CHAPTER 1
INFLUENCE BYPHYSICAL PRESENCE
You are a very disturbing magnet I believe to a certain extent in magnetism ... butI have never accepted the idea that persons can silently and almost withoutconscious effort, influence others for malign or beneficial purposes. In yourpresence, however, the thing is forced upon me as though it were a truth ...
—Marie Corelli
In the cultural history of all times and places there are records of people whomerely by their quiet and outwardly inactive presence have been able to exercisea healthy or unhealthy influence on their surroundings. The word "inactive"immediately alerts us to the fact that what we have here is not the taking of alead when an opportunity arises, but "contagion" with the essential radiation ofa personality possessing a certain psychic structure.
Agrippa von Nettesheim (1486-1535) put it this way in 1510: "Even as asafoetidaand musk drench everything in their smell, so something evil is imparted totheir neighbors by the evil and something good by the good, and often it clingsto them for a long time."
Extremely Psychoactive People
I have deliberately refrained from using the words "strong personalities,"because some people who have a negative effect on their environment are theexact opposite of this, and what they do is confined to paralyzing others andleeching them of their vitality; for which reason Dr. Eugène OSTY, (1874-1938)called them "personnes stérilisantes." Now even if our examples were only ofpeople like this, it would be reasonable to infer the existence of theiropposites, whom the Budapest medical hypnotist Dr. Franz Völgyesi in 1941labeled "extremely psychoactive" individuals.
The Evil Eye—"Ocular Rays"
Some cases of the so-called evil eye (Italian jettatura, mal occhio), theexistence of which is widely accepted by educated people, especially in Italy,might easily be explained as the negative effect of the whole personality;nevertheless modern researchers do assign a decisive role to the malign glanceof the jettatore [person possessing an evil eye], and an electroscopicapparatus made in England is said to have been deflected by rays emitted fromthe eye.
Dr. Walter Voeller (1893-1954) claims to have demonstrated with hisOrganoelectrometer that "continual neural-electrical discharges are emitted fromthe eyes." German mesmerists have taken great pains to demonstrate by simplemeans the émission pésante or "ponderable emission" from the human eye.
At all events, Charles Lafontaine, one of the most notable mesmerists of acentury ago, reported several cases of the killing of small animals within aquarter of an hour by the gaze, while each time the experimenter suffered fromunpleasant recoil reactions (weakness, headache, smarting eyes).
The "most unlikely jettatore known" in recent times was Cardinal Pignatelli DIBelmonte (1851-1948), if the usually well-informed Roger Peyrefitte is to bebelieved.
The Theme in Literature
Literature has often seized on our subject. Here we have space only for apassing reference to the declaration of Goethe's Margarethe in regard to Dr.Heinrich Faust's companion Mephistopheles:
"His presence agitates my blood.""And his presence stifles me inside."
CHAPTER 2
SYMPATHY, ANTIPATHY,INDIFFERENCE
There is certainly something in the law of attraction between human beings whichwe do not understand.
—Marie Corelli
This sentence from an imaginative writer, who often "know more than thephilosophic head" (that is to say, who on the basis of what reason derides as"unreliable intuition" arrives sooner and more often than reason does atvaluable perceptions—which, naturally, will have to be presented in a rationaldress to the rank and file who have little or no intuition) this word, I say,brings us at a stroke to the common experience of being affected by anotherperson. For in most of us in whom the parasitic cerebrum has still not quiteoverrun the emotions, there arises, on meeting a stranger, a feeling thatimmediately allows us to differentiate between compatible, attractive,sympathetic individuals and incompatible, unattractive, antipatheticindividuals. After spending more time with them we can also speak of those whoare "a tonic" to us and those who are "wet blankets." In addition there arethose in the majority who are neutral or indifferent.
Everyday life repeatedly teaches us that later experience will usually confirmthe initial emotional judgment that is often flatly opposed to the intellectualjudgment.
Here is an example from the medical sector: the celebrated internist, Chvostekmade the following observation: "When I first examine a patient I suddenlybecome aware of the nature of the disease as if by inspiration. Then, oncompleting the usual tests, I reach a completely different conclusion. In theprocess of time, often after several weeks, the accuracy of my instantaneousinitial diagnosis is confirmed."
The guardian of Kaspar Hauser (1812 [?]-1833), Baron Gottlieb Von Tucher (amember of the Kreisrat), wrote to the professor of Evangelical Theology, Dr.August Tholuck (1799-1877) in Halle a.d.S., as published by the latter in hisLiterarischen Anzeiger für christliche Theologie und Wissenschaft (1840, 318-320):"The effect that people had on him (Hauser) varied greatly; being pleasantor unpleasant, and in debauches was foul and disgusting even though he knewnothing of their way of life. Each individual has—said he—a personal scent,though it is not the kind that is smelled by the nose but quite different. Hecould not find words to describe it."
