Letters on the Od Force

7/28/2019 Letters on the Od Force

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THEODFORCE

LETTERS ON

ANEWLY DISCOVERED POWER IN NATURE

AND ITS RELATION TO MAGNETISM,ELECTRICITY,HEAT AND LIGHT

BY

BARON VON REICHENBACH

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854 by B. B. Mussey & Co.,

In the Clerks Office of the District Court for the Dist. Of Massachusetts

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PREFACE.

Whatever is true proves a power not only by being uttered but far more by being.

The following letters, treating of a new dynamic in nature, are a reprint, slightly

modified, from the Universal Gazette of Augsburg. They proposed, as was frankly avowed atthe time, to appeal to the German public against the injustice of certain professional scholars,

who did not bring forward their arguments but their scientific authority, for previously

declaring the present researches inadmissible and for discrediting them, in the public opinion,

unexamined, as entirely worthless. Every new thing ought to stand the contest with the old;

the reluctance to give way to the former arouses resistance from the latter. I have not been

disappointed: many of the facts which I have established are universally known, standing

firmly and safely against any dialectic attack, hundreds of thousands of the German people

giving evidence thereto. The conclusions drawn from these facts are almost self evident, and

public opinion, sensible of truth, has received my labours with favour.

It is evident, from the mixed public to be addressed that treatises of this description in apolitical newspaper ought to be limited to some incidental hints. Some of the chief points are

set forth as plainly as possible, avoiding amplification, as this is all which the space will

allow.

The "Universal Gazette" has given us, oftentimes series of interesting letters of a

scientific stamp,- astronomical, chemical, geological, phrenological, physiological, but, in

comparison with these I have written under evident disadvantage. They had nothing to relate

but known or acknowledged truths, which nobody would dispute.

My letters on the contrary, represent almost exclusively new things, or, at least, new

aspects of known things; and, therefore they are obliged not only to propound some doctrine

but also to furnish the arguments The former are more on a level and beaten path; the latter

are obliged to clear their way through the thorns of contesting opinions. Thus I feel obliged to

preface the present letters, and to refer those of my readers who should look for a more

circumstantial explanation, for an argumentation more strict, or for an investigation more

profound, to my work already published "Researches into the Dynamids of Magnetism, etc."

and, as for more ample information, I must beg to be excused till a more minute treatise on

the researches carried on- which I have for some time been engaged in- shall be finished;

wherein there will occur some investigations more extended than those which are treated of

in the present letters.

Baron Von Reichenbach, Castle Reisenberg, near Vienna, August, 1852.

PREFACE OF THE TRANSLATOR

The treatise I am about to lay before the American public, produced a deep sensation, a

year ago, when it was published in Germany. It treats of a new dynamic, or; power of nature,

unknown till now, though related intimately to those already explored, such as light, heat,

magnetism, electricity etc.; in short, to the rest of the so-called imponderable substances.

Everybody knows what an important part the latter play in the general economy of

nature, and how profoundly their effects influence the physical as well as the physiologicalcondition of man. It is more than a century since the celebrated Dr Samuel Hahnemann,

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originator of the homoeopathic in medicine discovered the great principle the healing art,

"similia similibus curantur," and, nearly at the same time, the miraculous effects upon the

human system of drugs, when reduced to atoms and brought in contact with the most minute

outlets of nervous matter in the living organism. For he proved by experience beyond all

doubt, that there may be developed by friction and trituration from the monocules of matter,

as earths, metals, liquids, gases, plants and animals, forces capable of altering in a very shortinterval the disposition of any living constitution, as soon as such efficacious dynamics are

brought into immediate contact with the most delicate fibres of organised matter in its highest

development; to wit, with the nervous tissue.

Each of the great discoveries in our century in succession in chemistry, physics,

physiology, geology, mechanics, etc., has contributed to confirm the general truth, that the

greatest effect through all nature is produced by forces engrafted upon matter in its most

minute forms, sometimes, indeed, even so small as to escape the unaided senses. When

Daguerre taught people how to make an accurate likeness of all objects in existence by means

of the sunbeam- by the atom of light projected through the boundless space of the universe at

a velocity of nearly two hundred thousand miles in one second- he discovered at the sametime that the most efficacious rays of light were lying beyond the boundaries of the visible

iris as it were, a dark and latent light. The recent researches of French end German naturalists

have proved the electric force to be spread all over nature in such abundance that, for

instance, in one drop of water there may be found more of this force than a steam-engine of

many hundreds of horse-power is able to produce; and this electric force, constrained in

subserviency to man, has, even in its present limited application, already annihilated both the

name and the effects of resistance in the calculations of men, respecting their mental

intercourse; to wit, the locomotion of thought.

Who does not remember that, scarcely a century ago, the assertion that the reefs and

islands of coral in the Pacific were the work of microscopic animals, was contested a

l'outrance, ridiculed and sneered at! The same thing happened in respect to the discovery that

some of the largest mountain ridges on our globe consist of nothing more than a residuum of

similar Liliputians of the animal kingdom, forming huge masses of solid rock, in some cases

many thousand feet high.

But all these things were palpable, pervious even to the understanding of the unlearned;

these new discoveries being susceptible of immediate application to practical purposes of

common life, and being turned, of consequence, to universal use.

There were, and are, however,

"- more things in heaven and earth

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy"

and every discovery like those just mentioned has, locked within it, like the jewel-box

in the Arabian tale, a hidden treasure, more precious than that. Thus we go on, step by step,

unravelling the most delicate and refined secrets of nature. Certainly as Goethe sung,

"What nature to discover would give to man no clue

He never would extort by crucible or screw;

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but science, that is, the result or deposit of an infinite series of investigations,

observations, and thoughts, furnishes man with the key that can reveal one by one all the

powers of nature, and the intrinsic value of the latter as to the phenomena of the visible

world.

Nothing has, however, up to the present time, more baffled the researches of thelearned, than the so-called forecast or projection of a spiritual world into this material one of

ours. All thaumaturgists of antiquity, all wizards and sorcerers of the middle ages, all

visionaries and spiritual mediums of modern time, have known, or feigned to know,

something thereabout. They were endowed, without doubt, with a peculiar sense for

observing certain phenomena invisible to the rest of the world, and therefore they felt

justified in asserting that they stood in an intimate and immediate relation to the invisible

world, to the realm of the spirits. What a mass of popular delusions has been based, from the

most distant times down to our own age, upon assertions like these! And have we not lived to

see in our own days, the conjurers from the dead rising up again in spiritual manifestations, in

the rappings and tiltings of tables, chairs and hats? Indisputable facts, it is true were in

existence to give credit to idle imaginations of such a kind; but, confounded by the oddity ofthese facts, the learned have neglected to sift the matter thoroughly, and to look for the

natural causes of them. Our author, on the contrary, was not afraid to go on in that direction.

After having picked up all those strange peculiarities that occur in a certain class of people, in

respect to their feelings and actions in common life, the so called idiosyncrasies, he tried to

put them to the test of the principles of science. He has laid down the results of his former

researches in this regard in his work, Researches on the Dynamids of Magnetism,

Electricity, heat Light, etc, in their Relations to the Vital Force", a work which even attracted

the attention of the great Berzelius. The facts which he obtained in the course of these

investigations led him to views more extended and to experiments more minute, which he has

dilated upon in the letters, a translation of which I offer herewith to the American reader. As

strange as may seem, the conclusions our author draws from the facts obtained by

experiment, carefully and repeatedly executed, they, will deserve at least a fair trial; that is, a

careful examination, according to the method plainly described in these letters. We do not by

any means avert that the axioms set up by the author are irrefutable, and beyond all criticism;

but we believe that in order to refute them, there must be facts drawn from experiment and

arguments based upon science.

Thus we send this little book into the world, begging nothing else for it but an impartial

examination, and, at least, as much of active sympathy as the spiritual manifestations have

met with in this country, without having justified, in our bumble opinion, their claim to such

devoted attention.

The Translator

SENSITIVE PERSONS

My dear friend; did you never in your life meet with people who showed the strange

peculiarity of an apparent aspersion to everything yellow- to that colour in general? A

beautiful lemon, a shining gold colour, a brilliant orange, are surely pleasant objects. What is

it that could be offensive in them? Ask such people what colour they are fond of; you will be

answered, almost uniformly, blue. The azure depths of the sky afford, no doubt a pleasant

sight; when, however, the evening sun encompasses them with a golden fringe, there willcertainly be added to the beautiful, the more beautiful, the splendid, the gorgeous! If I had to

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choose whether I should pass my inner life in a room painted straw colour, or in one of a light

blue, I should probably prefer the former. Every lover of blue to whom I have said so has

laughed at me and pitied my bad taste.

