ach, on condition that he would disclose his secret to the
subscribers, who were to be permitted to make whatever use they pleased of
it. Mesmer readily embraced the proposal; and such was the infatuation,
that the subscription was not only filled in a few days, but exceeded by
no less a sum than one hundred and forty thousand francs.

With this fortune he returned to Paris, and recommenced his experiments,
while the royal commission continued theirs. His admiring pupils, who had
paid him so handsomely for his instructions, spread his fame over the
country, and established in all the principal towns of France, "Societies
of Harmony," for trying experiments and curing all diseases by means of
magnetism. Some of these societies were a scandal to morality, being
joined by profligate men of depraved appetites, who took a disgusting
delight in witnessing young girls in convulsions. Many of the pretended
magnetisers were asserted at the time to be notorious libertines, who took
that opportunity of gratifying their passions.

At last the commissioners published their report, which was drawn up by
the illustrious and unfortunate Bailly. For clearness of reasoning and
strict impartiality it has never been surpassed. After detailing the
various experiments made, and their results, they came to the conclusion
that the only proof advanced in support of animal magnetism was the
effects it produced on the human body--that those effects could be
produced without passes or other magnetic manipulations--that all these
manipulations and passes and ceremonies never produce any effect at all if
employed without the patient's knowledge; and that therefore imagination
did, and animal magnetism did not, account for the phenomena.

This report was the ruin of Mesmer's reputation in France. He quitted
Paris shortly after, with the three hundred and forty thousand francs
which had been subscribed by his admirers, and retired to his own country,
where he died in 1815, at the advanced age of eighty-one. But the seeds he
had sown fructified of themselves, nourished and brought to maturity by
the kindly warmth of popular credulity. Imitators sprang up in France,
Germany, and England, more extravagant than their master, and claiming
powers for the new science which its founder had never dreamt of. Among
others, Cagliostro made good use of the delusion in extending his claims
to be considered a master of the occult sciences. But he made no
discoverie