Emerging in the late 18th century, physician Franz Anton Mesmer established a theory in which he referred it to “animal magnetism.” This newly established theory was Mesmer’s way of explaining different illnesses that involved ‘internal magnetic forces’ within the body. 

Mesmer’s treatment first began by giving his clients high dosages of iron and curing their bodies by holding magnets over them after the iron had flowed enough through their blood.  This theory stemmed from Mesmer’s belief that ‘bad health’ resulted from magnetic forces in the body being misaligned and so, by realigning the forces within the body back through magnetic force, his clients walked away ultimately “feeling better” (PsychCentral).

Eventually Mesmer stopped using magnets and began using some massaging methods and moving his hands across the body he was working with freely. He noticed that without the magnets, his clients still walked away feeling cured, and thus his belief that he had some sort of power within him filled his mind (PsychCentral). Quickly, Mesmer grew popular with the public in Europe, specifically Paris, but the medical world denounced him and his treatment as merely a nonsense of magic spectacle, talking about how Mesmer’s clients were only healed only because they were willing to be healed. 

Mesmer later died in 1815, but “Mesmerism,” rightfully named after him, became more popular in European countries and even the Americas, especially in relation to ideas of the supernatural and other mystical ideals that are shown in Victorian literature such as Jane Eyre, The Woman in White and Dracula. 

By the year 1851, physicians understood even more about the body and the nervous system. In a lecture by John Hughes Bennet in the year of Mesmeric Mania in 1851, he explains about the nervous system behind the eyes, and the “white and gray matter” that attaches itself around the nervous ‘cords’ as they stretched across the body from the brain to the spinal cord. “The spinal cord, both in its cranial and vertebral portions, furnishes the conditions necessary for combined movements; and the nervous power necessary for this [movement] … depend[s] upon the gray matter whilst the white matter of the cord acts as a conductor” (7). With this knowledge, Bennett continues to explain that sensation is “the consciousness of an impression” (8), such as cold feet in water, or an injury to the skin, and thus anyone can be influenced upon when the nervous system is alerted. 

What baffles Bennett is his own observations of Mesmerism. He takes note in the Preface of his article that there are those “Sensitive ladies who do not object to indulge in the emotions of [mesmerism],” in 1851, but that there are also those, gentlemen and students of Universities who choose to be mesmerized to be “entertainment for the public.” He writes about how he has seen individuals fall into the “peculiar condition” (11) of mesmerize after looking at an object for several minutes straight, only to watch their motion, memory, acts be performed seemingly against their will. 

Bennett’s bafflement comes from his observation of watching people choose to be put under the influence of someone else through Mesmerism. In the end, Bennett, as well as other doctors, merely saw the Mesmeric Mania of 1851 as mere entertainment for those who were willing to watch/take part in it. The mesmerist didn’t have any special powers at all, but rather the individual chose to “[put] themselves into a nervous condition in which their minds are temporarily influenced by suggestive ideas…[under] the delusion of being governed by a magnetic, or other external influence” (20). Because, as Bennett specifies in the conclusion of his study of the nervous system, “The brain and spinal cord acting together furnish the condition necessary for voluntary motion and sensation” (emphasis added) (9). 

As a reflection of our reading, Count Fosco is in question of whether or not he is in control as a mesmerist over his wife, Eleanor. In the eyes of her nieces, she has changed dramatically, and acts as a spy for her husbands that gives orders to her y glancing at her, or talking in private. While she very well could be mesmerized by Count Fosco, Bennett would argue that it is because she is voluntarily doing so, in what I would argue as willing to do anything for her husband to so they can gain the family inheritance, that Laura holds, but Eleanor will receive if Laura does not have children. By willingly being under his “influence,” as Bennett describes, Eleanor simply just has to do as she is told and take the role as a spy for her husband so they can achieve what they - both - want in obtaining money from the family after Eleanor was removed from the family will. 

Works Cited: 

Bennett, John Hughes, -,University of Glasgow. Library. The Mesmeric Mania of 1851, With a Physiological Explanation of the Phenomena Produced : A Lecture 1851 [Leather Bound]. Generic, 2022.

Tartakovsky, Margarita M. “Psychology’s History of Being Mesmerized.” Psych Central, 9 May 2011, psychcentral.com/blog/psychologys-history-of-being-mesmerized#1.