Joseph Philippe François DELEUZE (Sisteron 1753-1835), natur - Lot 47

Lot n° 47
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Joseph Philippe François DELEUZE (Sisteron 1753-1835), natur - Lot 47
Joseph Philippe François DELEUZE (Sisteron 1753-1835), naturalist, joined the Muséum and worked in collaboration with Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu; he is best known for having been a proponent of animal magnetism and for having requested that the Académie des sciences study the phenomenon. Autograph letter signed (draft with corrections), 2 pp. in-4. Circa 1820. Important letter on ANIMAL MAGNETISM, asking the Académie to reconsider its judgment. "It is for the members of the Académie alone to take part in the discussion which is taking place to decide whether animal magnetism should be subjected to a new examination, and I think that those who desire this examination could add nothing to the reasons you have set out in your excellent report, and to those which result from the experiments which have been carried out under your eyes. I am very sensitive to the respect shown to me by several academics who have attacked a doctrine I have studied for forty years, and I find it very simple that those who have seen nothing should believe me to be fooled by an illusion: I myself would doubt the truth of the facts I have observed if more than 400 French and foreign doctors had not seen and attested to similar ones: but my testimony has been invoked to prove that the examination you are asking for is not possible, and I have come to ask you to rectify a misunderstanding which is of the greatest importance because of the consequences it entails. I have been told that belief in magnetism is an essential condition for producing effects: I have said precisely the opposite, in all my works. And I've shown unbelievers how to convince themselves. The essential condition for producing effects is to want. Belief is a secondary condition which increases the force of magnetism, because the will has more energy and is not wavering when supported by confidence. I know a large number of people who do not believe in magnetism at all, but who have convinced themselves by the effects they have produced [...]. I would only say that circumstances have changed a great deal since 1813, and that the evidence in favor of magnetism today is too numerous to be ignored. Undoubtedly, a commission of scholars who go to see phenomena in a treatment may not see in it proof of the reality of a particular agent. But let them seek to enlighten themselves by acting themselves, then they will see: and no one will be able to appeal to their judgment.
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