ABSTRACT
In the second half of the 1700s in Vienna, Mesmer began to treat his patients by animal magnetism, a fluid which he thought was accumulating in their bodies. Imported into France, this treatment was poorly regarded by the scientific community: it seemed to act more by the power of imagination and of erotic attachment. Puységur studied the induction of magnetic sleep, which revealed a second personality (second condition) with unsuspected imitative abilities (sixth sense). After the Revolution, Abbé Faria highlighted the role played by suggestibility, and Braid coined the term neuro-hypnotism.
Charcot, treating hysteria, obtained scientific recognition of hypnosis, while the Nancy school applied suggestion in the waking state, calling this treatment “psychotherapeutics.” Liébault commented on the connection between telepathy and hypnosis, and Janet began practice remote hypnosis.
Forel introduced hypnosis at the University of Zurich, in Burghölzli, but at the University of Vienna, Meynert considered hypnosis a piece of charlatanry. Freud was not of the same opinion as his teacher, despite the fact that too many elements from occultism and spiritualism, including belief in telepathy, were mixed in with the practice of hypnosis.
We may wonder if Vienna, this glorious laboratory of modernity, the arts, sciences, and eroticism, was the predestined place for Freudian theories.
