Who doesn’t want to finish up the summer with a new skill? Why not try mesmerism! Thomas Welton is here to help with his 1884 Mental Magic: “The public again, after a lapse of 20 years, being much interested in the above subject, and having no clear explanation given to them on it or how to produce for themselves far higher Phenomena of the same class, I venture to hope that this work will not be unwelcome…”
Welton not only offers step-by-step instructions on how to mesmerise, but also instructions on using the planchette, a divination tool popular among spiritualists. The planchette was something like a wheeled Ouija board, the idea being that the spiritual power would transfer through the medium and into the board through touch and then make itself known by writing on a sheet of paper laid below.
Flip through the pages below or follow this link to read Mental magic: a rationale of thought reading, and its attendant phenomena and their application to the discovery of new medicines, obscure diseases, correct delineations of character, lost persons and property, mines and prings of water, and all hidden and secret things.