to heaven's gate; they hear the celestial song, and behold the heavenly host robed in snowy white; they imagine themselves inhabitants of that blessed world, until the spell is broken by the speaker closing his remarks, and, disappointed, they return to "earth's dull cares again."

But what is more especially understood by Animal Magnetism, is that power which some posseSF, of so concentrating their attention, and directing their will, with such energy, as to put some persons, especially if of feeble constitutions, into a magnetic sleep, and sometimes into somnambulism, and frequently to cure or relieve disease.

We have facts from the highest sources of testimony, to prove it true. The Royal Medical Society of France, in 1831, pronounced it true, and of vast importance as an auxiliary of medicine. Many of the members of this learned body had used it for some time in their practice; this turned the popular feeling of France decidedly in its favour. It is introduced with success into the hospitals of Paris, and extensively practiced by the most distinguished physicians of France, Germany, Holland, Sweden, and Prussia, and there is a professorship of Animal Magnetism at the Medical College of Berlin. Professor Kluge now fills that station. A number of eminent men in our own country use it in their practice.

The following extract is from the report of the committee, appointed by the Royal Acadamy of

Medicine, made to that learned body in 1831, to which we already have referred :

"You have all heard of a fact, which at the time fixed the attention of the Chirurgical Section, and which was communicated to it at the session of April 16th, 1829, by M. Jules Cloquet. The committee thought it their duty to embody it in this report, as the least equivocal proofs of the power of the magnetic sleep. It relates to Madame Plantain, aged 64 years, living at 151 Rue Saint Dennis, who consulted M. Cloquet, on the 8th of April, 1829, about an ulcerated cancer on her right breast, which she had had many years, and which was complicated with a considerable enlargement of the axillary ganglions. M. Chapelain, the physician of this woman, whom he had magnetized for some months, with the intention, as he said, of reducing the enlargement of the breast, had been able to obtain no other result than a very profound sleep, during which her sensibility appeared to be annihilated, but the ideas preserved all their lucidity. He proposed to M. Cloquet, that he should operate upon it, while she was plunged into a magnetic sleep. M. Cloquet, considering the operation to be indispensable, consented to it; and it was agreed that it should take place on the following Sabbath, April 12th. The two evenings previous, she was magnetized several times by M. Chapelain, who disposed her, when in somnambulism, to support the operation without

fear, and even led her to speak of it with composure, while, as soon as she awoke, she repelled the idea with horror. On the day appointed for the operation, M. Cloquet, on his arrival, at half past ten in the morning, found the patient dressed, and seated in an arm-chair, in the position of a person peacefully wrapped in a natural sleep. It was nearly an hour since she had returned from mass, which she always attended at the same hour. M. Chapelain had put her into the magnetic sleep, since she came back. She spoke with great calmness of the operation she was to undergo. Every arrangement having been made for the operation, she undressed herself and sat down upon the chair. M. Chapelain held her right arm, the left being suffered to hang by her side. M. Dailloux, a student at the Saint Louis Hospital, was charged to hand the instruments and to make the ligatures. First, an incision was made from the arm-pit, above the tumor, to the inner side of the breast. The second, commencing at the same point, separated the tumor below, and passed round to meet the first. M. Cloquet dissected the enlarged ganglions with caution, on account of their proximity to the axillary artery, and took off the tumor. The time consumed in the operation was ten or twelve minutes. During all this time, the patient continued to converse tranquilly with the operator, and did not exhibit the slightest sign of sensibility; no movement of the limbs or of the

features, no change in the perspiration, nor in the voice, no emotion, not even in the pulse, were manifested. They were not obliged to hold her, they merely sustained her. A ligature was applied to the thoracic artery, which was exposed during the extraction of the ganglions. The wound was closed with sticking-plaster, and dressed; the patient was put to bed, still in the state of somnambulism, and left there forty-eight hours. The first dressing was removed on Tuesday, April 14th. The wound was cleansed and dressed anew; she manifested no sensibility nor pain. The pulse preserved its natural beat. After the dressing had been put on, M. Chapelain awoke her, she having slept two days. She had no idea of what had been done; but on learning that she had been operated upon, and seeing her children around her, she experienced a very lively emotion which the magnetiser put an end to, by putting her asleep immediately."

The following names were appended to this report:-Bourdois de la Motte, President; Fourquier, Gueneau de Mussy, Guersent, Itard, J. J. Leroux, Marc, Thillaye, Husson.

Lafayette, in one of his letters to Washington, says: "A German doctor, called Mesmer, having made the greatest discovery upon animal magnetism, he has instructed scholars, among whom your humble servant is called one of the most enthusiastic; and before I go, I will get leave to let you

into the secret of Mesmer, which, you may depend upon, is a grand philosophical discovery."

Georget, the celebrated physiologist of France, was once a violent opposer of animal magnetism; but at length he had an opportunity of witnessing several magnetic phenomena, and not only became convinced of its reality, but almost an enthusi. astic advocate of it. In conversation with a friend on the subject, he remarked, "I am persuaded that great truths have escaped observers; but far from accusing them of exaggeration, I rather believe they have in their recitals kept below the reality. I believe, for example, that there is no perfect mode of treatment, but that which somnambulists prescribe for themselves, and that their admi.

rable instinct can be serviceable to others."

He inserted the following statement in his will : "I will not finish this document without adding to it an important declaration. In 1821, in my work on the Physiology of the Nervous System, I proudly professed Materialism. The preceding year, I had published a treatise on Madness, and another on the Physiology of the Nervous System, when new meditations upon a very extraordinary phenomenon-somnambulism-would permit me no longer to doubt of the existence in us and out of us, of an intelligent principle, altogether different from material existences. It is the soul. In regard to this matter, I have a profound conviction, founded upon facts which are not to be con