by 
 the ever-varying nature of the subjects of experi- 
 ment : as the highly organized body and mind 
 of a living being must necessarily be acted upon 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 9 
 
 with less uniform results than the passive mater- 
 ia^ operated upon in the purely physical sciences. 
 As an illustration, however, of a somewhat ana- 
 lagous diversity observable even in unorganized 
 materials, he exhibited two bars of steel, pre- 
 cisely the same in quality and appearance, one 
 of which was scarcely affected by a powerful 
 magnet, whilst the other became magnetic by a 
 single touch ; the difference arising solely from 
 their different degrees of hardness ; — thus, he 
 argued, it was reasonable to anticipate a corres- 
 ponding diversity in the influences of Mesmerism 
 according to the diverse temperaments of the 
 human system. But he might illustrate this 
 analogy still further. He might take two bar 
 magnets, — one of best cast steel, and made per- 
 fectly hard, representing the operator ; the other 
 of inferior steel, untempered or quite soft, repre- 
 senting the subject. If he placed these magnets 
 upon one another, with their corresponding pola- 
 rities in contact, or, more especially, if he made 
 magnetizing passes along each other in the 
 direction adverse to their condition of magnetic 
 tension, — then, it would be seen, that the weaker 
 lost its characteristic magnetism and was reduced 
 into conformity with the magnetism of the master- 
 influence. 
 
 This experiment might represent the case of 
 two individuals trying their strength together, as 
 to which could magnetically subdue the other ; 
 
10 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 — a case which actually happened in his own 
 experience. He was residing, last October, in 
 the same house with an interesting young friend, 
 who was the first in whom he had succeeded in 
 developing any striking phenomena. One even- 
 ing whilst he was sitting after dinner, in an easy 
 chair, his friend came up to him in a playful 
 manner, took both his hands in hers, and looking 
 him steadily in the face, said, "I'm going to 
 mesmerise you," "Very well ; go on," was his 
 reply. She did go on, he, at the same time, 
 exerting his own magnetizing influences. But 
 suddenly she became conscious of a most unex- 
 pected influence in herself, almost closing her 
 eyes. She darted off, under the surprise, utter- 
 ing an amusing exclamation, — whilst he, Dr. S. 
 remarked — "You have caught a Tartar,, Miss !" 
 
 In whatever power, therefore, the lecturer 
 argued, the development of the magnetic pheno- 
 mena in the human subject may consist ; — whether 
 in superiority of physical or mental strength, or 
 nervous energy, — this fact is obvious, that, for 
 success in the experiment, there must be superi- 
 ority, either in the individual capabilities, or in 
 the degree of nervous or magnetic energy exerted, 
 in the agent in the operation. 
 
 His attention had first been directed to this 
 investigation partly by the very inconclusive and 
 unsatisfactory nature of some public exhibitions 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 11 
 
 which he had witnessed ; and partly by a very 
 different result in the case of a lady in Exeter 
 whom he was invited to visit, who had been 
 recovered from most afflictive suffering under tic 
 doloreux, and who, whilst he was present with 
 her, exhibited phenomena of a very striking 
 nature, the reality of which were indisputable. 
 
 The result of his consideration of what he had 
 witnessed and heard, was the determination, 
 whenever opportunities might offer, to try for 
 himself the asserted phenomena. And such op- 
 portunities were not lacking. Up to the present 
 time, he had reckoned rather more than thirty 
 different cases whereon he had made trial ; and, 
 including repetitions with the same subject, his 
 various experiments had amounted to about 
 seventy. 
 
 As the individuals who had kindly submitted 
 themselves to experiment, or, rather, of whose con- 
 fidingness he had availed himself, were females — 
 he had felt it due to himself, as well as to them, 
 to have, at least, a third person present ; to have 
 the consent of parents, or proper guardian in case 
 of young persons ; or of the husband, in case of 
 a wife. In two instances, only, had he departed 
 from this rule. 
 
 The objects he had had chiefly in view, since 
 he had ascertained his personal capabilities of 
 developing the condition of Zoistic Magnetism, 
 were : the scientific investigation of facts and 
 
12 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 phenomena ; the magnetic or electric (?) physi- 
 ology of the human system ; and any curative, 
 or other beneficial effects or capabilities, of this 
 powerful agency. 
 
 He owed a debt of gratitude, which he had 
 much satisfaction in expressing, to those who had 
 submitted themselves to his experiments, as w-ell 
 as to the parents or husbands who had sanctioned 
 their so doing, whereby he had gained an amount 
 of knowledge which, he hoped, would be found 
 not only to be interesting, as related to the de- 
 velopment of a curious series of facts ; but use- 
 ful, as a contribution to general science, and, in 
 regard of its curative applications, to humanity. 
 That consideration for the feelings of those who 
 had yielded him their confidence, in reference to 
 a prevalent shrinking from publicity, had been 
 duly regarded, he trusted, his communications 
 now to be made would evince ; as, whatever use 
 he might feel himself at liberty to make of facts, 
 as such, he should in no case connect the facts 
 with individuals unless by special permission. 
 
 His own experiments, the lecturer proceeded 
 to state, had been conducted principally, with 
 previously untested subjects ; and these, except 
 two, in a rank and condition of life affording the 
 most satisfactory results, and the best security 
 against either mistake or deception. Out of the 
 entire number of cases he had tried, with ladies, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 13 
 
 he had been successful in eliciting more or less 
 of the characteristic phenomena of Zoistic Mag- 
 netism in above one-half, and, generally, at the 
 first trial. Out of about seventy experiments, less 
 than one-third only had altogether failed ; whilst 
 in nearly two-thirds, phenomena of an interesting 
 nature had been elicited. 
 
 He had proceeded in his investigations, since 
 the time when they had become sufficiently 
 specific in their developments, on the most rigid 
 principles of inductive science ; noting, in the 
 results, these phenomena only which were indis- 
 putable. His attention, in accordance with the 
 objects already set forth, had been principally 
 directed to the physiological characteristics of 
 this mysterious agency ; to the tracing of its 
 apparent magneto-electric properties ; and to the 
 capability of the influence of relieving human 
 suffering, or curatively, to its action on disease. 
 
 His first attempt was made, under not very 
 favourable circumstances, Dec. 17th, 1845. An 
 obvious influence, however, in one of two ladies 
 who offered for the occasion, was produced. 
 
 The sixth experiment, made July 17th, 1846, 
 proved so satisfactory and beautiful, that the 
 parties present were intensely interested, and 
 none more than himself astonished, at the effects 
 he had been the instrument of producing. 
 
 The subject, in this case, was an elegant, talen- 
 ted and accomplished girl of about sixteen. On 
 
14 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 witnessing the expression of exquisite enjoyment 
 beaming in her countenance, her parents, who 
 had previously been sceptical on the subject, were 
 much affected, one of them, even to tears ; whilst 
 another lady, being the only addition to the party j 
 was so struck with the beauty of the countenance 
 that she described it as "the face of an angel !" 
 Her answers to questions which I proposed 
 were indicative of a very pious condition of mind 
 and of a feeling of felicity : — " I was never so 
 happy in my life : I dont deserve to be so happy : 
 it is heavenly !" — " I hope I am God's child : if I 
 did not think so I could not be happy !" 
 
 She was most unwilling to be awoke ; wishing 
 to remain where she was all night. On being 
 awoke, she felt very sleepy — and slept soundly 
 and sweetly ; a long, refreshing sleep, and then 
 arose, still ha^py, lively as the lark. Her feel- 
 ings, during the night, she described as being 
 singularly happy, — not so much in the circum- 
 stance of dreams as in emotions, which, she 
 described, as being of a pious and spiritual na- 
 ture. The joyous feeling remained during the 
 next day, and no reaction whatever took place. 
 
 Experiments made with two interesting young 
 ladies, sisters, in July of last year, afforded a 
 number of very beautiful (though mesmerically 
 considered, ordinary) phenomena. Both of them 
 at different seances, fell into a species or filicitons 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 15 
 
 trance. They conversed with the magnetizer 
 freely ; but the voices of other persons in the 
 room were inaudible to them. In one of the 
 cases, his own voice was not heard when he re- 
 tired out of contact with the subject. Passes 
 from the head downward, quite clear of the 
 dress, were distinctly felt, and elicited pleasur- 
 able, sometimes delightful, sensations. His fingers 
 being pointed downward, towards any part of 
 the body or limbs, without contact of the dress, 
 were felt. " It was," as one said, " as if something 
 like electrical current was coming from him to 
 her." Upward passes always had an unplea- 
 sant effect, and changed the previously happy 
 expression of the face into a frown. 
 
 Contact of the hand of cny of the persons 
 present, was unpleasant, and the intruding hand 
 was always pushed off. When h* had taken the 
 hand of one of the ladies (the sister of the subject 
 of experiment) his own hand, he found, had 
 acquired an uncongenial influence indicated by 
 discomposure of the face, and the impatient 
 remark, — "You touched Fanny; don't touch 
 Fanny, she's not mesmerised." 
 
 It might serve to illustrate the general state of 
 feeling, in this and similar cases, Dr. S., remarked, 
 as well as the self-possession and acuteness of 
 the mental faculties— if he were to read, from 
 his records of experiments, a part of the con- 
 versation with Miss Jane L . 
 
16 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 This young lady, it might be premised, was 
 about seventeen years of age — a frank, confiding 
 and amiable person; with a pleasing generous 
 expression of countenance. The idea of the 
 ridiculous, in her situation on the sofa, occasioned, 
 at first, much playfulness of remark, and frequent 
 bursts of laughter. But these soon ceased and 
 passed into a state of sweet composure. 
 
 On first speaking to her, he, Dr. S., in a soft 
 whisper, said — 
 
 " Are you pleasant, Jane ?" 
 
 The reply, very softly uttered, was — " yes." 
 
 " Do you like it ?" 
 
 " Very much." 
 
 " Do you feel happy ?" 
 
 " Very happy : it is delightful." 
 
 " What makes you so happy ?" 
 
 " I dont know : I am generally happy ; but I 
 was never so happy before." 
 
 Her face now beaming with a smile expressive 
 of delight, he, Dr. S., said : — 
 
 " You remind me of my sweet child, Flora," 
 — the subject of his first interesting experiment — 
 " but you do not know about her, do you ?" 
 
 " Yes : Fanny told me about her." 
 
 " Would you wish to be like her ?" 
 
 " I should much like it." 
 
 " But she is a very pious girl ; lives in the love 
 of God : do you love God ?" 
 
 " Yes, I hope I do." 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 17 
 
 " If you do, my child, God loves you ; for we 
 cannot love Him, you know, without His first 
 loving us : Do you desire, then, to give yourself 
 to Him r 
 
 " Oh, yes, I wish to do so." 
 
 "There is no happiness like that, and none 
 without it." 
 
 " Yes, I know it," — was the reply. 
 
 "Do you think true religion is gloomy, or 
 cheerful" ? 
 
 "Oh : cheerful." 
 
 "Cheerful," Dr. S. continued, " without levity. 
 But can you distinguish the difference betwixt 
 cheerfulness and levity ?" 
 
 " There is a great difference." 
 
 Recurring to a previous topic, Dr. S. then 
 asked ; — 
 
 " Do you still find it pleasant and happy being 
 mesmerized ?" 
 
 " It is delightful : I should like to be always 
 so" : and then, with a peculiar ardour of express- 
 ion, she added, — " It is not satanic — it is 
 divine !" 
 
 " If it produces in you," Dr. S. proceeded, 
 " as I hope it does — pious feelings, I think you 
 may say so." 
 
 " It does." 
 
 " But you know you could not be always so." 
 
 " Why not ?" 
 
 " Why ! you would not be as one of the seven 
 sleepers ?" b 
 
18 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 " It would be very pleasant." 
 
 " But you must eat and drink ?" 
 
 "I don't want it." 
 
 "You would like to know my child Flora/' 
 Dr. S. continued, — ". would you not ? she is so 
 interesting." 
 
 " I should like it very much : but, I dare say" 
 — she added, reflecting apparently on the descrip- 
 tion given of her when mesmerized^ as being 
 singularly lovely, — " I dare say you think me 
 very ugly ?" 
 
 " Why should you say that ? you do not think 
 so ; female vanity would tell you otherwise." 
 
 " Men are more vain ;" was the prompt reply. 
 
 "Women," Dr. S. playfully added, "you 
 know, are characteristically vanity." 
 
 " Men are more so" — she tersely replied. 
 
 " Yet, though you may think so, you cannot 
 do well without them." 
 
 Very dryly, she responded, and in a manner 
 which caused a general burst of surprize and 
 laughter : — 
 
 " They are very well in their way /" 
 
 At a more advanced period of the evening, after 
 eliciting, in conversation, several of the peculiar- 
 ities and phenomena already described, Dr. S. 
 contemplating the placid, happy-looking face of 
 bis youno- friend, renewed his questionings, by 
 Baying : — 
 
 " I wi^h your mamma could ?ee you now : I 
 think she would be interested." 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 19 
 
 u Oh, I wish dear mamma was here ; and that 
 she was mesmerized ; it would make her so 
 happy." — " I wish they were all mesmerized, 
 it is so delightful." 
 
 u Do you think"- -alluding to a slight lameness, 
 attended wdth some pain, in one of the ladies 
 present, Dr. S. continued, — u that mesmerizing 
 would do Mrs. S good ?" 
 
 "Yes: it would." 
 
 " But would it, think you, cure her lameness." 
 
 " No : I don't think it would ; but then she 
 w r ould be so happy that she would lose the pain." 
 
 " But suppose you were lame, would it, think 
 you, do you good ?" 
 
 u I'm not lame : so I don't need it." 
 
 These selections from the conversation which 
 passed, in this interesting case, he, the Lecturer 
 had given, for the purpose of illustration as he had 
 before intimated. The whole was characterized 
 
 by similar liveliness and readiness. Mr. S , 
 
 indeed, at whose house the experiment was 
 made, remarked, that it w r as like the effect 
 of machinery. No time seemed to intervene 
 betwixt the question and answer. The reply 
 was generally instantaneous. So surprized, in- 
 deed, was this gentleman, who had previously 
 considered mesmerism as mainly imposture, and 
 many of its pretensions humbug ; that, fre- 
 quently, when he witnessed strange results, which 
 he now felt were realities, he threw up his hands, 
 exclaiming, — " astonishing !" " wonderful !" 
 
20 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 In the experiments with these young ladies, as 
 well as in numerous other cases which he detailed, 
 the principle of attraction was strikingly mani- 
 fested. Not only was the hand of the subject 
 raised and moved in various directions, by the 
 proximate influence of his finger, without contact ; 
 but, in some cases, the subject, when placed on 
 her feet, would follow him in her trance, with the 
 eyes firmly closed, amid the scattered furniture 
 of the room — walking against the table, as the 
 shortest way in the direction of the attracting 
 influence, when he had quickly stepped round 
 behind it — and moving backward, and then slowly 
 turning round, when he had silently, without his 
 shoes, slipped unexpectedly behind her. Music, 
 in one of these instances, produced a great effect ; 
 the time and rhythm of the air being evidently 
 marked, and responded to in motion, as in waltz- 
 ing, — the influence being irresistible, although 
 giddiness and discomfort were the result. 
 
 The general state of feeling, he remarked, 
 which had been elicited by the magnetic con- 
 dition, was, in his experiments, that of happiness, 
 often of extreme enjoyment. In all his successful 
 experiments, indeed, he had met with only two or 
 three exceptions, and these in the case of subjects 
 of very nervous temperament. But in no case 
 did any unpleasant effects remain. 
 
 He had always found them ready to converse, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 21 
 
 after he himself had spoken to them ; but not 
 to commence a new conversation (that is, un- 
 stimulated by word or act) or voluntarily to start 
 a new subject, or offer a gratuitous remark. He 
 might except, however, a cataleptic case ; as also 
 that of a very intelligent young lady, who would 
 sometimes pursue a subject of thought, of her own 
 accord, which had been suggested by previous 
 questions. He should further observe, with 
 respect to the numerous conversations he had 
 held, that in no one instance had an expres- 
 sion ever been uttered, by the subjects of his 
 experiments, which they could have cared for 
 being published to the world. Of the effect of 
 an improper question, of his subjects, he could 
 only judge by the self-possession, and the pro- 
 priety ever indicated in what he had witnessed ; 
 and his decided judgment was, that, could he have 
 made an unfitting enquiry of any of his subjects 
 of experiment, he would have been answered 
 with such rebuke as the abuse of his position 
 might have deserved ! 
 
 The Memory of the magnetized persons was 
 found to be extremely quick and perfect. All 
 information acquired previously was forthcoming, 
 if solicited ; the remembrance of facts and con- 
 versations was vivid ; and the recollection of 
 former conversations when in the magnetic 
 state (which were utterly forgotten in the ordi- 
 
22 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 nary waking state) was equally quick and accu- 
 rate. For, as a general fact, it was observed, 
 that, where there had been a due extent of the 
 magnetic influence, no knowledge of what had 
 passed, during the state of sleep, remained after 
 the party was awoke. Indeed every 'peculiar 
 effect and influence seemed, in a moment, after 
 the opening of the eyes, to have passed away. 
 The presence of the magnetizer, which before 
 had been so strongly desired ; the positive enjoy- 
 ment of his proximity, or the painful feeling indi- 
 cated if he retired out of juxtaposition ; the 
 repugnance to the approach of other persons, or 
 consciousness of any difference in influence from 
 the approach of those in the room, — all vanished 
 with the cessation of the magnetic sleep ! 
 
 These remarks, however, he should observe, 
 applied chiefly, as general phenomena, to a par- 
 ticular stage of the magnetic influence, and to 
 the result of experiments cautiously performed. 
 For where cross or disturbing magnetisms had 
 been unduly permitted, or where the state of 
 coma had been very deep, both the progress of 
 the awakening, and the state of feeling when 
 awoke, were sometimes much otherwise. 
 
 The effects of his experiments, on different 
 individuals, and sometimes (though not so usual) 
 in different seances, were very various as to the 
 degree of depth of the sleep, the susceptibility to 
 
ZOISTiC MAGNETISM. 23 
 
 external influences, and the variety of the pheno- 
 mena elicited. Sometimes the influence was so 
 partial that the eyes would be closed without 
 the loss of consciousness or any other faculty. 
 Persons in the room were then heard when speak- 
 ing, or moving, and were readily discriminated. 
 Their touch was instantly distinguished from that 
 of the Magnetizer, and either discouraged, or 
 remarked on as unpleasant. Bat in other cases, 
 all consciousness of the presence, or voice of 
 others, whilst remaining seated at a distance, 
 ceased ; though their approach to the Magnetized 
 subject was generally felt, so as to produce dis- 
 turbance, even whilst they were several yards off ; 
 and approach into contact, if inadvertently per- 
 mitted, had sometimes painfully disturbing or 
 unpleasant effects. There were cases, indeed, in 
 which rude contact might have been dangerous. 
 With one young lady, who had become so sus- 
 ceptible that he had been able to close her eyes 
 in four or five seconds of time, — a spontaneous 
 influence took place when he was magnetizing 
 her sister in the same room. Once when she 
 was removed some yards from them, her eyes 
 were suddenly and unexpectedly closed — on 
 which she called out — " I can't open my eyes." 
 This effect, however, Dr. S. ascribed to the ima- 
 gination and sympathy of the individual ; for the 
 result was very different from that when she had 
 been duly and specifically magnetized. Tn the 
 
24 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 spontaneous case, she described the effect as con- 
 sisting only in the closing of the eyes — as in all 
 other respects her faculties were unaffected ; but 
 when she was duly acted upon, she said, " she 
 felt mesmerized all over." 
 
 The eliciting of sympathy of the senses, was the 
 highest species of phenomena, among those usually 
 referred to mesmeric power, which he, Dr. S., had 
 succeeded in developing. Phenomena, of this 
 species, occurred on the first trial of a lady, 
 a much attached friend, in Exeter. She was not 
 only aware, (being with one hand in contact,) 
 when he drank anything, however cautiously, 
 with his face turned away, but instantly, on being 
 asked, stated what it was — as "wine" — "water." 
 And on his being pinched in the arm, she com- 
 plained spontaneously of her own corresponding 
 arm. When his foot was unexpectedly trod 
 upon, she drew her foot up under her dress, 
 complaining that it cramped her foot. And like- 
 wise, on his head being rapped with the knuckles 
 of a friend, she put her hand to her own head 
 and expressed discomfort or pain. 
 
 But results of this order, still more interesting, 
 were elaborately developed in other cases and 
 experiments. In one of these — the case of Miss 
 
 Mary P , an elegant and interesting young 
 
 friend, — the sensibility and sympathy were, on 
 the first trial, so peculiarly elicited, as to yield a 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 25 
 
 fair expectation of realizing ultimately, (if any 
 where,) the higher phenomena asserted of Zoistic 
 Magnetism. But opportunity, unfortunately, 
 was not afforded for the full investigation. 
 
 In another case, however, where the circum- 
 stances were more favourable for a long and 
 careful seance, the results were of such peculiar 
 interest as to deserve to be described more in 
 detail. 
 
 The subject, in this instance, was an interest- 
 ing girl of about fifteen — a member of a pious 
 family — whose confiding and affectionate dispo- 
 sition, with peculiar sensitiveness and playfulness, 
 had brought about, mutually, a rather favourable 
 acquaintance some weeks before. 
 
 On the very first trial (a trial recently made), 
 the phenomena arising out of community of taste 
 and sensation, were developed in a very high 
 degree, as would be shewn, satisfactorily, he, Dr. 
 S. believed, by the particulars he was about to 
 give taken from his manuscript records of per- 
 sonal experiments in Zoistic Magnetism. He 
 should proceed at once to the description of the 
 experiments in this particular department of 
 research, merely premising, that his young friend 
 was in the state usually called, " sleep-waking," 
 with her eyes completely closed ; that she was 
 lying on a couch, he being seated on a chair by 
 the side of it ; and that, throughout these experi- 
 
26 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 ments, lie always maintained his contact, by 
 holding her left hand with his right. 
 
