Marie-Antoinette adepte de Mesmer?

Bonjour,

Je suis un peu troublée. D'après l'article que je vais vous indiquer en référence à ma question, la Reine Marie-Antoinette aurait été adepte des élucubrations de Mesmer. Et ce serait Louis XVI qui aurait mis un terme aux élucubrations de cette homme en diligentant des commissions pour enquêter sur la véracité scientifique de la méthode de Mesmer.

Je suis troublée, parce que je croyais jusqu'à présent que la Reine n'était jamais tombée sous la coupe de ce charlatan. Or, ici, je lis l'inverse et l'auteur de l'article l'appelle sans ambages "le magnétiseur de Marie-Antoinette".

madame antoine

Veuillez m'excuser, je m'aperçois que j'ai oublié la référence de l'article sur Mesmer.
http://www.cippad.com/2014/04/franz-anton-mesmer-lexcentrique.html

madame antoine

Oui première nouvelle pour moi aussi...il faudra que je lise cet article à tête reposée donc   

Cependant il est vrai aussi que Marie-Antoinette avait l'esprit curieux vis à vis de ces choses là, donc pourquoi pas...

Nous avons eu plusieurs débats sur les thérapies initiées par Mesmer. Un sujet lui est consacré:
https://maria-antonia.forumactif.com/t231-franz-anton-mesmer

Voici d'autres conversations:
https://maria-antonia.forumactif.com/t23p675-la-princesse-marie-therese-de-lamballe?highlight=Majest%E9
https://maria-antonia.forumactif.com/t3547-la-face-cachee-des-lumieres
https://maria-antonia.forumactif.com/t191p6-jefferson-in-paris-avec-charlotte-de-turckheim-ivory
https://maria-antonia.forumactif.com/t158-la-reine-etait-elle-superstitieuse

De mémoire, je dirai que nous n'avons jamais pu apporter de réponse tranchée sur l'opinion de Marie Antoinette sur Mesmer.   

Perso, je pense comme toi, Chou. Curieuse de toutes les nouveautés comme elle l'était, il n'est pas impossible que notre Antoinette ait voulu "tester" le fluide de Mesmer. Mais de là à fréquenter ses séances...   

Vous pensez bien, la reine de France eu milieu de la foule en transe dans un baquet, ça se saurait!   

Oui c'est ce que j'allais écrire : ça se saurait   
Une reine de France ne se déplaçait pas incognito comme cela, et nous aurions des témoignages en ce sens si elle avait fréquenté ce type de séances...
Donc curieuse oui, mais pratiquante ce serait un scoop   

Marie Antoinette est intervenue pour faire donner une pension à Mesmer. En 1784 toutefois, Loulou a demandé une commission pour examiner les agissements de l'homme.





Mesmer became famous especially in Paris, Marie Antoinette asked the French government to offer him a life pension and enough money to set up a clinic. Mesmer did not allow the French government to supervise the clinic and in 1784 the king of France appointed a commission to investigate Mesmerism.
Despite so many reports of people being cured of ailments, the report concluded that animal magnetism and the magnetic field were figments of the imagination and Mesmer’s practices and theories were debunked.—Read More:http://www.kevbee.co.uk/History.htm
http://madamepickwickartblog.com/2012/11/mesmer/

Je note la référence pour lire l'article plus tard parce que ça m'intéresse:
http://www.kevbee.co.uk/History.htm

Mesmer et Marie Antoinette:



http://32minutes.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/mozart-mesmer-franklin-and-the-glass-harmonica/


... nan, j'plaisante, j'plaisante...   C'est juste une dame...   

Et encore un article à lire dès que j'aurai plus de temps!   

Un super article sur le fameux baquet. Avec de super photos que je vous copie déjà:
http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/21/turner.php



The sole remaining example of Mesmer's baquet, on display at the Musée d'Histoire
de la médecine et de la Pharmacie, Lyon, France.



