I Soggetti di Donato — Testimonianze Dirette/en
| 📰 Fonte primaria: rivista Le Magnétisme di Donato (1880-1886) |
| Questa pagina deriva dal corpus della rivista Le Magnétisme — Journal de Psycho-Physiologie diretta da Donato (Alfred d'Hont) e Édouard Cavailhon dal 1880 al 1886, pubblicata fra Parigi e Bruxelles. La rivista è la fonte primaria autobiografica e tecnica più importante per il metodo della fascinazione magnetica e per la tradizione del magnetismo europeo del tardo Ottocento.
Documenti Drive ISI-CNV — fascicoli digitalizzati:
|
The section Les Fascinés Peints par Eux-Mêmes (The Fascinated Described by Themselves) of Donato's journal collects letters written directly by the subjects who underwent Donato's sessions. These testimonies are historical documents of extraordinary value because they describe from within the experience of fascination — what one sees, what one feels, what one loses, and what remains.
The Testimony of Marius Koning (Amsterdam, 1886)
Marius Koning, a medical student, underwent fascination for the first time on October 5, 1886. On the first attempt, Donato declared him insensitive. On the second, at his request, Donato agreed to stare at him longer:
- «Nous nous assîmes vis-à-vis l'un de l'autre, je mis mes mains dans les vôtres, et nous nous regardâmes fixement et fort, durant quelques minutes... D'abord j'ai vu dans vos yeux comme deux étincelles, mais bientôt ces deux étincelles ne formèrent qu'une seule boule de feu et je finis par ne plus voir qu'un seul point blanc très brillant.»
After a few seconds, Donato stood up, and Marius found himself forced to follow him against his own will:
- «Malgré moi, je me trouvai forcé de suivre vos pas. Je ne pouvais presque plus plier mes membres et il me semblait que la force des extenseurs surpassait celle des fléchisseurs.»
He could not bend his limbs. He had the sensation that the extensor muscles were stronger than the flexors — as if an external force prevented flexion. When Donato made him lie on the ground, he could not get up despite all efforts. Then Donato rubbed his right arm — which became insensitive — and inserted a pin under the skin: «je n'en sentis rien, lorsque vous me piquâtes une épingle d'argent sous la peau, et néanmoins je savais que vous me piquiez». He felt nothing, but he knew he was being pricked — consciousness was intact, sensation was abolished.
The Testimony of Claudine Bonnetin (Lyon, 1886)
Claudine Bonnetin, of robust constitution, was fascinated at the Théâtre du Gymnase. Her experience well summarizes the post-fascination state:
- «Les expériences auxquelles j'ai été soumise ne m'ont fait aucun mal. À mon réveil j'avais un léger mal de tête qui se dissipait aussitôt. M. Donato m'ayant laissée trop longtemps dans une pose d'extase, je me réveillai affaissée sur le tapis, mais je ne me souviens pas d'être tombée.»
The spontaneous awakening after a prolonged ecstatic pose — she does not remember falling, she simply found herself on the carpet. Consciousness did not register the fall.
The Testimony of Omeri Coppens (Brussels, 1884)
The painter Omeri Coppens was hypnotized at a distance. Someone in the audience tried to pinch his legs to verify if the sleep was real — and the next day he noticed his legs were covered in bruises:
- «Une fois je me suis aperçu que j'avais les jambes couvertes de bleus qu'une personne m'avait faits en me pinçant lorsque vous m'avez endormi à une longue distance. Cette personne voulait s'assurer si mon sommeil était simulé ou réel; je crois qu'elle doit être convaincue maintenant.»
He slept at a distance, felt nothing during the session, but the body physically registered the painful stimuli.
What Happens to the Eyes: the "boule de feu"
The most recurring description is that of Donato's eyes progressively transforming. Marius Koning describes: two sparks, then a single ball of fire, then a single bright white point. The visual field progressively narrows to a single point — Donato's eye. Everything else disappears. This progressive reduction of the visual field to a single luminous point is one of the distinctive characteristics of fascination compared to ordinary hypnosis.