I shall invert the question, and should like to hear from you, if you have ever met with

any person who would declare that he abhorred blue. Certainly- never. Nobody ever shrankfrom blue. For what reason, then, is there such an agreement in disgust for yellow, and

predilection for blue, with some persons?

We know, from the theory of colours, that yellow and blue are in a mutual relation;

both are complementary colours which exhibit a kind of polar contrast. May it not be that

there is hidden under this something beyond the mere effect upon our faculty of sight- an

unknown deference more profound than the simple optical difference of colour that we are all

acquainted with? And may there not be, moreover, a difference between men in general as to

their sensibility to such a difference, so that some would be able to perceive what others had

not the faculty of descrying? May there not be, as it were, people of two different sorts of

senses? Such would, indeed, be a peculiar phenomenon. Let us, then, further investigate thissubject. Girls like to gaze in the looking-glass; neither are there wanting men who are wont to

rejoice in their own reflection. And who would, indeed, object to their doing so, when a

striking counterfeit of God's beautiful masterpiece is smiling from the looking glass exciting

the anticipation of a victory to be won by it? Is there anything more charming. more splendid,

in the world, than a beautiful human being? Why, may it not be possible that there are girls,

women, nay, even men, who are accustomed to shun the mirror; who would turn their back to

it, not being able to endure the refection of their own faces? Certainly, there are such

specimens. There are people- neither do these occur rarely- in whom the looking-glass

produces a peculiar sensation of anxiety, as if a lukewarm, loathsome breath were touching

them, so that they cannot even for a minute quietly endure it. The glass not only reflects upon

themselves their counterfeit, but throws back on them all impression ineffably painful,

stronger with some, less strong, with others perceptible with many so slightly as to leave

behind only a vague aversion to the looking-glass. Why, what is this? What is its origin? Why

do some people only feel it, and not all?

You have travelled, I suppose, a good deal over the world; and, I dare say, you have

met, in the mail, on the railroad, or in the omnibus, with people, who, with the most offensive

obstinacy, insisted upon pulling open the windows of the car, whether there was storm,

draught of air, or icy cold. Some persons pay no regard to their travelling companions, even

when suffering from rheumatic complaints. You think such a demeanour exceedingly rude;

but pray defer alittle your hard sentence, at least till you have gone over some more of myletters. It may be that you will obtain from them the conviction that there often occur, in a

densely packed assembly, some unknown things sufficiently powerful to affect many persons

past endurance, whilst the rest are not in the least aware of them.

Do you not remember any friend who cherishes the whim of never consenting to sit

down at the table, inthe church, in the theatre, or anywhere else, amidst others in a row; who,

on the contrary, exerts himself to the utmost, at all such places, to get at the corner seat?

Mark him well, he is our very man, and we shall, by and by, be made more intimately

acquainted with him.

You have, I think, sometimes observed females who, when at church, fall ill.Sometimes they even fall into a swoon, and must be carried out. If you pay attention, you will

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learn that fits like these always befall the same persons; they are totally unable to endure

sitting in the nave of the church without feeling, sick, being in perfectly good health at other

times.

Your physician will tell you that you ought to lie on the right side in your bed, in order

to sleep well and soundly. But pray ask him, once, for what reason. He will, if honest, keepsilence. He does not know the origin of this rule;but be knows, from long experience, that

many people while lying on their left side cannot be put to sleep. He has heard this, but he

remains unacquainted with the hidden cause of that peculiarity. If you pay a little further

attention, you will learn that all people are by no means obliged to lie down on their right side

in order to fall asleep, but thatmany can slumbersoundly, even when reposing on the left

side: yea that there numbers to whom it seems quite indifferent on which side they rest, and

to whom a night passes quietly on their left ear appears as refreshing as one slept on the right.

But you will find, in that case, that those who cannot fall asleep except when resting on the

right side, will number very few; yet they cling so eagerly to this peculiarity, that they may

lie for hours, nay, even during half the night, on the left side, without losing themselves; and

yet, as soon as they turn on their couch, they will instantly fall asleep. This is, indeed, an oddthing, but you may observe it anywhere.

How many people are there who are unable to eat from a spoon of white copper,

argentum, China silver, or any other alloy of silver; whilst some others do not detect any

difference for common use from genuine silver! How many people you may meet with who

cannot be prevailed upon to take coffee, tea or chocolate, from a brass drinking- cup, or

kitchen vessel, which most other persons do not heed at all! How many people bear deep

aversion to any warm eatables- especially when much cooked- to fat meat, sweetmeats, &c.,

preferring cold, simple food, being especially partial to that which is sour! There are amongst

these a good many that cherish such a predilection for salads, that they may be heard to say

they would rather abstain from all other food than salads. Some others cannot comprehend,

the disproportionate delight derived from these things.

There are, lastly, some people who cannot bear to have anybody placed behind them.

Persons of this description are wont to shrink from any crowd, assembly, or market. Some

others are averse to shaking hands, and think it quite intolerable if you should try to keep

their hand in yours; for some time they strive to get rid of it and run away. How many are

there who cannot brook the heat from an iron stove, though very well enduring that from an

earthen one!

Shall I enumerate yet more, even hundreds of such idiosyncrasies which are peculiar tocertain people? Why, what opinion are you to form about them? Are singularities of this kind

only either conceits derived from neglected education, or bad habits caused, perchance, by

local interruptions of health? Thus, of course, they would appear to those who are

accustomed to look only at the surface of things; and we are indeed often induced by mere

appearances to wrong such sensitive persons. If all these strange phenomena should appear

isolated, scattered about amongst divers people in different situations, as mere accidental

manifestations, we should, perhaps, be justified in undervaluing them. There is, however, a

circumstance, not thought worth attending to till now, which represents these things in quite a

different light. For, indeed, no one of the peculiarities mentioned above occurs separately, but

is everywhere connected with some of the rest. If you would consent to investigate this

subject conscientiously, you would meet in one and the same individual with most, even,very often with all of those peculiarities, and never, in any case, will you meet with a single

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one only. The foe to yellow shrinks from looking into the glass; the lover of the corner seat

pulls open the windows of the omnibus; the sleeper on the right side gets sick in the church,

he who dislikes China-silver prefers cold and simple food to fat and sweetmeats, being fond

above all of salad, and so on.

And thus all oddities of description everywhere appear in the same, person in anuninterrupted line, from the aversion to yellow to the dislike of sugar; from the predilection

for blue to the greediness for salad. There is no evident solidarity of all odd characteristics of

this kind amongst their bearers; experience at least, exhibits it so everywhere; for whoever

possesses one of these oddities participates generally in all.

It becomes evident, from the preceding remarks, that all these phenomena are

undoubtedly connected with each other; and, should it be so, can only happen from the

circumstance that all of them are related to a common principle, to a common, though hidden

fountain, from which they alike come forth. As this spring, however, exists only in some

individuals, being wanting in allthe rest, it becomes altogether evident that there are in this

point of view two different species of men,- common people, who do not possess anyof thesesensibilities, and, on the other hand,people of a peculiar irritability, who may, under the least

exposure, be a the way just described.

The latter may be properly called Sensitives for they are, indeed, frequently more

sensitive than the Mimosa. They are so in their innermost nature, which they are powerless to

change, dispense with, or to master, by any effort of their own. People, therefore, are unjust

to them, whenever their whims and oddities are mistaken for spontaneous caprice or

rudeness. Besides this mistake, sensitive persons have, with their peculiar sensibility, which

has been nowhere acknowledged up to the present time, much to undergo in the intercourse

of our society, which does not yet make due allowance for those oddities, though they are

entitled to a more tender regard than that which has yet been bestowed upon them. Their

number is rather large, and you will learn by and by how deeply things are penetrating into

human society, of which I have given you in the foregoing remarks only the first notions

appearing on the surface.

OD. CRYSTALS. DARK ROOM.

