Posthumous Humanity: A Study of Phantoms/Chapter 5

The human phantom does not always reveal itself in as clear a manner as in the examples I have cited. It has also sometimes obscure manifestations of a very varied nature, which make of it a sort of elusive Proteus. Mesmerism exhibiting analogous manifestations in the somnambule, the medium, the ecstatic, &c., it is often difficult to say whether the primary cause of these phenomena should he ascribed to the inner personality or to the nervous fluid, or, again, to the combined action of these two agents. In a great number of cases, their union seems so close that one is led to ask himself if it is not from the second that the first derives its origin and its energies. Let us explore this curious side of human physiology; but, to begin with, let us say a few words respecting the universal fluid, which the magnetizers often confound with the nervous fluid.

The universal fluid, that is to say, the subtle fluid which fills space and penetrates all bodies, had been recognized by Greek philosophy several centuries before our era; it was the ether which Descartes resuscitated at the moment when they ​were laying the foundation of modern physics. But it is scarcely half a century since the existence of this fluid has been placed beyond doubt, and proved, so to say, officially—thanks to the learned analyses of Fresnel on Light, completed by the ingenious experiments of Arago. Subsequently, various men of science have attempted to explain by the same method—I mean by the theory of the ether—other branches of physics, and they have obtained the same success. Finally, the astronomers, among whom we must give the first place to Boucheporn and Father Secchi, have crowned the work of Fresnel by demonstrating that the laws of universal gravity are consequences of the properties of ether.

It is, then, to-day a scientific fact that an eminently subtle fluid, in whose depths the celestial bodies float, fills the immensity of the universe, and that the phenomena of light, heat, electricity, gravitation, chemical affinity, &c., are due to the diverse modes of action of this fluid.

When, towards the close of the last century, Mesmer wished to satisfy himself as to the effects of the magnetic bouquet, he was not slow in perceiving that he had a fluid as agent or vehicle, and he bethought him of the universal fluid, which the Cartesian school had just restored to honour. His hypothesis was adopted by the majority of his successors. The practice of magnetism soon demonstrated, it is true, the existence of a special fluid, the nervous fluid which disengages itself in the ​passes under the will of the operator and produces the phenomena of somnambulism. But the old terminology continued to prevail, especially among persons unacquainted with physics, who only see in the nervous fluid a synonym for the universal fluid. That is a grave error, which it is important to dispel. The nervous fluid, which I shall also call the mesmeric ether, from the name of him who first recognized it, is common to all animals provided with a nervous apparatus sufficiently developed, or, in a word, to a great number of living beings. In the normal course of life, it flows away as it forms itself, or, rather, when it exceeds a certain tension, and loses itself in the ground or in the atmosphere, in such a way that it passes without notice. But among animals, as well as in man, it reveals itself by manifestations sui generis in certain cases of volition. Let us take, for example, the magnetizer at the moment when he entrances his somnambule. It is known that the business of the cerebro-spinal apparatus is to execute the movements which are imposed upon it by the will. The nervous fluid, belonging to this apparatus, is governed by this same mechanism. At each magnetic pass it flows the length of the operator's arm, under his will, and escapes by the extremity of the fingers, like electricity, to act physiologically on the somnambule. If the latter is antipathetic to magnetic action, the operator ends by feeling the symptoms of exhaustion, and sees himself obliged to stop ​when he has lost all his fluid.^[1] His passes have no more effect. The magnetic power only reappears the next day, when a new quantity of mesmeric ether has accumulated in the organism. Only a portion of the fluid emitted acts on the somnambule. Much of the aura, probably the greater part, remains in his clothing or is dispersed in the room. When the sittings have been long or numerous, there is sometimes so much aura in the apartment that certain persons refuse to pass the night there, not being able to breathe such an atmosphere.^[2]

​From this analysis result three orders of facts, which demonstrate at once the existence and nature of the mesmeric ether, the physiological action which it exercises on the somnambule, such as we see nervous temperaments experiencing in a room saturated with fluid, and, finally, the exhaustion which happens to the magnetizer after a certain number of passes.