Anonymous French cartoon, Mr. Mesmer's tub, 1780s.
Courtesy Wellcome Library, London.



Anonymous French cartoon, Magnetism Unveild, 1784.
Benjamin Franklin is shown brandishing his exposé of animal magnetism,
while Mesmer flees with his loot on a witch's broom.



Anonymous French cartoon, The Magic Finger, 1780s.
Mesmer practices his devilish sexual magic on a patient.
http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/21/turner.php

Bonjour,

Visiblement, il est très difficile d'apporter à cette question une réponse claire.

madame antoine.

Je vais continuer à chercher. Le sujet m'intéresse.   

Merci pour ces détails Pim, tu maîtrises   

pimprenelle a écrit:

Mesmer et Marie Antoinette:



http://32minutes.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/mozart-mesmer-franklin-and-the-glass-harmonica/


... nan, j'plaisante, j'plaisante... C'est juste une dame...

J'ai eu peur en plus   

J'espère bien, c'était le but!   Faire très très très très peur.   

Bonjour,

Pour en revenir à Mesmer, nous ne savons donc toujours rien de plus sur une éventuelle fréquentation de Marie-Antoinette ? C'est d'autant plus difficile à savoir que les deux personnages sont très sujets aux fantasmes des foules. C'est le sujet sur la pièce de théâtre qui mêle la Reine et le Chevalier d'Eon qui m'inspire ce raisonnement. Le public aime bien accoler les célébrités, surtout celles qui exhalent une odeur de soufre, comme Mesmer.

madame antoine

Explications supplémentaires sur le magnétisme animal:


Anton Mesmer arrived at Paris in 1778, and began modestly by making himself and his theory of animal magnetism known to the principal physicians. At first, his encouragement was but slight; he found people more inclined to laugh at than to patronize him. But he was a man who had great confidence in himself and was of a perseverance which no difficulties could overcome. He hired a sumptuous apartment, which he opened to all comers who chose to make trial of the new power of nature. M. D’Eslon, a physician of great reputation, became a convert, and from that time animal magnetism, or as some called it, mesmerism, became the fashion in Paris. The women were quite enthusiastic about it, and their admiring tattle wafted its fame through every grade of society. Mesmer was the rage, and high and low, rich and poor, credulous and unbelieving, all hastened to convince themselves of the power of this mighty magician who made such magnificent promises. Mesmer, who knew as well as any man living the influence of the imagination, determined that, on that score, nothing should be wanting to heighten the effect of the magnetic charm. In all Paris, there was not a house so charmingly furnished as M. Mesmer’s. Richly stained glass shed a dim religious light on his spacious saloons, which were almost covered with mirrors. Orange blossoms scented all the air of his corridors; incense of the most expensive kinds burned in antique vases on his chimney pieces; aeolian harps sighed melodious music from distant chambers, while sometimes a sweet female voice from above or below stole softly upon the mysterious silence that was kept in the house and insisted upon from all visitors. “Was ever anything so delightful!” cried all the Mrs. Wittitterleys of Paris, as they thronged to his house in search of pleasant excitement. “So delightful!” said the pseudophilosophers who would believe anything if it were the fashion. “So amusing!” said the worn-out debauchees who had drained the cup of sensuality to its dregs and who longed to see lovely women in convulsions, with the hope that they might gain some new emotions from the sight.

The following was the mode of operation: in the center of the saloon was placed an oval vessel about four feet in its longest diameter and one foot deep. In this were laid a number of wine bottles, filled with magnetized water, well corked-up, and disposed in radiuses with their necks outward. Water was then poured into the vessel so as just to cover the bottles, and filings of iron were thrown in occasionally to heighten the magnetic effect. The vessel was then covered with an iron cover, pierced through with many holes, and was called the baquet. From each hole issued a long, movable rod of iron, which the patients were to apply to such parts of their bodies as were afflicted. Around this baquet the patients were directed to sit, holding each other by the hand and pressing their knees together as closely as possible to facilitate the passage of the magnetic fluid from one to the other.

