Mesmerism, or System of Interactions

IV

this important matter was so completely misunderstood and, given the intellectual trend of the scholars and non-scholars of the time, still so confused, that public discourse on it could only be resumed under more favorable conditions. This was in the years 1797–1798. At that time, a young physician, I believed I would harm the cause itself if I made known experiences to which people would be all the less likely to attach belief. I therefore remained silent and strove only to develop myself in science, and, as much as lay in my power, to develop science through myself—as both can only occur uniformly—both theoretically and practically. I aimed to bring the subject—which is, according to my innermost conviction, of high importance for the entire science of nature and for medicine in particular—up for discussion again in more mature years.

It is perhaps the strangest thing that has ever happened to a scientific, and moreover a simultaneously practical subject, as was the case with magnetism referring to animal magnetism or mesmerism. At the very least, one should have thought that the public teachers at universities—even with the mistaken assumption that this matter rested upon an error—that the teachers of physics as well as those of physiology and medicine in general, would have had the obligation to at least historically and properly examine this subject.