animal magnetism
a hypothetical physical force that allegedly can have a curative effect when focused on ailing parts of the body, often through the use of a magnetized wand, magnetized rods, or a magnetized bath (see baquet). This method was proposed in 1779 and popularized by Franz Anton Mesmer, who claimed some treatment success with it. In the 1840s, James Braid investigated the curative effects of animal magnetism, concluding that it worked not through the application of magnets to ailing parts of the body but through the practitioner’s induction of a sleeplike state in patients and through the interplay of patient belief and healer suggestion to elicit a positive result. Braid revised the treatment under the term hypnotism (see hypnosis). Both hypnosis and its forerunner, animal magnetism, are also sometimes called mesmerism.