 A tumbler glass, containing some water, having, 
 at r* r . S.'s intimation^ been cautiously put on a 
 chair and pushed forward within reach, (this 
 caution being requisite from the extreme sensi- 
 tiveness of the subject) Miss Anna shrunk, as if 
 uncomfortable, the moment he took hold of it. 
 The fact of the discomfort, he might observe, was, 
 in this and in many other cases, determined, by 
 a peculiar tremulous grasp of his hand, with 
 which he kept his connection with his young 
 friend, — which, like the delicate perception of the 
 fisherman through the medium of his rod, of the 
 smallest touch on his bait or line, afforded a gene- 
 ral and most sensitive test of any discomfort, or 
 disturbance, in the subject of experiment. 
 
 On realizing this sign of discomfort in Miss 
 Anna, when he took up the glass, he asked, — 
 
 " What is it you dislike?" 
 
 u That cold thing," — she replied. 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " A glass ; — I don't like it it is so cold." 
 
 Drinking a portion of it, with his head turned 
 away, he continued his enquiries,- - 
 
 " What is it that I tasted ?" 
 
 " Water" — she instantly replied ; " but I don't 
 like it." 
 
 Considering that this repugnancy arose from 
 the incongenial magnetic or electric condition of 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 27 
 
 the glass, from its having been touched by other 
 hands, or not duly assimilated with his own 
 touch, he passed the fingers of his left hand over 
 it whilst it rested on the chair, and darted the 
 points of his fingers towards, sometimes so as to 
 touch, the surface of the water. 
 
 On his again tasting it, she manifested less 
 repugnance. 
 
 " It is not now so unpleasant," she said, on the 
 enquiry being made, " as it was." 
 
 Repeating the magnetizing manipulations on 
 the glass, Dr. S. tried the experiment of drinking 
 a third time : Anna now expressed no particular 
 dislike to it. Probably, had the process been 
 continued, her dislike would have changed to the 
 converse. 
 
 Wine, was then handed to him, Dr. S., in a 
 wine-glass, and, as in the other case, through the 
 medium of the chair. On his tasting it, though 
 with his face turned quite away from the sofa, the 
 effect was obviously very disagreeable to Anna. 
 This feeling was not only indicated by the 
 peculiar tremulous or spasmodic action with the 
 fingers, but strongly marked in the change of the 
 previously happy expression of countenance. 
 
 " It is wine ;" she said, " and I don't like it." 
 
 " I taste it in my mouth : it goes into my head." 
 
 On repeating the trial very cautiously at a 
 subsequent period in the seance, she instantly de- 
 tected it, and, on the enquiry being put, she 
 said, — 
 
28 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 " I don't like wine : I never take it : it is dis- 
 agreeable : don't take any more." 
 
 " What have I ?" asked Dr. S. 
 
 " You have half a glass of wine." — It was pre- 
 cisely so ! 
 
 Mrs. G , who was present, on being beck- 
 oned to stretch out her hand towards his, did so 
 till the points of their fingers came into contact. 
 Anna immediately noticed it, and begged him 
 not to touch any one — or, not to let any one 
 touch him. 
 
 He next beckoned for some article standing by 
 the fire-place, which was immediately handed to 
 him, but so much behind and beneath the level 
 of the sofa, as to have been invisible to Anna, 
 had her eyes been open. She instantly felt it, 
 and expressed dislike. On being asked, " why ?" 
 she said— " it is cold." "What is it ?" "The 
 poker." 
 
 In the like guarded manner, Mrs. G , keep- 
 ing in a stooping position and still under the 
 screen of the head of the sofa, handed the experi- 
 menter a variety of articles, most of which Anna 
 described (evidently from the sensations pro- 
 duced) correctly, — that is, as to their nature, or 
 the material of which they were composed. A 
 mistake occurred in the case of a tea-kettle of 
 tinned-iron, taken from the hob, the handle of 
 which was warm — just about blood-heat: — this 
 she mistook for wood ! 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 29 
 
 Unexpectedly, as far as Dr. S. was concerned, 
 Mrs. G. pinched his foot ; immediately Anna in- 
 dicated discomfort. 
 
 "What is it," Dr. S. asked; " where did you 
 feel any thing ?" 
 
 « In my foot." 
 
 <• Which foot ?" 
 
 "The left." 
 
 " Which now ?" — Mrs. G. having changed to 
 the other. 
 
 " The right." 
 
 " Where now ?" — Dr. S. continued to enquire, 
 as Mrs G. pushed the point of a hard substance 
 against his leg, — " where now ?" 
 
 " My foot" — was still the reply. 
 
 All the persons present were here much 
 amused by finding how much she was alive to the 
 nicities of the most scrupulous conventionals, as 
 it clearly came out when Dr. S. said, — 
 
 " It is not the foot." 
 
 " Yes ; the foot. . . above the ancle /" 
 
 The various answers given to questions put to 
 this amiable young person were very interesting, 
 as characterized by intelligence, appropriateness 
 and piety of feeling. 
 
 In another case, which had very striking and 
 interesting results, — that of a Lady of much 
 energy, frankness, and individuality of character, 
 — the community of taste and sensation were 
 highly developed. 
 
30 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 Miss H 's condition, generally indeed, was 
 
 analagous to several that he had witnessed, — in 
 sensibility to the approach of others than the 
 Magnetizer ; in felicity of feeling when the oper- 
 ator held her hands, and no cross-magnetism, nor 
 movements in the room took place ; and in un- 
 consciousness of the voices, either when speaking 
 or singing, of those in the room. 
 
 She did not generally specify what article was 
 touched by him, Dr. S. but always felt any con- 
 tact, or even proximity of persons or things 
 brought near him. Every such exercise of sen- 
 sation was unpleasant to her. She participated 
 with him in the taste of water, and wine ; both 
 of which she disliked. On his biting a bit oif a 
 mint lozenge, she complained strongly against the 
 injury to the teeth, and remonstrated with him 
 for eating " such a vulgar thing." — But tincture 
 of rhubarb, which, unwittingly to Dr. S., was 
 handed to him, produced, immediately on his 
 tasting it, (though with his head turned away) 
 exclamations and actions singularly expressive of 
 the most extreme disgust. All the natural indi- 
 cations of dislike he bad ever seen in children, 
 whilst taking nauseous medicines, characterized 
 as such indications were by the entire unreserve 
 of expression in children, both in word and cir- 
 cumstance, — were embodied in the case of Miss 
 H , in the experiment referred to ! 
 
 Hf> might just add, w itli regard to this very 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 31 
 
 interesting case, that the sensibility of Miss 
 
 H , to the movements of the persons in the 
 
 room where she was, and even in an adjoining 
 room having an open door betwixt, was singular- 
 ly acute and surprising. Movements of the several 
 persons around, though they might be seven or 
 eight yards off, were both noticed and shewn to 
 be disturbing, sometimes very distressing. Even 
 the movements of two canary-birds, just behind 
 the sofa, were unpleasantly felt. 
 
 The day after this experiment, Miss H 
 
 described to him, Dr. S., in very striking and 
 intelligent terms, the progress and changes, with- 
 in the limits she could remember, in her feelings 
 — her felicities and her disturbances. Her first 
 peculiar perception, which occurred a few minutes 
 after all the parties had taken their places, was 
 as if a cloud were coming before her eyes, — in- 
 creasing so in density as to produce an effect 
 like that observed in "dissolving views :" all 
 objects became gradually obscure and successively 
 vanished, except the Magnetizer ; him she 
 saw a long time, his eyes appearing shining like 
 two bright lights. At first, and whilst she was 
 undisturbed, her feelings were perfectly felicitous : 
 she felt as if she was in an ethereal region (a feel- 
 ing remarkably indicated in the expression of her 
 countenance), elevated, as in a commanding or 
 superior position, above all who were present. 
 
32 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 A still more admirable and extraordinary case, 
 however, came within his, Dr. S's, experience, 
 which, merely noticing it at present, he would 
 reserve for farther description. 
 
 It was a cataleptic case — the only specific one of 
 the kind he had had, — in which the senses, gene- 
 rally, were inoperative, whilst the community of 
 taste was such, as, by repeated trials was proved, 
 not only to be realized when other parties were 
 interposed betwixt the operator and the subject, 
 but when the operator was entirely out of con- 
 tact, and, had her eyes been open, out of sight ! 
 
 In the investigations hitherto described, in- 
 teresting, and, in many particulars, extraordinary 
 as they might seem, he, Dr. S., had not proceeded 
 in the development of phenomena to the extent 
 attained, he believed, by many others in this 
 department of the human physiology. Several 
 degrees or stages, so to speak, of characteristic 
 phenomena, had been described by writers on 
 this subject : these to which distinctive differences 
 might be ascribed, belonging to his own investiga- 
 tions, comprised, as he conceived, the following : — 
 
 1. A perceptible magnetic action, as observed 
 in the eyes of the subject, with, perhaps, some 
 dimness of sight, or heat of the forehead, but 
 without sleep. This state he had found sufficient 
 for soothing persons in a condition of excited 
 feeling, or suffering under local pain. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 33 
 
 2. A closing of the eyes, generally without 
 power in the subject of opening them ; but in 
 other respects full consciousness of what was 
 passing, and a capability of conversing with 
 those around. Sometimes the attraction in this 
 stage was found to be such as to cause the sub- 
 ject, if duly raised and placed on the floor of the 
 room, to follow the magnetizer. 
 
 3 . Sleep-waking, or somnambulism, in which the 
 subject converses with the magnetizer only, but 
 does not hear other persons ; great sensitiveness 
 to the approach of any person, but the operator ; 
 with the exhibition, when consistently magnetised, 
 of a kind of polarity, comprising the experience 
 of pleasurable feelings by contact or passes on 
 the proper side, such as by the operator's right 
 hand on the left side, and repellant or painful 
 feelings, by contact or passes on the wrong side. 
 
 4. Sleep-waking, with the perception, in the 
 subject, of sensations, either by taste, or by feel- 
 ing, induced on the operator ; at the same time, 
 in certain cases, insensibility to pain, when 
 pinched or pricked, for instance, on the proper 
 side, by the Magnetizer. This, as well as the 
 stage preceding it, has been generally found (no 
 cross or interfering magnetism being permitted) 
 to be a condition of great enjoyment, and, not 
 unfrequently, of peculiar felicity. 
 
 5. Sleep of insensibility, in which, — whilst 
 there may be sympathy of taste with the Mag- 
 
34 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 netizer, or great experience of happiness, with 
 singing, talking of things or places mentally con- 
 templated, — the senses are not susceptible of 
 personal impressions ; so that treatment which, 
 at other times, would occasion severe pain, is not 
 felt, and objects placed before the eyes, though 
 they might frequently be open, are not seen. 
 This condition, it is hardly necessary to say, is 
 one of those in which surgical operations may 
 be performed without pain, or consciousness of 
 injury, to the magnetized patient. 
 
 As to these definitions, however, derived, as 
 they avowedly were, from his own investigations 
 solely, he, Dr. S., must guard himself by saying, 
 that he by no means puts them forth as being 
 universally appropriate. For although he was 
 fully authorized, he considered, in giving them, 
 with some confidence, in their relation to his 
 personal investigations, he could not assume, — 
 after the experience he had had of the extraor- 
 dinary and unexpected contradictions of what 
 might have been fairly predicated, — that they 
 would in all cases, even within their respective 
 stages or degrees, be found to apply. The ex- 
 perience already acquired, indeed, would lead 
 him to suppose it to be not improbable, but that, 
 as general definitions, they would include or de- 
 termine, too much. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 35 
 
 The analogies of phenomena in Zoistic Mag- 
 netism, included in the definitions he had 
 been submitting, with familiar facts in ordinary 
 magnetism (not now to extend them to the 
 equally striking relations they bore to certain 
 electrical phenomena) might, as the Lecturer 
 shewed, be thus illustrated experimentally. 
 
 The principle of attraction, admitted of a 
 simple illustration in the ordinary experiments 
 of the attraction of iron, or of concealed magnets 
 in floating toys, by the magnet. 
 
 By the action of a magnet on a needle suspen- 
 ded on an universal joint, which Dr. S. exhibited, 
 it was seen, that in the following of the marked 
 end by the south pole of the bar magnet which 
 he moved near it, or in the receding of the same 
 end from the contrary pole of the magnet, — a 
 fair illustration was yielded of the attractive and 
 repellant effects of the dissimilar or similar 
 hands of the operator in Zoistic Magnetism, on 
 those of the subject of experiment. 
 
 And of the general sympathy of the subject 
 with the operator, whether as to movements or 
 otherwise, — he submitted an experiment, which, 
 on the plan he had adopted, any persons, provided 
 with a small bar magnet, and a bar of iron like 
 it, could make for themselves. A small bar of 
 iron, which he now exhibited, seven or eight 
 inches long, he would place on the glass of his 
 watch whilst the watch lay on the table ; in this 
 
36 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 case the convex surface of glass, being touched 
 only by the polished piece of iron in a point, 
 acted as a convenient pivot. So placed, the iron 
 was inert, and indifferent to any particular posi- 
 tion. But he now placed over it, say two or three 
 inches distant, a strong bar magnet of similar size. 
 Instantly, it was found, the iron bar had been 
 mesmerized by the juxta-position, and would now" 
 follow the master magnet, as he turned it round, 
 and would sympathize, as it was seen, in all its 
 motions ! 
 
 The analogy of the processes employed for the 
 developing of the magnetic condition, in both 
 Zoistic and ordinary magnetism, was, as Dr. S., 
 experimentally shewed, equally close and inter- 
 esting. As to the process generally employed in 
 his experiments, this analogy was necessarily 
 close ; because he had been guided, in regard to 
 its mode and manipulations, by pre-consideration 
 of what he knew respecting the magnetizing of 
 steel. But the remarkably influential results of 
 this process — hereafter to be more fully described 
 — justified, he conceived, the relations and ana- 
 logies he had been led to assume. 
 
 Witness, further, the analogy traceable betwixt 
 the Zoistic and unorganic magnetism, in regard 
 to the different degrees of tension or energy 
 developed by mere contact, and by manipulation 
 with passes. Let us take, for instance, said the 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 37 
 
 Lecturer, a straight bar of soft steel, unmagne- 
 tized ; and place it, first of all, betwixt the 
 opposite poles of two strong bar magnets, and a 
 small degree of magnetic power, is, we find, de- 
 veloped. But let us make passes from the middle 
 of the bar to the end without contact, (strokes 
 with the opposite poles of two bar magnets being 
 at the same time made, whilst a slip of card- 
 board was interposed, from the middle to the 
 extremities of the bar laid on the table) and 
 mark the effect : — the previously weak and im- 
 perfectly magnetized bar now lifts, though no 
 actual contact has been made, an ordinary port- 
 manteau key. In the employment, however, of 
 two bars of the horse-shoe form, one of them mag- 
 netic, the other to be operated on, these effects 
 might, perhaps, prove to be still more analogous. 
 By the use of the same apparatus, he, Dr. S. 
 might illustrate a further analogy in the demes- 
 merizing processes. In order to this he w^ould 
 take the soft steel bar already magnetized, 
 which, it would be observed, could sustain a key 
 of moderate size. Whilst the key was thus sus- 
 tained by the bar on the stand, he would make a 
 stroke (or pass) with the adverse pole of the bar 
 magnet, from the end supporting the key, to- 
 wards the other extremity. The key now, as 
 would be observed, fell, and the pole recently so 
 energetic, was seen to be demagnetized. # 
 
 *This experiment to be demagnetizing to the extent of both poles, requires a 
 cbange of the poles of the magnet after passing the middle of the bar operated on 
 so that the two polarities may be respectively subdued. 
 
38 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 For this experiment represented, with consider- 
 able closeness, the usual mode of demesmerizing 
 by reverse passes, though the result seemed also 
 to be promoted (along with other means of a 
 different kind) by lateral passes across the face 
 and chest. In his own practice, indeed, he was 
 very generally able to awaken his subjects in the 
 manner he should describe, viz., by first gaining 
 their assent to his so doing, by a representation 
 to them of his reasons — the wish, for instance, 
 or request, of parents or other persons having a 
 right to controul ; or, as to himself, the lateness of 
 the hour, or other engagements : — and, when the 
 assent had been gained, by breathing, or blowing 
 softly, on the upper part of the face, over the 
 eyes. Sometimes, however, a considerable time 
 was requisite, with the employment of reverse 
 passes, &c, in order that no discomfort or in- 
 convenience might result. 
 
 This simple process of demagnetizing, how- 
 ever, generally as he had found it available, was 
 not sufficient, he might observe, in all the cases 
 which had come within his own experience. And 
 as in a cataleptic case he had found it better, in 
 regard to the securing of his confiding subject 
 against unpleasant effects, to leave the dispersion 
 or neutralization of the magnetizing influence to 
 quiet and undisturbed repose, rather than to pro- 
 ceed in efforts for awakening beyond the simple 
 and gentle means he had ordinarily employed, — 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 39 
 
 so he believed it-had been generally found, that, 
 in all cases of difficulty, this, of all other courses, 
 was the safest and the best, — viz., to allow the 
 subject or patient to sleep it out. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 CONSIDERATIONS CONCERNING THE HIGHER, AND WHAT MIGHT 
 BE DEEMED MORE QUESTIONABLE, PHENOMENA, ASCRIBED 
 TO THE PROVINCE OF ZOISTIC MAGNETISM J ADDITIONAL 
 AND ORIGINAL DEVELOPMENTS AND RESULTS OF FURTHER 
 PERSONAL RESEARCHES ; WITH AN EXPOSITION OF THE RA- 
 TIONALE AND PROBABLE PHILOSOPHY OF THIS MYSTERIOUS 
 AGENCY. 
 
 In the previous Lecture, he, Dr. Scoresby, had 
 described, and had illustrated by experiments in 
 another department of science, his researches in, 
 what might be characterized as, the ordinary 
 facts and phenomena of Zoistic Magnetism. His 
 purpose generally had been, not to startle by 
 questionable assertions concerning astounding 
 wonders ; but to appeal to the understanding of 
 his audience, whilst justifying, on scientific ana- 
 logies, the grounds of his own belief. Hence he 
 had confined himself, in his descriptions of phe- 
 nomena, altogether to what had been deve- 
 loped by his own researches, — mentioning only 
 what he had seen with his own eyes, wrought, 
 instrumentally, with his own hands and magnetic 
 influence, and tested, as far as he was able, by his 
 own experience and judgment. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 41 
 
 Taking nothing for granted, he had thus en- 
 deavoured to make his ground good at every step. 
 Starting, he believed, with a mind in a condition 
 of enquiry, and with as much reserve of judgment 
 as he could command, as to what might probably 
 be matters of fact, — a reserve, however, siding 
 more with doubt and questionings than with pre- 
 possession or credulity, — he himself felt, as he 
 trusted would be felt by others, that the progress 
 he had in this wise made, was the more satisfac- 
 tory and conclusive. 
 
 Hence the developments already given, or yet 
 to be given, would be found useful, he hoped, 
 (inferior as they were to the records of others 
 who had been digging longer and deeper in the 
 same field) for enabling those whom he addressed 
 to appreciate the facts ; and in some measure to 
 discriminate betwixt the real and the unreal — 
 betwixt fact and error — betwixt true philosophic 
 phenomena and mere superstition, — betwixt the 
 living wonders of the operations of Divinely plant- 
 ed laws in man, and the morbid creations of timid 
 apprehensions, or pious jealous dread of baneful 
 mysteries. 
 
 And the discrimination betwixt fact and error, 
 he, Dr. S., might remind the audience, is not a 
 matter of indifference even in science. We may 
 dishonour the Great Author of Creation by deny- 
 ing the facts concerning His wonderful works ; 
 as we dishonour the Great Author of Revelation 
 
42 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 by denying the truths of the Bible. Not, indeed, 
 that the rejection of truths in philosophy may be 
 injurious to our best interests, like scepticism in 
 religion; but yet our scientific scepticism may 
 be dishonouring to God's handy-work, and dis- 
 advantageous, socially, intellectually, and influ- 
 entially, to ourselves! If science has suffered 
 damage by the religious scepticism of some of its 
 advocates ; so religion, it might be easily shewn, 
 has not unfrequently suffered injury, (with re- 
 flective, intelligent minds,) from the scientific 
 scepticism, or unreasonable denouncements of 
 scientific developements, by some of its zealous 
 and pious supporters ! 
 
 Of the higher phenomena, as usually described, 
 he had not himself had, until after the commence- 
 ment of his lectures, any satisfactory examples. 
 And though since then he had met with some new 
 and remarkable phenomena, in a department of 
 this field of research beyond what he had pre- 
 conceived to be demonstrated fact ; he could not, 
 at present at least, receive in the same light, cer- 
 tain statements of a peculiar species of clairvoy- 
 ance, &c, which were popularly set forth. 
 
 Whilst submitting, however, his personal im- 
 pressions, it was but fair towards others more ex- 
 perienced than himself in this special etherial 
 field of the human physiology, to say, that, in 
 giving any opinion respecting certain phenomena, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 43 
 
 he claimed no presumptuous right of judgment 
 beyond what belonged to any one, who, with a 
 reasonable experience in the niceties of scientific 
 research, had had corresponding opportunities of 
 arriving at a fair conclusion. And even if his 
 judgment should be supported, when he might 
 object, by the analogies of science and research in 
 cognate phenomena, — he should still claim for it 
 only such consideration as might be due to his 
 grounds of objection, according to their satisfac- 
 toriness or deservings. 
 
 In truth, whilst at the beginning of his re- 
 searches, he felt, in common with multitudes of 
 others, not only great hesitation in receiving, but 
 much boldness in rejecting, statements which he 
 had deemed inconsistent with the essential rela- 
 tions of cause and effect, — he had been taught cau- 
 tion, by experience, as to what might be justly or 
 safely denied, from the circumstance of pheno- 
 mena, respecting which he had had strong doubts, 
 being forced upon him as truths by incontrovert- 
 ible evidence and demonstration. So that whilst 
 he could not yet receive, some phenomena 
 asserted of Zoistic Magnetism, as facts, — and 
 for reasons which he would state, — yet develop- 
 ments of an order so much higher than what he 
 had contemplated, had so unexpectedly arisen out 
 of his own experiments, as to induce that caution 
 in denying, or hesitation in disbelieving, to 
 which he now adverted. 
 