You have, no doubt, succeeded in descrying, according to the characteristics I gave you

the other clay, some amongst your acquaintances belonging to that class of people whom I

called Sensitives. Neither is it difficult to meet with them; they exist in considerable

numbers everywhere; and, if there should not be at your command any healthy person of thisdescription, then look only for those who are troubled when sleeping, throwing off in sleep

their coverlet, speaking when dreaming, or who are apt to start up; or those who suffermuch

from passing headache, from stomach ache, complaining frequently of nervous

indispositions, disliking large companies, preferring to be only with a few friends, or even

seeking total seclusion. With a very few exceptions, all these people are of a more or less

sensitive disposition.

But all these things are only the trite portions of the subject in question; put to the

scientific touchstone, there appear phenomena and manifestations of a quite different

importance.

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Provide yourself with a natural crystal, at; large as you have at hand, either a spar of

gypsum a heavy spar, or a Gotthard mountain crystal of a foot in length; put it horizontally

over the corner of a table or the back of a chair, so that both ends of it project. This done, lead

a sensitive friend near it, and direct him to approach the palm of his left hand to the ends of

the crystal, at a distance of six, four, or three inches. Your sensitive friend, before half a

minute has passed, will tell you that from the end of the upper point came forth towards hishand a cooling breath, and, from the opposite end, the lower surface of the crystal, by which

it was originally attached to the ground,- something lukewarm touched his hand. He will find

the cooling breath to be pleasant and refreshing; the lukewarm, on the contrary, as it were,

accompanied by a loathsome and almost nauseous sensation, which, even if continued only a

short time, will prove intolerably affecting and exhausting to the whole arm.

When I observed this manifestation for the first time, it seemed to me both new and

enigmatical; nobody would believe it. I have since repeated the experiment with hundreds of

sensitive persons at Vienna, with the same results. It was proved by experiments in England,

Scotland and France; and anybody may try it for himself, for there are all over the world

plenty of sensitive persons. Whenever one of these persons places his left hand near someother points of the crystal, to wit, to any corner of either side, he will feel, indeed, now

lukewarm, then cool fits, but every time incomparably fainter ones than on either of the

points at the opposite poles.

As these contrary sensations were produced, without the crystals having been touched,

at a distance of some inches, yea, with very sensitive persons, at the distance of some feet, I

thought it evident that something was pouring forth from these, as it were, half-organised

minerals, that the science of physics has not yet explored, and which, though we are unable to

perceive it by the eye, proves its existence by material effects. As Sensitives are enabled to

act through feeling, in so extraordinary a way more than the rest of mankind, the thought

struck me whether they could not, also, surpass our faculties in regard to the sense of sight;

whether they, perhaps, would not be able to perceive, in deep darkness anything of these

strange emanations from crystals! In order to sift this problem thoroughly, I took, in a dark

night of 1844, a huge mountain crystal to a highly sensitive lady, Miss Angelica Starman,

whose physician, Prof Lippich, a celebrated pathologist, was present. We brought about

complete darkness in two rooms, in one of which I placed my crystal, on a spot unknown to

any one present except myself. After a short stay in the first room, in order previously to

accustom the eyes of the Sensitive to the darkness, we led the lady into the where the crystal

was laid down. After a very short time she denoted the place in which it had been put. She

told us that its whole body glowed throughout with a delicate light, and that its upper point

was streaming forth a light as large as a hand, or the palm of a hand, blue in constant motion,sometimes scintillating, of tulip form, dissolving in its upper part into a delicate vapour.

When I inverted the crystal, she saw, rising over its other, obtuse end, a dull smoke, of

reddish-yellow colour.

You may imagine how much I rejoiced in listening to these statements. It is the first

experiment (of the many thousands preceding and following it, made with numberless

varieties of crystal), which has established beyond cavil the fact, and secured its admission by

very many sensitive persons, that the effects upon the sense of feeling, produced by crystals,

are accompanied by certain phenomena of light, which follow the former at the same pace,

appearing in polar contrast as blue and reddish-yellow, and can be perceived only by

sensitive persons.

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If you should wish to repeat the experiments just described, I feel obliged to direct your

attention to the circumstance that you cannot reckon on any success in them but in absolute

darkness. The light adhering to the crystal, is of so faint and delicate a description, that even

the slightest trace of any other light, penetrating by accident into the dark room, would be

sufficient to blind the sensitive observer, that is, to impair, momentarily, his sensitive faculty

for such exceedingly delicate light. There are, besides, but few persons of so high asensitiveness as the lady mentioned above, who was enabled to perceive that tender light after

so short a stay in the dark room, With persons of moderate sensitiveness there was required,

in most cases, a stay of one or even two hours in the dark in order to free their eyes

sufficiently from the over-irritation of day, or lamp-light, and to prepare them completely for

the perception of crystal light. Nay, there have occurred to my experience some cases, where

persons of faint sensitive predisposition did not perceive anything even in the third hour, but

succeeded, nevertheless, in the fourth, in perceiving the lustre of the crystal, and were thus

convinced of the reality of this phenomenon.

Well, you are now eager to learn what the fact concerning it actually is, or to what

department of either physiology or physics these manifestations are to be referred, accordingto both their subjective and objective condition. They are not heat, though they produce

sensations resembling those of cool and lukewarm; for there is no conceivable fountain of

heat, and, if there were such an one existing, it would be perceived not only by sensitive, but,

also by non-sensitive persons; or, at least, by a delicate thermoscope. They are not electricity,

for there is no inducement for the everlasting current that streams forth in that case; no

electroscope is affected by it, nor is conduction according to the laws of electricity, of any

effect. Neither can it be magnetism nor diamagnetism, because crystals are not magnetic, and

diamagnetism does not operate in any crystal in the same way, but in a different and contrary

one, and the latter is ever the case in the phenomena spoken of. Neither could it be common

light, for the reason that, though this phenomenon is accompanied by light, mere light does

not produce anywhere at the same time both lukewarm and cool sensations.

Why, what are, then, actually, these effects above described? If you should press me for

an answer, I should feel obliged to avow that I do not know myself. I mark the manifestations

of a dynamid, which I am unable to record amongst any of the known ones. If I am not

mistaken in judging about the facts proved by experiments, this phenomenon is to be placed

between magnetism, electricity and heat, but it ought not to be identified with either of them:

and, thus embarrassed, I have chosen to designate it by the word Od, the etymology of

which. I shall expound in another place.

THE SUN. THE MOON. THE IRIS

You already know the "Sensitives," and you are acquainted with the element they move

in, that is, the dynamic expressed by the word Od. We did not, however, in that way, touch

anything more than one corner of the hem of the immense drapery in which Nature has thus

wrapt itself. This remarkable force does not spring forth alone from the poles of crystals, it is

emerging also from numerous other fountains in the universe, as strongly as in the case last

mentioned, even more so sometimes. In the next place I shall direct your attention to the

stars, and, above all, to the sun. Place one of your sensitive friends in the shade; put in his left

hand a common empty barometer tube, or other tube of glass, or only a wooden stick, and

cause him to stretch it into the sunshine, whilst both person and hand remain in the shade

Very soon you will hear something of this simple experiment that may strike your mind. Youwill, of course, expect that the experimenting person will feel the stick waxing warm; for

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sunshine cannot but warm it. But you will learn quite the reverse; the sensitive hand will

become sensible of divers sensations, but their result will be coolness. As soon as the stick is

drawn back into the shade, coolness will cease, and the experimenter will feel it growing;

warm; when brought once more into the sunshine, it will become cool again, the

experimenter being thus able accurately to control his own sensations. It is evident, therefore,

that there are circumstances most simple, though unknown down to the present time, underthe prevalence of which the direct ray of the sun does not produce the effect of warmth, but,

on the contrary, in a very unforeseen and strange manner, an impression of cold. Moreover

the Sensitives will tell you that the coolness manifested in this case agrees perfectly with that

produced on the upper end of the mountain crystal. Whereas, that coolness however, should it

be of the condition of Od, would, of course, manifest itself in some way, as a phenomenon of

light in the dark. Neither will you fail in producing it, if you will repeat my experiment, as

follows: I conducted a copper wire from an illuminated room into my dark room, and then

carried the exterior end of it into the sunshine. A very short time afterwards the part of the

wire left in the dark began to grow luminous, and on its end arose a small phenomenon,

flame-like as big as a finger. The sunbeam, consequently, poured into the wire in this way,

the substance of Od, which was seen by the Sensitives in the darkness radiating in the form oflight.