One is reminded of a comment that the Viennese "psychological dietician" BaronErnst von Feuchtersleben (1806-1849) apparently quoted from Karl LeberechtImmermann (1796-1840): "It is a pity that we do not know if the noted Berlinphysician Dr. HEIM, who was so renowned a diagnostician and could accuratelydistinguish between various cutaneous eruptions by their smell, could also sniffout moral proclivities by the same organ."
Personal Scent—The Odor of Sanctity
There may in fact be occasional subliminal odorific stimuli involved in theemotional interaction between two individuals. As an illustration of being "inevil odor" here is a quotation from the physician August Strindberg (1849-1912).In an attempt to reify the indefinable, he says: "If someone smells of rats, heis a skinflint ... hatred smells like a corpse." Proverbially there is an(agreeable) "odor of sanctity," which can be taken literally. Among many otherthings, holiness is based on sexual abstinence. JOYCE puts the followingapposite monologue in the mouth of his character Bloom:
Perhaps they [the female sex] get a smell off us ... must be connected with thatbecause priests that are supposed to be are different. Women buzz round it likeflies round treacle ... That diffuses itself all through the body, permeates. Sourceof life and it's extremely curious the smell. Celery sauce."
He is seconded by a well-known pendulist researching the odic side of thequestion: "The male seed contains very powerful odic forces, and the pendulumdescribes the most lively circles over it.... Its radiations pervade the wholebody, and after a seminal emission this influence in the body falls to aminimum. A sensitive man will perceive the diminution in radiation. A younghusband who is sowing unsparingly in the garden of love can always be recognizedby his feeble radiations.... A man with a good store of radiant power is unusuallyattractive to a sensitive woman and she is easily won."
And "easily won" describes the three ladies in Goethe's Faust when they caught awhiff of the man Paris (Faust, Part Two, Act I, lines 6473-6479, Reclam).
According to the esoteric Tantric document Bhairavi Diksha, retained sexualenergy is sublimated into a subtle essence, ojas, which is stored in thebrain. And according to another textbook of Yoga (Svâtmaramâ,Hathayogapradipika, III, p. 89) it produces "a pleasant odor."
CHAPTER 3
THE SOURCE OFOUR IMPRESSIONS?
Similarly the appearance of individuals excites in us sympathy, love, or hate.But do not these various feelings come from the vibrations that emanate fromthese folk?
—G. Lakhovsky
On what expression (imprinted from inside to outside) does our impression of theperson who confronts us depend? Proverbially, "first impressions are best";which means that it is preferable to rely on those that have not been filteredthrough the brain.
Deductive Impressions
The most lasting impressions are based on what we infer from the forms ofexpression—the style of behavior of those we meet. Deduction is a purelyintellectual function, and as such lies outside the scope of our present study.
Partly Instinctive Impressions
Another way in which we form impressions of those we meet relies on externals,such as deportment, gesture, mimicry, manner of speaking (accent), handshake,and physiognomy; of which the "cherubic wanderer" Angelus Silesius (Joh.Scheffler [1624-1677] sings:
It is a righteous law on earth,That faces show their owners' worth.
And in the face it is the eyes that are "the light of the body" (Matt. 6:22) andthey arrest us by their gaze.
In a variety of ways, this outer revelation of the inner prompts us by reflexaction—so to speak—to make a relationship judgment (i.e., an assessment of thedegree to which the other person is in tune with us), a judgment which quiteoften becomes verbal. My use of the words "reflex action" is meant to indicatethat we are dealing here much more with the obtrusion on us of a person's outerform than with a regular, actual, physiognomical observation and examinationcarried out by our primary consciousness. It is something that lies betweeninstinct and intellect, but somewhat nearer to instinct.
To this (and the next) section, a word may be added from Dr. Herbert Müller-Guttenbrunn(d. 1945)—"the Lichtenberg of the 20th century"—in an old number of"Das Nebelhorn" [The Foghorn] (Vienna): "As little as I regard physiognomy as ascience, so much do I believe in intuitive character reading at first sight."
Wholly Instinctive Impressions
However, external appearances make the above-mentioned impression on us only ifthey are genuine, only if they are really expressing essential traits. If theyare merely a pose, the partner's heart is known by its formless feelings andappearances are ignored! The transition from half-instinctive to fullyinstinctive face reading is made automatically: the presence of the other personis what matters.