But it is not only at the extremity of the fingers that the fluid flows away; being at the command of the will, it follows all the routes that the latter prescribes. Is magnetized water wanted?—it suffices that the mouth shall blow into a glass to cause the liquid to acquire new properties indicating the presence of mesmeric aura. Here the fluid has been transmitted by the breath, escaping from the chest. At other times it is darted by the eyes: it is known that certain magnetizers throw their subjects into sleep by fixing them with a glance. When, as a result of a special constitution, a person disengages fluid of a bad nature, it may throw into convulsions and even kill little animals, such as chickens, goslings, &c. It is the Evil Eye, which has been often denied, but which none the less is based upon authentic facts; and I have known personally a woman attacked with this infirmity. The serpent in particular shows us daily undeniable examples of the Evil Eye. No one is ignorant of the fact that when it fixes its glance upon a bird perched on a tree, the latter soon ​loses confidence and flutters from branch to branch until be falls a prey to the fascinator. ^[3] The action of the fluid is here so much the more energetic, in being not only darted by the eyes, but also by the breath and the quivering tongue of the reptile.

It is especially in animals called electric that the nature and origin of the mesmeric ether may be closely studied. They are so designated because they possess the singular faculty of accumulating a sort of vital electricity in a special organ which serves them as condenser, and of emptying them-selves of it at will by successive discharges, com-parable to those which we obtain with our electric apparatus. It is thus that they stun or stupefy the enemies who approach them. Three kinds of fishes, the gymnotus, silurus, and torpedo, have acquired a certain celebrity in this respect. The first, which is met with in lakes and tanks of the New World, especially in the basin of the Orinoko, is only known to naturalists. The same as to the ​second, which is confined to the Nile and other rivers of Septentrional Africa. But the torpedo, common enough in the Mediterranean, affords daily opportunity to verify this singular phenomenon. Its electric faculty, which is noticeable in different degrees in all the varieties of this species, is particularly remarkable in the torpedo proper. The inhabitants of the coast, who feed upon this fish, know that the condensing apparatus must be thrown away as unhealthy. When the animal, seeing itself pursued, gives its shocks, the latter go on diminishing, in intensity in ratio to their multiplication, and end in producing no effect whatever. These fish are then completely harmless. In hunting them, this is the moment when it is possible to seize them. It is with them as with the magnetizer, who, after numerous passes upon an insensitive subject, feels himself exhausted, and is obliged to stop. All their electricity has been lost in the discharges, and their benumbing power only reappears when the organism has accumulated a new quantity of fluid in the storage-battery. It is easy here to observe in a direct manner the nature and origin of the mesmeric ether. When we cut the nerve which puts the brain in communication with the condensing organ, the electric faculty completely disappears; the fluid, being unable to flow to the usual reservoir, runs off into the ambient medium, as with other fishes. We see, at the same time, that it comes from the cerebro-spinal axis, ​since it outflows from the encephalon into the receptacle by the intermediary nerve which places these two organs in relation.

Are the fishes of which we have spoken an exception in nature? We do not think so. At present we know only in an imperfect manner the aquatic fauna. In an exploration of the Amazon river, Agassiz collected eighteen hundred new species of fish. It is presumable that the list of electric animals will lengthen in degree as we gain a better knowledge of the inhabitants of our seas, lakes, and rivers. If it were permitted us to express all our thought, we should say that the torpedo, gymnotus, silurus, and their congeners are appearing to us as the last representatives of an ancient electric fauna. Do not let us forget that in the earlier geological ages of the planet, the ocean, the soil, and the atmosphere were traversed by currents of electricity otherwise potential than those of to-day. Now, as we shall have occasion hereafter to demonstrate, there exists between the ordinary electricity and vital electricity, otherwise called the nervous fluid, such a relation that every recrudescence of the first leads to an abnormal development of the second. Perhaps, some day, palæontology will exhume fossils bearing still some traces of a condensing apparatus. Perhaps, also, research in comparative anatomy will result in discovering in man or other vertebrate some vestige of atrophied organs which have formerly possessed electric functions. Moreover, ​the insect world offers us a number of species which present, although upon a lesser scale, analogous phenomena. These animals cause, when they are touched, a shock or numbness which reminds one of electric discharges. It is, therefore, permissible to lay down as a principle that, the day when the terrestrial fauna shall be sufficiently well known, mesmeric ether will appear as an essential consequence of the nervous mechanism.