But let us go on a step further. Let the sunbeam fall upon a good prism of glass and

cause it to reflect the colours of the rainbow on an opposite wall. Have your sensitive

performer, with the glass rod in his left hand, try the colours one by one. When the

experimenter shall hold it out in a way to intercept only the blue or violet colour, his

sensations will be exceedingly pleasant and cool; far more pleasant and cooler than that

produced by the whole sunbeam. When, on the contrary, he places it in the yellow or rather in

the red light, the pleasant coolness will instantly cease, and instead of it, a warmth ensue and

a loathsome tepidity, which would in a very short time tire the whole arm. You may likewise,

cause your sensitive to hold out his naked finger, instead of the intermediate pole, into the

colours; the effect will be the same. I preferred, at the first experiment, to use only the rod, in

order to exclude, by a poor conductor of heat, any coeffect on the hand of the actual warm

rays. These effects of the analysed sunlight will be proved to be exactly the same as those

streaming forth from the poles of crystals. You may infer, from these facts, that Od of both

effects is contained in the sunbeam; it is pouring forth at every moment in immeasurable

quantity, from our sun, together with and heat, and thus exhibits a new and powerful agency

in it, the distance of whose effects we are as yet unable to appreciate or calculate.

Well, I shall now venture to request you to look back once more upon the foes of

yellow and the admirers of blue in my first letter. Did we not learn that the pole of the crystal,which was breathing forthpleasant coolness, emitted altogether blue light- and, do we not see

here in quite a different way, the sunlight, by its blue beam, also emitting a coolness

exceedingly refreshing? On the other side did not the reddish light of the opposite pole on the

crystal and likewise. both the yellow and the red of sunlight, produce lukewarm impressions

on sensitive persons You will be aware that in both these cases, so much differing from each

other, the blue was followed every time by very pleasant, the yellow-reddish by equally

uncomfortable sensual impressions. We have therefore, here the first hint, that may caution

you against a hasty sentence upon the supposed caprices of sensitive persons. You will allow

that indeed in both the yellow and blue there may be hidden something more than a mere

optical effect upon the retina of the human eye- that an instinct rooted more deeply for some

delicate and unknown purpose is here ruling the feelings and of consequence the judgementof Sensitives and, lastly that this phenomenon may be worth the most careful attention.

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But, even without referring to colours, I shall suggest to you another easy experiment,

in order to discern the standard of Od in the sunbeams. I have tried it myself many times.

Pray, polarise them in the usual way, by causing them to fall under an angle of 35 25' on a

package of a dozen panes of glass. Then have your sensitive friend hold the rod in his left

hand, alternately in both the reflected and the transmitted light. You will be told, every time,that the former conveys, by way of the rod, to the hand in contact, the coolness of the Od; the

latter, on the contrary, the loathsome lukewarmness of it.

When you are in the humour, you may avail yourselves of this peculiarity to banter the

chemists. Take, for that purpose, two tumblers filled with water, placing the one in the

reflected sunlight and the other in the transmitted rays. After a delay of six to eight minutes

let it be tasted by a sensitive man or woman. They will tell you, instantly, that the water

placed in the reflected light tastes cool and sour; that in the opposite light, lukewarm and, as

it were, bitter. Once more; place a small glass vessel, filled with water, in the blue light of the

rainbow, and another of the same size in the yellow ray; or place the first on the pointed edge

of a large mountain crystal, and the other on its obtuse lower corner. In any of these casesyou may be assured that the sensitive will feel the water from the blue light to be delightful,

delicate, acid-like; that from the reddish-yellow, on the contrary, nauseous, bitter and harsh.

He will, if permitted, empty the former with high delight; but, if you should prevail upon him

to drink the latter, it may happen as has chanced to me, that is, that the, sensitive may shortly

afterwards vomit vehemently. Then hand the water over to the gentlemen of the chemical

profession, and let them analyse from out it the "amarum" and the "acidum", that is, its bitter

and its sour constituents!

Operate with the moonlight in the same way as you did with the sunlight. You will

obtain similar, though partly contrary results. A glass rod held out by a sensitive experimenter

with his left hand, into full, serene moonlight, will impart to him, not coolness, but lukewarm.

A glass of water, placed for some time in the moonlight, will taste more lukewarm arm and

loathsome than another which was left meantime in the shade. Everybody knows what great

influence the moon exercises upon some people; all persons affected by her being, without

any exception, Sensitives, and, indeed, generally of peculiar sensitiveness. And, as she does

evidently exercise some effects of Od and her influence upon lunatics is in accordance with

those effects, which may be produced also by other sources ofOd, she is, as an Od-producing

constellation, of great importance to us.

There is, radiating from the light of both in sun and moon, a powerful substance of Od,

in such abundance that we may easily intercept and manage it for simple experiments. Howimmense its influence proves to be upon all mankind and, in consequence, upon the whole

animal and vegetable kingdoms, you will learn, by and by, from many evidences. The Od is,

after all, a cosmic dynamid, emitting rays from star to star, like light and heat, embracing the

universe.

MAGNETISM

These essays are called "odic-magnetic letters" Now why magnetic? You will ask, what

is there of magnetism in them? I feel obliged to answer to your question- very little, or

nothing at all. But, as people are wont to call a number of manifestations (referring to our

subject) magnetic, I feel obliged to submit, for the moment, to this nomenclature. The causeof this custom is to be found in the circumstance that magnetism is carrying along with itself

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some faculties of Od, as the light of both the sun and moon has similar ones in its suite, as the

same spring forth. from crystal poles, and from numerous fountains besides, which have not

the slightest connection with magnetism, in so far, at least, as we have understood this latter

power of nature up to the present time. Let us then, investigate a little further the mutual

relations between Od and magnetism.

Place a powerful loadstone obliquely over the edge of a board, so that both ends of it

may project, in the same way as you did with the large crystal; arrange the board or table in

such a manner that the loadstone may be placed in the meridian, to wit, the north pole of the

needle of the compass toward the north, and its south pole toward the south; then direct your

sensitive friend to place himself in front of the magnet, bringing his left hand slowly towards

it at a distance of from six to four inches. After having complied with your orders, he will

give you the same information which you got from him when touching the crystals; namely,

that the northward pole exhales a cooling breath to the hand, the south pole, on the contrary, a

lukewarm, loathsome air. You may then place again, on each of the poles, a glass of water,

and, after six to eight minutes, cause the sensitive to taste either of them. He will declare the

glass placed northward to be fresh and coal; that on the southward pole, on the contrary,lukewarm and disgusting; and if you wish once more to vex the necromancers of chemistry,

they will get angry and in order to escape from this perplexity, will deny the whole fact,

though evident as the sunlight, affirming it to be not true. You may smile at the weak side

exposed in this case by the learned men of the cathedra, for the great truths of nature cannot

be converted into untruth by mere negation without proof. These gentlemen may be

compelled before long, to modify their opinion thereabout.

You will, no doubt, think it self evident that the suppositions that led me into the dark

with crystals, would work upon my mind also in regard to the effects of magnet. The first

experiment on this matter I arranged with Miss Mary Nowotny at Vienna, April, 1844, and

have repeated it many hundred times since in the dark room, with divers Sensitives. I rejoiced

in seeing my suppositions justified to my satisfaction when the lady declared that on either

end of the magnet there was a burning flame fiery and glaring smoking and spark- on the

northward pole blue, on the southward, yellow-reddish. But pray, try the easy experiment

yourself, only modifying it by placing the loadstone vertically, the southward pole upward,

and you will be told that the flame springing forth from the pole will increase. If the magnet

were sufficiently powerful, it would be seen rising up to the ceiling of the room; yea, it would

even produce on the ceiling an illuminated oval circle, of one to three feet in diameter, so

bright that, if the observer be sufficiently sensitive, he might describe to you the paintings he

sees there. But I must caution you against omitting any precautions for getting absolute

darkness, and for accustoming the eyes of the performer to the latter for some hours;otherwise your observer could see nothing. You would operate in vain, and the truthfulness of

my statements would run the risk of being suspected, undeservedly.

This bright phenomenon would appear more beautiful, if you would apply to the

experiment a horse-shoe magnet, placing the latter with both of its poles upward. I operated

with one of this description, of a hundred weight power. All Sensitives attending the

experiment saw streaming forth from either of its poles a delicate light, to wit, two beside one

another, which neither attracted, nor overpowered, nor influenced each other, as the magnetic

powers of opposite poles do, but which quietly, side by side, sprang upward, filled with

numberless small spots white-hot shining and forming altogether a column of light as big as a

man, which by all who saw it, was described as exceedingly beautiful and delightful. It arosevertically to the ceiling, forming there an illuminated circular plane about six feet in diameter.