44 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 His own experiments, indeed, numerous and 
 varied as, in their subjects and circumstances, 
 they had been, were yet, in certain departments 
 of this interesting field of research, necessarily 
 defective, because of their having been made 
 (except in two or three casesj on persons in a 
 state of health; whilst it was reasonable to 
 believe, that, in many cases of disease, the ner- 
 vous influence — so specially acted on in Zoistic 
 Magnetism— would be peculiarly sensitive and 
 influential. Cases, indeed, of persons out of 
 health were by no means of rare or questionable 
 occurrence, in which extraordinary acuteness of 
 the senses, nervous susceptibility to external 
 influences, pr oneness to somnambulism, &c, had 
 been witnessed and recorded as phenomena result- 
 ing spontaneously from disease, analogous to those 
 developed by mesmeric manipulation. In cases 
 so predisposed to results of the nature of these de- 
 veloped by Zoistic Magnetism, therefore, it could 
 not be unreasonable to expect phenomena, within 
 the limits of the powers implanted in the human 
 organization, of a still higher order than what 
 he, Dr. S., had been able to elicit. 
 
 The evidence of phreno-magnetism, or excite- 
 ment of the cerebral organs, which he had ob- 
 tained in his own experiments, — though he had 
 frequently made trials in this department of 
 Zoistic Magnetism — had not hitherto been satis- 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 45 
 
 factory. So that, although he had witnessed 
 several cases by other hands, which he could not 
 but think to have been real ; his own mind was 
 still in abeyance as to the question, — whether the 
 results sprung independently, from an action on 
 the phrenological organs ? or dependency, from 
 the influence of the will and special purpose of 
 the manipulating agent in the experiments ? 
 
 In the department of clairvoyance, his, Dr. 
 Scoresby's, experience had been but very slight. 
 He had never witnessed any of the performances 
 of persons known or assumed to possess this 
 faculty ; nor had he met with cases, beyond what, 
 in the course of this lecture, he should have occa- 
 sion to describe, which had yielded examples of 
 phenomena, of the nature of those usually charac- 
 terized as clairvoyant. And, as to the glimpses 
 which he had had of these ordinarily latent mys- 
 teries in the constitution of man, — he had some 
 personal gratification in saying, that they were 
 completely within the imaginable limits, he had 
 for himself assigned, to the philosophic relations 
 of cause and effect. 
 
 Of some of the alleged phenomena, however, 
 — such as those of a prophetic nature, in which 
 real predictions, not chance guesses, respecting 
 circumstances dependent on the operations of the 
 human will and actions, are asserted to have been 
 given ; or of the determination of things, abso- 
 
46 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 lutely unknown to the clairvoyant or to any per- 
 son around him, then passing, or having recently 
 passed, in distant places or regions ; or of the 
 sudden acquisition of languages, or subjects of 
 knowledge, previously unlearnt and unheard, — he, 
 Dr. S., must avow himself altogether sceptical : 
 nay, he must consider them, so far as his own 
 judgment could enable him to form an opinion, 
 as delusive, or mistaken, or not thoroughly tested, 
 assumptions : — assumptions, also, adverse to the 
 most universally established laws of physical 
 science — the laws of cause and effect — and, as 
 such, what he decidedly believed might be pro- 
 nounced impossibilities ! 
 
 In his earlier consideration of other phenomena 
 ascribed to the clairvoyant state, he had associa- 
 ted with what he had just referred to, the state- 
 ments concerning a power of reading through 
 opaque substances, or of deciphering written or 
 printed documents by the touch of the hand, or 
 contact with the back of the head, the sole of 
 the foot, or other parts of the surface of the 
 human frame. But difficult as it might be to 
 conceive of the accomplishment of ends belonging 
 specially, apparently, to the organ of sight — an 
 organ so beautifully, and, as an optical instru- 
 ment, in many respects, so intelligibly construc- 
 ted, — by parts of the system not designed by the 
 Creator, as it should seem, for effecting such 
 purposes at all ; yet he must modify his former 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 47 
 
 views so far, (whilst not himself convinced of the 
 reality of the power asserted to exist) as to 
 separate this class of phenomena from that of the 
 prophetic kind.* 
 
 Consistently, however, with the phenomenon of 
 the transmission of sensation, from the agent to 
 the subject, under the influence of Zoistic Mag- 
 netism, — which his own experiments had abun- 
 dantly confirmed — he saw no impossibility in the 
 transfer of thought and feeling, to the extent of 
 receiving the picture in the mind of one, when 
 en rapport, upon the mind of the subject under 
 the higher influence of this mysterious agency. 
 
 That pictures in the mind of the magnetizer, 
 might be transferred — as the camera obscura 
 transfers the external scene into a picture within 
 ■ — he not only thought to be within the reason- 
 able limits of possibility ; but he must candidly 
 state, that he thought evidence had been adduced, 
 by men of unquestionable reputation and acknow- 
 ledged talent, such as, if not to convince the un- 
 
 *In justice to a scientific friend who had gently remonstrated with Dr. S. on 
 account of his statement, in a former lecture, of unbelief of what this friend con- 
 sidered to be facts in his own experience, — the Author adds an extract from his 
 letter, which, in respect to one point referred to above, is, he admits, if not of con- 
 clusive, at least, of fair application. — " It is really no more inexplicable'' his friend 
 writes, " that the clairvoyant should be able to see through an ordinarily opaque 
 body, than that your magnet (referring to an experiment Dr. S. had described in 
 which a compass was moved through the body of a railway engine by a magnet at 
 the opposite side, just as if there were nothing betwixt) should be able to see 
 through the steam-engine boiler I Both aie equally above mere human knowledge, 
 but nothing more." 
 
48 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 prejudiced enquirer, at least to demand caution 
 in denying the statements to be, in reality, facts. 
 
 But whilst admitting, in all fairness and can- 
 dour to others, so much in respect of what he, 
 Dr. S., deemed not improbable developments in 
 the region of clairvoyance ; he felt bound to jus- 
 tify, as to other and still more difficult pheno- 
 mena, his own distinctive declaration of unbelief. 
 
 His grounds of unbelief were of two descrip- 
 tions : — 
 
 First : In the impossibility, without a miracle, 
 as he conceived, of determining passing events, 
 at a distance, far beyond the reach of existing 
 influences, or beyond the perception, when aided 
 by instruments to the utmost, of the human 
 faculties. And the clear impossibility, to his 
 mind, also, of there being found in natural causes 
 or agencies, any influence or medium by which 
 events, contingent on the human will, yet un- 
 accomplished, not actually begun, not even medi- 
 tated by man, being certainly predetermined ; 
 for such predeterminations must be clearly mir- 
 aculous, and, consequently, within the peculiar 
 province of omniscience ! 
 
 Secondly, — he grounded his unbelief on the 
 notorious fact of failure, by any clairvoyant, or 
 all clairvoyants, of determining any thing, as far as 
 he was aware, of ideally useful consideration. He 
 might except, indeed, from this decided opinion 
 of unbelief, the possibility, (as he might deem it) 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 49 
 
 of the gaining some insight into the state of 
 diseased subjects, placed en rapport with the 
 clairvoyant ; or of prevision as to the effect of 
 certain modes of relief (?) ; or of introvision, 
 as to the condition of the viscera, &c, of 
 the clairvoyant himself, — results, which, if fairly 
 questionable, w r ere yet, in measure and part at 
 least, within the limits of influence betwixt the 
 parties, such as he held to be not inconsistent 
 with possibility, on the theory he had assumed 
 and stated. 
 
 At the same time he must be free to state — 
 that the only case of the assumption of such 
 pow r ers in a clairvoyant, which he had ever met 
 with, unfortunately was proved, as he fully be- 
 lieved, to be one of imposture ; — the powers being 
 assumed, as a profession, and the practice of the 
 pretended powers employed, (under indeed a 
 good deal of medical knowledge,) for the purpose 
 of gain ! 
 
 Another fact as to what clairvoyance ought to 
 have been able to do, if real, but has never yet 
 done, is one of some notoriety, viz., that whereas 
 different individuals, disbelieving the assumptions 
 of clairvoyants, or desirous of satisfactorily testing 
 them, have enclosed bank notes in opaque enve- 
 lopes, with the offer of any such note, as a reward 
 to a successful attempt to read the inscription 
 thereon, without penetrating or disturbing the 
 
 D 
 
50 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 cover. But no such reward, for success, has ever 
 been claimed ; nor, of course, ever been earnt. 
 
 Finally, it might be added, in respect to this 
 ground of unbelief, that purposes of immense 
 utility have been submitted to clairvoyants, for 
 determinations of various kinds, without ever, he 
 believed, resulting in the obtaining of any infor- 
 mation that could be essentially useful. If, by 
 the way of illustration, clairvoyants can deter- 
 mine the state of things and persons in distant 
 regions, as, in multitudes of idle results has been 
 asserted, why do they not give some useful in- 
 formation. "Why," as a lady who was much 
 interested in the fate of the absent Arctic expedi- 
 tions, said to him when speaking of the pretensions 
 referred to, — "Why, if they can tell what is 
 passing at any distance, do they not tell where 
 the discovery ships are, or what is their fate i" 
 
 Whilst on this part of his subject— discussing 
 the claims, as to his views of them, to belief of 
 the higher or more questionable phenomena 
 asserted of Zoistic Magnetism — he might just 
 refer to another particular in which he might be 
 able to yield a strong measure of refutation. He 
 referred to the assumption of pow r ers in some 
 Mesmerizers, of operating at great distances, and 
 putting their patients to sleep, at their will, when 
 the parties might be separated widely from each 
 other. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 51 
 
 He had two arguments to offer against the 
 reality of such a power. 
 
 The first was derived from the operation of 
 the law of influence in respect of distance. If 
 "any force, short of the Divine, could operate with 
 an energy unaffected by distance, then the as- 
 sumed power, might be a reality. But if, as his 
 experiments had clearly determined, the power 
 of the magnetizing agent actually diminished as 
 the distance increased, then the preceptible opera- 
 tion of that power must necessarily be limited. 
 
 The second argument against the asserted 
 powers, was derived from fact. Whilst he, Dr. 
 S. had such highly creditable statements of facts 
 in which patients had been put to sleep when the 
 magnetizer was at a distance; he had always 
 ascribed, as he doubted not the fact to be, these 
 results to be due, not to any external agency, 
 but to the power of the imagination and sympathy 
 of the patient. 
 
 Reference to a single case would be sufficient, 
 if not to prove, at least to justify, his view of this 
 phenomenon. A friend of his who was mesmeriz- 
 ing curatively, told one of his patients, when he 
 was about to leave home, that, on the following 
 day, at a particular hour, he should exert his in- 
 fluence in order to place her in her accustomed 
 mesmeric condition. On his return from his 
 journey, he found that the result he had assumed 
 had actually taken place; the patient, at the 
 
52 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 proper time, duly went to sleep. But this, it so 
 happened, was entirely independent of any effort 
 on his part, or any act of his will, — for he him- 
 self let the hour pass by, having altogether for- 
 gotten what he had proposed being done ! 
 
 In the descriptions of phenomena thus far given, 
 there was little perhaps, as he, Dr. Scoresby, pre- 
 sumed, — except as to the illustrations and indi- 
 viduality of the facts, — that would be considered 
 as very peculiar or novel. Those, indeed, as 
 before he had intimated, who had made the 
 subject of Zoistic Magnetism their study, and 
 had had experience in its operations curatively, 
 might deem the experience and practice hitherto 
 declared as little more than elementary. 
 
 He had given these descriptions and details, 
 however, rather fully, because of their standing 
 independent of what had hitherto been published 
 by others, as the results of personal researches, 
 tested, too, in every particular and phenomenon, 
 by all the experience, in the investigation of other 
 branches of science, which he could bring to bear 
 upon them. In these respects, therefore, he 
 trusted they would not be deemed unworthy of 
 the consideration and attention of his audience ; 
 nor unacceptable, as a contribution, however 
 humble, to the body of facts, otherwise given to 
 the public, iu respect to the subject which he 
 sought to elucidate. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 53 
 
 It was due, perhaps, to the several investiga- 
 tors of the subject, which he, Dr. S., was dis- 
 cussing, (as, indeed, to himself, also) to state, 
 that, if he had not referred to what they had 
 done and more elaborately examined into — or if 
 he had refrained, to a considerable extent, from 
 reading the published views and expositions of 
 others, — it was not that he did not fully estimate 
 their labours ; but that, he considered, it might 
 do more for the cause of truth, — in respect to a 
 subject that has been so much questioned, and, 
 not unfrequently, held in contempt — to give his 
 personal and independent researches, incomplete 
 as, under such limited experience, they neces- 
 sarily must be, than to attempt to embody with 
 his own, the more elaborate researches and 
 various views of Mesmerists in general. 
 
 He now, however, came to a branch of his In- 
 vestigations, w T hich (though in his unlearnedness, 
 perhaps, he might be mistaken,) wxmld be found 
 to comprise features, not only of peculiar interest, 
 but, in certain particulars, of novelty and origin- 
 ality. 
 
 It had been his, Dr. Scoresby's, desire, when 
 communicating his further researches, to have 
 embodied the proceeds, so to speak, of a great 
 number of interesting experiments, in one compact 
 series, with the view of obtaining some general 
 results. But whilst the results, within his limited 
 

 54 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 experience, were assumed to spring from influences 
 belonging essentially and generally to the human 
 organization ; yet, it must be admitted, that they 
 had not been verified to the extent that might be 
 desired, by other agents, and other subjects, so as 
 conclusively to claim for them the character of 
 general laws in the human physiology. As, in- 
 deed, there are peculiarities in every individual 
 case, wherein the magnetizer or the magnetized 
 is changed, — the results arrived at by any one 
 experimenter, should have extensive confirmation, 
 in order to their being received as general, by 
 the requisite varieties in loth parties ; and as 
 there are, in Zoistic Magnetism, different stages, 
 characterized, to a certain extent, by distinctive 
 phenomena, an additional difficulty is presented 
 against results, generally, being set forth as 
 essential characteristics of the constitution and 
 physiology of man. 
 
 In regard to what had sprung out of his own 
 investigations — comprising phenomena at once 
 satisfactorily yielded, and, for the most part, 
 rigidly tested, — he, Dr. S., had every confidence 
 in setting them forth as res facta. Whatever 
 differences, therefore, might necessarily pertain 
 to the endless varieties in the circumstances of 
 such researches, — the results he had arrived at 
 he must consider as, specifically, in many cases, 
 and relatively, (as to the respective stages) in all 
 cases, involving general phenomena and general 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 55 
 
 laws. That is, as to results obtained through 
 the medium of two of his best and most elabor- 
 ately tried subjects, — he could have no doubt but 
 that, whilst they were strictly conclusive in each 
 individual case, they were relatively (in regard to 
 the stage or degree of magnetization) indicative 
 of general phenomena. 
 
 Among the results which had sprung out of 
 his own distinctive investigations, he had re- 
 garded, as of peculiar interest and importance, 
 those concerning a sort of polarity in Zoistic 
 Magnetism, with sensibilities of an electric nature, 
 apparently, of exquisite delicacy ; and concerning 
 the peculiar action of electrics, and, their insulat- 
 ing properties, on the magnetized subject. 
 
 By the term polarity, (which he used only con- 
 ventionally) he, the lecturer, meant, not what in 
 relation to its stricter use it might seem to imply, 
 but, a condition produced under the action of 
 Zoistic Magnetism, in which specific phenomena, 
 of the nature of these attendant on, or resulting 
 in, polarity, in the case of ordinary magnetism, 
 are developed, — such as attraction of the hands 
 of the agent and subject, in different magnetic or 
 electric conditions ; and^ repulsion of the hands or 
 limbs, of either side from head to foot of the 
 subject, when in a condition of tension or excite- 
 ment of the same quality. Ordinarily, and most 
 extensively, he had developed those characteristic 
 influences and differences, by the mode of magne- 
 
56 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 tizing whilst the converse hands of the operator 
 and subject were in contact ; in such case attrac- 
 tion taking place betwixt the converse hands., &c. 
 of the agent and subject, and repulsion betwixt 
 the like hands, or similar sides of the body and 
 limbs generally. 
 
 But, it should be observed, that the magnetic 
 state may exist in a high degree of sensibility 
 and energy in the subject or patient, without the 
 distinct manifestations of these phenomena; 
 whilst the phenomena, characteristic of polarity, 
 may, in certain cases be developed, whilst the 
 energy or depth of the magnetic condition is by 
 no means great. 
 
 The stages in which the effects of polarity, (or 
 different kinds of electricity ?) were principally 
 developed, were those of the "sleep-waking" 
 denominations generally; but the insulating 
 powers of electrics, in his experiments, were not 
 always found to be conclusive -and complete 
 except in the lower sleep-waking state (that of 
 No. 3, described at page 33) previous to the 
 development of community of sensation. 
 
 In proceeding now with his more advanced 
 investigations — instead of attempting to cast 
 them together, — it might be more interesting to 
 his audience, as well as more advantageous 
 to his subject, bis describing, separately, some 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 5/ 
 
 of the more instructive cases on which he had 
 recently had the privilege of experimenting. 
 
 The first of the cases, whereby he should en- 
 deavour to elucidate and advance his subject, was 
 one in which the effects of different modes of 
 magnetizing, — the nature of the attractive and 
 repellent influences, — and the insulating power 
 of electrics, — had their most elaborate and 
 specific developments. The subject in this case, 
 
 was Miss P , of W , a young lady of 
 
 much talent and cultivation of mind, as well as 
 of frank and generous disposition ; who, with 
 full consent and approval of her parents, allowed 
 him, Dr. S., every opportunity, mutually avail- 
 able, during a period of about seven weeks, for 
 making such experiments as, in the progress of 
 his investigations, he found requisite or desirable. 
 On these occasions, comprising thirteen seances, 
 and about twenty experiments, the mother of 
 the young lady, — a pious, intelligent, and interest- 
 ing person — was always, except once, present, 
 and she frequently suggested varieties in the ex- 
 periments, or subjects of conversation, which 
 served greatly to enhance the interest, as well 
 as the completeness, of the researches. Indeed 
 each of the parties whose sanction to the experi- 
 ments was requisite, yielded that sanction, to 
 the confiding willingness of Dr. S.'s young 
 friend, in the most unreserved and generous 
 
58 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 manner, — all of them contemplating the object of 
 the investigator as one of much importance, not 
 only to science, but also., as it might prove, to the 
 cause of suffering humanity. 
 
 This young lady, it might be mentioned, had 
 become so susceptible to the magnetical influence 
 by his hands, that, under favourable circum- 
 stances, he could generally close her eyes, with- 
 out any previous manipulations, in from two to 
 five minutes ; and could always awake her by a 
 few upward passes, or, as his usual practice was, 
 by breathing, or blowing softly, on her forehead 
 and eyes. 
 
 It was hardly necessary for him to say, where 
 such perseverance was allowed him, by the affec- 
 tionate and watchful mother, that no ill effects, 
 or material personal inconvenience, ever resulted 
 from any of his experiments. 
 
 The facts in Zoistic Magnetism, which he, Dr. 
 S., had derived fundamentally from experiments 
 
 with Miss P , might, in some respects, be 
 
 deemed as specific and individual, though they 
 had been confirmed in many essential particulars 
 by experiments with others. What he proposed 
 to communicate in respect to these experiments 
 would be mainly scientific ; — otherwise the nu- 
 merous instances of intelligent, clever and pious, 
 sometimes of curious or amusing, replies, which 
 his questions, during the magnetic sleep, had 
 elicited, would have afforded, had he had time 
 for details, an abundance of interesting matter. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 59 
 
 His plan, to take chiefly the scientific part, 
 might be most clearly and compactly carried out, 
 by giving a general summary of the results 
 arrived at during the whole series of elaborate 
 investigations. 
 
 Classifying these results under certain specific 
 characteristics, he should commence with, — 
 
 I. The effect, in the depth of sleep and distinc- 
 tive development of polarity (such as he had 
 defined it) of various modes, or processes of 
 magnetizing the subject. 
 
 1. The arrangements and process which he, 
 Dr. S., was led, from previous consideration of 
 supposed principles in Zoistic Magnetism, to 
 adopt, were found to yield the highest degree of 
 sensibility to attractions and repulsions. And, 
 as his method was usually the same, and had 
 been found, in his experience generally, so ex- 
 tremely effective, he might here, advantageously, 
 describe it in detail : — 
 
 The subject of experiment, being dressed in 
 fabrics of cotton or woollen materials, was placed 
 in an easy chair, comfortably supported, he, the 
 experimenter, taking his seat on an ordinary 
 chair, exactly in front, so that every part of the 
 systems of the operator and subject should 
 mutually be proximate, and opposite, to each 
 other, in their converse sides ; that is, the right 
 eye, shoulder, arm, hand, foot, &c. of the one 
 party, being opposite to the left of the other. So 
 
60 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 arranged^ the natural polarities, as assumed, and 
 the flow of the magnetic currents or electric 
 influences, were supposed to be in the most 
 favourable relations for their mutual development. 
 
 When, however, the subject, as was frequently 
 the case, was placed on a sofa, or, with a curative 
 object, on a bed, he, the operator, whilst sitting 
 parallel and face to face, usually crossed his 
 knees, and covered, with a view to insulation, his 
 proximate knee with silk (which otherwise, he 
 supposed, might act unfavourably,) so as to yield 
 the most consistent arrangements for the magnetic 
 developments. And beyond the particulars speci- 
 fied, he preferred (for reasons he could not now 
 particularize) to have the sofa in the line of the 
 magnetic meridian, with the head of the subject 
 towards the north. But, it was in no case his 
 practice, he might add, to take a position higher 
 than his subject, so as to occasion a strain on the 
 eyes by looking upward, — though so doing a de- 
 gree of congestion might be produced, calculated 
 to facilitate the magnetic arrangement, — but 
 always to have the eyes of each party so directed 
 as to take their natural and easy position. 
 