The considerations which we have just stated put us upon the path of the phenomena which are noticed in certain persons called electric. It is commonly young girls approaching puberty who present this singular state. Possibly it is due, at least in part, to the physiological activity which is taking place in them at this epoch. The mode of life exerts also a certain influence, for it is especially in the labouring class that these young girls are found. Also, the name of electric servant-maid is often met with in the works of magnetizers. The properties of mesmeric ether explain this phenomenon. It results from an abnormal disengagement of fluid, due to a physiological predisposition or some other cause. By a sort of organic fluctuation still unknown in its essence, vital electricity seems to act on a woman inversely to the ordinary electricity. We know that, when lightning falls on a group of persons of both sexes, the women are seldom struck, whilst men are almost invariably. About 1846, just when spiritism was about to appear, ​several young electric girls were known in France, England, and the United States. We shall speak only of Angélique Cottin, a young peasant of Orne, whose name had some notoriety in Paris. The following details are borrowed from M. de Mirville:

"Thursday, January 15th, 1846, at about 8 p.m., Angélique Cottin, aged 14 years, was weaving gloves of silk thread with three other girls, when the oaken table used for fixing the end of the woof moved from its place, so that their united efforts could not keep it in position. They fled in fright at so strange an occurrence; but the stories they told were not believed by the neighbours who were attracted by their cries: at first two, then a third, urged on by the bystanders, tremblingly resumed their work without the fact mentioned repeating itself; but as soon as Angélique, imitating her companions, took up her woof, the table again moved, danced, was upset, and then violently thrown back. At the same time, the young girl was irresistibly drawn after it; but as soon as she touched it, it flew farther back: terror was general; they thought that some one had east the evil eye on her that morning. At night there was calm. The next morning the child was isolated from the fatal table, and, in order that she might resume her work, they fastened her glove to a bin weighing about 150 pounds; but this obstacle, when opposed to the action of the mysterious and terrible force, did not ​long resist. The bin was displaced and upset, although the communication was only established by a thread of silk. They ran to the Presbytery to ask for exorcisms and prayers. The curé at first laughed, but subsequently verified their story, and sent them to the doctor's. The next day shovels, tongs, fire-brands, brushes, books, were all scattered at the approach of the child; a pair of scissors, hanging from her belt, were flung into the air, without the cord being broken or their being able to know how it had been untied. The curé guarantees the authenticity of this detail, mentioned also in the report of M. Hébert de Garnay. This fact, the more remarkable, says he, for its analogy with the effects of lightning, at once prompted the thought that electricity must play an important part in the production of these astounding facts; but this line of inquiry was cut short—the fact did not occur more than twice. M. de Farémont, a neighbouring landed proprietor, a man of sober character, much respected, a friend to progress, and versed in physical science, took her in his carriage to the Doctor of Mamers; the doctors, at first opposing, afterwards proved the truth of the statement and yielded.

"Tuesday, the 3rd, there was an incessant crowd. On this and the following days more than a thou-sand persons visited her; among the number, nearly all the doctors of the country, eminent physicians, druggists, lawyers, professors, ​magistrates, ecclesiastics, and so forth, without counting the great savants of the Academy of Science."

These reports are completed by an extract from a letter addressed by M. de Farémont to M. de Mirville, dated November the 1st of the same year:

"The phenomena have not stopped since last spring. I have seen, I see, and I can always see when I choose, the most curious and unaccountable things. For, look you, gentlemen, the stumbling-block is that your savants understand no more about it than I. They should have seen and studied. We, who have seen, believe because all the facts have. occurred under our eyes, are palpable, and cannot be refuted in any way. Those who thought themselves wise hang their heads and are silent. The populace say that the child is bewitched, and not a witch, for she is too simple for them to give her this title. As for me, I have seen so many contradictory effects produced in her by electricity; I have seen, under certain circumstances, good conductors operate, and, under others, inefficient to such an extent that, if one confined himself to the general laws of electricity, there would constantly be contradictions to reconcile; thus I am convinced there is in this child some other power than electricity."

The noise that was made about Angélique Cottin having reached Paris, several physicists went to Orne to study the phenomenon. Of the number were Arrago, Mathien, and Logier, of the Academy ​of Science. They were astonished, in their turn, with the facts which occurred under their eyes; upon their return to Paris, Arrago did not hesitate to bring before the Academy the question of the electric girl. The weight of authority attaching to the name of the illustrious Perpetual Secretary decided his colleagues to form a commission to verify the extraordinary facts which had been reported; then was seen repeated that which had several times occurred at the Academy of Medicine under analogous circumstances. Like the majority of men of science, the members of the Institute, who were to undertake the investigation, having never studied the effects of magnetism, were persuaded in advance that there was trickery or exaggeration in the prodigies ascribed to Angélique Cottin. In such a disposition of mind, their mission was foredoomed to failure. The phenomena which commonly occurred round the young peasant either did not now repeat themselves or did so but feebly. As Du Potet sensibly observes, investigations of magnetism have almost invariably failed with hostile committees. It suffices, in fact, for an opposing influence to be involuntarily emitted by the cerebral fluid of the spectator to neutralize the action of that which the magnetizer throws upon the somnambule. It was the same with Angélique Cottin, for the electricity which manifested itself in her was none other than vital electricity, which I have called the mesmeric fluid. The commission did not worry ​themselves in the least about giving a flat contradiction to the testimony of several thousand persons, among whom were to be counted scientific men of the first rank, but declared, through their reporter, that all the stories circulated about Angélique Cottin were without the slightest foundation.^[4] This conclusion, announced by the Institute, had authoritative influence on public opinion, and thereafter no one paid any attention to other electric damsels, who were, at about the same time, noticed in the journals.