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When the experiment was continued for a considerable time, the whole ceiling of the room

grew by degree, visible. Whenever a magnet of this description is placed on a table the flame

it exhales illuminates its surface entirely and even the objects upon it as far as a yard's

distance from its surface. When a hand is put into it, a shadow is seen; when, on the contrary a

flat body, as a small board, a pane of glass or a sheet of metal, is brought horizontally into this

flame like phenomenon, the latter is seen curving around those materials, running alongbeneath them like common fire around a pan or pot. Whenever any one blows or puffs into it,

it begins to flare as if it were a lighted candle. Whenever a draught of air sets in, or the

magnet itself moved, it stoops sideways in the direction or the current of air, like a torch when

moved. When a burning-glass is brought near it, light may be gathered and concentrated into a

focus. The manifestation is for that reason very material, possessing many of its attributes in

common with the usual flame. When two of them are brought together so as to meet each

other crosswise they do not disturb one another by any attractions or repulsions, but will

penetrate one another each proceeding undisturbed on its own way. Whenever one of them

proves to be stronger, as it were fitted out with a stronger faculty of propelling, it will pierce

its inferior, cleaving it so that the latter will pass on both sides around it. A similar effect takes

place when a rod is held in it; it will cleave the flame, and the latter will be reunited behind it.Well, as crystals may be seen by any sensitive person, in a delicate lustre that penetrates their

whole substance, so the same persons will perceive, likewise, the steel of the magnet glowing

throughout in a sort of whitefire. In the same manner do the electromagnets manifest

themselves*.

*These phenomena of light on magnets are treated of more explicitly, accompanied by

the necessary proofs in the work Untersuchungen ueber die Dynamide des Magnetismus der

Electricitaet, der Waerme, des Lichts etc., in ihren Beziehungen zur Lebenskraft, von

Freiherrn V. Reichenbach, Braunschweig, Vieweg, 1860.

There is no parallelism whatever between the attributes just enumerated, and those of

magnetism, the former being exclusively those of Od. If you would compare a spar of

gypsum with a loadstone, you would perceive the emanations of Od from the homonymous

poles, of both the former and the latter, as well in respect to the effect upon sensation as to

that oh sight, to be not substantially different, crystals being perhaps a little superior to

magnets in regard to the power of Od, their coolness or warmth being more clearly defined,

their faculty of light more powerful; but the crystal wants magnetism. You have therefore, in

that instance side by side both Od joined to magnetism and Od without any magnetism, in

each both of them being of the same power It cannot, therefore, by any means be asserted that

Od is a gift to magnetism, nor even only one of the attributes of magnetism, nor magnetism

itself. The Od appears in crystals totally separated from any magnetism whatever, and I shallby and by enumerate to you a good many more instances as striking as those given above, in

which Od of the strongest power occurs; not the slightest trace of magnetism in the usual

sense of the word, being present.

Od, therefore, is to be considered as an independent dynamic, which exhibits itself in

the suite of magnetism, as well as in crystals, in the sunbeams, and many manifestations of

nature beside, whereof we shall treat further in another place.

We know the great points of similarity between magnetism and electricity. We are

aware that the former appears in the train of the latter, and vice versa so that we are prone to

identify them. Light and heat act in a similar way; the one produces the other; each changingat every moment from itself into the other. We are unable, nevertheless, to designate,

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anywhere, the common point of issue from which both of them must be derived. The same is

the case in respect to Od. We are, therefore, obliged to guess that these dynamic phenomena

must, in the last instance, come forth from a common source; but, as long as we shall be

unable to prove this identity of origin, so long there is left to us nothing else but to treat of

electricity, magnetism light, heat, &c., as of a particular group of phenomena. Whereas, while

we comprehend that the numerous manifestations of Od could not be ranked amongst any ofthe dynamics known to us at present, there is left no chance for us but to gather them

separately, forming thus a peculiar group. In the following letters I shall try to prove, beyond

any doubt, that the manifestations of this dynamic are not inferior, either as to their compass

or their importance, to those which have already obtained, in physical science, the right of

naturalisation.

ANIMAL MAGNETISM.

In our day there is once more a great deal of discussion about an oddity, which was

already known eighty years ago, under the name of Animal Magnetism (so called by

Mesmer). Our fathers, our grandfathers and our ancestors, disposed of it totally;notwithstanding, it arises constantly anew, and can never die. Why, on what depends so

tenacious a life? "Upon falsehood, deception and superstition"; for as such, this topic was

treated by a celebrated physiologist in Berlin. We shall see whether they were right who

knew no better course than to repeat these words.

Let us seize it, at present, without any long preamble, by its horns. Please direct a

person of moderate sensitiveness, or of a marked disposition of that kind, to go into the dark;

take with you a cat, a bird, a butterfly, if you can obtain one, and a flower-pot, with the

flower in blossom. After some hours you will hear strange things. The flowers will emerge

from the darkness, becoming visible. At first, they will spring forth from the gloom of

universal darkness confusedly, in the form of a grey mist. Afterwards there will he formed in

the latter some specks shining more brightly. At last, they will dissolve and expand

themselves, the separate flowers becoming discernible, and the forms recognised waxing

brighter from moment to moment. When I had led the renowned botanist, Professor

Endlicher- who was an individual of moderate sensitiveness- to such a flower-pot, he

exclaimed as if terrified, "There is a blue flower, it is a Gloxinia." It was indeed "Gloxinia

speciosa var. caerulea" he had seen in absolute darkness, having recognised it both by its

form and colour. But without any light there could, of course, be seen nothing at all. There

must have existed, therefore, some light to enable him to observe the plant so distinctly as to

recognise it not only in respect to its form, but also its colour. Why, whence came this light?

It was emanating, actually, from the plant itself, the latter growing luminous. Fruit buds,stamens, pistil, anther, corol, stem, all appeared in a delicate light, even the leaves were to be

seen, though in a fainter lustre. Everything became visible in a soft glow, the organs of

generation the foremost. the stem brighter than the leaves. Your butterfly, your bird, your cat,

all will step forth into visibility, parts of them will grow luminous, and the light will move

with them to and fro. But by and by you will hear your sensitive friend stating that he has a

sight of yourself. The first time you will seem to him like a shapeless man of snow; then, like

a man in armour, having on his head a high helmet; at last, like a giant, awfully gleaming.

Then cause the sensitive to direct his looks to his own form. Somewhat perplexed, he will

perceive himself emitting light even through his clothes; not only his arms but also his feet,

his legs, chest, trunk, the whole will be seen in a gentle glow. Direct his attention to the

hands. In the beginning they will resemble a grey vapour, then they will assume the aspect ofa profile on a faintly lighted ground; at last, the fingers will appear in their own light, being

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seen as they appear when you place your hand near the flame of a candle, that is, transparent.

The hand will seem to have grown longer than it actually is; from the tip of each finger will

appear, as it were, a luminous continuation that will measure, according to circumstances,

half or even quite a finger's length. The hand will thus seem to be increased in size by its

whole length, by the burning tail that appears on every finger. The upper joints of the fingers

will shine the brightest; the roots of the nails even outshining the latter.

When the astonishment caused by this self illuminating faculty of man, unknown down

to our days, shall have subsided, and you desire to ask for your colour, then you will, perhaps,

wonder again at being told that it is different on different parts of your body, the right hand

shining in a bluish light, whilst the left appears in a light of yellow-reddish colour; the

former, of course, appearing more obscure, the latter more luminous; that the same difference

is to be seen as to both your legs; that even the whole right side of your face is more dull,

more bluish than the left; nay, that the whole right part of your body seems to be bluish and a

little more obscure; the left, on the contrary exhibits itself of a yellow-reddish colour, and

perceptibly brighter than the former. It will then instantly rush to your mind, that you here

meet again with the same contrast of colours (to wit, of blue and reddish-yellow) which youhave met with in the light of the crystals, in the sunshine, and in the flames of the magnets.