Then came in the assistant magnetizers, generally strong, handsome young men, to pour into the patient from their fingertips fresh streams of the wondrous fluid. They embraced the patient between the knees, rubbed them gently down the spine and the course of the nerves, using gentle pressure upon the breasts of the ladies, and staring them out of countenance to magnetize them by the eye! All this time the most rigorous silence was maintained, with the exception of a few wild notes on the harmonica or the pianoforte, or the melodious voice of a hidden opera singer swelling softly at long intervals. Gradually the cheeks of the ladies began to glow, their imaginations to become inflamed, and off they went, one after the other, in convulsive fits. Some of them sobbed and tore their hair, others laughed till the tears ran from their eyes, while others shrieked and screamed and yelled till they became insensible altogether.
http://www.laphamsquarterly.org/voices-in-time/animal-magnetism.php

This was the crisis of the delirium. In the midst of it, the chief actor made his appearance, waving his wand, like Prospero, to work new wonders. Dressed in a long robe of lilac-colored silk richly embroidered with gold flowers, bearing in his hand a white magnetic rod, and with a look of dignity which would have sat well on an eastern caliph, he marched with solemn strides into the room. He awed the still sensible by his eye, and the violence of their symptoms diminished. He stroked the insensible with his hands upon the eyebrows and down the spine, traced figures upon their breast and abdomen with his long white wand, and they were restored to consciousness. They became calm, acknowledged his power, and said they felt streams of cold or burning vapor passing through their frames, according as he waved his wand or his fingers before them.

“It is impossible,” says one man, “to conceive the sensation which Mesmer’s experiments created in Paris. No theological controversy in the earlier ages of the Catholic Church was ever conducted with greater bitterness.” His adversaries denied the discovery; some calling him a quack, others a fool, and others again, like the Abbé Fiard, a man who had sold himself to the Devil! His friends were as extravagant in their praise as his foes were in their censure. Paris was inundated with pamphlets upon the subject, as many defending as attacking the doctrine. At court, the queen expressed herself in favor of it, and nothing else was to be heard of in society.

Mesmer now wrote to Marie Antoinette with the view of securing her influence in obtaining for him the protection of government. He wished to have a chateau and its lands given to him, with a handsome yearly income, that he might be enabled to continue his experiments at leisure, untroubled by the persecution of his enemies. He hinted the duty of governments to support men of science and expressed his fear that if he met no more encouragement, he should be compelled to carry his great discovery to some other land more willing to appreciate him. “In the eyes of your majesty,” said he, “four or five hundred thousand francs, applied to a good purpose, are of no account. The welfare and happiness of your people are everything. My discovery ought to be received and rewarded with a munificence worthy of the monarch to whom I shall attach myself.” The government at last offered him a pension of twenty thousand francs and the cross of the Order of St. Michael, if he had made any discovery in medicine, and would communicate it to physicians nominated by the king. The latter part of the proposition was not agreeable to Mesmer. He feared the unfavorable report of the king’s physicians, and breaking off the negotiation, spoke of his disregard of money and his wish to have his discovery at once recognized by the government. He then retired to Spa, in a fit of disgust, upon pretense of drinking the waters for the benefit of his health.

After he had left Paris, the faculty of medicine called upon M. D’Eslon, for the third and last time, to renounce the doctrine of animal magnetism, or be expelled from their body. M. D’Eslon, so far from doing this, declared that he had discovered new secrets and solicited further examination. A royal commission of the faculty of medicine was, in consequence, appointed on the March 12, 1784, seconded by another commission of the Académie des Sciences, to investigate the phenomena and report upon them. The first commission was composed of the principal physicians of Paris, while, among the eminent men comprised in the latter, were Benjamin Franklin, Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, and Jean-Sylvain Bailly, the historian of astronomy. Mesmer was formally invited to appear before this body but absented himself from day to day upon one pretense or another.
http://www.laphamsquarterly.org/voices-in-time/animal-magnetism.php?page=2