 Thus situated, respectively, the magnetic con- 
 dition was generally (first of all) developed, by 
 merely taking the hands of the subject in his, the 
 operator's, hands, right with left, and left with 
 right ; and then steadily looking at each others 
 Byes. After the eyes closed, and after a few 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 61 
 
 minutes continuance of motionless and silent con- 
 tact of the hands — he proceeded to make passes, 
 usually with one hand at a time, whilst retaining 
 the other hand, from the head over the face, or 
 side of the head, downward to the extremity of 
 the arm, or, as far as easily practicable, towards 
 the feet — always confining the manipulations of 
 either hand to its proper side. In cases where the 
 eyes could not be closed by the mere contact of 
 hands, &c, — passes were restorted to, partly free, 
 (two or three inches above the dress,) and partly 
 in contact with the dress of the subject, in aid of 
 the quiescent influences. It was of course his 
 practice, consistently with what has universally 
 been deemed requisite, to give his mental ener- 
 gies and will to the object in view. 
 
 Every variation in the relative positions of 
 operator and subject, or in modes of manipula- 
 tion diverse from what had been suggested induc- 
 tively from theory, he Dr. S., found, (so far as his 
 
 experiments with Miss P went) diminished 
 
 the susceptibility, or entirely obliterated the ex- 
 istance, of distinctive attractive and repellent 
 influences. 
 
 2. Thus, when the operator occupied a place 
 at one side of the subject, unless his knees were 
 crossed so as to bring the right and left knees of 
 the parties into proximity, the peculiar pheno- 
 mena appeared to be less distinctive and the 
 polarity less sensitive. 
 
62 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 3. When j again, the parties were relatively 
 situated as in No. I, — the subject being placed 
 recumbently on a sofa, — and the magnetizing was 
 effected by the eyes, and free downward passes, 
 without contact of the hands or otherwise,, — the 
 eyes were not closed till about twice the usual 
 time, and very slight polarities were developed. 
 
 4. Situated respectively, as before described, 
 the magnetizing, — to the extent of closing the 
 eyes, which now occupied thrice the usual time, — 
 was effected, by fixing the eyes, as ordinarily, 
 but with the similar (or wrong) hands in con- 
 tact ; — that is, each party holding with the right 
 hand, the right hand of the other. After sleep 
 had been induced, various passes, some free and 
 some in contact with the dress, were made by one 
 hand at a time from the head downward to the 
 feet, but so only that each hand was confined to 
 the side of its own denomination ; that is, the 
 passes with the operator's right hand were made 
 down the right side of the subject, and with the 
 left correspondingly. 
 
 In this case, the sleep was so much less com- 
 plete than usual, that the voice of another, than 
 that of the operator, was heard and replied to, 
 and no polarities (at least nothing repellent) were 
 perceptible. 
 
 5. The same order of contact (the wrong hand 
 being held) was tried in another experiment with 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 63 
 
 Miss P ; but varying the passes, by making 
 
 them upward, with the view of ascertaining, 
 whether, under this change of direction, a change 
 might not be given to the general magnetic 
 currents in the subject. The result, however, as 
 far as a single experiment could be relied on, was 
 singularly summary. For hardly had two free 
 passes been made, on one side only, upward, 
 before the subject opened her eyes, and became 
 wide awake ! 
 
 6. An attempt was made to magnetize by mere 
 contact of the proper hands, under the same 
 arrangements as before, without the use of the 
 eyes. But after a continuance of several minutes, 
 — twice or thrice the ordinary time, — no effect 
 whatever was perceptible. 
 
 7. A further variation in the process was 
 adopted, under the same general arrangements, 
 by taking both hands of the subject in the right 
 hand of the magnetizer, and the extremities of 
 the shoes of both her feet in his left hand, whilst 
 each looked the other steadily in the face. The 
 eyes, as in other cases, were closed, but after a 
 longer interval than usual ; but the sleep was so 
 slight that a reply was instantly given to a call 
 by the mother of the young lady, with the inti- 
 mation — "I am not asleep." "Why, then," he, 
 Dr. S., asked, "did you close your eyes ?" "Be- 
 cause I could not help it," — was the answer. 
 
 Here, again, no polarities were developed. 
 
64 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 II. Phenomena resulting from, or attendant on, 
 the state of polarity. 
 
 The results of this section, it should be noted, 
 though originally derived from experiments with 
 
 Miss P 3 had been extensively corroborated by 
 
 other cases. But, it should be further observed, 
 in respect to the effect of other circumstances, 
 that the results might require considerable modi- 
 fication (as will hereafter appear) if contact, by 
 the experimentor, with conflicting magnetisms or 
 polarities should have taken place ; or, still more 
 so, if the magnetizer should have breathed on 
 the hand, or other parts of the system, by means 
 of which, or in which, some of the particular 
 phenomena might have been developed. 
 
 1 . The Polarity, (as for convenience of des- 
 cription he had designated this condition) indi- 
 cated by repellent and attractive influences of 
 the hand, &c, of the magnetizer — was found, in 
 the most complete cases, to extend from the 
 crown of the head to the point of the foot ; but, 
 otherwise, from the shoulder joint, downward ; 
 and though the sensitiveness was increased by 
 proper downward passes, yet the parts not 
 reached by the passes, as the feet in many in- 
 stances, were magnetized inductively, so as often 
 to exhibit extreme sensitiveness. 
 
 In the case of Miss P , now more specially 
 
 referred to, the head was, as it were, an unity ; 
 for no repellent influence was ever produced by 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 65 
 
 either proximity or touch with the adverse hand 
 of the magnetizer, upon the head, or face, or 
 neck of the subject, — no matter how highly sus- 
 ceptible, to an adverse influence, the other parts 
 of the body and limbs might be. This difference, 
 however, might not improbably be due to an in- 
 ferior degree of magnetization ; or to less sensi- 
 tiveness than that of other cases. 
 
 2. There was an inseparable dependency for 
 
 polarities, both in the instance of Miss P , 
 
 and in the cases of several others, on the exis- 
 tance of the sleep-waking-state ; for, at the very 
 instant when the eyes were opened, the sensible 
 polarities, with their attendant enjoyments and 
 disagreeable sensations, vanished. Either hand 
 of the operator might now be applied to the 
 similar hand or foot of the subject ; and any of 
 the parties in the room might now approach into 
 contact, without the smallest feeling of discom- 
 fort, or other particular sensation, being pro- 
 duced. 
 
 This fact was verified in a great number of 
 instances, and, however familiar it might be to 
 those who witnessed it, invariably occasioned a 
 renewal of the expressions of surprize. 
 
 Where, however, the subject was very suscep- 
 tible and the state of coma deep, so as to render 
 the awakening a work of time, — the cessation of 
 sensitiveness to adverse polarities did not fully 
 take place on the mere opening of the eyes. In- 
 
 E 
 
66 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 dications of magnetization, would sometimes, in 
 such cases, remain for a considerable interval after 
 the return of vision and general consciousness. 
 
 3. The attractive and repellent influences 
 existing betwixt the respective polarities of the 
 magnetizer and the magnetized, — could not be 
 exercised, or stimulated, without a remarkable 
 effect and contrast on the feelings of the latter : 
 and the effect of a change from agreeable to ad- 
 verse influences, or the converse, on the expres- 
 sion of the countenance of the subject, was as 
 sudden, as it was great and characteristic. 
 
 4. Contact of the attracting hands — that is, of 
 right with left, or left with right of the agent and 
 subject ; or downward passes, whether free or in 
 contact with the dress, with either hand of the 
 operator, on the converse side or limb of the sub- 
 ject, — was almost always found to be productive 
 of pleasurable sensations, often of delightful, or 
 felicitous, feelings. 
 
 5. The mere proximity of the right hand of 
 the operator, on the contrary, to any part of the 
 right side of the body, from the shoulder to the 
 foot, was always productive of repellent, and 
 unpleasant effects, — sometimes as in a feeling of 
 cold, but more frequently in the manner, ap- 
 parently, of an electric shock. These effects 
 were curiously and strikingly indicated by the 
 singular changeableness of expression of the 
 countenance, — the sweet and happy expression 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. &7 
 
 becoming gradually grave, as the adverse hand 
 approached within a few inches of her similar 
 hand, or other parts of the same side of her per- 
 son ; passing into a frown, or expression of dis- 
 pleasure or pain, when it approached so as nearly 
 to touch ; and occasioning, by contact with the 
 dress, if not before, a sudden withdrawal of the 
 hand or foot, against the agreeable sensibilities of 
 which this violence had been done ! By the 
 pointing of a finger, only, though at the distance 
 of several inches, on the side of the repellent 
 influence, these striking changes in the express- 
 ion of feeling, would, in very sensitive cases, be 
 produced. 
 
 6. Passes made entirely clear of the dress, and 
 on subjects in complete darkness by reason of 
 their closely compressed eyelids, — were generally, 
 whenever the sensibility was considerable, dis- 
 tinctly felt ; and the position of the operator's 
 hand, whether in motion or stationary, over any 
 part of the body or limbs, would, on the question 
 being asked, be commonly pointed out. 
 
 Uptvard passes over the limbs, (if they did 
 not reduce the magnetic condition of sleep) were 
 productive of effects, which, in different subjects 
 of his, occasioned their being described as " like 
 rubbing upward a cat's back ;" as being * un- 
 natural," or "painful," or "cold," or "disagree- 
 able 3 because they awaken." 
 
 7. Either hand of the subject being extended 
 
68 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 by the proper hand of the magnetizer, would 
 generally remain stretched out ; and, by a few 
 longitudinal passes, touching the extended arm 
 with the points of his fingers, would become 
 rigid, and often remain so for a long period to- 
 gether. In this condition it was generally found, 
 that, on the approach to each other, or contact 
 of, the points of the fingers of the principals in 
 the experiment, — attraction or repulsion resulted, 
 according as the hands were of the converse 
 denomination, or the same. 
 
 The attraction was often sufficient to cause the 
 rigid arm to revolve in the socket of the shoulder, 
 just as, in the experiment he, Dr. S., had de- 
 scribed, the needle suspended on an universal 
 joint, followed the movements of the attracting 
 magnet. The adverse influence, however, acted 
 so far uncertainly as only sometimes to repel, but 
 at others to relax the rigidity of the arm, or, 
 occasionally, when the degree of sleep was slight, 
 to awaken the subject. 
 
 8. If, when the right hand of the subject was 
 thus stretched rigidly out, the fingers of the 
 operator's left hand were pointed towards the 
 other, as in the same extended line, — the degree 
 of tension would be generally increased ; whilst 
 the pointing of the fingers of his right hand, in 
 the same line, and approaching towards con- 
 tact with those of the subject's right hand, would 
 often cause the extended fingers to bend and 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 69 
 
 collapse, and then, not unfrequently, the arm to 
 fall down. In susceptible cases — except where 
 the rigidity was great, — the resolution of the 
 rigidity took place whilst the adverse hands were 
 at several inches distance from each other. 
 
 As to this result, respecting the peculiar in- 
 fluence of the adverse polarities of the magne- 
 tizer's hand on the rigid arm of the subject, — he, 
 Dr. S., might exhibit an experiment, in ordinary 
 magnetism, which yielded, he thought, an elegant 
 illustration of the analogy existing between the 
 two principles. 
 
 For this he had provided himself with a pair 
 of strong bar magnets, to the marked, or north, 
 end of one of which, whilst resting flat on a 
 stand, he attached, so as to project horizontally, 
 a series of several short cylinders of iron. The 
 little cylinders, it might be observed, were hollow, 
 and were connected, loosely, by a thread passing 
 through the centres of a bit of cork in each of 
 them, so as to admit of flexure, without entire 
 separation, among themselves. As thus held out 
 horizontally by the force of the magnetic attrac- 
 tion, they might be supposed to represent the 
 condition of the rigid arm of the magnetized 
 subject. Presenting, now, in the same horizontal 
 line, the other bar magnet — the difference of 
 effect, from its different poles, would be seen to 
 be very striking. On presenting the south pole 
 of the magnet in his hand, so as to approximate 
 
70 ZOiSTIC MAGNETISM, 
 
 the series of cylinders, the rigidity was observe-* 
 ably increased ; but on approaching the series 
 with the north or adverse pole, (being of the 
 same denomination as that of the sustaining 
 magnet) the cylinders, it would be noticed, be- 
 came successively detached (as the fingers of his 
 subject began to collapse,) and ultimately the 
 whole series, when the antagonist magnet had 
 approached sufficiently near, fell down on the 
 table. 
 
 9. Downward passes, by the magnetizer's con- 
 verse hand, along any side of the rigid arm and 
 hand, generally caused a concave curvature of the 
 fingers of the subject towards the side whereon the 
 manipulations were made, — producing an upward 
 curvature where the passes were made above the 
 arm, and a lateral or downward curvature, when 
 they were made on the sides, or below. 
 
 10. Besides the special attractive and repellent 
 influences, on parts of the body or limbs, a 
 general attractive influence was found to be crea- 
 ted by the person of the operator on that of the 
 subject. This influence was commonly such as to 
 produce a feeling, for the time and, under given 
 circumstances, of great happiness, and of attach- 
 ment, by consequence, during the seance, to the 
 instrumental source of it. On the retiring of the 
 magnetizer, to a little distance from his subject, 
 a feeling of discomfort, sometimes of intense 
 anxiety verging to tears, was found to take place ; 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. /I 
 
 and such was the measure of attractive influence, 
 under these circumstances, that the sleeping -sub- 
 ject, as has been shewn, would sometimes follow 
 the master-influence in his movements about the 
 room. 
 
 II. The law of distance, in respect to the 
 intensity of these influences, was not determined \ 
 but most conclusively it was shewn to have a 
 ratio of the nature of that of other attracting or 
 repelling powers, — the power diminishing clearly 
 with the increase of the distance ; varying, not 
 improbably, as in other cases, in the ratio of the 
 squares of the distance, inversely. 
 
 III. Of generally repellent influences, of persons 
 and things, on the feelings and sensibilities of the 
 subject in the Zoistic Magnetic condition. 
 
 The results thus far described belonged to in- 
 fluences, chiefly, it would have been observed, 
 betwixt the magnetizer and his subject, whilst no 
 other magnetisms of persons or things were pecu- 
 liarly interfering : but he, the lecturer, had now 
 to speak of influences resulting from the presence 
 or movements of persons near, and from contact, 
 by the magnetizer, either with them or other 
 things. 
 
 1. The general effect of proximity, of other 
 persons than the magnetizer, was found to be 
 unpleasant or painful to the subject, more 
 especially when any movement took place. Or- 
 
72 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 dinarily, a person moving, when the subject was 
 in a sleep-waking, and moderately sensitive, 
 state, was felt at some yards distance ; but, if the 
 state was highly sensitive, — as would more par- 
 ticularly appear in his further accounts of experi- 
 ments, — the magnetized subject was found to be 
 sometimes disturbed by the slightest movements, 
 such as those of the hands, or feet, or head of 
 any of the persons present, though seated in the 
 most distant part of the room ; and to be pain- 
 fully disturbed, or excited, (it might possibly be 
 injuriously) by the near approach, or rude con- 
 tact, of another. 
 
 2. The influence of persons, however, who 
 might be seated near at the commencement of the 
 experiment, or being subsequently brought up by 
 the magnetizer, and placed en rapport with the 
 subject, — was not found, whilst no change in 
 contact, or movement in person, took place, to 
 be disturbing to the subject under magnetic ac- 
 tion, even when in a very sensitive state. 
 
 3. Contact with things, such as the touch of 
 another not being en rapport, or the touch of any 
 article or thing in the room, by the operator in 
 the experiment, would be felt, and that some- 
 times painfully, in cases of delicate susceptibility, 
 by the subject. And the experimenter being 
 touched or pinched by another, might yield, in 
 this case, as had been shewn, a reciprocating feel- 
 ing in the subject ; and his eating or drinking, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 73 
 
 however cautiously and concealedly, might result 
 in community of taste. Nor was this mysterious 
 transference of sensible impressions from the 
 person of the magnetizer to that of the subject, 
 confined to impressions so made whilst the par- 
 ties were in contact ; but might take place, 
 under circumstances favourable for the develop- 
 ment of the phenomena, (as further records would 
 shew) when the parties were separated by con- 
 siderable intervening spaces in the room. 
 
 But the particulars of the results of this order, 
 as developed in a highly sensitive subject, would 
 come in with most advantage, in their proper 
 place, in his descriptions of experimental investi- 
 gations yet to be given. 
 
 4. The magnetized subject, he had generally 
 found, (except in very low states of magnetization) 
 was unregardful of questions asked by the per- 
 sons in the room, and often insensible to any sound 
 from their voices. But in other cases, whilst 
 there was a general inability to discern what they 
 might say, — a disturbing effect, as if from dis- 
 agreeable impressions, was not unfrequently 
 observed to take place. 
 
 IV. Modifications of the phenomena, in polarity, 
 and other peculiar effects, when the subject, Miss 
 
 P , (with whom the results of this fourth 
 
 section were specially obtained,) was dressed in 
 silk or satin fabrics. 
 
74 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 1 . A dress of rich satin, in the case of Miss 
 P 9 was found to render the process of mag- 
 netization slower, and its development less ener- 
 getic. The sleep was not so profound, so that 
 the ear was generally sensible of other voices be- 
 sides that of the magnetizer. 
 
 2. The arm could not be made in like manner 
 rigid, as with a dress of other materials, when a 
 long-sleeved satin dress was worn. The fingers 
 could be extended ; but the elbow and shoulder 
 joints remained flexible. 
 
 3. The satin dress was found to be completely 
 insulating, as to external attractions and re- 
 pulsions. Passes, without contact, over the satin, 
 were imperceptible . The proximity or contact 
 of adverse hands, or feet, was not regarded ; nor 
 did contact over the dress, of the right hand of 
 the operator with the right shoulder, arm, or 
 knee, produce any revulsion of existing happy 
 feeling, or any change in the countenance, or any 
 apparent consciousness of particular sensation. 
 
 4. When the feet of the subject were drawn 
 up beneath the dress, as instinctively they were 
 when one of the persons in the room approached 
 
 the foot of the sofa, she, Miss P , no longer 
 
 regarded the increased proximity. Her mother 
 could now touch the sofa, and even place her 
 hand over the satin-covered feet, without un- 
 pleasant effects being particularly marked. In 
 fact, all within the satin was insulated, — encased 
 
20ISTIC MAGNETISM. ~75 
 
 against external influences, like the tortoise in its 
 shell ! 
 
 5. Insulated, however, as the satin-covered 
 parts of the body were from external influences, 
 they were not defended against the general 
 magnetic or electro-magnetic arrangement ; but 
 were all inductively magnetized. Hence, it was 
 found, that any part, which, whilst covered, was 
 defended from adverse polarities, became instantly 
 susceptible if the insulating material were re- 
 moved. But the magnetic condition was not 
 found to be so intense in the general system, as 
 where the whole person was enrobed in non-elec- 
 trics . It resembled the magnetizing of a soft steel 
 bar by contact, at the extremities only, with the 
 opposite poles of two magnets ; the magnetism 
 was weaker throughout, though generally diffused. 
 
 6. By means of silk fabrics, or other electrics, 
 any portion of the body, when magnetized under 
 the most favourable circumstances of dress and 
 position, could be instantly protected from adverse 
 magnetisms. Thus, with a silk handkerchief 
 interposed, he, Dr. S., could touch, without any 
 apparent discomfort to the subject, her right hand 
 with his right, or her left with his left. Such, 
 also, were the insulating effects of oiled silk ; 
 window glass ; paper covered with sealing-wax 
 varnish ; india-rubber, &c. 
 
 7. The susceptibility of the unprotected parts 
 was, at the same time, as great as ever. If the 
 
76 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 fingers of the operator's incongenial or repellent 
 hand, were bent over the edge of the plate of 
 glass, or extended at all beyond the margin of 
 this or any other insulating substance, — instantly 
 the brow of the subject was seen to contract as 
 indicative of a feeling of discomfort. When he, 
 Dr. S., slid his hand slowly down the satin sleeve 
 over the arm of Miss P. ; the instant that the 
 points of his fingers advanced beyond the pro- 
 tecting dress, the repulsion and disturbance be- 
 came manifest. 
 
 8. Insulation from the earth, in both Magnet- 
 izer and subject — so far as the interposition of 
 thick silk and satin fabrics could avail — did not 
 in any way, that he, Dr. S., could perceive, di- 
 minish or modify the effects. Under this arrange- 
 ment, — no insulting material covering the subject, 
 or being interposed betwixt the subject, and the 
 magnetizer — her eyes were closed in about three 
 minutes, and the sensitiveness, to repellent in- 
 fluences, was found to be as great as under the 
 most favourable circumstances. Hence, it was 
 inferred that the influence productive of the phe- 
 nomena had not, as in frictional electricity, de- 
 pendence on the earth ; but must, like magnetism 
 or voltaic electricity, have its sources inherently, 
 or, in the animal organization. 
 
 9. No disturbance was produced, — either in 
 the state of insulation of the last experiment, or 
 under any other arrangements, — by juxta-position 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 77 
 
 or contact with the magnetized subject, on the 
 needle of the compass, nor on the needle of a 
 delicate galvanometer, nor on the gold leaf of an 
 electrometer. With these several instruments the 
 circuit was variously made, and the modes of 
 contact were variously tried, — especially in con- 
 nection with the points of the fingers when the 
 arms were made rigid, — but no influence what- 
 ever could be detected. In the use of the gal- 
 vanometer, he might mention, the connection 
 was made by means of insulated copper wires, 
 and the circuit was completed in several different 
 ways. 
 
 10. Bar-magnets were also tried, as well as 
 sticks of excited sealing-wax, — their extremities 
 being presented to, or put in contact with, the 
 points of the fingers of the extended and rigid arm, 
 — but no sensible influence, as to attraction or re- 
 pulsion, was, in the case of Miss P , observed. 
 
 These results, however, are not noted as proofs 
 that no influence might be elicited under the 
 action of more powerful magnets, or more 
 strongly excited electrics, or under more felici- 
 tous arrangements ; but only as indicating what 
 occurred in the trials, he, Dr. S., had himself an 
 opportunity of making. 
 
 The next case to which he, Dr. S., should refer, 
 as yielding phenomena which, in his then expe- 
 
78 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 rience, were novel to him, was one already 
 alluded to in his first lecture. 
 