Now, may not the parallelism, which every time grew manifest between the blue and cool

light of Od, as well as between the yellow-reddish and lukewarm, be found and proved to

exist also in respect to the self-illuminating faculty of man? You deem this to be

problematical; and, indeed, the nature of this attribute of the human body would be left

enigmatical, unless such a fact could be proved. I have tried (August, 1844) the following

experiment with Mr Bollman, a joiner, fifty years of age, and of moderate sensitiveness. I put

his left hand in my right, in such a way that the fingers of each of us interlaced those of the

other, but did not touch one another. After a minute I replaced the fingers of my right by

those of my left hand. Thus I changed hands several times, and learned therefrom that the

man felt my right blue-shining hand, to be cooler than my left yellow-shining hand, the latter

waxing far warmer. The evidence looked for was found. I repeated the experiment afterwards

with many hundreds of sensitive persons, when it was verified by the same result Then I

extended it, in numberless variations, to other parts of the body, as feet, cheeks, ears, eyes,

nostrils nay, even to the halves of the tongue; but in all of these cases I got but one and the

same result, namely, that the whole right side of anybody, whether male or female, is

observed by sensitive persons to be cooler; the whole left side, on the contrary, to be warmer.

Well, you will comprehend, from these facts, that man is polarised from his right to the left

exactly as any crystal between the poles of its great axis, as the magnet between its northward

and southward pole, as the sunlight between blue and yellow. As, however; the effects with

their characteristics are the same, we feel justified in concluding that the causes also are thesame that is, that man, too, is, or develops, Od, and precisely of the two different forms which

have been observed in other sources of Od. I examined for the purpose of evidence, cats,

chickens, ducks, dogs, horses, cattle; all of which were found to be of the same condition.

Plants which I caused to be investigated proved to be subjected to the same law, from their

root up to their leaves. All the universe, therefore, the whole organic, living nature, is

luminous and abounding in supplies of the dynamid of Od, streaming forth and pervading it;

and, if you will look over this vast fact with its immense extent of meaning through all the

universe, then will dawn upon you a new light on that subject, a small fragment of which has

been both improperly and incorrectly called, down to our days, animal magnetism. After

having handed to you, in the outset the key of entrance into this intricate maze, I shall try

with the lamp of theory in hand, to pass speedily through it in your company.

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MAN, THE BEARER OF OD

Whenever I took a sensitive left hand in my right one, you saw that there was produced

a sensation of pleasant coolness; but whenever I did the same with my left hand, a loathsome

warmth a lukewarm feeling, took place. This may be inverted. A left hand may be laid into a

sensitive right one; in this case the sensation will be one of pleasant coolness. Tried on theright hand, there will follow a nauseous sensation. The law is before us: odic homologous

joining of hands (left with left, or right with right) are lukewarm and loathsome; odic joining

of the opposite poles (left with right, or right with left) are cool and pleasant. Now recall the

remark in my first letter, that there are people whom it affects uncomfortably whenever

anybody shakes hands with them, and who break off rather vehemently when any one tries to

clench their offered hand. It is, however, the custom to shake the right hand. In this case,

therefore, a homonymous coupling of hands takes place, being lukewarm and loathsome,

very soon growing painful, and by and by intolerable to the sensitive person; and thus they

strive to get rid of it by detaching themselves from it, violently if necessary. Go on a step

further: put your right fingers on the left arm of a sensitive individual. on his shoulder, under

the shoulder, on the temples, on the thigh, on the knee, the foot, the toes, anywhere on the leftside of the whole sensitive body; your right lingers will be felt cool and pleasant; all these

touchings being, of course, a contact of a heteronymous description. Do the same on the right

side of the sensitive with your left fingers, and you will produce the same sensation of

coolness; these touchings being likewise a heteronymous contact. If you should apply, on the

contrary, all these touchings to the left side of the sensitive, by your left fingers, or vice versa,

on the right side by your right fingers, all would be felt contrarily, that is, lukewarm and

unpleasant; the latter contacts being only homonymous.

Put my statements to the test, choosing for that purpose another contact of common life.

Place yourself beside a sensitive person as near as soldiers stand when mustered in file; your

whole right side will, in this case touch the whole left side of the sensitive; there will not be

any utterance of displeasure. But, pray turn round at your place, so that your left side comes

in contact with the left of your sensitive neighbour; he will then instantly give vent to his

complaint of a lukewarm uneasiness, and he will, unless you should shift to your former

place, find it intolerable, and step back. In the former case the contact was homonymous, in

the latter heteronymous.

Choose another relation. Take your place immediately in the rear of your sensitive

friend, your front facing his back; or in the same manner before him, your back fronting his

face; in either case your right side will be placed next to his right, and, at the same time, your

left to his left. Both are, however, homonymous connections; the Sensitive will not bear withit, and he will leave you instantly unless you change your position. Here, I feel obliged to

refer once more to a passage in my first letter, where I directed your attention to the existence

of people who cannot endure that any one should take his place near them, neither in their

rear nor immediately before them; from that very instinct shunning every crowd and every

market-place. You will comprehend by what strong impulse these people are induced to do

so.

I know some stout and lively young men who dislike riding on horseback. This seems,

at first sight, quite contrary to a manly disposition; for the exercise on horseback and the

management of the horse are certainly a high delight to the strength of youth. But, on

horseback, the rider is obliged to turn to the animal his homonymous sides. The case is nearlythe same as that mentioned above, when a sensitive feels immediately before him the back of

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another. All male persons, in whom I have met with this disgust of riding on horseback, were

Sensitives. As an instance I may name the Barons Auguste and Henry Oberlaender.

There are, likewise, females that cannot endure carrying a child on their back, not even

for a few minutes, in mere sport. This case resembles the one just mentioned; it agrees with

those where sensitive individuals feel another in their rear. Such These females are alwaysSensitives. There are many people who cannot sleep in the same bed with another. These

"mauvais coucheurs" are proverbial. The reason is evident from the preceding arguments But

even the general custom of all civilised nations, namely, to give the right side to persons

superior to one's self, by placing one's self on them left, sitting down on their left or guiding

them by their left arm has its deep motive in the relation of our condition to Od. This custom

indeed is said to be introduced in order to leave free to the privileged person the motion of his

right hand. This reason may have had its share in the introduction of the custom mentioned,

but the influence of sensitiveness thereupon has been probably of far greater importance.

When two persons are placed sideways near one another, they are mutually loading one

another with their Od; he on the right side receives a load of negative Od from him on the

left; the latter a load of positive Od from the former. The right one obtains, therefore, as muchof negativeness as the left one loses of it; the left, on the other side, gains as much of

positiveness as the right one loads upon him. But the peculiar effect of the stronger

negativeness of Od is, as you know, cooler and more pleasant; that of the stronger

positiveness more lukewarm and disagreeable. The female, therefore, whom you place on

your right side, obtains as much of pleasure as the male on her left of uneasiness. The key to

this immemorial habit is not, therefore, to be looked for in custom alone, but it corresponds

with something; in the inmost recesses of our nature. This goes so far, that people of rather

strong sensitiveness cannot stay at all on the left side of any one. Numberless cases like these

occur in human life in a thousand connections and modifications; all of which may be

explained and determined according to the law just developed. But everybody may infer,

from these facts, how very often the pretensions of sensitive persons and their claims upon

regard and forbearance might be justified.

MESMERISM. THE MAGNETIC PASS AND MEDICAL MEN.

You perchance, ask me what we se, of the so-called magnetisation of a person regarded

from our point of view, since you may consider this subject as the very hinge on which my

letters are turning. This is, however by no means the case, though it may be a very

remarkable part of the manifestations of Od. It has obtained a practical importance rather

extensive, having produced the so-called Mesmerism, that is, a certain method of curing

introduced into the medical art by Dr. Mesmer, he availing himself of the dynamic of Od as aremedy in some diseases. Mesmer thought it, according to the condition of the natural

sciences in his age, to be magnetism, calling it Animal Magnetism. Neither of the

appellations, Od or Mesmerism, will, by any means, interfere with the other. The former

belongs to the department of Physics, and designates a cosmic power; the, latter refers to a

special application of this power in Therapeutics, and belongs to the medical science.

Let us here recur to the fifth of these letters, where I invited you to pass with me

through the mazes of the so-called "Animal Magnetism," the lamp of theory, just acquired, in

our hand.