These experiments lasted for about five months. They had hardly commenced before Mesmer, alarmed at the loss both of fame and profit, determined to return to Paris. Some patients of rank and fortune, enthusiastic believers in his doctrine, had followed him to Spa. One of them proposed to open a subscription for him of one hundred shares, at one hundred louis d’or each, 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 140,000 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 magnetizers were asserted at the time to be notorious libertines who took that opportunity of gratifying their passions.

At last the commissioners published their report. 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 quit Paris shortly after, with the 340,000 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.
http://www.laphamsquarterly.org/voices-in-time/animal-magnetism.php?page=3

marie antoinette a surement fait comme les autres. elle a voulu tenter cette expérience.   

Bonjour,

Précisément, la question reste entière et c'est précisément là l'objet de notre recherche.

madame antoine

Un article sur Mesmer:

HISTOIRE - Mesmer, l’excentrique magnétiseur de Marie-Antoinette
du vendredi 13 juin 2014impression



Au XVIIIe siècle, Franz-Anton Messmer assurait pouvoir guérir toutes sortes de maladies en agissant sur le “magnétisme animal” de ses patients. Son remède : un fluide magnétique transmis par un dispositif de son invention : le baquet. Les malades sont pris d’hystérie mais en sortent guéris. A la Cour de Louis XVI, la méthode fait fureur. Jusqu’à ce qu’une commission médicale désavoue l’original médecin.



Franz-Friederich-Anton Mesmer est né en 1734 en Allemagne. Passionné par la nature, il suit des études de philosophie, de théologie puis de droit avant d’entrer en école de médecine. C’est lors de ses études qu’il commence à s’intéresser aux sciences occultes, puis à l’exorcisme. Il rédige d’ailleurs sa thèse sur l’influence des planètes sur le corps humain.



Au lit avec ses patientes, pour accélérer le processus

Très vite, il affirme l’existence d’un “fluide magnétique animal” qui agit sur le corps humain. Pour Mesmer, la maladie est causée par une mauvaise distribution dans le corps de ce magnétisme animal et la guérison demande une restauration de cet équilibre perdu. Et justement, Mesmer assure être capable de rééquilibrer tout ça, grâce à ses talents de magnétiseur… A cette époque, le jeune médecin exerce à Vienne, mais ses méthodes ne sont pas vraiment du goût de ses confrères. Une rumeur se répand, Mesmer se mettrait de temps en temps au lit avec ses patientes, pour accélérer le processus de guérison. C’en est trop, il est expulsé de la faculté de médecine pour “pratiques charlatanesques”.

Le magnétiseur se réfugie donc en Suisse, puis en France, en 1778 où il reçoit la protection de Marie-Antoinette. A la Cour de Louis XVI, ses excentriques remèdes vont prendre une toute autre dimension. Mesmer organise des séances dans lesquelles il accueille ses patients par de la musique douce et une lumière tamisée. Il se déplace à travers la salle habillé de soie lilas et utilise ses mains et des incantations pour transmettre ce fameux fluide magnétique invisible. Une méthode qui, selon ses malades, guérit de tous les maux. Le médecin allemand devient une célébrité : le Marquis de Lafayette, Mozart, et surtout la reine Marie-Antoinette ne jurent que par ses remèdes.



Mesmer n’hésite pas à “magnétiser” des arbres

Mais les patients deviennent trop nombreux. Mesmer, qui met un point d’honneur à soigner autant les nobles de la Cour que les gens du peuple, invente donc son célèbre “baquet”. Il s’agit de de larges récipients en bois de chêne remplis d’eau “magnétisée”. Les malades, reliés entre eux par une corde, devaient agripper de grandes tiges de fer pour recevoir le fluide magnétique sur la partie du corps qui les faisait souffrir. Dans la caisse, il y a de l’eau dans laquelle sont immergés de la limaille de fer, du verre pilé et d’autres objets. Puis l’influence du magnétisme agit. Beaucoup sont pris de crises d’hystérie et de convulsions. Un signe que le fluide fait son effet, assurait Mesmer.

