Mémoire sur la découverte du magnétisme animal

The Mémoire sur la découverte du magnétisme animal is Mesmer's programmatic statement of his doctrine of "animal magnetism." Its central claim is that a single, invisible, fluid-like force pervades the universe, and that imbalances in its flow within the body produce disease, which the trained operator can cure by restoring the fluid's circulation.

The text sets out the theory behind a practice conducted through magnetized objects, hand passes, and group sessions around his baquet, often inducing dramatic convulsive "crises" interpreted as blockages breaking through. It systematizes the idea that one person can deliberately and repeatedly alter another's physical and mental state.

A 1784 French royal commission attributed the effects to imagination rather than any physical fluid, yet the work proved historically pivotal. By relocating the laboratory in which suggestion and the placebo response would later be discovered, Mesmer became the indispensable starting point of the hypnotic lineage.