Nye Encyclopedia of Ancient and Forbidden Secrets

toes remained insensible to external stimuli, and frequently he himself showed every symptom of such a magnetic crisis as was afterwaeds to become a special feature of mesmeric treatment. Personally Greatrak was a simple and pious gentaleman, persuaded than his marvellous powers were a divinely – bestowed gift, and most anxious to make the best use of them. The other healer mentioned, Gassner belongs to a somewhat later period-about the middle of the eighteenth century. Gassner was a priest of Bludenz in Vorarlberg where his many cures gained for him a wide celebrity. All diseases, according to him, were caused by evil spirits possessing the demons. He too was a man of kindly disposition and piety, and made a large useof the scriptures in his healing operations. The ceremony of exorcism was a rather impressive one. Herr Gassner sat at a table, the patient and spectators in front of him, A bluered- flowered cloak hung from his shoulders; the rest of his clothing, we are told, was” clean, simple, and modest.” On his left was window, on his right, the crucifix. His fine personality, deep learning, and noble character inspired the faith of the patient and his friends and doubtless played no small part in his curative feats. Sometimes he made use of magnetic manipulations, stroking or rubbing the affected part, and driving the disease, after the manner of Greatrakes, into the limbs of the patient, the formula of exorcism he generally pronouuced in Latin, with which language the demons showed a perfect familiarity. Not only could he control sickness by theses means, but the passions also were amenable to his treatment. Now anger is apparent, now patience, now joy, now sorrow, now hate, now love, now confusion, now reason,-each carried to the highest pitch. Now this one is blind, now he sees, ans again is deprved of sight, etc. “These curious results suggest the phreno- magnetism of later years, where equally sudden changes of mood were produced by touching with the finger- tips those parts of the subject’s head which phrenology associated with the various emotions to be called forth.