The Paradox of Intact Consciousness
The most striking feature emerging from all the testimonies is this: the subject is fully conscious of what is happening to them, but cannot intervene. They know they are being pricked but feel no pain. They know they are following Donato but cannot stop. They know they cannot get up but cannot find the strength.
Donato himself writes: «The subject is in no way asleep; he possesses full consciousness of his acts and, brought back to the normal state by a word or a breath, he can relate the different experiments he has submitted to.»
This is the disruptive core of fascination compared to all previous models: it is not sleep, it is not unconsciousness, it is not post-hypnotic suggestion. It is a state of paralyzed wakefulness — consciousness observes, but the will does not command.
Significance for the Method Paret
These testimonies are essential for understanding what the Method Paret seeks to reproduce with the Ball of Light. The goal is not to put the subject to sleep nor to eliminate their consciousness. It is to create that state in which consciousness remains present but the will yields — a state of total receptivity in which the channel between operator and subject is completely open, with eyes open, without the active critical filter.
Sources
Primary Sources
For the framework of the 19th-century European magnetic tradition, the main primary sources, all digitized in the ISI-CNV Drive folders, are:
- Franz Anton Mesmer, Mémoire sur la découverte du magnétisme animal, Genève-Paris, 1779.
- Armand-Marie-Jacques de Chastenet, Marquis de Puységur, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire et à l'établissement du magnétisme animal, Paris, 1784.
- Joseph Philippe François Deleuze, Histoire critique du magnétisme animal, 2 vols., Paris, 1813.
- Charles Lafontaine, L'Art de Magnétiser ou le Magnétisme Animal, Paris, Germer Baillière, 1847 — PDF Drive ISI-CNV.
- Charles Lafontaine, Mémoires d'un magnétiseur, 2 vols., Genève, 1866 — vol. I PDF · vol. II PDF.
- Baron du Potet de Sennevoy, Manuel de l'étudiant magnétiseur, Paris, 1846; Traité complet du magnétisme animal, Paris, 1875; La Magie dévoilée, Paris, 1852.
- Donato (Alfred d'Hont) and Edouard Cavailhon (ed.), Le Magnétisme — Journal de Psycho-Physiologie, Paris-Bruxelles, 1880-1886 — issues 1-50, 50-104, 104-154, 154+ digitized in the ISI-CNV Drive (see page Donato — Il Padre della Fascinazione for direct links).
- Édouard Cavailhon, La Fascination Magnétique, Paris, E. Dentu, 1882.
- Albert de Rochas d'Aiglun, Les états profonds de l'hypnose, Paris, Chamuel, 1892; L'extériorisation de la sensibilité, Paris, 1895; Les états superficiels de l'hypnose, Paris, 1893.
- Hector Durville, Magnétisme personnel ou psychique, Paris, 1903; Traité expérimental de magnétisme, 2 vols., Paris, 1904-1907 — ISI-CNV Drive folder: Durville Books.
Anti-Hallucination Verification Dossier
Verifiable primary source excerpts for the Lafontaine/du Potet/Deleuze school are collected in the primary source excerpts dossier on Drive ISI-CNV, part of the anti-hallucination verification system adopted by the School to ensure that every historical claim is traced back to a verifiable textual passage.
Secondary Reference Bibliography
- Adam Crabtree, From Mesmer to Freud: Magnetic Sleep and the Roots of Psychological Healing, Yale University Press, 1993.
- Henri F. Ellenberger, The Discovery of the Unconscious: The History and Evolution of Dynamic Psychiatry, Basic Books, 1970 (chapters on mesmerism and early hypnosis).
- Alan Gauld, A History of Hypnotism, Cambridge University Press, 1992.
- Bertrand Méheust, Somnambulisme et médiumnité (1784-1930), 2 vols., Le Plessis-Robinson, Synthélabo, 1999.
- Nicole Edelman, Voyantes, guérisseuses et visionnaires en France 1785-1914, Paris, Albin Michel, 1995.
- Daniel Pick, Svengali's Web: The Alien Enchanter in Modern Culture, Yale University Press, 2000.
- Marco Paret, A History of Hypnotism (ISI-CNV), for the placement of French-Italian magnetism in the line Mesmer → Puységur → du Potet → Lafontaine → Donato → Caravelli → Di Pisa → Paret.