Let us now pass to electric plants, if, indeed, we may give this name to certain vegetable species endowed with extraordinary sensitiveness. Such a property implies the existence of a special organ analogous to the nervous tissue of animals. Now some eminent botanists have thought they detected in the leaves of some of these plants a delicate tissue which seemed to represent a rudimentary form of this nervous system.^[5] Different instances ​of vegetable sensitiveness, that are observed in a number of plants, such as the Sensitive Plant, the Dionœa, Venus' Fly-trap, would thus be accounted for in a rational manner. These species are quite common in South America, where they often occupy great tracts, and sometimes it has happened, when I was crossing the high plateau of the Brazilian chain of the Orgar mountains, that I saw the guide, who rode before me, strike with his whip the plants at the edge of the path we were following, and immediately a shiver would be communicated successively to all the plants in the meadow, as though all these stalks were bending under the breath of a mysterious wind. One cannot ignore in this phenomenon the action of a sort of vital electricity. Without doubt, a deeper study of botanical species would disclose to us the existence of plants presenting properties really electric, and here is what we find already in the Année Scientifique for 1878:^[6] ​"They have made this curious discovery in America, that a plant, the Phytoloccea, possesses veritable electric properties. When a branch of this bush is cut, the hand receives a shock like that which is given by an electric machine. An English physicist desired to test the degree of intensity of the electricity thus emitted. A small compass needle was affected at seven or eight paces by the plant, and this influence was proportionate to the distance; the nearer it was brought, the more jerky was the motion.

"When the compass was placed in the middle of the bush, its needle began to turn rapidly. No trace was found of iron or other magnetic metal in the soil. This property, then, belongs to the plant itself. Let us add that the intensity of the pheno-menon varies with the time of day. At night this property is scarcely observable; it reaches its maximum at two p.m.^[7] The power increases during a thunderstorm. It is affirmed that no bird nor insect will alight upon the electric plant."

We shall repeat, in connection with plants, what we have said in speaking about electric animals. It is presumable that the list of vegetables possessing these properties will be enriched with new species with the progress of botanical science, and that, some ​day, it will no longer be a question of a few plants, but of an immense electrical flora. Certain facts seem to justify this hypothesis. In the mountains of Wurtemburg, says Dr. Kerner, the cows are often seen to suddenly fall into an indescribable uneasiness, even running into madness; seized with a like vertigo, children ran at full speed towards their houses; and a still more extraordinary fact, the furniture and utensils of all sorts indicated also the same mysterious influence, shifting place, shaking, flying back when one would take hold of them, evidencing thus, by these movements and this repulsion, that it was a question of electrical action. Simultaneously, says Dr. Kerner, one noticed in the Seeress of Prevorst an exaltation of sensitiveness which doubled her second sight.

These phenomena must be attributed, we must infer, to the vegetal electricity of these mountains, the initial action of which might well be common electricity. We know, in fact, that there exists so close a bond between these two agents of planetary life, that they seem sometimes to mutually engender each other. A second fact, quite common in the United States, gives a new strength to this view of the case. There is sometimes developed in that country such a quantity of electric fluid that, at night, the bushes seem to become incandescent.^[8] This phenomenon does not confine itself to the country, ​but is sometimes seen in the cities. Strangers^[9] who visit New York or other cities of the Union are sometimes surprised to feel a prickling in the fingers, or to see sparks fly at the moment when their fingers touch the brass door-handle. When one remembers that the United States is the classic land of mediums and spiritism, he is led to ask himself if this overflow of mesmerism should not be ascribed to a transformation of fluidic forces, human electricity being set in motion by vegetable electricity, while the latter would receive the primary impulsion from the afflux of terrestrial electricity.