 Amelia O , a young woman of about nine- 
 teen years of age, amiable in disposition, slight 
 and rather delicate looking in person, had become, 
 incidentally, the subject of experiment. She was 
 from the country, and knew nothing, except by 
 brief previous explanation, of what she might 
 probably experience. In a few minutes she was 
 under powerful magnetic influence ; and, though 
 her eyes did not remain permanently closed, it 
 was evident, from the failure of repeated attempts 
 to make her wink, that she saw nothing. Of 
 external impressions, whether of sight or feeling, 
 she seemed to be entirely insensible. Any one 
 in the room, just as well as the magnetizer, could 
 touch her without producing any apparent dis- 
 comfort, — except with a cold hand. Pinching, 
 or other means of making her feel, which could 
 be tried without risk of subsequent unpleasant- 
 ness, were utterly disregarded. In a few minutes 
 after the commencement of the process, her pre- 
 vious grave timidity passed off, and was succeeded 
 by a condition, when left undisturbed, of undevi- 
 ating enjoyment. Sometimes she seemed quite 
 felicitous. She laughed, and talked or sang, 
 almost incessantly. In talking she seemed to 
 have the actual and familiar scenes before her, 
 which she described, or referred to, with a 
 characteristic simplicity and innocency. Her 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. /9 
 
 singing consisted always of hymns, — the senti- 
 ment of which she seemed to feel. 
 
 The phenomenon, in this case, which excited 
 most special interest with all the persons present, 
 was that of community of taste betwixt the sub- 
 ject and the agent in the experiment. He tasted 
 wine, (a liquid w T hich she greatly disliked) and her 
 pleasant happy face was instantly disturbed. He 
 took water, and she became composed. He ate 
 biscuit, (a small thin and crisp kind) and she, 
 smiling, as enjoying it, made movements of the 
 lips and mouth as if eating. The effects were 
 similar w r hen six persons were interposed betwixt 
 the parties ; and, in every variation of the trial 
 — except, when he, Dr. S., went out of the room, 
 and beyond a thick wall — the effects were simi- 
 lar. When the experimenter was out of contact 
 in the middle of the room, with his back turned 
 to the subject ; when he stood on an ottoman 
 covered, with a view T to insulation, with a silk 
 handkerchief ; and even when he retired into a 
 further division of the drawing room, and ate 
 and drank, and drank and ate, with the separat- 
 ing partition, to which folding doors were attach- 
 ed, interposed betwixt them, — she gave exactly 
 the same tokens (except in degree) of dislike to 
 wine, and relish of the biscuit he tasted, as she 
 had done when they were in immediate contact. 
 A thin sweet biscuit which he, Dr. S., also tasted, 
 she relished exceedingly, and remarked, that 'the 
 
80 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 sweet biscuits came from Mrs. W s, she 
 
 knew, because she had taken them in !' Her ob- 
 servations, superadded, on the respective accom- 
 plishments of the cooks of the two households, 
 were at once characteristic and amusing. 
 
 The ordinary means, by gentle processes, failed 
 in waking her up : but, being somewhat relieved 
 from her previous unwillingness to move, she was 
 taken up stairs, to rest, at his, Dr. S's., request, 
 where she washed her hands, still in a state of 
 somnambulism, remarking that the water (of the 
 natural temperature) was warm. She slept it off 
 in a few hours, and rose of her own accord, at the 
 usual time, quite well. 
 
 A third case, the last he, Dr. S., should, in the 
 series of mere experimental investigations, adduce, 
 — was one which, to him, had yielded very singu- 
 lar information and delight. It was that of Miss 
 
 H , to which, in his first lecture (pp. 29-31,) 
 
 he had referred, with respect only, however, of 
 what he might designate an introductory seance ; 
 but which had become, in subsequent experi- 
 ments during three more long seances, increas- 
 ingly important, by reason of new investigations 
 under improved experience, as well as intensely 
 interesting in new or unexpected effects, and 
 in scientifically consistent developments. For, 
 most advantageously, as to the eliciting of such 
 results, it happened, that whilst this lady pos- 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 81 
 
 sessed, naturally, a high degree of sensibility in 
 temperament, and poetry of character, — her gene- 
 ral intelligence and mental cultivation, qualified 
 her for yielding developments of various phe- 
 nomena, under singularly lively and distinctive 
 characteristics. 
 
 The experiments with Miss H , were made 
 
 at the residence of Capt. P , and, at the 
 
 seances now to be described, in the drawing- 
 room. This room, it should be noted, was so 
 commodious and spacious that, when the subject 
 of experiment was on a sofa near one of the win- 
 dows, the company present (which varied from 
 half-a-dozen to about fifteen persons) could be 
 dispersed at considerable distances, — the princi- 
 pal part being generally seated on, or in a line 
 with, a sofa, opposite to the window, so as to 
 admit of a clear interval in the middle of the 
 room, of at least five yards. 
 
 Miss H , it was found, was so susceptible 
 
 of the magnetic influence that, whilst recumbent 
 on the sofa, her eyes could be permanently and 
 completely closed, with very small effort on the 
 part of Dr. S., and without a single pass being 
 made, in the course of from one to three minutes. 
 Sensible effects, indeed, were produced by the 
 quiet and simple process he, Dr. S., had usually 
 adopted, within half-a-dozen seconds of time 
 after the contact of each other's hands. The 
 previous smile changed rapidly, but by gradual 
 
82 ZOTSTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 progress, into a grave expression of countenance 
 — a few slight spasmodic startings occurred — the 
 eyelids, at brief intervals, were transiently shut 
 — the head bowed or fell aside, followed by a 
 brief awakening, as of one just falling asleep — 
 and then the eyes became finally closed. Shortly 
 afterwards, sometimes whilst a few passes were 
 being made, and sometimes before, a sweet and 
 peculiar smile of child-like expression, and indi- 
 cative of great happiness, would' beam upon the 
 countenance, when, conversation and experiments 
 could forthwith be carried on, without particular 
 effort of will or intention on his, Dr. S's., part, or 
 risk of awakening on the part of his subject. 
 
 The phenomena elicited in these experiments 
 were, as to their general characteristics, similar 
 to w T hat had been observed in some of the cases 
 which he, Dr. S., had already described, — par- 
 ticularly in those of the Misses L , W , 
 
 P , and G . But these with Miss H 
 
 were characterized by sensitiveness, by diversity 
 of developments, by advance into the class of 
 the higher and more mysterious effects, — in 
 degree and interest far exceeding what had been 
 exhibited in any previous individual case within 
 his experience. 
 
 Not, however, to go over the ground again 
 which he had hitherto been traversing, where the 
 effects elicited were but ordinary in their charac- 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 83 
 
 ter, he should confine himself, mainly, to the 
 description of developments presenting, to his 
 mind, something new, or more characteristically 
 scientific. And as it might be convenient, for the 
 sake of order and compactness, that the develop- 
 ments of the various seances, obtained through 
 the medium of this admirable subject, should be 
 classified and cast together, — he should now 
 proceed, first of all^ to describe, — 
 
 1 . The exceeding susceptibility of the subject to 
 movements of persons in the room, and within or 
 near the house. 
 
 In the first and second seances with Miss H , 
 
 — various experiments had been made, as well as 
 numerous incidental effects observed, in respect 
 to movements of persons present at the time. Her 
 sensibility was such that the smallest change of 
 position, or even movement of the head or hand, 
 of any of the company, was productive of un- 
 pleasant feelings, — as indicated by the contraction 
 of the brow and the altered expression of the 
 mouth,— as well as, not unfrequently, by a sort of 
 spasmodic action on the body or limbs. The 
 reality and extent of this sensibility had been 
 repeatedly tested by movements designedly made, 
 on his, Dr. S's., suggestion. The results were 
 most decisive, as to an extraordinary perception 
 
 in Miss H , of every movement, though the 
 
 parties might be separated by the breadth of the 
 room. 
 
84 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 On reconsidering these effects, it had occurred 
 to him, Dr. S., that it might be objected — firmly 
 as the eyes were closed — that she had possibly 
 heard and understood, the intimations given by 
 the experimenter, and so he, and others, might 
 have been deceived. To meet this imagined 
 objection, he had provided for the third seance, a 
 large screen — it was a clothes-frame, of about 
 ten feet wide and seven high, covered completely 
 with folds of linen — which was placed betwixt 
 the parties in the room, and the subject under 
 experiment. The screen was about nine feet 
 
 from the sofa on which Miss H w T as lying, 
 
 and about six feet from another sofa at the back 
 of the room, on which four ladies were seated. 
 To avoid the use of words capable of guiding the 
 subject, — could she, by any intuitive operation of 
 mind or imagination, have exhibited the effects 
 she might know to be expected, — he, Dr. S., had 
 prepared a series of written directions for the 
 guidance of his assisting friends, in which cer- 
 tain movements, designed to be made, were indi- 
 cated by numbers instead of words. His numeri- 
 cal signals were to the following effect : — 
 
 1. Let one of the party rise cautiously and 
 stand up, without other movement. 
 
 2. Stretch out the right hand towards the sofa 
 opposite. 
 
 3. Stretch out the left hand. 
 
 4. Raise either hand above the head. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 85 
 
 5. Sit down. 
 
 Thus prepared, and whilst Miss H was 
 
 indicating great contentedness and happiness 
 under contact of the proper hands, he, Dr. S., 
 called softly, "number one," — which was carried 
 into effect in absolute silence ; and instantly the 
 brow contracted, and there was manifest appear- 
 ance of disturbance. "Number two" being called 
 out, the disturbance was increased. "Number 
 three" produced a like effect. "Number four" 
 occasioned still greater disturbance. After "num- 
 ber five" had been called, but few moments 
 elapsed before all was repose and happiness in 
 the expression of countenance of Miss H — — . 
 
 The experiment was repeated several times at 
 the third seance, and verified at the fourth, by 
 different individuals, in succession, behind the 
 screen. Sometimes it was varied by calling first 
 of all — "number two," — and thus going through 
 the series of movements of the hands whilst 
 seated. The effects were similar, though not so 
 great. A still less effect, it was thought, in the 
 degree of disturbance occurred, when a lady with 
 a muslin dress obeyed the call for the various 
 movements, than with one wearing a silk dress. 
 The screen was subsequently overlaid, (above the 
 previous covering of linen), with a quantity of 
 shawls, cloaks, &c, made of fabrics of silk and 
 satin, with a view of ascertaining, whether these 
 might not intercept some of the radiant influence. 
 
86 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 On two or three series of experiments, after the 
 manner of the former, being made, the results 
 seemed to justify the anticipation ; — the effects, 
 generally, though similar in nature to the former, 
 seemed to be considerably less disturbing. 
 
 But the disturbing influence of personal move- 
 ments was not limited to intervals of fourteen or 
 fifteen feet. Persons moving in the hall were 
 
 felt by Miss H ; men working on the lawn 
 
 some forty yards distance produced disturbance ; 
 and carts, passing in a lane when about a hundred 
 yards off, were observed to be exceedingly dis- 
 turbing. Some of these effects, however, might 
 possibly be the result of sound, or vibratory 
 action, on the subject of experiment, the sensi- 
 bility of whose faculties appeared to be singularly 
 great. 
 
 2. The adverse and repellent electricities (?) of 
 all extraneous substances, as to their action on the 
 magnetized subject. 
 
 In using, as if interchangeable, the terms 
 electricity and magnetism, whilst describing his 
 
 experiments with Miss H , he, Dr. S., would 
 
 guard himself against the supposition of his doing 
 so either in looseness of expression, or as if con- 
 sidering these influences identical. His reason 
 for not at once substituting electricity for magne- 
 tism in his general descriptions would hereafter 
 appear ; but, meanwhile, he should feel himself 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 87 
 
 free to adopt either term, for the occasion, just 
 as the one or the other seemed the best adapted 
 to the apparant character of the phenomena. 
 
 Any substance, whatever, taken up from an 
 adjoining table, or from the floor, or from the 
 
 hand of another, produced, in Miss H , an 
 
 effect like that of an electric shock, whenever 
 such substance was brought into contact with the 
 hands, or feet, or indeed any part of the body, or 
 on either side of the body ; — the shock being 
 almost as powerfully felt through the dress, as 
 on the uncovered hands. 
 
 From this effect it was inferred, that all sub- 
 stances had, naturally, a quality of electricity, or 
 of some other subtle influence, adverse to that 
 of the magnetized subject. 
 
 And whilst, as he had before shewn, repellent 
 effects w T ere always produced by a touch of the 
 hand, or knee, or other parts of the body of the 
 experimenter, on any part of the body or limbs 
 of the subject of the same side ; it also was found 
 that if either hand of the experimenter, had had 
 but momentary contact with any extraneous per- 
 son or substance, having its natural polarity, then 
 it became repellent and unpleasant to the subject, 
 no matter on what side, or part of the body, it 
 might be placed. It might be further stated, 
 that such was the inductive influence of these 
 adverse electricities, that, after either hand 
 of the operator had touched, (or, he believed 
 
SB ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 had been placed very near to) his own person oil 
 the converse side, — its action was found to have 
 become repellent to the subject on the side even 
 where, in its undisturbed polarity, it had been 
 wont to have a soothing or a pleasurable in- 
 fluence. 
 
 3. The neutralizing of the adverse or repellent 
 electricities, of bodies or substances extraneous to 
 the magnetized subject, by the breathing thereon by 
 the magnetizer. 
 
 Until he, Dr. S., discovered this simple method 
 of neutralizing extraneous electricities, or re- 
 ducing them to the condition of his own polarities, 
 — his experiments on the effects of contact or 
 proximity of extraneous substances with his very 
 susceptible subject, had been surrounded with, ap- 
 parently, inextricable embarrassments. Though, 
 indeed, he might reduce his own repellent local 
 polarities, into some measure of conformity with 
 those of his subject, by persevering in contact, or 
 making passes on the parts having adverse con- 
 ditions of magnetism (or electricity) — and, by 
 similar treatment of extraneous substances, might 
 bring them into like congeniality ; yet these pro- 
 cesses were often attended with such great dis- 
 comfort or pain to his kindly confiding friend, 
 and sometimes required so much time for the 
 required purpose being effected, that he was 
 vastly relieved and aided when he found, — that 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 89 
 
 what had previously been a work of much diffi- 
 culty, might now, by the mere act of breathing, 
 be accomplished in a moment ! 
 
 Thus whilst an instantaneous touch of any 
 part of the left side of his sensitive subject, with 
 a finger of his left hand, had invariably occa- 
 sioned a start, as if by an electric shock, with a 
 change of countenance from an expression, per- 
 haps, of extreme happiness to that of displeasure 
 or distress, — the same act being done after 
 merely breathing on the points of his fingers, was 
 attended either by an agreeable, or indifferent, 
 result. 
 
 In like manner contact with extraneous sub- 
 stances, which ordinarily produced a convulsive 
 start, would often be sustained after breathing 
 on the erratic hand, by which they were taken 
 up, without the smallest indication of either pain 
 or dislike. 
 
 But the phenomena elicited, under the alter- 
 nate action of the natural or adverse polarities, 
 and of the neutralized condition, were so truly 
 astonishing and beautiful as to deserve more 
 particular description. 
 
 When, with a stick of red sealing-wax, taken 
 from off an adjoining table, he touched the hand, 
 
 or arm, knee or foot of Miss H , on either 
 
 side, she started, as if convulsively ; and when he 
 repeated contact after contact, on the same side 
 or part, several repetitions of the shock, though 
 with a gradual diminution of intensity, took place. 
 
90 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 After renewing the adverse contact of the sealing- 
 wax with the table, or with the hands of one of 
 the persons in the room, he again touched the 
 
 hand of Miss H , with it, and, as before, there 
 
 was a convulsive start ; he then breathed on the 
 wax and again touched her, when, instead of a 
 shock and frown in the face, there was a quiet 
 contented smile. This experiment, varying, in 
 all conceivable ways, the manner of contact with 
 adverse substances, he repeated, during three 
 seances, at least a hundred times. And so rapid 
 and certain were the changes — when, for instance, 
 he touched Miss H 's hand with the sealing- 
 wax, alternately after contact with the sleeve of 
 his coat, and after breathing upon it, — that they ap- 
 peared absolutely marvellous : for there was now 
 a shock and frown, then a smile of satisfaction ; 
 now a shock, then a smile, as rapid, in their 
 changes, as the several manipulations could be 
 effected, and as specific and characteristic in the 
 effects, as the results of any process in electricity 
 or magnetism whatever ! 
 
 So, also, were the results, when contact with 
 his hand, having adverse polarity, was made, before 
 and after breathing on it. Before the breathing, 
 there was a start with a frown ; after the breath- 
 ing, no start, but a complacent smile. In like 
 manner, when his proper hand was applied to his 
 subject, after contact with some extraneous sub- 
 stance, or with the wrong side of his body ; the 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 91 
 
 relative effects, before and after breathing thereon, 
 were similar : — for when the acts of contact and 
 breathing were made at intervals of scarcely two 
 seconds of time, and, alternated by numerous 
 repetitions, the expected phenomena always took 
 place with equal celerity and uniformity. 
 
 He must not omit, however, here to remark, 
 that the neutralizing effect of breathing on his 
 own hand was distinctly local. It made no 
 change on the general polarities of the rest of his 
 system. For, after the hand had been so neu- 
 tralized, the shoulder, elbow, knee, &c. of the 
 same side, were found still to possess their dis- 
 tinctive polarities. 
 
 Similar experiments to those he had just des- 
 cribed, with a variety of substances, possessing 
 very different qualities in respect of ordinary 
 electricity, were also tried, and with correspond- 
 ing results. Glass, crystals, metals, silk, paper, 
 &c, were subjected to the same kind of process. 
 In some of them, indeed, especially in the case 
 of electrics generally, — it was needful, he ima- 
 gined, to handle the substance and breathe upon 
 it longer than with a non-electric, before the 
 condition of agreeable neutrality seemed to be 
 produced. But this condition, after a little 
 perseverance, was invariably found to be pro- 
 duced. 
 
 The effects of breathing, it should be observed, 
 were not peculiar, as by experiment, he had found, 
 
92 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 to the human or animal electricity. For on ex- 
 citing a stick of sealing-wax, or a cylinder of 
 glass, under atmospheric circumstances highly 
 favourable to the electrical development, he found 
 he could neutralize its action on a delicate gold- 
 leaf electrometer, in a few moments, by this very 
 process. No matter what was the cause,— 
 whether the breath, the dampness, or the force 
 of air, — the result was similar to what had been 
 realized in the experiments he had described. 
 
 In the experiments with this young lady, how- 
 ever, it was important to notice, — that she her- 
 self was t he actual electrometer, — an electrometer 
 of exquisite sensibility and delicacy. For whilst 
 no electricities or magnetisms in her, could be 
 made to shew sensible action on his delicate 
 galvanometer, electrometer, or compass needle ; 
 she, the subject, was sensible of electrical, or other 
 changes, which, probably, could not be detected 
 by any instrument ever yet fabricated or devised 
 by man ! 
 
 4. The insulating poiver of electrics. 
 
 This important fact in natural science, was 
 
 beautifully exhibited in the case of Miss H . It 
 
 was not, however, until after he, Dr. S., had dis- 
 covered the neutralizing effect of breathing, so as to 
 be able to disembarrass such materials of existing 
 electricities, that he was able at all to connect 
 these effects with the results attained from ex- 
 periments with Miss P . 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 93 
 
 Miss H , whilst under the magnetic in- 
 fluence, being an electrometer, as he had stated, 
 of exquisite sensibility, caused all insulating sub- 
 stances, on the early trials, apparently to fail. 
 But, under the neutralizing process referred to, 
 he ultimately found them abundantly and charac- 
 teristically effective. 
 
 Thus having breathed over a sheet of paper 
 covered with red sealing-wax varnish, which, 
 previously, had occasioned something like a shock, 
 — he found that when it was laid on his right 
 knee, the hand of the same side of Miss H. would 
 rest quietly thereon, being defended by its perfect 
 insulation from the discordant influences. But 
 when the intervening paper was withdrawn, 
 instantly the face would be darkened by a frown 
 and the hand snatched away. 
 
 The effect of silk, compared with the develop- 
 ments in the case of Miss P , was, on his 
 
 early trials, most perplexing. He had placed a 
 silk handkerchief, with a view to insulation, over 
 his right knee which was contiguous to the right 
 side of his subject ; but when he attempted to 
 place her right hand upon it, the silk was found 
 to be repellent like the knee itself; and when he 
 threw the handkerchief, as he took it from the 
 knee, upon any part of the right side of Miss 
 
 H , it occasioned a shuddering repellency, as 
 
 of an adverse electricity. But having breathed 
 on and through the handkerchief, it no longer pro- 
 
94 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 duced discomposure in the subject, no matter 
 on what part of her person it might be thrown. 
 
 With the silk handkerchief thus neutralized by 
 breathing through it, the reality of its protecting 
 power was beautifully shewn. Being so pre- 
 pared, and laid over the experimenter's right 
 knee, the right hand of the subject, naturally ad- 
 verse to such a contact, was placed upon it, 
 where it reposed in perfect quiescence. Whilst 
 so situated, he, Dr. S., slowly and cautiously 
 drew away the handkerchief from betwixt the 
 reposing hand and the sustaining knee : when, 
 at the very instant that the insulation was violated, 
 
 the arm of Miss H , bending at the elbow 
 
 joint, flew up with a sudden, and rather violent, 
 blow against her shoulder ! At different seances, 
 and on several occasions, this curious and beauti- 
 ful experiment was repeated. Sometimes he 
 engaged the attention of his subject by conversa- 
 tion, whilst the withdrawal of the silk fabric was 
 stealthily going on ; but the result was utterly 
 independent of either the attention or will of his 
 subject. The bending of the arm was always the 
 same and always as sudden. It reminded him, 
 though a converse motion, of the release of a 
 spring bayonet attached to a blunderbuss which 
 he happened to possess, in which the bayonet 
 flew out, with startling velocity, the instant the 
 retaining bolt or trigger was withdrawn. 
 
 Another striking instance of insulation, which 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 95 
 
 was shewn on two different occasions, deserves 
 yet to be described, — consisting of the insulation, 
 in silk, of the person of one of the company. 
 