You know that, wherever you touch with your fingers a sensitive person in the dark, animpression, both sensible and visible, is produced upon him. It is, however, scarcely

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necessary, that any contact should actually take place; the mere approximation of your fingers

produces a considerable effect. The emanation, which in the dark extends visibly to a

considerable distance beyond your fingers, immediately reaches the body to which they draw

near, exercising some influence upon it. You may produce some rather powerful irritations,

even at a distance of one or more feet, which may be on persons of only moderate

sensitiveness. With persons of high sensibility, however, this reaches as far as across theroom; and there have occurred to me many cases where the effect was distinctly visible at the

surprising distance of twenty or thirty paces, and even more.

Thus far we have treated only of stationary touchings, contact without motion. But, at

present I shall invite you to move along with the points of your fingers, or with the pole of a

crystal, or with a magnet, from one point of the body of a sensitive person to another.

Approach, for example, the points of your right fingers to the left shoulder of your sensitive

friend, passing them softly and slowly as far down as the joint of the elbow, or down the

whole arm, extending even beyond the fingers. As before, by stationary contacts, you now

will produce, by such touching, a certain impression moving downward along the whole line,

producing a cool pass that may be considered as a chain of numberless links waxing cool.Medical men call this phenomenon, the 'Pass'. Do the same on some other points, for

instance, over the left side of the head, down the left side of the body, and the left foot, even

beyond the toes, and you will produce all along the same cool sensation. When you operate in

the same way with your left hand down the right side, you will produce the same effect as

before; both being heteronymous contacts. When, at length, you choose to apply both hands

together to this experiment, carrying on both passes above mentioned, over the sensitive

person, from top to toe, the whole person thus passed over will be pervaded with a pleasant

sensation of coolness and quietness. Now, what you have just done is nothing but what the

disciples of Mesmer, and all of the so-called magnetic physicians, denominate the animal

magnetic or mesmeric pass. Thus, you, too, are now able to magnetise.

For this purpose, you must understand it is quite indifferent whether you apply the pass

with your band, or with the poles of crystals or magnets, whether you exercise it immediately

on the naked skin or over the clothes, either at a distance of half a span or of an ell or more;

the effect will be each time the same in kind, only decreasing in power in proportion to the

increased distance.

The influence produced by extraneous heteronymous emanations of Od upon the

condition of a sensitive person, forms the substance of the so-called 'Magnetisation'.

Whenever you operate in the dark, the Sensitives will perceive the burning ends of the fingers

or poles passing down over them; they will see, moreover, on those points of their bodytouched momentarily by the flames of Od, a mark more luminous than the rest running with

the engendering principle of light. From this phenomenon of light, as well as from the effect

of a cool sensation, you may infer, conclusively, that the magnetising person exercises upon

the person magnetised, a charm which may be regarded as of great importance; that Od,

which is emanating with blue light, exercises an influence particularly exciting upon the

bearers of Od with red light, that is, heteronymous upon heteronymous And, whereas, the

human body proves to be a strong bearer of Od, the substance of the latter partaking strongly

of the inmost being of the former, it becomes evident that magnetic passes of this description

may penetrate deeply into both the physical and mental economy of man. Excitation of sleep,

or restlessness; an influence (either useful or injurious) upon morbid interruptions in the

body; impressions by "applying the hands upon the body, passing over it," etc., are, therefore,by no means " a pitiable error, full of deception and superstition, as people in some places

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have thought themselves justified in asserting- but physiological facts, based upon the laws of

nature, and proved by experience. Only those who will never take pains to examine into these

facts, can indulge in the utterance of such a premature judgment.

When, however, you ask me for the actual profit that medical art draws from these

magnetic proceedings, I venture to say, from conviction that it may become immensely greatas soon as the physical and physiological theory of the Od shall be perfectly expounded and

developed; but that, at present, it seems to me rather limited and problematical. When listen-

to the magnetisers, or reading their reports one might, indeed, be tempted to think them able

now, as Mesmer thought himself eighty years ago, to cure by that method any disease

whatever. Every physician, to whatever school he may belong, is wont to imagine, when his

patient has recovered, that his art teas cured him. Why should not a magnetic practitioner

cherish the same self-conceit? We, and other people, are fully aware that, amongst twenty

convalescents, nineteen recover by themselves and very often in spite of the art of the

medical man. I have myself, notwithstanding ascertained thus much, that on whatever part of

the human body a is laid or moved according to heteronymous connection of Od, there takes

place an enhancement of the activity of vital force; and, indeed, no superficial one, but suchas to force its effects very rapidly even to the innermost organs. Whenever, therefore, a local

exhaustion is manifested, some revival and an increased activity may be produced. This is a

general result, great and ample, which intelligent practitioners will know how to estimate. I

consider the influence of Od, especially upon convulsions, as being established by evidence. I

have, myself, in numberless cases, assuaged or produced arbitrarily, in this way, complaints

of this description. But whenever I have observed physicians operating at a sick-bed, I have

seen them, with very few exceptions, exhibiting such foolish tricks, that any final result

beneficial to the patient must prove next to impossible.

Without a knowledge of both the real condition of Od and the laws belonging to a

power so complicated, what solid result could reasonably be expected to be obtained hitherto

by groping blindly along through the darkness? But we may hope that our medical men, as

soon as the nature of Od and its complications with the faculties of the living organism, shall

be recognised, and scientifically developed by profound researches, will also begin to

introduce, in place of the present rambling, harum-scarum practice, a more rational system of

procedure, in order to bring under strict laws the effects of Od upon the morbid human body;

and thus draw from these extraordinary manifestations some certain benefit for mankind,

which they have long since desired from this source.

CHEMISM.

I showed the other day, what is by animal magnetism. It is no magnetic effect upon the

human body, but the effect of Od, which may be exercised upon as well (and sometimes with

stronger results) by numerous other sources of Od as by the magnet; the latter operating in

such cases as an accidental vehicle of Od, but never in its condition as a magnet. Therefore,

let us drop the phrase, "animal magnetism," as obsolete. It is derived from a period when

people used to form the dullest and most confused notions about such things; and it disagrees

with the present state of theoretical illustration of the subject in question. Before, however,

leading you further toward the bottom of the subject, I feel obliged to make you more

acquainted with the extension of Od in nature.

You know this dynamic that pours forth in an everlasting and unalterable current from anunknown fountain by the poles of crystals. You know, further one that is emanating from a

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source lessening by degrees, and at last dried up, namely, from steel magnets. You know,

finally, an Od that is springing forth from well transient though living, that is, from organic

life. Well, I am about to lead you now to an Od that sparkles forth for a little moment, and

then speedily dies away; it is that produced by chemical process. I say, considerately, by

Chemism, as it is well to distinguish between it and affinity; the former designating chemical

force. Uncork a bottle of champagne in the dark, before the eyes of a sensitive bystander; hewill shout with delight at the flash of fire that will follow the cork. as it flies up to the ceiling

of the room. Then, the whole bottle will appear in a white glow, as if it were a mass of

glittering, snow, and a bright, undulating cloud will be seen playing, over it. Though you do

not perceive anything of this splendid firework, you are nevertheless aware that it is a

manifestation of Od, and if you wish to comprehend it, then attend to some of my

experiments. Pour, in the dark, a spoonful of finely ground sugar, or kitchen salt dried on a

metal pan, into a glass of water. The sensitive person, at first, sees little or nothing of these

things; as soon as you stir them up, he will immediately see the water turning into light.

When holding it in his left hand, he will feel it growing rather cold. Thus even the simple

solution is developing Od; it is, therefore, a source of Od. Place a wire of copper or zinc in a

glass filled with diluted sulphuric acid. The whole wire will show a kind of glowing fire, andthere will appear, quickly rising from its upper end, a manifestation of light, in shape rather

resembling the flame of a common candle, only of far more feeble brilliancy. In its

uppermost part it will turn into a vapour, with many delicate sparkles rising vertically, the

wire feeling to the left hand of the sensitive far colder than before. The dissolution is,

therefore, likewise, a source of Od. Prepare an acid water from a Seiditz powder. First,

dissolve, in the dark, bicarbonate of soda in half a glass of water; it will immediately become

luminous; in another half glass of water, dissolve tartaric acid; it will likewise grow lustrous,

and, indeed, more intensely so than the former. When, after some minutes, both of them have

returned to their former condition, pour them together. The mixture, will exhibit, in a

moment, a brightly shining appearance. feeling to the left hand as cold as ice, and there will

be piled up over the glass a cloud of whitish lustre. Chemical decomposition is also,

therefore, developing, and rather vehemently too, abundance of Od. Prepare a solution of

sugar of lead, and pour into it a solution of alum; the whole fluid will be instantly visible in

the dark. Conduct both polar wires of a voltaic apparatus into water; as soon as

decomposition commences your sensitive friend will see the water shining and increasing in

brightness; the vessel, on the contrary, touched with his left hand, will feel cold. Every

chemical process, therefore, is developing Od. Chemical action is a vehement source of Od,

suddenly springing forth, but drying up as soon as the play of the affinities subsides.