From the preceding considerations, it follows that the mesmeric ether presents sometimes certain similitudes to cosmic ether. Let us sum up in a few words what is known of its nature, in order to postulate what is known of the analogies and differences between these two fluids.

Let us say, to begin with, that it is a matter for extreme regret that the physiologists have not submitted mesmeric ether to a series of exact experiments to verify the properties that are ascribed to it, but which we only know upon the affirmations of the magnetizers. Like the universal fluid, it moves with the rapidity of thought, acts at great distances, penetrates all bodies, and renders objects which it impregnates with its vibrations susceptible to attraction and repulsion. But these phenomena suggest but distantly the ether, properly so called; it ​differs from it especially by a lesser degree of in-tensity and energy. The nervous fluid possesses, in addition, special properties which it derives from its atomic constitution, and which throw light upon a number of extraordinary facts observed in the different forms of mesmerism, magnetism, ecstasis, sorcery, &c.

The first of its characteristics is the lightness that it imparts to bodies. This explains the in-offensive projectiles of the spiritualistic and posthumons ballistics: the most massive tables raised by a child; sorceresses condemned to drowning, unable to sink in the water except under the efforts of several men; mediums, ecstatics, obsessed persons, walking the air, or soaring to the top of a tree or roof of a house like birds. Another feature is incombustibility. Fire does not act—at least according to the testimony of magnetists—upon objects impregnated with mesmeric aura, books, clothing, &c. Persons have also been seen under the influence of the fluid to stand the test of boiling water, red-hot iron, &c. Nevertheless, we think it will be prudent to wait for new experiments before pronouncing finally upon these strange facts.^[10]

​Still further let us note, as a striking feature of nervous ether, the property of lingering almost indefinitely in bodies which it has impregnated; magnetized water, in closed bottles, retained at the end of six months its mesmeric principle. Stuffs and other objects retain for a long time traces of the fluid which has saturated them. We may thus comprehend the prodigies which are sometimes worked at the tombs of persons who are venerated in their different religions.^[11] The cures thus operated are rarely lasting,^[12] but, none the less, they testify to the presence and action of the thaumaturgic fluid. This property seems to contradict what we have said respecting the ease with which ether runs through bodies to act at a distance. But ​it is possible, we think, to explain this anomaly if we keep in view the nature of the fluidic molecules secreted by the nervous apparatus.

They result from a grouping of the chemical atoms which compose the cerebro-spinal tissue, hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulphur, &c., to speak only of the principal ones. It is possible that the aggregates resulting from such complex combinations may not always be homogeneous; the most subtle traverse walls to transmit their action to a distance, whilst the others, serving in some sort as a gross residuum^[13] to the first, lingers in the garments of the somnambule, and in the atmosphere of the room where the magnetic experiments are made.

We shall close these considerations upon the nervous fluid by a rapid glance at the causes which make it develope, and the diverse modes of manifestation which betray its presence.

The causes are very various, and some, involving ​the intimate nature of the subject, baffle analysis. We may lay down the principle that all have as their initiative a mechanical action, which is taking place in the nervous apparatus. The most common action is that of thought. We know, according to the recent works on physiology, that every act of intelligence implies molecular disturbance of the cerebral tissue, and hence a disengagement of fluid proportionately abundant to the initial action, I mean as the transformation of atomic forces is more energetic. Ordinarily this disengagement is too trifling to manifest its presence but if there be a strong mental tension acting protractedly upon the brain, the quantity of ether set in motion will be great enough to produce the effects of mesmerism. It is thus that in the magnetic passes a sustained volition compels the fluid to manifest itself. As to the external causes, we shall only cite the influence of atmospheric electricity, and the processes of sorcery, to which we shall return in a special chapter.

The phenomena of mesmerism are not less varied than the causes which produce them. A fixed idea, strong preoccupations, lead to somnambulism. The practices of ascetic life engender thaumaturgists; the fluid of the magnetizers, acting on the subject, has as a consequence somniloquence. An organic or moral predisposition gives rise to mediumship. Certain causes, still badly defined, bring about the strange facts of obsession and ​catalepsy.^[14] Narcotics easily prepared cause sometimes the dreams, sometimes the realities, of sorcery. Each time one sees this mysterious personality, which we have called the inner man, form itself and grow in proportion as the fluid becomes more abundant and more active an unanswerable proof of the intimate relationship which unites these two psychological agents.

The following chapters are devoted to the summary exposition of these different prodigies.