 The Honorable Mrs. W , being dressed in 
 
 silk, and with a gown so ample as to touch the 
 floor all round when she was standing at rest, — 
 covered her head and arms, at Dr. S's. suggestion, 
 with a small silk mantle, which was lying loose 
 at her hand, and then, being beckoned forward, 
 walked up to within about a yard of the magne- 
 tized subject. Under other circumstances the 
 effect would have been almost convulsive ; but 
 
 now the approach of Mrs. W , so thoroughly 
 
 enveloped in silk, was hardly noticed. But when 
 a hand was cautiously thrust out from beneath ; 
 or when the mantle was just opened in front so 
 as to expose only a very small portion of the face, 
 and but one eye, — there was instantly a start and 
 
 a frown in Miss H , (though her face was not 
 
 in that direction) with a disturbance so increas- 
 ingly distressing that Mrs. W. had either to renew 
 her insulation, or retreat to the farther side of 
 the room. 
 
 By these experiments, he, Dr. S., conceived it 
 to be abundantly shewn, that the electric con- 
 dition of the sensitive magnetized subject, and 
 the insulating power of electrics, — as originally 
 
 developed in Miss P , — were not the effect 
 
 of any idiosyncracy, in her case, but phenomena* 
 of a general character in Zoistic Magnetism. 
 
96 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 5. The conversion of painful inflictions into 
 pleasurable sensations. 
 
 This result was realized oil, perhaps, a hundred 
 trials, made, at intervals, during the four long 
 seances with Miss H— — . As any severities in- 
 flicted during the magnetic insensibility, would 
 be felt, as injuries, on the awakening of the sub- 
 ject, he, Dr. $., could, of course, make trial of 
 no pain-giving action beyond pinching, or prick- 
 ing slightly with a pin, — and to the extent only, 
 in either mode, to which persons in sport might 
 try the sensibilities of one another. 
 
 But the effect of these, ordinarily, pain-giving 
 processes, yielded to his magnetized friend, under 
 the action of his proper hand, only pleasurable 
 sensations. On pinching the top of her left foot, 
 with the finger and thumb of his right hand, 
 there was always an indication of enjoyment, and 
 so, that the harder he pinched the more expres- 
 sive and obvious were the signs of pleasure. 
 Sometimes she would laugh out, as if in excess of 
 enjoyment, and, being asked, why she laughed, 
 she would reply — "because it is so pleasant." 
 Very often as he pinched her, in order to shew 
 to others the curious effect, she would say — " I 
 like that": "goon": " it is delightful" : just as 
 in the ordinary state of the human system the 
 like process would give pain to the subject ; so 
 in the magnetic state, and under the proper 
 polarities, there were regularly produced the con- 
 trary feelings ! 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 97 
 
 The effect of pricking with a pin was equally 
 curious. For very many trials, indeed, he had 
 been greatly embarrassed on finding a pin handed 
 to him, or thrown to him, or taken from a table, 
 always producing a sudden start and frown. And 
 though he neutralized the electricity of the hand 
 with which he took up the pin, he found the effect 
 the same. Or w r hen, having taken up the pin 
 and dropped it on the person of the subject over 
 the centre of the chest, he had breathed on his 
 hand before he took it up, — he still found a shock 
 and pain produced. He found it difficult to be- 
 lieve, in respect to these results, that the small sub- 
 stance of the pin could in itself retain a quantity 
 of adverse influence sufficient to produce the 
 effects he witnessed. Ultimately, he inferred, 
 that part of the effect might probably be due to 
 the electricity induced on his hand in taking up 
 the pin, even when he had had no contact with, 
 but only proximity to, an adverse polarity ; but 
 still some repellent quality, after all allowances 
 for such influence, seemed to abide in the metal 
 of the pin. 
 
 Having, however, effectually neutralized the 
 electricity of the pin, and of his own right hand 
 whilst holding it, he found the action of its point, 
 on the hands or feet of Miss H- , just as plea- 
 sant as the act of pinching ! The more he 
 pricked, the more she smiled approvingly. If he 
 questioned her, whether she would not be dis- 
 
98 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 pleased on awakening, to find herself pinched or 
 pricked ? — she always said " No, I shall not." 
 "Hike it" : "do it again" : "go on." 
 
 That pain, in the waking state, would have 
 resulted from these experiments, he, Dr. S., had 
 been abundantly satisfied by the fact, that the 
 foot of his young friend was quite sore the day 
 after the third seance ; and the hand, w T hich, in the 
 fourth seance, he had more particularly practiced 
 on with the pin, was found covered with red spots 
 in the places where he had inadvertently pressed 
 the pin within the surface of the skin. 
 
 The conclusion w r hich would, he conceived, be 
 inevitably arrived at from these results, must be 
 confirmatory of the statements so frequently put 
 forth, — as to the adaptation of the condition of 
 mesmerized patients for the undergoing of opera- 
 tions without either anxiety or pain. From his 
 own experiments, — now imperfectly described, — 
 he, Dr. S., felt fully convinced, that, had the 
 operator, in an amputation, had his patient in the 
 condition of Miss H., whilst he was relatively in 
 that of the magnetizer, not only could an opera- 
 tion have been performed without pain, but, 
 possibly, under an experience of pleasurable sen- 
 sations ! 
 
 6. The attachment of the hands, feet, fyc, of the 
 magnetized subject, immoveable/, as to any power in 
 herself, to the sofa, or to the floor of the room. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 99 
 
 Of this species of phenomena, he, the lecturer, 
 had hitherto been himself incredulous. He had 
 been disposed to ascribe to deception on the part 
 of the operator, or intention on the part of the 
 subject, the phenomena of this kind which he had 
 witnessed in some public exhibitions ; and where 
 he had heard of specific cases, altogether beyond 
 suspicion, because of the known integrity of the 
 parties, he had still doubted, in respect, to the ex- 
 tent of th.eiiAu.ence asserted, whether the observers 
 might not have been deceived ? All, therefore, 
 which he could justly claim from those who, like 
 himself, had been incredulous, was to give 
 credit to him and the lady who kindly submitted 
 to be his subject of experiment, for their personal 
 integrity, — and then, duly considering the record 
 he had to give of what he had himself, instru- 
 mently, accomplished, judge according to fair and 
 just judgment. 
 
 Finding, on his second seance with Miss H , 
 
 such a wonderful power and effect, magnetically 
 or electrically, when he breathed on any article 
 in a condition adverse to the polarities of his sub- 
 ject, — it occurred to him to try, whether, by any 
 such process, as that referred to, he could attach 
 her hand to the back of the sofa ? The idea of 
 this experiment, as well as the species of attach- 
 ment he proposed to try, was stimulated in some 
 degree by a matter of convenience, viz : — the secur- 
 ing his subject, on the sofa, (she having previously 
 
100 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 followed him when he retreated from her side) 
 whilst he should try certain experiments, respect- 
 ing community of taste, when out of contact. He 
 made the contemplated trial, breathing on the 
 back of the sofa and then placing the flat of Miss 
 
 H 's left hand on the spot, when, to his no 
 
 small surprise, he found she could not remove it. 
 For, when he now retired into the middle of the 
 
 room, though Miss H nearly threw herself 
 
 off the sofa in the effort to follow, her hand 
 remained steadily affixed. He next attached, by 
 the like process, the other hand to the sofa pillow, 
 and both the feet to the foot of the sofa. All were 
 found to be attached, as to any power in herself, 
 immoveably. And so rigidly were the feet 
 retained that, though he, Dr. S., exerted consider- 
 able force in attempting to raise them, he was 
 unable, whilst in a sitting posture at least, to 
 effect his object. 
 
 Subsequently, when Miss H had followed 
 
 him on the floor, he tried another experiment of 
 which he had often heard, and as constantly dis- 
 believed ; — the making of a line, or circle, on 
 the floor with his hand, with the view of arresting 
 the movements of his subject within that invisible 
 cordon. The trial, to his great surprize, suc- 
 ceeded; for his subject, who had aforetime followed 
 him in his meanderings amid the furniture of the 
 room, was now suddenly arrested ; and arrested, 
 as it appeared, by such irresistable agency, that, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 101 
 
 in her anxiety to pass, she supplicated in the 
 most earnest and touching manner to be released, 
 throwing herself into postures which, for express- 
 iveness and gracefulness, were fit for studies for 
 the painter or statuary ! So touching and earnest 
 
 indeed, was the manner of Miss H , whilst 
 
 thus apparently held by an unseen and almost 
 unimaginable power, — that those who witnessed 
 the scene were greatly moved by it, one of the 
 ladies, especially, even to tears. 
 
 Explanation of this strange phenomenon, he, 
 Dr. S., should not in the present place, attempt, 
 except negatively r , to give. That it was not the effect 
 of attraction, according to the ordinary nature 
 of this principle, he had obtained, he thought, 
 conclusive proof. He had placed his silk hand- 
 kerchief beneath the hand w T hich he attached to 
 the back of the sofa, and then raised, without 
 undue violence, the previously attached hand. 
 The handkerchief remained, when the hand was 
 drawn off ; though the hand instantly fell back to 
 its place, when he relinquished his hold of it. He 
 again interposed a book betwixt the hand and the 
 sofa ; but the hand which had seemed to be 
 attached to the book, could be raised, whilst the 
 book remained in its place. 
 
 In respect to the apparent attachment to the 
 floor, too, his present explanation would be little 
 more than negative. It was not, he believed, 
 from the force of either attractive or repellent 
 
102 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 powers in the magnetized line on the floor. If 
 the attracted subject had not felt the act done by 
 the magnetizer on the floor, he doubted whether 
 she would have been arrested at all, in her 
 attempt to step beyond it. For on his quickly 
 turning round the screen, when his subject, on 
 the other side, was free to follow, and mak- 
 ing a stroke of his hand on the floor, as he had 
 done before, — she crossed the invisible line, in 
 her progress whilst following him, without ap- 
 parent consciousness, or any interruption. 
 
 He might mention in this connection, the em- 
 barrassing effects, produced on the sleep-walker 
 whilst following him, from proximity of the par- 
 ties present at the seance. The painful sensation 
 she seemed to experience, and the sudden starts 
 she made, when she came unexpectedly near any 
 one ; the indications of aversion, or almost terror, 
 she manifested, as arrested in her course when he, 
 Dr. S., slipped betwixt the chairs whereon two 
 ladies were seated, — were singularly curious and 
 interesting. 
 
 7. Community of taste out of contact. 
 
 In the first two seances, he, Dr. S., had tested 
 this striking phenomenon in a variety of ways. 
 He had found that any thing taken from the 
 table, or the hand of another person, or even out 
 of his own pocket, being a substance to be tasted^ 
 produced, on his eating or drinking it, disturbing 
 
ZOIST1C MAGNETISM. 103 
 
 effects. He thus tasted, with his back turned 
 
 to Miss H , and whilst he stood in the middle 
 
 of the room, — a variety of substances — such as 
 fruit, or ginger, lozenges, wine, or what was most 
 offensive, a decoction of bark. Decided marks 
 of disturbance instantly followed each trial of this 
 kind ; whilst effects, as of extreme or sickening 
 disgust, were produced by the sympathy of taste 
 when he took some of the decoction of bark. But 
 still more surprizing was the change, from the 
 suffering expression, or displeased scowl, when 
 having breathed upon either of the articles pre- 
 viously so distressing, the features were found to 
 relax, and, as he continued to breath on it, the 
 face at length indicated satisfaction, whilst the 
 lips and mouth began to move as if enjoying 
 something agreeable. Even the disgusting de- 
 coction, after it had been duly breathed upon, 
 produced an expression of at least questioning 
 approval, if not of satisfaction, in the sympathy 
 of taste ! 
 
 But these experiments being all made within 
 the ordinary range of vision, — though, indeed, 
 not visible, because of the operator's position, and 
 of the closed eyes of the subject, — it was 
 deemed desirable, in order to the demonstration 
 being incontrovertible, to repeat them behind the 
 screen. Dr. S., having, therefore, secured his 
 friend under experiment from rising to follow 
 him,— by breathing on the sofa and attaching her 
 
104 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 hands thereto, — he went behind the screen, and^ 
 whilst others watched the effects, he repeated 
 several of the experiments of tasting. On this 
 occasion he took lozenges, to eat, and some strong 
 tea, which he had prepared in a vial, to drink, — 
 and the effects were precisely as before. On 
 tasting any of these, as they first came to hand, 
 
 Miss H 's countenance became greatly dis- 
 
 disturbed. Asking her the reason, she complained 
 — " it was unpleasant" — " she did not like it" — 
 and requested him not to take it ! But just as 
 before, when he tasted more of any of the same 
 articles after handling them and breathing upon 
 them, the countenance changed its expression, 
 not unfrequently into that of pleasure, — whilst 
 she would sometimes answer to the question 
 " whether she liked it ?" — " yes" — or " more ; 
 more !" 
 
 In these latter experiments on community of 
 taste, he, Dr. S., was at a distance of about 
 
 twelve feet from Miss H , with the screen, 
 
 covered with linen and silk draperies, standing 
 betwixt them ! 
 
 Further experiments were also made at the 
 fourth seance, which served for the verification 
 of the results he had just described. Tasting, 
 covertly, a variety of articles whilst he held one of 
 
 Miss H 's hands, — her alternate dislike, and 
 
 complacent endurance, of things unpleasant, were 
 most characteristic of the peculiar phenomena 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 105 
 
 previously determined. Miss H— ~, however, 
 seldom named the article he tasted, when ques- 
 tioned about it, — whether it was taken in con- 
 tact or at a distance, — but seemed to realize the 
 distinctive quality of the taste. When he had 
 taken first tincture of rhubarb, with which she 
 was excessively annoyed, and then mint lozenge, 
 — he found that the effect could not be easily 
 obliterated by the usual process of tasting again 
 after breathing. She complained, almost angrily, 
 of this treatment, saying — "why did you put 
 such nasty things in my mouth ?" <c I hate 
 them." And even after he, Dr. S., had taken 
 some water — which certainly did not materially 
 benefit his palate — she complained of his giving 
 her all sorts of nasty tastes in her mouth ! 
 
 Out of contact, and again behind the screen, 
 the effects were similar to those previously 
 elicited ; but no accurate designation, he should 
 observe, was given to any of the several articles 
 he tasted in these latter experiments. 
 
 8. A glimpse at Clairvoyance. 
 
 Though he, Dr. S., did not attach much value 
 to his trial of the powers of his subject, in this 
 much disputed and mysterious province of his re- 
 searches ; yet he thought it well to communicate 
 the result of this investigation. He would mention 
 two or three particulars, bearing on the minor 
 phenomena, from which, they, his audience, might 
 
106 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 form their own conclusions. The facts, at least, 
 were curious. 
 
 A flower having been thrown by one of the 
 company against the back of Miss H's. head, she 
 started, rather violently. He took it cautiously 
 up, quite out of her sight, he believed, had her 
 eyes even been open, and, having breathed on it, 
 replaced it. She was now quiescent under the 
 same kind of contact as had, just before, been so 
 painful to her. On asking her "What it was?" 
 she replied, "A flower. " "What kind of flower ?" 
 "White and yellow." It was a species of nar- 
 cissus, of the colours named. 
 
 A book was next handed to him. It was a 
 reprint of an old edition of "Sir John Maun- 
 devile's Voige and Travaile," and was opened at 
 a page containing a curious wood cut, — a man 
 with a goose's head. He placed it cautiously on 
 the top of Miss H's. head, and she immediately 
 burst out in a laugh, remarking — "how funny," 
 —"how queer." "What is it?" Dr. S. asked. 
 "I don't know," was the reply ; "but it's very 
 queer." Another page was then applied to the 
 top of the head, where there was a cut of a bird 
 with two necks and two heads. She expressed 
 annoyance, and said, "I don't like it : it's heavy : 
 take it away." "What is it ?" he enquired. "It's 
 foolish : take it down : I don't like old books." 
 "It's not an old book," he replied. "It is," she 
 repeated : "I don't like old books." 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 107 
 
 He finally suggested for her consideration a 
 residence of his sister's in Yorkshire, asking her 
 to describe it. In order to bring it more fully 
 before her mind, he described the general locality 
 of the house, as being about six miles from 
 Whitby, near the railway, and proposed that she, 
 
 Miss H , should take a journey with him 
 
 there. He then asked her " if she could describe 
 the house ?" She complained of "being too 
 sleepy" : then of "its being too dark." Keeping 
 her to the subject, she at last said, — "Oh, I think 
 I see it now — it's a white house ; but it is too 
 dark: foggy." "What kind of house is it?" 
 "Not very large ; but friendly ; comfortable." 
 "What is the form of it ?" he then enquired. "Is 
 it high and narrow, or broad ?" "Broad : not 
 very high," was the reply. "Is it all the same 
 height ?" " No : it is higher in the middle." 
 "Do you see any thing particular in the kitchen ?" 
 — he farther asked, — "Or any pictures in the 
 rooms ?" " No : it is too dark ; I can't see it." 
 "What do you see else ?" "There is a bridge." 
 "What kind of bridge ?" "Red : it is brick, I 
 think." 
 
 Now these several particulars, except what was 
 said about the bridge, happened to be correct. 
 And all, but the bridge, he had himself thought 
 about. There were three bridges very near the 
 house ; but none of them built of brick. Were 
 the particulars thus consistently described derived 
 
108 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 from pictures in his mind ? Or were they happy 
 guesses ? To him, the results, though curious, 
 did not appear conclusive. The facts were before 
 his audience ; they must judge for themselves. 
 
 9. The stimulating of natural faculties, and of 
 educational acquirements. 
 
 Among the great variety of interesting phe- 
 nomena elicited in his experiments with Miss 
 
 H , there was nothing in any of the results, 
 
 he believed, — not even in those of which he had 
 himself been most incredulous, — at all bordering 
 on the supernatural. Nor was there anything 
 in the beautiful and astonishing effects he had 
 now to describe, beyond what might be reasonably 
 ascribed to an extraordinary excitement and 
 stimulation of natural faculties and educational 
 acquirements. 
 
 The phenomena to which specially he referred, 
 had respect to extemporaneous singing and dra- 
 matic action — which were elicited in the manner 
 he would now attempt to describe. 
 
 On one occasion — the last and most important 
 seance of the series under review, — he had 
 arrested the progress of Miss H., whilst following 
 him about the room, by passing his hand rapidly, 
 in a semi-circular line, over the carpet in advance 
 of her. The anxiety she evinced, as he, Dr. S,, 
 retired from her beyond this species of magic 
 barrier, was productive of actions and sensible 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 109 
 
 emotions of a highly interesting and dramatic 
 description, — now supplicating, now coaxing, 
 with such singular variety of touching expression, 
 as to bring out the feelings of her friends in 
 sympathetic emotions or tears. 
 
 But the more remarkable effects were elicited, 
 when, at the suggestion of one of her friends, 
 he, Dr. S., asked her to sing. For some time she 
 hesitated, — c she doubted whether she could sing ; 
 she was too sleepy ; too tired.' Urging her to do 
 so, however, on the ground that he should much 
 like it, she said, ' she would try ;' and so surpriz- 
 ing was the result of the trial that the parties 
 present were overwhelmed with astonishment and 
 delight. Her song was an operatic piece in 
 German, which none of her friends had ever 
 heard before. It was in fact extemporaneous ; 
 yet elegant, varied, and beautiful. From the 
 highest notes within the compass of her voice, 
 which were sustained with undeviating softness 
 and delicacy, she would descend in felicitous 
 warbling, and elegant conceptions of musical 
 effect, — elaborating her subject with the happiest 
 introduction of minor passages, and beautifully 
 executed cadences ; whilst the admirable and 
 graceful action, with which her singing was ac- 
 companied, yielded a power of expression to her 
 varied emotions, which was highly dramatic and 
 beautiful. Sometimes her feelings seemed elevated, 
 as by a species of sacred inspiration ; sometimes 
 
110 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 the expression was softly delicate and touching ; 
 sometimes, as towards the conclusion when she 
 was portraying some incident of heart-rending 
 sorrow, her mingled expression of horror and 
 woe was of inimitable effectiveness. 
 
 The power of highly stimulated emotions, of 
 elevated, pure and empassioned feelings, thus 
 developed in natural action and expression, — had 
 yielded, he was authorized to say, to several in- 
 dividuals of cultivated taste who had participated 
 with him in the enjoyment of the unexpected 
 exhibition, a measure of astonishment and delight, 
 such as, under artistical performance of highest 
 merit, they had rarely realized. For himself, he 
 might say, it was the finest thing, of this species 
 of talent, he had ever witnessed. 
 
 He, Dr. S., had asked the friends of Miss 
 
 H , if they had ever heard any thing like this 
 
 before ? They had often heard and admired her 
 singing ; but anything at all comparable with 
 this they had never heard. He asked the per- 
 former herself, in the fulness of his surprise as 
 she concluded, — where she had learnt it ? " I 
 never learnt it ;" was the reply. " Where did 
 you get it then ?" he asked. " You gave it to 
 me." "You are not speaking accurately," he 
 added ; " do not deceive me." " If I did," she 
 answered, "you would know." 
 
 But this interesting and beautiful scene did not 
 terminate here. He had at first touched, he 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. Ill 
 
 believed, by the way of experiment, the place 
 assigned, phrenologically, to the organ of tune. 
 He now touched the place of "tune" and 
 
 "veneration," and requested Miss H , "to 
 
 sing something more." How far any result came 
 of this, his audience would judge for themselves. 
 But, curiously enough, it happened, that shortly 
 after he had removed his fingers from the speci- 
 fied contact, Miss H began again to sing. It 
 
 was a portion of the beautiful air of Haydn, — 
 " with verdure clad." It was performed, as some 
 who were present described it, with an uplifted 
 face and angelic expression, and feeling of devo- 
 tion, that was truly sublime ! But she did not 
 complete it. " She forgot it ; and was very 
 tired." 
 
 No one but those present, it would be felt, 
 could possibly appreciate the admirable effect of 
 this performance. He, Dr. S., however, had the 
 support of different persons who witnessed it, in 
 this opinion, — that his description (which he had 
 put in writing and read over to them) fairly 
 represented the facts, and was anything but 
 exaggerated. 
 
 10. General concluding remarks on this most 
 interesting case. 
 
 During the whole of the time, within the 
 several seances, in which the experiments, yield- 
 ing the results he had described, were being 
 
112 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 carried on ; — Miss H , never, for a moment, 
 
 that he observed, opened her closely compressed 
 eye-lids. Her state of feeling, when lying on the 
 sofa, and free from actions or movements of a 
 disturbing nature, was uniformly one of happy 
 enjoyment or felicity. It was a species of feli- 
 citous somnambulism. 
 