After writing the above, I found the following corroboration of my explanation:Dr. Walter Kröner (then of Berlin-Charlottenburg) stated to an interviewer:
Each immediate psychological reaction to people and things: sympathy andantipathy, liking and aversion, everything we understand by the notionspresentiment, intuition, and instinct, does not spring naked from the ponderingprovoked by stimulation of the senses, or from association, but is at leastpartly the result of a direct, i.e., telepathic, response. This intuitivereaction is especially striking in artists, women, and children. Hence, even innormal individuals, an atavistic mediumistic ability is continually at work inthe unconscious.
But what is obtained by those who are naturally gifted is a representativecross-section of the essential nature of the partner crystallized from theirthoughts, words, and deeds, and verified by later experience!
The Rosicrucian Trismegistus IV advised people to use this instinct:
Antipathies also form a part of magic (falsely) so-called. Man naturally has thesame instinct as the animals; which warns them involuntarily against thecreatures that are hostile or fatal to their existence. But he so often neglectsit that it becomes dormant. Not so the true cultivator of the great science,etc.
He has been seconded more recently (in 1923) by the self-initiated GustavMeyrink (1868-1932):
In cases where the intellect alone is not sufficient for making a correct choiceof the ways that should be taken, we must turn to our prescience and innersensitivity while strengthening our instinct progressively, as if it were acompass needle we were learning to trust.
Reason and Instinct Antagonistic!
In this connection, Dr. Franz Hartmann (1838-1912) admonishes us as follows:
What does a modern botanist know about the signatures of plants, by which theoccultist recognizes the medicinal and occult properties of plants as soon as hesees them? The animals have remained natural, while man has become unnatural.The sheep does not need to be instructed by a zoologist to seek to escape if atiger approaches: it knows by his signature and without argumentation that he isits enemy. Is it not more important for the sheep to know the ferociouscharacter of the tiger than to be informed that the latter belongs to the genusfelis? If by some miracle a sheep should become intellectual, it might learn somuch about the external form, anatomy, physiology, and genealogy of the tiger,that it would lose sight of its internal character and be devoured by it.
This authority has a supporter in Prof. August BIER (1861-1949), privycouncillor, who once said: "Man has become a farm animal with too muchunderstanding and too little instinct."
On reading of Hartmann's imaginary sheep which has become so intellectual thatits inner eye is clouded, we are reminded of Meyrink's instructive tale about atoad asking a millipede how it manages to keep leg pairs 1 and 2 in marchingorder with leg pairs 144 and 145, etc. The arthropod (which in fact never hasmore than 200 feet) tries to figure it out "and can no longer put one foot infront of another."
Another parable introduces a man with a "doormat" of a beard who is asked bysome impudent fellow whether he puts the beard over or under the blanket atnight. The long-beard has a good long think and eventually replies. "With thebest will in the world I cannot tell you. I myself do not know, for I have nevernoticed it." However, from then on, whenever the old man tried to go to sleep,he laid his beard on top of the blanket and this did not seem right; then hetucked it underneath and found this intolerable. What he used to do quitenaturally had become a problem once he was aware of it! Just as the night-prowlingtroll overtaken by the first rays of the sun is petrified, so our vitalautomatism is disabled when brought into the light of consciousness!
Wave Transmission
When there is no direct physical contact between two silent partners, it isobvious that the mediation of an instinctive impression can take place only byundulatory waves, so that the transference is like a radio transmission. Here isa prevailing unanimity of opinion on this subject from that of the "demonicknight" (Aram) of Nettesheim through that of the saga writer Hermann Eris BUSSE(1891-1947). The former declared in 1510: "A foreign soul has no less power overthe body of another than a foreign body has. Hence, we may assume, oneindividual acts on another simply through temperament and character."
This is why the philosophers issue warnings against mixing with ill-natured andunfortunate people, as their souls, filled with harmful rays, infect theirsurroundings in a malign way. On the contrary, one should seek the company ofgood and fortunate people, since these by their proximity can be very profitableto us." The latter asserted in 1939: "There are rays and reverse rays passingbetween individuals; so much is certain. Inexplicable antipathies andinexplicable attractions are caused by them."
Biological Emanations or Thought-Waves?—"OD"
The question now arises: What can be the nature of these rays—are theybiological emanations or thought waves? in the middle of the last century, BaronKarl von Reichenbach (1788-1869) identified, chiefly in human subjects, a fluidhe called Od, concerning which he left behind nine mostly bulky tomes. "Sincehe made some 12,000 tests of the most varied sort, and under stringentconditions, on about 150 persons of all classes, whoever reads his writingswill, if ready to feel the total impact of what Reichenbach did, regard theexistence of Od as established as satisfactorily as anything can be establishedin general," opines a modern naturopathic physician.
The world shook Reichenbach's hand as a scientific industrialist who developedparaffin and creosote, but refused to shake his hand as an investigator of Od:"Od," said the world, "does not exist, and the bio-magnetism (mesmerism) basedon it is nothing more than prettily disguised hypnotism!"
