In conclusion, let me animadvert upon the injustice with which, to its own loss, society has treated mesmerism. The use of mesmerism in nervous disorders, its use towards preventing suffering in surgical operations, have been denied and scoffed at in the teeth of positive evidence. The supposition of physical influence existing that can emanate from one human being and affect the nerves of another, was steadily combated as a gratuitous fiction, till Von Reichenbach's discoveries demonstrated its soundness. And, finally, the marvels of clairvoyance were considered an absolute proof of the visionary character of animal magnetism, because the world was ignorant that they occur independently of that influence, which only happens to be one of the modes of inducing the condition of trance in which they spontaneously manifest themselves. Adieu, dear Archy.
Yours, &c.
Mac Davus.
HISTORY OF THE CAPTIVITY OF NAPOLEON AT ST HELENA.[10]
Whatever may be the pursuits of our posterity, whether the mind of nations will turn on philosophy or politics, whether on a descent to the centre of the earth, or on the model of a general Utopia—whether on a telegraphic correspondence with the new planet, by a galvanised wire two thousand eight hundred and fifty millions of miles long, or on a Chartist government—we have not the slightest reason to doubt, that our generation will be regarded as having lived in the most brilliant time of the by-gone world.
The years from 1789 to 1815 unquestionably include the most stirring period since the great primal convulsion, that barbarian deluge, which changed the face of Europe in the fifth century. But the vengeance which called the Vandal from his forest to crush the Roman empire, and after hewing down the Colossus which, for seven hundred years, had bestrode the world, moulded kingdoms out of its fragments, was of a totally different order from that which ruled over our great day of Change. In that original revolution, man, as the individual, was scarcely more than the sufferer. It was a vast outburst of force, as uncircumscribed as uncontrollable, and as unconnected with motives merely human, as an inroad of the ocean. It was a vast expanse of human existence, rushing surge on surge over the barriers of fair and fertile empire. It was hunger, and love of seizure, and hot thirst of blood, embodied in a mass of mankind rushing down upon luxury and profligacy, and governmental incapacity embodied in other masses of mankind. An invasion from the African wilderness with all its lions and leopards in full roar, could scarcely have less been urged by motives of human nature.
But the great revolution which in our time shook Europe, and is still spreading its shock to the confines of the world, was human in the most remarkable degree. It was the work of impulses fierce and wild, yet peculiarly belonging to man. It was a succession of lights and shadows of human character, contrasted in the most powerful degree, as they passed before the eye of Europe—the ambition of man, the rage of man, the voluptuousness, the ferocity, the gallantry, and the fortitude of man, in all the varieties of human character. It was man in the robes of tragedy, comedy, and pantomime, but it was every where man. Every great event on which the revolution was suspended for the time, originated with some remarkable individual, and took its shape even from some peculiarity in that individual.
Thus, the period of mob-massacre began with the sudden ascendency of Marat—a hideous assassin, who regarded the knife as the only instrument of governing, and proclaimed as his first principle of political regeneration, that "half a million of heads must fall."