 Every attempt, to make her hear and under- 
 stand what was said by the persons in the room, 
 failed. Generally their voices were inaudible to 
 her, though sometimes, a loud call would pro- 
 duce a slight disturbance. In order to test the 
 inaudibility of other voices than his, — an an- 
 nouncement had been twice made (not justified, 
 however, by fact) in a quick and loud tone, of 
 what it was well known would have been. most 
 startling to her had she heard it. But she con- 
 tinued quietly smiling whilst he, Dr. S., was hold- 
 ing one of her hands. 
 
 In no case did she experience any inconveni- 
 ence, from the elaborate trials of experiments on 
 her, except mere ordinary tiredness, which soon 
 went off. On one occasion, she was suffering so 
 much from head-ache before the seance com- 
 menced, as to induce Mrs. P to bathe her 
 
 forehead and temples w 7 ith eau de cologne. 
 During the seance he, Dr. S., had noticed ex- 
 pressions indicative of continuance of the pain. 
 He placed his hands on her forehead, the flat of 
 the palms, when she immediately expressed her 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 113 
 
 sense of relief : — c she liked that :' ' it took away 
 her head-ache.' And so it proved, for when she 
 was awoke up she was free from pain and per- 
 fectly well. She generally slept well afterwards, 
 and felt no unpleasant effects from her previous 
 discipline, and, sometimes, trying exercises ; — on 
 the contrary, she felt better than usual (as it was 
 
 reported to him by friends of Miss H ) and 
 
 had been more free from accustomed head-ache. 
 
 She had no recollection whatever afterwards of 
 the incidents which, to her friends, had been so 
 striking and interesting. She did not know, till 
 told of it, that she had been on the floor, singing, 
 &c. A general recollection of happiness, with a 
 vague feeling that she had been in sorrow when 
 so exercised on the floor, — was all that she seemed 
 to have been aware of. 
 
 When Miss H was following him about the 
 
 room, he might further observe, she saw nothing, 
 as she intimated, but her magnetizer ; and when 
 questioned as to how she saw him she said — ' she 
 knew very well' ; c she felt w r here he w r as.' 
 Whenever he stopped retreating from her, and 
 took one or both of her outstretched hands, then 
 she was perfectly satisfied, and her happy expres- 
 sion of countenance was instantly restored. One 
 curious variety occurred. For the sake of ex- 
 periment, he, Dr. S., took up a silk mantle lying 
 in his way, and, whilst Miss H. was following 
 him, held it up before his chest and body 
 
 H 
 
114 ZOTSTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 awaiting her approach. Her anxiety to advance 
 was now thwarted by the adverse electricity of 
 the silk, which proved effectually repellent. The 
 conflict of feeling and sensation was strikingly 
 conspicuous ; and the mixed expression produced 
 by the conflicting influences «w T as extremely 
 curious and interesting. 
 
 It might be added, in regard to these experi- 
 ments generally, that a considerable difference 
 in the degree of susceptibility at different seances 
 was observable,— though less in the case of 
 Miss H than in that of any other of his fre- 
 quently tried subjects : — and he was led to infer 
 that the state of the atmosphere had a consider- 
 able influence on, what might be called, the 
 electrical phenomena, — these being quite inferior 
 in interest, he thought, when the atmosphere w T as 
 damp and in a bad state for ordinary electricity. 
 
 The influence and power of Zoistic Magnetism 
 in certain diseases, had been so abundantly 
 proved by a large number of practical mesmerists, 
 medical men and others, that it could no longer, 
 he believed, as a general fact, be considered a 
 matter of doubt. The history of the success of 
 Mr. Greatrakes, within the period of 1662 — 1666, 
 — as given in " Douglas's Criterion or Miracles 
 examined," published nearly a century ago, as 
 well as in several other publications of the very 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 115 
 
 time — abundantly shews, not only that this in- 
 fluence was used curatively at that period, but 
 with very surprizing effects. 
 
 In this important department of practical 
 utility, he, Dr. S., had had but trifling experience. 
 For with the objects he had in view, as already 
 stated, it was more advantageous to make experi- 
 ments on subjects in health, than on patients 
 suffering under disease, — as, in such case, he 
 could not with propriety have diverted the pur- 
 pose of relieving suffering humanity, by disturb- 
 ing experiments for the eliciting of scientific 
 principles and phenomena. 
 
 In the relief of head-ache, arising from inci- 
 dental causes, he had himself witnessed and, 
 indeed, instrumentally proved, the beneficial 
 effects of Zoistic Magnetism. 
 
 But beyond this, he had had one case of pecu- 
 liar interest, which, though too limited as to 
 time, for realizing the hoped-for benefits to the 
 patient, was yet amply sufficient to shew the 
 salutary influence of this agency on the system 
 of the suffering patient. 
 
 In this particular case, which he had under- 
 taken at the request of a clerical friend, — the in- 
 cumbent of the parish in which he was staying 
 for a few days as a visitor, — he had magnetized a 
 lady who was suffering under severe pain arising 
 from organic disease. The effect of the magnetic 
 influence was not only soothing and happy, but 
 
110 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM* 
 
 totally overcame the feeling of suffering, and 
 resulted in unwonted sleep. Speaking to one of 
 her sisters of the feelings she had realised, after 
 one of the early experiments, she said — " I have 
 been in heaven." In eight trials out of nine, she 
 had always realized perfect relief from suffering, 
 and an experience of the sweetest composure and 
 enjoyment, — though no sleep, distinctly magnetic, 
 was ever produced. Generally, the effect took 
 place within four or five minutes after taking hold 
 of her hands. Once, however, there was a cur- 
 ious difference, when the lady, according to the 
 wishes of her friends, was attempted to be mag- 
 netized after she went to bed. She was then 
 suffering great agony from an incidental cause. 
 The taking of her hands and looking her in the 
 face, by Dr. S., yielded some relief ; but the usual 
 passes, which were always felt to be delightful, 
 could not be satisfactorily made on account of a 
 great thickness of bed clothes. Over the face and 
 chest, however, where there was nothing but a 
 shawl above the night dress, the effect was, as 
 formerly, relieving and pleasant ; but the local 
 pain, which was removed from its ordinary place, 
 lodged, as to sensation, at the very spot w T here 
 the points of the manipulator's fingers rested at 
 the termination of the passes. 
 
 Such was the prevailing and almost immediate 
 relief of suffering, produced in this instance by 
 the influence of Zoistic Magnetism, that he was 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 117 
 
 strongly impressed with the conviction, even in 
 local or organic diseases, of its practical benefits ; 
 so that, under a judicious and persevering appli- 
 cation of these means, a world of suffering might, 
 in many cases, be prevented ; and, that, though it 
 should fail in healing, the span of life, in all 
 probability, might be considerably extended. 
 
 It yet remained, the lecturer proceeded to say, 
 that he should state his views of the rationale of the 
 phenomena he had been describing and endea- 
 vouring to elucidate. Not that he assumed to 
 give any conclusive statement of the theory of 
 Zoistic Magnetism ; but to endeavour to elicit, 
 relatively to recognized scientific principles, such 
 considerations as might aid in rescuing the phe- 
 nomena in some degree from the region of mys- 
 tery and doubt, and might place them in reason- 
 able, and he would hope appreciable, relation to 
 means and end, cause and effect. 
 
 These objects he might conveniently proceed 
 with under two leading enquiries ; — What is this 
 mysterious agency ? And how does it operate ? 
 
 I. The first of these guiding enquiries, was,— 
 What is this mysterious agency ? 
 
 The resulting phenomena of Zoistic Magnetism, 
 had, as, in his first lecture, he had more particu- 
 larly shewn, very striking analogies with those of 
 
118 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM, 
 
 ordinary magnetism ; whilst the developments 
 from his later investigations indicated character- 
 istics more distinctively electrical. But whilst 
 these latter facts seemed to point so distinctly to 
 an electric origin, yet he could not from thence 
 infer that this must be certainly so. As to mag- 
 netism and electricity, though principles insepara- 
 bly co-existent, he could not deem them identical; 
 but, as he had long contemplated them, — along 
 with heat, lights chemical action, and other cog- 
 nate phenomena, — as the several attributes or 
 properties of some more mysterious and subtle 
 agency. And the same essential, and hitherto un- 
 defined agency, he believed to pervade the whole 
 constitution of the material world ; an agency by 
 means of which, as the servant of the Great Crea- 
 tor, He appears to regulate and subordinate the 
 creation to His will. 
 
 Thus whilst these various qualities in matter, 
 —which he, Dr. S., considered as attributes 
 of a common originating agency, — were found, in 
 many cases, to be co-existent, — no one of them 
 could be fixed upon as the master-power ; for 
 each one, in its turn, might be made the develop- 
 ing power of the rest. So that chemical action, 
 for instance, might be made to develope, at the 
 same time, light, heat, electricity, magnetism ; 
 and, conversely, magnetism might be so made to 
 operate as to yield the phenomena of electricity, 
 heat, light, and chemical action. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 119 
 
 Hence, it must be seen, that the quality of a 
 resulting influence, does not necessarily corre- 
 spond with, or point out, the originating agent. 
 The resulting action may be magnetical, as in the 
 operation of the electric telegraph, whilst the 
 immediate agency may be electrical, and the 
 source of that agency, a particular order of 
 chemical action. 
 
 These views being applied to the subject under 
 consideration, discouraged him against asserting 
 the conclusion, however probable such conclu- 
 sion might seem, that the grand agent of the 
 phenomena in Zoistic Magnetism must be elec- 
 tricity. It might be so ; or it might, in its more 
 remote action, be magnetism ; or, still more 
 remotely, it might be a species of chemical action 
 produced by the decomposition of portions of the 
 human system, and so occasioning that perpetual 
 wear and tear of the physical part out of which 
 arise the necessity for perpetual renovations by 
 means of food and air. Under such uncertainty, 
 at least, as to the actual quality of the master- 
 agency in Zoistic Magnetism, he had not hitherto 
 felt himself called upon to change the designation 
 he had commenced with for that of Zoistic 
 electricity ; notwithstanding, he might still find it 
 convenient to speak of it, in reference to its 
 apparent nature, as electrical. 
 
 But to return to his leading enquiry, — as to 
 what this mysterious agency is ? 
 
120 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 The principle operated on, in the subject in 
 whom the magnetic condition might be developed, 
 appeared to him, Dr. S., to be that which was 
 transmitted by the nerves from the fountain of 
 the brain, or, in other words, the nervous in- 
 fluence, — the influence by which the vital func- 
 tions and acting organization are stimulated and 
 carried on, and by which the monitions of the 
 will and mind become effective in operation. 
 From the powerful action of voltaic electricity 
 on the animal structure, and on the nerves of 
 animals recently deprived of life, — the nervous 
 influence has been assumed by many to be iden- 
 tical with electricity. But it only concerned his, 
 Dr. S.'s, object, in what he had now before him 3 
 to point out, in order to the consideration of his 
 other enquiry, — that he held the mysterious agent 
 in Zoistic Magnetism, whatever that agent might 
 be, to be identical with that of which the nervous 
 system was the vehicle and apparatus in opera- 
 tion. And this might suffice to conduct his 
 audience to his second guiding enquiry ; — 
 
 II. How does this mysterious agency, in Zoistic 
 Magnetism, act P 
 
 From the facts and phenomena, he had de- 
 scribed in these lectures, it would be obvious, 
 that the mode of action of the influence referred 
 to, must be diverse from its operation under its 
 ordinary government. The nervous system 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 121 
 
 becomes, in certain measure, subject to a new 
 and extraneous guidence. Instead of the direc- 
 tion being from the will and functions of the 
 magnetised subject, it is transferred, in some 
 remarkable particulars, to the agent in the oper- 
 ation. Not in all particulars, it should be noted, 
 does this transference of agency operate : for it 
 does not over-power either involuntary functions, 
 or identity of mind ; but the operation of volun- 
 tary actions, nervous influences and sensations, 
 and power of will. The involuntary machinery 
 of the wonderful fabric goes on as usual ; the 
 operations of the mind are, in many respects, free 
 and active, and its general faculties often singu- 
 larly alive and effective ; whilst the principles of 
 the mind, as in his experience had been strikingly 
 evinced, seem not merely to be retained, Tmt to 
 be refined and characterized by child-like inno- 
 cency and purity. 
 
 But, in many other particulars, the magnetic 
 influence of the agent becomes the master-in- 
 fluence with the subject. The nervous current, 
 so to speak, seems, in these respects, to flow 
 conversely. The will of the agent acts, in cer- 
 tain muscular results, instead of that of the in- 
 dividual. The course of the nervous action being 
 reversed, the operation of the influence by which 
 sensation is produced, is also, as to the suscep- 
 tible subject at least, reversed. Ordinary hurts 
 or injuries, inflicted on the subject, are not trans- 
 
122 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 mitted to his perceptions ; whilst hurts, or sensa- 
 tions impressed on the agent are conveyed, by a 
 singular anastomosing of nervous or sensorial 
 currents, conversely, to the perceptions of the 
 subject. If, in the ordinary operations of the 
 nervous instrumentality, the brain be considered 
 as an electric telegraph, transmitting, at once, 
 monitions and powers of action : in the magne- 
 tized subject the action is, in measure, reversed ; 
 the will of the magnetiser now, in certain respects, 
 operating instead of that of the subject. So that 
 had we the case of two persons mutually magne- 
 tizing each other, we might expect, he, Dr. S., 
 conceived, a perfect reciprocation of all the in- 
 fluences ordainly impressed upon the subject, — 
 the will of each one becoming dominent on the 
 other, and impressions on the sensations of either 
 being felt by the other. 
 
 Fully to elaborate his ideas of the rationale of 
 these altered conditions, would carry him far 
 beyond his proposed limits ; yet he must endea- 
 vour to sketch, as compactly as might be, consis- 
 tent with intelligableness, their bearing on the 
 principle varieties of phenomena he had already 
 described. 
 
 1 . In respect to the mode of development of the 
 magnetic condition. 
 
 And here he must refer to a principle found to 
 be of very general operation in natural science : 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM* 123 
 
 viz., to the power in certain agencies of deve- 
 loping, elsewhere, the like latent qualities. Thus 
 in case of electricity, or magnetism, the active 
 powers of one body may elicit similar qualities 
 in other bodies, having a capacity for the peculiar 
 influence, or in which the principles were existing, 
 but dormant. Hence a magnet may render, by 
 juxta-position or contact, a mass of iron or steel, 
 previously indicating no polarity, magnetic ; 
 an electrified body, by mere proximity with 
 another having no such sensible quality, may 
 induce in it an electrical condition ; whilst, in 
 the case of combustibles, the power of one in 
 action, however feeble, may develope the latent 
 qualities of the other to an unlimited extent of 
 conflagration. 
 
 Hence, a glimpse, if not a correct insight, 
 into, the rationale of Zoistic Magnetism^ may 
 be derived from our knowledge of apparently 
 kindred sciences ; wherein, not improbably, we 
 have to deal with one, and the same, essential 
 agency, modified, in the subject under review, 
 by the animal organization and the principle 
 of life. 
 
 The requirements for the development of the 
 Zoistic Magnetism, would, on the principle of 
 development of other cognate phenomena, seem 
 to be, — the previous production of a magnetic 
 or electric condition in the agent. If, therefore, 
 by any effort or power of the agent, such a con- 
 
124 ZOIST1C MAGNETISM. 
 
 dition were produced in himself, — it is but 
 consistent with the analogies of science to admit, 
 that such condition might possibly produce an 
 influence on, or yield development of, the 
 magneto-electric elements or properties in the 
 subject with whom he is in connection. 
 
 But how may such a condition be primarily 
 produced in the agent? The answer usually 
 given, and which to him, the lecturer, seemed 
 sufficient, was the effort of the mind or will of 
 the agent — acting upon his nervous, or Zoistic- 
 Magnetic, system. 
 
 The philosophy of this proposition might be 
 viewed, in a modified form, in every act which 
 results from the human will. Any one wills to 
 stretch out his arm. The wonderful series of 
 powers and mechanism with which the body is 
 endued, obeys the authority with the swiftness 
 of thought, and the arm is stretched out. In 
 this case — according to the physiological theory 
 — the brain, under the power of the will, excites 
 action, by virtue of the nervous influence, in the 
 nerves of the arm — the nerves induce action in 
 the muscles of the arm and shoulder — the 
 muscles operate upon the beautiful system of 
 joints — and the arm obeys the mandate of the 
 master-power ! 
 
 If, however, the nerves or brain shall be acted 
 on — as acted on they may be — by another power 
 besides the individual mil, the arm may, in like 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 125 
 
 manner, be stretched out. Of this fact, disease, 
 passion, terror, sympathy, and a variety of other 
 causes, yield innumerable examples ; examples 
 of action, in the nervous or stimulating motive 
 agency of the human system, independant of the 
 individual will. 
 
 Hence analogy and fact justify the assump- 
 tion, that actions and effects on the nervous 
 system of one individual may be produced — as 
 in a thousand other cases they are — by develop- 
 ments in the nervous or magnetic or electric 
 system of another individual. 
 
 To produce, therefore, the requisite condition 
 and power in the agent, with a due regard to 
 proximity and circumstances in the subject, is 
 evidently the groundwork of the operation, and 
 this, it is believed, is sufficiently afforded by the 
 energetic directing of the mind and will of the 
 agent. But as the electric charge, if remote 
 from conducting bodies, is inert ; as the Leyden 
 jar, most highly charged, seems, as it stands 
 insulated, as powerless and uninfluential as an 
 ordinary jar, — so must the self-willed magnetic 
 force in the agent be powerless and unobserve- 
 able, unless the circumstances for its transmission 
 or effusion be provided. 
 
 But another principle, also comes in, in this 
 process of magnetic development. As magnetism 
 developed in the iron of the conductor or arma- 
 ture of a magnet, aids both in the support, and 
 
126 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 for higher development, of power in the master- 
 magnet, — so, it may be assumed, does the 
 magnetic condition developed in the subject of 
 Zoistic Magnetism, both aid in the development, 
 and contribute to the support of, the magnetic 
 power of the agent. It may, indeed, be reason- 
 ably doubted, whether any considerable power 
 of magnetical arrangement can be wrought up in 
 the agent, by his mere voluntary energies, without 
 such aid in sustaining energy from the subject. 
 
 As an illustration, by the analogies of science, 
 of the leading phenomenon now referred to, — of 
 the over-coming of the natural master-power in 
 the subject of Zoistic Magnetism, by the domi- 
 nancy of the operator — he, Dr. S., would submit 
 to his audience an experiment in ordinary mag- 
 netism. He had provided himself, as would be 
 observed, with half a dozen magnetic compass- 
 needles, which he had suspended on blunt points, 
 in a straight-line on a board, — the needles being 
 so adjusted, as to distance, that, when arranged 
 continuously, their mutually attracting poles 
 should come very near, but without touching, to 
 each other. He would now place the board in 
 the direction of the magnetic meridian, whereby 
 the needles were found to adjust themselves, 
 spontaneously, under the naturally master-in- 
 fluence of the earth's magnetism. But if he pre- 
 sented to the northward extremity of the series 
 of needles, the north pole of a strong bar-magnet, 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 127 
 
 this new influence, it would be seen, assumed the 
 dominancy, — the nearer needles were turned 
 round, and, as he passed the same pole from north 
 to south of the board, though at considerable 
 elevation above it, the magnetic current in the 
 whole series was found not only to be reversed, but 
 to become self-sustained in the reverse direction. 
 
 It might be objected, in regard to an obvious 
 fact in Zoistic Magnetism, that the influences 
 developed in the subject were incomparably more 
 powerful than what appeared in the agent. But 
 as to this, analogies could be shewn, fully ade- 
 quate, he conceived, to satisfy the objection. 
 
 [These analogies were shewn by the lecturer in 
 a series of curious and original experiments, in 
 which the apparently feeble power of the earth's 
 magnetism, was applied for the yielding of sources 
 of magnetism in wires of steel, when aammered 
 upon vertically-sustained bars of iron, such as 
 sufficed to render these wires strongly magnetic ; 
 and such as, in larger and more perfect arrange- 
 ments, had sufficed, as he remarked, to yield 
 power enough to magnetize a variety of instru- 
 ments and machines attaining, ultimately, to the 
 power of sustaining, attractively, weights amount- 
 ing to four hundred pounds !] 
 
 2. As to the making of the limbs rigid, by the 
 will and manipulation of the operator, — he, Dr. S., 
 had little to say in explanation. It was obviously 
 
128 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 as he conceived, an effect of the reversed influence 
 on the nervous system of the subject, developing 
 itself in this curious phenomenon, — a phenomenon 
 strikingly calculated to convince the candid, 
 though incredulous enquirer, of the reality of the 
 powers asserted of this mysterious agency. 
 
 Instead of venturing farther, however, into the 
 field of speculation as to the cause of it, he would 
 rather avail himself of the opportunity, afforded 
 by this reference to mesmeric rigidity, of caution- 
 ing those who might witness its production 
 against the danger of the severe processes, some- 
 times foolishly, if not brutally, adopted, for test- 
 ing the extent or reality of the phenomenon. 
 As to this, he was anxious to put them on their 
 guard against testing fact, by injurious proofs. 
 Cases were well known in w T hich the out-stretched 
 rigid arm had been pressed down, without resolv- 
 ing the rigidity, by the suspension of heavy weights, 
 or, what w r as still worse, by the unregulated force 
 of downward pressure by ignorant or thoughtless 
 spectators. It would be well that all practitioners 
 of Zoistic Magnetism should be aware, that the 
 fibre of the rigid muscles of the arm or shoulder 
 might easily be ruptured by this unimagined 
 violence, — where the leverage is such, when the 
 horizontally extended arm is pressed down by 
 the wrist, that a pressure of only ten pounds must 
 exert a strain of, perhaps, near one hundred and 
 fifty pounds at the shoulder ! 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 129 
 
 A case, in point, was mentioned to him by a 
 clergyman, A person employed officially in his 
 parish having attended a lecture on mesmerism, 
 disbelieved and scoffed at the asserted results. 
 The lecturer having challenged him to an experi- 
 ment, personally, he fearlessly submitted, and, 
 under the trial, his right arm was extended 
 beyond his own power of flexure. The persons 
 present were encouraged to test the rigidity by 
 endeavouring to bend it ; but failing, individually, 
 two young men at length put their united force 
 to the hand, and still without effecting its per- 
 manent depression. The somewhat depressed 
 arm elastically sprung up on being released from 
 this brutal violence. But though it had resisted 
 the force, it was essentially damaged by the rude 
 experiment ; and no wonder. If the downward 
 force on the wrist were assumed at a hundred 
 and fifty pounds (and it might have been more) 
 the force on the muscles at the shoulder would 
 probably amount to almost a ton ! It was no 
 wonder, then, that an abscess broke out in the 
 shoulder, and that the arm of the unhappy sub- 
 ject, was, in respect of its ordinary capabilities, 
 ruined for life ! 
 
