However, his impact is still felt as the term “mesmerized” originated from the public’s enthrallment with Mesmer’s magnet treatments. Publically humiliated, Mesmer fled France in disgrace and lived in seclusion the rest of his life. It was then revealed that no magnets were used and that there was nothing behind the door. While next to the door, the participants stated that they felt the healing power of the magnets, just as they had in earlier times when the magnets were visible. One of the many experiments used to disprove Mesmer’s claims consisted of informing some who professed to have been helped by the magnet therapy that they would be exposed to magnets through a closed door. The findings of the inquiry were that the magnets had no healing powers and only helped some people because of a placebo effect, or as the final report stated, “imagination.” The King commissioned a group of distinguished academics, including Benjamin Franklin, who was in France gathering French support for America during the Revolutionary War, to conduct the investigation. Mesmer’s notoriety reached such heights that in 1778 the King of France launched an investigation to determine the legitimacy of his claims. In spite of these allegations, more and more people flocked to Mesmer, paying absorbent amounts of money to receive his treatments. After studying his magnet treatments, they and numerous other prominent medical institutions declared Mesmer a charlatan. His fame grew to such extent that the medical professors at the University of Paris began evaluating his claims. To cure these ailments, Mesmer devised a magnet therapy that he claimed would realign the magnetic forces in the body.Īt first people scoffed at his ideas, but after he produced testimonials from patients who claimed that the magnets had relieved their pain, word spread across France and soon people were lining up to receive Mesmer’s magnet treatments. Mesmer proclaimed that the human body contained magnetic force fields and if these force fields were not in harmony, illness would result. Franz Anton Mesmer became famous throughout France for his attempts to heal the human body though the use of magnets.
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