The German physician Franz Anton Mesmer moved to Paris, the most open and lively capital in the world at the time, encompassing within himself that old mixture so often generated by freedom: intellectual ferment at the highest level mixed with charlatanism in its most abject forms; Mesmerism would gain proselytes throughout the world: Mesmer affirmed that the universe is pervaded by a subtle fluid that unites all bodies and attributed all illnesses to alterations in this fluid; he genuinely believed in the scientific nature of this thesis and subjected his discipline to a rigorous scientific control that would unequivocally demonstrate its groundlessness and the placebo effect in 1784.