 In like manner, he, Dr. S., would most strongly 
 deprecate, every kind of experiment on the mag- 
 netized subject which would result in suffering, 
 or other ill-consequences, if inflicted in the ordi- 
 nary state. Such, for instance, as trials of pun- 
 
 i 
 
130 ZOTSTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 gent salts or liquids to the nostrils ; — for, it should 
 be remembered, that, the act of smelling, in our 
 ordinary sensibility, is guarded against serious 
 mischief, by the sensation of unpleasantness or 
 pain ; but not so in the magnetic condition. So 
 that the pungent vapour then unfelt, may pro- 
 duce inflammation in the membranes over which 
 it passes in its progress to the lungs ! 
 
 3. As to the fixing of the hands or feet, he, 
 Dr. S., had already spoken so far, in respect of 
 theory, as to shew that the phenomenon did 
 not arise from any principle corresponding with 
 ordinary attractions. The effect, as to him it 
 appeared, was due to a species of spasmodic or 
 rigidifying action on the hand or foot of the 
 subject, induced and upheld by, probably, some 
 electric condition in the object to which the limb 
 might be attached, produced therein by the touch- 
 ing or breathing of the operator. So that 
 an influence, electrically, in the hand of the 
 agent, — otherwise resulting in rigidity on the arm 
 of the subject, — might here be transferred to the 
 sofa or to the floor, and become energetic in in- 
 fluence, and sustaining in its effect, after the 
 manner of the originating agency. 
 
 The attachment of the feet by a stroke of the 
 hand across the carpet, it appeared, was either 
 aided by the imagination of the subject, or the 
 electric influence developed by the act must be 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 131 
 
 very evanescent, — or this act, as done a few yards 
 in advance of his subject, behind the screen, 
 would hardly have failed to produce the same 
 results as in other cases. 
 
 4. As to the development of artistical or extra- 
 ordinary powers. 
 
 Intensely interesting as the performances of 
 
 Miss H , in singing, composing, and acting 
 
 had been, there was nothing in them, as he had 
 before notified, that belonged to the region of 
 the supernatural. These phenomena resulted, 
 obviously, from the power of the exciting and 
 elevating agency by which the performer was 
 herself acted upon. She was well known, indeed, 
 as an accomplished singer ; and, her private 
 friends knew her, as he, Dr. S., afterwards learnt, 
 to have a peculiar taste and aptitude for dramatic 
 action. In any former exercises, however, of this 
 description, the results could bear no comparison, 
 with these referred to ; the former would be the 
 mere results of a dramatic taste and pre-consider- 
 ation of the effects, in action, of passion and 
 emotion; but the action he had witnessed, 
 being the simple consequence of feeling and emo- 
 tion, became perfect, because entirely natural. 
 
 As to other analagous results, that had been 
 spoken of elsewhere, in respect of acquisitions in 
 language or literature supposed, previously, to 
 have been unknown, — he, Dr. S., considered them 
 
132 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 as having arisen, not out of new and marvellously 
 conveyed powers, but out of impressions, at some 
 time or other made on the memory, which, under 
 the susceptibility of the magnetic condition, had 
 been elicited. For we were not without examples, 
 he believed, in the history of disease, of remark- 
 able revelations of apparently lost impressions on 
 the memory, coming out, — like the prepared plate 
 from the daguerreotype camera after exposure to 
 the quicksilver vapour, — in vivid representation 
 of images previously unseen. 
 
 In like manner as the tablet of memory is, 
 under Zoistic Magnetism, sometimes made to 
 give out its previously invisible impressions of 
 memory, — it is not impossible but that the retina 
 or the nervous organization of other senses, may 
 restore impressions long before made upon them, 
 which no power of the individual will could 
 enable the subject, at other times, to recall ? 
 
 And by the quickening of the senses, too, this 
 powerful agency may doubtless make extraordi- 
 nary developments , For whilst, in certain stages 
 of the magnetic condition, the senses, as to ex- 
 traneous impressions, appear to be suspended, 
 and may actually be so ; in other stages, as to 
 peculiar impressions, the ear may be quick in 
 hearing, the touch and general sensation suscep- 
 tible of perceiving, in degree inconceivably 
 beyond their ordinary capabilities. 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 133 
 
 5. As to impressions, on the sensibilities of the 
 magnetized subject, derived from persons at a 
 considerable distance. 
 
 The extraordinary sensibility of some of his 
 subjects to the movements of persons consider- 
 ably removed from them, with walls, or floors, 
 or opaque screens, intervening ; and the still more 
 surprizing sympathy of taste where the agent and 
 subjects were separated by spaces of several yards, 
 and with screens, or projecting partitions, inter- 
 posed, — had occasioned to him, the lecturer, 
 more perplexing thought, and had resulted in 
 more enlargement of idea on the wonderous 
 system of influences ordained by Infinite Wisdom 
 for the perfecting of the functions of humanity, 
 than all his previous reading and researches had 
 opened out to him. 
 
 Time would not allow him to attempt the 
 description of the progress of his thoughts in this 
 mysterious field of physiology. But he would 
 touch upon some of the leading ideas. 
 
 The phenomena referred to seemed to indicate, 
 either that there existed a special medium, amid 
 the space to which these sensibilities extended, 
 capable of conveying impressions as the air con- 
 veyed sound ; or that there existed an universal 
 power of radiation from all animal bodies (ex- 
 tending, very possibly, to every substance or 
 thing in nature) throwing out rays, not merely of 
 heat, but of other subtle influences pertaining to 
 
134 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 the animal constitution ; and so as at once, like 
 the nervous and sensorial powers, to convey and 
 receive impressions betwixt body and body, each 
 and all reciprocating their influences one with 
 another. Weighing these two suppositions, he 
 himself felt decidedly inclined to the latter. 
 
 \ By means, he supposed, of this radiating in- 
 fluence, the magnetized subject, — often incom- 
 parably more sensitive than the most delicate 
 galvanometer or electroscope, — received im- 
 pressions, both from the electricities disturbed by 
 movements in the parties planted near, and from 
 the sensations of the magnetizer with whom she 
 sympathized. In the former case, a discordant 
 effect was produced on the sentient powers of 
 the subject, by reason of the incongruity of the 
 radiating influences ; in the latter case, there 
 seemed to be a resonance, like that of synchron- 
 ous musical strings, causing the sympathizing 
 sensibilities of the subject, to harmonize with the 
 influence of the magnetizing agent. 
 
 The ordinary effects of radiation, in the recipro- 
 cating of diversities of temperature in contiguous 
 bodies, and tending to bring all into a similar 
 state, — might illustrate, though in a very imper- 
 fect degree, the supposed radiation of other physi- 
 cal influences betwixt man and man. Whilst the 
 wonderful, (because not generally appreciated,) 
 influences radiating betwixt associated individuals 
 among men, — might serve as an analogy for the 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 135 
 
 understanding of other striking physical pheno- 
 mena which, in modern times, have been indica- 
 ted by photographic research. If it be so, that the 
 light from any object cast into definite shape by a 
 convex lens, and then thrown upon an ordinary 
 snrface of polished metal, may leave an impression 
 thereon; or if it be so, that a medal or cameo 
 placed immediately over a like polished surface, 
 but without contact, may, by reason of its mys- 
 terious radiation, leave a picture of itself on the 
 proximate metal ; — may it not also be consistently 
 imagined that man, in his individuality, may be 
 thus radiating, on things around, characteris- 
 tic impressions, (and these not by any means 
 transcient or evanescent,) such as, by faculties 
 peculiarly ordered, and sensibilities specially elici- 
 ted, may be perceived and identified ? 
 
 With radiations and emanations of generic 
 characteristics and differences we w r ere sufficiently 
 familiar. We could easily distinguish, by our 
 ordinary perceptions, the heat of the sun from 
 that of a fire. We might distinguish, too, betwixt 
 the heat radiated from a fire of coal, and that 
 from a fire of wood ; or of a particular kind of 
 coal, such as the anthracite, from the ordinary 
 bituminous coal ; or of a heated furnace of iron, 
 from the heat of a brick kiln. 
 
 But whilst these differences, generally or 
 specifically, might be perceived, — differences in 
 individual radiations from fires of the same seam 
 
136 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 of coal, and of like intensity and mass, could 
 hardly be looked for. Not so, however, as to 
 emanations from different persons. As to inor- 
 ganic substances, various separate masses might 
 be precisely similar and yield precisely the like 
 emanations ; but as to organic substances, no two 
 individual specimens would be found perfectly 
 and entirely alike. Similar as the leaves of the 
 elm might, to ordinary observation, appear to be 
 to one another ; no two leaves of the same tree, or 
 in a forest of the same trees, would be found 
 to be exactly the same. 
 
 Hence it may be imagined, that the subtle 
 etherial principle which he, the lecturer argued, 
 proceeded from every particular creature, might 
 be in like manner modified, generally, by the 
 organization and qualities of the tribe to which 
 it belonged, and, individually, by the peculiarities 
 of personal identity. In this view, the Zoistic 
 Magnetism of each individual might reasonably 
 be supposed to be peculiarly personal and distinc- 
 tive from all others ; to have an identity in its 
 emanations, as distinctive as the personality of the 
 being from which it flowed. Hence we might 
 understand something of the phenomena of the 
 scent of a dog : — how, he being magnetized, as it 
 were, by the kindness or attaching influence of 
 his master, has a perception of his master's foot- 
 steps, and, in certain cases, so sensitively, as to 
 enable him to trace, by the emanations impressed 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 137 
 
 on the ground, his master's course, not only to 
 great distances, but, possibly, through the bewil- 
 dering mazes and mixture of other influences, in 
 the market or the fair ! 
 
 If the phenomena of scenting be favourable to 
 the theory of emanations, characterized by 
 identity of person, for which, he, Dr. S., argued ; 
 the fact of a peculiar perception existing in some 
 individuals, of the proximity of certain animals, 
 — such as of a cat, for instance, however con- 
 cealedly, being in the room — should be deemed 
 as indicative of a somewhat analagous emanation 
 from the animal tribes generally. 
 
 For so he believed the fact to be. From con- 
 sideration of the phenomena he had been the 
 instrument of developing in cases of Zoistic 
 Magnetism, — he could find no other rational 
 explanation but in some such influence as that he 
 had attempted to describe, — an influence carried, 
 perhaps, as an atmosphere, around every living 
 creature, and sending off emanations, too, in 
 every direction. 
 
 6. As to the operation of Zoistic Magnetism 
 curatively. 
 
 Of the extent to which this powerful agency 
 was capable of operating; of the diseases to 
 which it might be applicable when all other means 
 of relief had failed ; of the beneficial results, in 
 practice, which had been derived to suffering 
 humanity through the philanthropic efforts of 
 
138 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 persons not medically educated, as well as under 
 the manipulations or direction of regular prac- 
 titioners, — he, the lecturer, did not mean to 
 enlarge. But only whilst stating his own con- 
 viction of a capability in this mysterious power of 
 effecting most beneficial results for man, — he 
 purposed to state the views he entertained of the 
 rationale of its curative operations. 
 
 In regard to the benefits it was capable of 
 affording in the suspension of pain, under suffer- 
 ing, and of sensation under pain-yielding opera- 
 tions, — he had witnessed and described circum- 
 stances, calculated, he hoped, to convince his 
 audience, that these assumptions of beneficial 
 influence in Zoistic Magnetism, were matters of 
 fact. How this power might operate for the effect- 
 ing of these specific purposes, he had already 
 indicated his ideas. 
 
 His views of the principle on which this in- 
 fluence was capable of acting curatively, might be 
 further set forth. As many cases of human 
 suffering arose from deprivation of sleep, — the 
 inducing of sleep, without the use of mischievous 
 narcotics or soporifics, — seldom administered 
 without the entailment of painful reactions or 
 aggravation of the evil, — must of itself be cal- 
 culated to act very beneficially. For sleep so 
 induced — by means of mutual sympathies and 
 reciprocating influences inherent in man — might 
 be well deemed to be favourable to the restora- 
 tion of other functions of life, and so to the aiding 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 139 
 
 the vital elasticities in recovering dominion over 
 the prostrate frame. 
 
 Beyond this important influence, he, Dr. S., 
 could well believe, that the magnetisms of the 
 healthful operator might serve to stimulate the 
 disordered or paralysed power of the nervous 
 agency in the diseased subject ; that an abund- 
 ance, too, of the vital energy, in the one party, 
 might be brought in aid of the defective vitality, 
 of the other party ; that the physical strength of 
 the agent might yield renovation of strength in 
 the atrophied subject ; and that the commanding 
 nervous power of the magnetizer over that of the 
 magnetized, — might overcome and regulate, what 
 he might call, the nervous congestion that had 
 been productive of disease. 
 
 As a distributive agent, in regard to congested 
 or disordered nervous influence, — this master- 
 principle, duly in operation, should, he conceived, 
 have a very beneficial influence. In local in- 
 flammation, it would appear, there was not only 
 a determination of blood to the place, but an 
 excess of nervous action productive of soreness, 
 — which of these was the cause and which the 
 effect, it was not for him to say, — but if the fact 
 be so, then, he must assume, that the magnetic 
 manipulation would be calculated, as his own 
 experiments indicated, to draw off the nervous 
 congestion, and to distribute the nervous influence 
 in regular circuit, and so, both to reduce the 
 inflammatory action, and to yield a soothing 
 
140 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 effect on the general system. For, according to 
 the views he entertained, the process of magneti- 
 zation produced arrangement of the electric or 
 magnetic elements of the human system ; and, so, 
 tended to restore the equable circulation of the 
 influence, or fluid, transmitted by the nerves. 
 
 If in these views, however, he, the lecturer, 
 were correct, — he must suggest a caution in the 
 use of this agency curatively, as to the risk of 
 employing a debilitated or an unhealthy magne- 
 tizer. In such case, the magnetic manipulation, 
 instead of being beneficial, might result in mis- 
 chievous or pernicious consequences. He had, 
 indeed, known a case of this very description. 
 Where, under his hands, extraordinarily relief 
 and benefit had been experienced by a greatly 
 suffering invalid, — his place, as magnetizer, had 
 been taken by a member of the domestic circle. 
 But he, being of a debilitated constitution, pro- 
 duced a converse result from that which was 
 designed, and looked for ; the patient lost strength 
 rapidly, whilst the operator realized an invigor- 
 ating influence out of the still existing physical 
 strength of the individual he sought to relieve ! 
 
 He, Dr. S., might finally state, as to the bene- 
 ficial application of Zoistic Magnetism, — that the 
 results he had obtained in the department of 
 polarities, had, according to his theory, an im- 
 portant bearing on the efficiency of this agency 
 curatively. There might be cases, he admitted, 
 in which too great sensitiveness might be induced 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 141 
 
 in the patient, but — as from most of his researches 
 it had appeared, that due attention to polarities, 
 was of singular effectiveness in yielding soothing 
 and agreeable results from the magnetizing con- 
 tact and manipulation, — he was strongly im- 
 pressed with the importance of the consideration 
 of polarities for obtaining the best results. 
 
 In bringing these lectures now to a conclusion, 
 he, Dr. Scoresby, had much satisfaction in stating, 
 that, — whilst his subject had greatly grown upon 
 his hands, both in extent and variety and interest, 
 — all his anticipations of the consistency of the 
 phenomena, which it had been his endeavour to 
 develope and elucidate, with received principles of 
 natural science, had been amply confirmed. That 
 the results he had described were absolute reali- 
 ties, he could no more doubt than any fact of 
 science he had ever had the privilege of investi- 
 gating. And if they were real phenomena, they 
 were worthy of careful investigation, and, in their 
 results, would doubtless witness, like other power- 
 ful agents employed by the Great Creator, to the 
 Divine wisdom and beneficence ; whilst the know- 
 ledge acquired concerning them, would, like the 
 discoveries in other departments of science, be 
 found practically important to mankind. 
 
 The agency itself, to which he referred, as he 
 had already endeavoured to shew, was one of grand 
 importance, and of extensive employment, in the 
 
142 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 human constitution, — the same agency, most 
 probably, modified by organization, as that found 
 in mysterious operation in all created nature 
 within reach of man's means of research. For 
 he saw no reason for limiting a power, so clearly 
 assimilated or identified with the nervous energy 
 of a system " fearfully and wonderfully made," 
 to the operations, or effects, or curious develop- 
 ments, ordinarily ascribed to its province. He 
 was disposed to contemplate it, instrumentally, 
 as engaged in the production of various pheno- 
 mena belonging to life and organization, such as 
 sleep, ordinary somnambulism, fainting, &c. And 
 he did not see why it should not have relation 
 to, or influence in the development of, human 
 sympathies, feelings and affections, and be a 
 medium, (the agency itself, being apparently, 
 immaterial and etherial) engaged instrumentally 
 — under the laws of the Great Originator, and 
 under the guidance or influence of the human 
 spirit and vitality, — in all the operations per- 
 taining to the functions of the living man ? 
 
 For himself, he must say, he did consider 
 the operations of this agency as being extended 
 far beyond what was ordinarily contemplated of 
 it. For what, he might ask, are these mysterious 
 sympathies and influences of nature, by which 
 man becomes attached to, or repellent of, his 
 fellow man ? Whence are the powers by which 
 new feelings are so wrought into our constitution 
 as to act spontaneously as if they were part and 
 
ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 143 
 
 parcel of. our original nature ; by which new alli- 
 ances become a mixing of identities, and God's 
 primeval law of marriage yields a new and mys- 
 terious oneness ? Whence are the acute percep- 
 tions by which a footstep, scarcely heard, becomes 
 sensibly vibratory on affection's delicate chords ? 
 Whence arise the occasional aversions betwixt 
 individuals, sometimes quite unaccountable and 
 undesigned, when first they are brought together ; 
 and the unreflective repellent effects of some so- 
 ciety into which they may accidentally be thrown ? 
 Whence arise, on the other hand, the sweet sym- 
 pathies springing up betwixt certain individuals, 
 — often spontaneous, undefined, uncherished, — by 
 which, at first meeting, heart seems to assimilate 
 with heart, so as to resolve the surprising sympa- 
 thies into confiding affection ? And whence, 
 again, are those intuitive influences, — such as 
 a mere glance of the eye, an incidental movement, 
 the utterance of a word, a touch of the hand, — • 
 which become electrical in operation, and often 
 enduring in their results ? 
 
 These things, he, Dr. S., did not view as mere 
 physical effects, or the direct operations of Zoistic 
 Magnetism ; but (as research and fact might 
 justify the supposition) as being, not improbably, 
 elicited out of the human mind and organization, 
 instrumentally, by this strange power in anima- 
 ted nature. But, even so, — should the doctrine 
 assumed, be in reality established, — the advance in 
 knowledge could be held only as an obscure glance 
 
144 ZOISTIC MAGNETISM. 
 
 into the mystery of the Divine handy-work. As 
 of old it was said 3 so might he call it to mind ; 
 that "no man can find out the work that God 
 maketh from the beginning to the end" : " Lo, 
 these are parts of His ways ; but how little a 
 portion is heard of Him !" 
 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 The Author of the foregoing investigations (as lie may now with but limited excep- 
 tion style himself) having begun with an Advertisement, finds it needful to finish 
 with a Postscript. Tor it may be necessary to explain that, as some important 
 and instructive investigations were being carried on during the progress of this 
 publication through the press, he has freely availed himself of the new information 
 they yielded. But this he must, of course, have done, at some risk of discrepancy 
 betwixt the views he had stated at the outset, and the moi e enlarged conceptions 
 derived from progressive developments. If any such discrepancies should appear, 
 the statement now appended, may serve to explain the iact, if not to excuse the 
 defect ; and, it should serve too, to account for, and he hopes to excuse, the exten- 
 sion of the second lecture, in length and quantity, beyond its due proportions. 
 
 No experiments, it will have been observed, were made in the course of the 
 delivery of these lectures, in the actual department of which they treated ; but only 
 in what were deemed cognate sciences. Experimental elucidation of the pheno- 
 mena deseribed was not attempted, because of the Author's investigations having 
 been made on a class of persons who could not, with propriety, appear before a 
 public audience ; and as he himself had never been satisfied with the experiments 
 he had witnessed in public lectures on hired subjects, he could not expect the confi- 
 dence of his audience in the substitution of such for the actual cases on which hi3 
 researches had been made. 
 
 In conclusion, the Author may notice an enquiry which has sometimes been 
 made of him, personally, in respect to his researches in Zoistic Magnetism, viz : — 
 why the experiments herein referred to were so prevalently made on female subjects ? 
 In reply, it may suffice to mention, two or three principal reasons: — 1. Because 
 his experiments were generally made with persons who voluntarily offered them- 
 selves, and these happened, almost entirely, to be ladies : — 2. Because he found, 
 with those who so offered, entire confidingness, and no one instance of attempted 
 deception, and, but rarely, any endeavour to resist the influence : — 3. Because 
 when these scientific developments were being elicited in healthful subjects — with 
 whom the magnetic condition is much less easily produced, he believes, than with 
 diseased persons — there seemed to be some advantages in the female constitution, 
 for his objects, both on account of its readier subjection to the developing in- 
 fluence, than that of men, and on account of its greater nervous susceptibilities, 
 whereby the phenomena elicited might be expected to be more characteristic, and 
 the electric peculiarities more sensitive. The author now regrets, however, that he 
 had not tried some experiments on the attractive and repellent influence, so 
 interestingly elicited in the case of ladies, with some subjects of his own sex ; for 
 however probable the correspondence of the phenomena may be in the two sexes, 
 be is unable, from this want of experience, to attest their uniform agreement. 
 
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