Et quand le baquet, qui peut soigner 20 personnes simultanément ne suffit pas à répondre à la demande des malades, Mesmer n’hésite pas à “magnétiser” des arbres autour desquels ses patients peuvent se frotter. “Il n’y a qu’une maladie, qu’un remède, qu’une guérison” assurait-il.

Ces experts expérimentent la méthode “à l’aveugle”

Mais le médecin a aussi beaucoup d’ennemis. Parmi eux, les membres de l’Académie des sciences, mais surtout Louis XVI, féru de sciences. A la demande du roi, le gouvernement charge deux commissions d’enquêter sur la véracité scientifique du magnétisme animal. Parmi les membres de ces commissions on trouvait Antoine Lavoisier et Benjamin Franklin, ambassadeur des États-Unis à Paris, ou encore le mathématicien Jean Sylvain Bailly et le médecin Joseph Guillotin. Ces experts expérimentent la méthode Mesmer “à l’aveugle”. On fait croire à des gens qu’ils sont magnétisés, avec de l’eau normale, et on en magnétise d’autres à leur insu. Les conclusions sont sans appel pour Mesmer : il n’y a aucune évidence scientifique dans ses remèdes. Et les effets observés chez les patients ne sont que le fruit de leur “imagination”. C’est la fin de la gloire pour le magnétiseur qui retourne vivre à Vienne, et continue ses recherches, plus discrètement.

Quelques années plus tard, pourtant, on reparlera de lui. En 1840, un médecin écossais, James Braid, développe la technique de l’hypnotisme. Pour ce faire, il s’inspire des travaux du magnétiseur de Marie-Antoinette.
http://www.unof.org/spip.php?page=imprimer_breve&id_breve=2759

Un autre ici:

Mesmer, Marie Antoinette and a Royal Commission

During the years before the French Revolution, writes D.M. Walmsley, Mesmer’s treatment of patients by 'animal magnetism' in some ways foreshadowed the methods of modern pyschiatry.

For several years before the revolution, Anton Mesmer built up an immense reputation in Paris among people of all classes. As in our day, the prevalent turmoils and stresses gave rise to mental ills on a large scale. Mesmer’s astonishing cures mainly depended on methods foreshadowing modern psychiatry; and inevitably he found himself at loggerheads with established medical authorities.
http://www.historytoday.com/dm-walmsley/mesmer-marie-antoinette-and-royal-commission

Bonjour,

Voici une citation de Pierre de Nolhac dans son livre sur la Reine, La Reine Marie-Antoinette. La citation se trouve à la page 138 de l'édition faite par La plume au vent en 2000.



On notera que l'auteur met cette citation en scène, ce qui donne du poids à sa crédibilité.

madame antoine

La citation provient effectivement des Mémoires du Comte de Ségur. Elle est donnée dans un passage où le Comte fait état de l'esprit de philanthropie qui régnait dans son cercle d'amis. Un de ses amis avait avec générosité essayé de magnétiser un homme avant de s'apercevoir qu'il était mort depuis trois heures. Le Comte de Ségur tut la mésaventure de son ami, mais la Reine ne se priva pas, de son côté, de lui en raconter d'autres qui couraient sur son compte et sur ses amis adeptes du magnétisme animal.

Voici d'abord la citation de la Reine.



Voici ensuite la réplique du Comte de Ségur et ses considérations privées.



madame antoine

Très beau passage merci madame antoine

J'adore les écrits de Nolhac en plus Marie-Antoinette avait de l'esprit c'est effectivement confirmé ici!

Ségur aussi!