When a bottle of alcohol, or rather ether, sulphuretted carbonic gas, or caustic

ammonia, is uncorked in the dark, the air continuing perfectly quiet by keeping off anybreath, then your sensitive will see arising perpendicularly from the mouth of the bottle a

bright column; and, indeed, the sooner in proportion to the expansive faculty of the fluid. But

not only matter, the evaporation of which is as quick as that of the chemical preparations just

mentioned? but some other bodies also, like quicksilver, of a very slight power of

evaporation, push forth from the mouth of the bottle a bright vapour. Solid materials act in

the same way, especially such as iodine which drives forth a smoke brightly shining. and

becomes luminous itself. Evaporation, and of consequence distillation, too, are going on

under constant development of Od.

Every fermenting fluid of sugar continues luminous, bubbles of air arising from it like

glowing pearls. Must of wine in fermentation is such a fluid of chemical action as isconstantly luminous. You may now explain to yourselves, without any assistance, the turning

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of your champagne into fire and flame.

But decay, also, is a process of fermentation. Whatever is rotting becomes, of course,

lustrous. This fact we knew, indeed, a long time since, from the doctrine of phosphorescence;

but we have not yet expounded the near relation of the light of Od to the latter. If non-

sensitive persons, like ourselves, do not perceive any trace of phosphorescence on decayingmatter, the latter is seen, nevertheless by Sensitives in a full blaze of light.

Well, as we are treating just now on decay, there is no great distance hence to the dead.

Will you accompany me, for a moment, to the realms of the dead, in order that you may come

back, if you will believe me, enriched by an instructive glance at their nightly revelries? Do

not you know that the souls of the deceased continue, for some time, hovering about their

graves until all earthly things that still cling to them on this side of the tomb are atoned for;

until they have entered into everlasting rest? You look at me in amazement! I am however, in

earnest; for these spirits may, indeed, be seen; you may learn it by as many proofs as you

like. Certainly you were told by your nurse that it is by no means every one who is gifted

with the faculty of descrying spectres and spirits of the deceased; that there are, on thecontrary, only certain people privileged to obtain a sight of these ghosts. All these things

flashed into my mind once when I was experimenting, with persons of strong sensitiveness,

upon the rottenness of fishes. I wished to know whether I should not be able to get more

nearly acquainted with the fiery dead. Miss Leopoldine Reichel consented to go, in a very

dark night in November, 1844, to the cemetery of Gruenzing near Vienna, situated at a short

distance from my residence. She perceived, indeed, fiery phenomena on some of the mounds.

Afterwards led to the vast burial-places of Vienna, she saw there a good many mounds

surmounted by movable flames. The latter moved to and fro, all in the same way, like a file

of dancers, or like soldiers when drilling. Some of them were nearly as big as adults; others

small, crawling on the ground like dwarfish hobgoblins. But all of them made their

appearance only in the rows of recent mounds; none of the mounds of an earlier date

exhibiting any of these fiery guardians. Miss R. approached them rather timidly and slowly.

At her approach the human forms died away; she perceived them to be nothing more than

shining mists such as she had observes before by thousands in my dark room. Then she

ventured to draw nearer, and met with nothing but bright vapour She stepped, undauntedly,

into one of them; it reached up to her shoulders; she could blow it away by the motions of her

garb. The dancing and drilling were dissolved into the motions of the wind, that had played in

the same way with all these lamps. Another time I sent four sensitive persons to the cemetery

of Sieuring. The darkness was then so impenetrable that some of them fell to the ground

repeatedly on their way. But, after having arrived at the sepulchres; all of them saw the fiery,

spectre-like shapes, more or less distinctly in proportion to the different degrees of theirsensitive irritability. They imagined they saw air shining upon the recently closed tombs. One

of them drew with his umbrella figures on those mounds. The characters so produced

remained increasing in light on the scored soil. What was it, then? Nothing else but the

decaying miasmas, exhaled from the tombs, which rise from the latter into the air, so that the

wind may play with them; timidity interpreting their fluctuations in the draught of air as

dances of living spirits. It is carbonic ammonia, hydrogetted phosphoric gas, and some other

productions of decay, known, and unknown, which are developing light of Od by

evaporation. When rottenness ceases, the glow fades away- the dead are expiated!

But, my dear friend, we have to make atonement with our old women; we have to

apologise for a wrong done to them. The fiery spirits above the tombs are, after all, existingin truth and fact; their existence cannot be denied; we must concede it to them whether we

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like or not to do so; and they will continue to be right. We are even obliged to avow it to be

true, that spectres cannot be seen by everybody, but only by chosen individuals (Sensitives).

It is not their fault that we did not comprehend what they assured us of thousands of years

since.

SOUND. FRICTION. SPRINGS

In my last letter we assailed superstition, searching for it in one of its dens, which it has

haunted for many centuries. Today I shall try to hit it once more in the same way. Let

investigate the extension of Od through nature. In October, 1851, Mr Enter, an individual of

moderate sensitiveness, was introduced into my dark room, as I intended trying whether

sound did not stand in some relation to Od. I took a receiver of an air pump by its handle, and

struck it cautiously with a key. As soon as it rung, it became luminous and visible. The

stronger the stroke, the brighter the apparition. A rod of metal, a horse-shoe magnet, struck so

as to ring, seemed to be enlarged while shining. A bell of metal, of a strong and piercing

report, struck for some longer time, shone so intensely, that a bright lustre pervaded the

whole room, being seen by every sensitive person present. On a violin being played, not onlythe strings, but the whole sounding board grew radiant. The ringing bodies became, in these

cases, not only Od-shining, but they spread also a bright atmospheric clearness about them.

They were, so to speak, surrounded by an aureole. Every wineglass struck with a knife by me,

as people do in calling for a waiter, received a veil of light, brighter in proportion as the pitch

of the tone was high. This veil of light exhibited a visible vibration like the sound itself. The

spot I struck against was every time of the brightest lustre.

Well, I now caused sensitive persons to put their hands in bells of this kind, both of

glass and metal, in such a way as not to touch the body of the bell, anywhere. Whenever I

struck against them outside, the left hand was affected with coolness, the right one with

lukewarmness only; the sensation from Od, of course, setting in again, as in the experiment of

the blue beam of the sun, of the upper end of the crystals, and the northward pole of the

magnet. In short, I was gratified to have descried in sound, also, a very powerful source of

Od.

At another time (July, 1844), I examined the condition of friction, as to its relation to

Od by giving into the left hand of Miss Maria Maix, a copper wire, the opposite end of which

I had fastened to a small board. When I rubbed the latter with a board of the same description,

heat ran along the wire into the sensitive hand. When I rubbed the wire in the dark on a

grindstone that revolved on a turner's lathe, the whole wire grew glowing with Od,

enveloping itself in its whole length in a glittering shine; on its opposite end arose a light inthe form of a candle's flame. For a counter proof I took a glass tube of a barometer, putting

one end of it in water, and rubbed it for some minutes against the grindstone turned quickly.

The whole tube waxed bright, together with the glass of water. All Sensitives present, when

tasting the latter, thought it lukewarm, bitter, and loathsome; one of them, whom I prevailed

upon to empty it, experienced shortly afterwards a fit of violent and repeated retching. So

every doubt was removed as to the very rapid development of Od from friction.

This effect, in its further application, led to a result, which will give you, I am sure,

much pleasure. I desired to know whether the friction of fluids, too, would elicit Od. Some

glass vessels, well closed, the contents of which consisted of alcohol, ether, oil of turpentine,

creosote, all became luminous, whenever shaken in the dark; so did their contents. But evenwater in well-corked bottles, when shaken, became luminous, and, held in the left hand, of a

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disgusting lukewarmness; as soon as the motion subsided it became again invisib

Documents

Letters on the Od Force