Second degree :—Half-sleep, or imperfect crisis. Most of the senses still remain m a state of activity, that of vision only being impaired, the eye withdrawing itself from the power of the will.
Third degree :—The magnetic or mesmeric sleep. The Orgall8 of the senses refuse to perform their respective fuuctions, and the patient is in an unconscious state.
Fourth degree :—The perfect crisis, or simple somnambulism. In this stage the. patient is said to " wake within himself," and his consciousness returns. He is in a state which can neither be called sleeping nor waking, but which appears to be something between the two.
Fifth degree :—Lucidity, or lucid vision. This is called in France, and mostly in this country etairrsonee ; in Germany, Ilellschen. In this state the patient is said to obtain a clear knowledge of his own internal mental and bodily state, is enabled to calculate with accuracy the phenomena of disease which will naturally and inevitably occur, and to determine what are their most appropriate and effectual remedies. He is also said to poems the fame faculty of Internal Inspection with regard to other persons who have been placed In tuauneric connection (ea rapport) with him.
Sixth degree :—Univeroal lucidity ; in German, All tenteine KlarAcif. In this state the lucid vision becomes greatly increased, and extends to objects whether near or at a distance.
Such are the states of the system recognised by mesmerists, and works on the subject abound with eases illustrative of each of these six degrees. However, there are mainly who practise mesmerism who are sceptical with regard to the real existence of the two last degrees, although such cases are recorded by the best authorities on animal magnetism.
One of the most eingular statements with regard to mesmerism is its application to phrenology. It is asserted that persons iu the sleep waking state, when that region of the head is touched or pointed at 17 the mesmeriser which is over the seat of the supposed phrenolo gical organs in the brain, will exhibit the mental emotions and states which are peculiar to the exercise of these organs. Thus when the organ of language ie touched, the patient talks ; when wit, he Laughs when benevolence. he is kind, and so forth. Such cases are attested by Dr. Elliotson, Mr. Braid, Mr. James Simpson, and others.
The mesmeric state has been applied mostly to the cure of disease, for which purpose it was used by 3lesnier when it first attracted public attention. It has also been used for the purpose of producing sleep during surgical operations, as well as a means of divination for the purpose of ascertaining past and future events. A case of this kind
was related by Miss Martineau, in which one of her attendants was asserted to be able in the mesmeric condition to predict future events. The class of diseases which have been cured by its means are those which are known to medical men an functional nervous diseases.
Various nervous diseases, such as paralysis, epilepsy, ,ke., come on from changes in the structure of various organs, but these are not susceptible of benefit from the mesmeric state. It is in those cases where no atru.tural lesion can be supposed to exist, and which often yield to sudden changes of the mind from various causes of excite ment, and which frequently cease without obvious cause, that the disease has yielded to this remedy.
Many theories have been propounded in order to embrace the facts of animal magnetism. 31temer and his immediate followers attributed them to the action of a subtle fluid in the bodies of animals, which enabled them to exercise an influence on each other at a distance, just as a magnet affects iron ; hence he called it animal magnetism.
This hypothesis of a nervous fluid susceptible of being influenced and producing an influence more or loss modified, was adopted by most writers on mesmerism till the appearance of Mr. Braid's experi ments. The mesmeric state having been produced by 3Ir. Braid without any influence from a second person, he accounted for the phe nomena by supposing that there was "a derangement of the cerebro spinal centres and of the circulatory and respiratory and muscular systems, induced by a fixed state, absolute repose of body, fixed attention, and suppressed respiration concomitant with that fixity of attention." lie further added, that In all cases he believed "that the whole depended on the physical and psychical condition of the patient, arising from the causes referred to, and not at all on the volition or lasses of the operator threwiug out a magnetic fluid or exciting into activity some mystical universal fluid or medium." Whilst there can be little doubt with regard to many of the facts recorded on this subject, they have been ao remarkably misrepresented through the feelings of those who have observed and narrated them, that men of science, disgusted with the imposture of seine and the credulity of others, have generally shunned its investigation, and turned a deaf ear to what they consider the pretensione of its professors.