Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay (read book txt) 📖

THE MISSISSIPPI SCHEME.

John Law; his birth and youthful career—Duel between Law and Wilson—Law’s escape from the King’s Bench—The “Land-bank”—Law’s gambling propensities on the continent, and acquaintance with the Duke of Orleans—State of France after the reign of Louis XIV.—Paper money instituted in that country by Law—Enthusiasm of the French people at the Mississippi Scheme—Marshal Villars—Stratagems employed and bribes given for an interview with Law—Great fluctuations in Mississippi stock—Dreadful murders—Law created comptroller-general of finances—Great sale for all kinds of ornaments in Paris—Financial difficulties commence—Men sent out to work the mines on the Mississippi, as a blind—Payment stopped at the bank—Law dismissed from the ministry—Payments made in specie—Law and the Regent satirised in song—Dreadful crisis of the Mississippi Scheme—Law, almost a ruined man, flies to Venice—Death of the Regent—Law obliged to resort again to gambling—His death at Venice

THE SOUTH-SEA BUBBLE.

Originated by Harley Earl of Oxford—Exchange Alley a scene of great excitement—Mr. Walpole—Sir John Blunt—Great demand for shares—Innumerable “Bubbles”—List of nefarious projects and bubbles—Great rise in South-sea stock—Sudden fall—General meeting of the directors—Fearful climax of the South-sea expedition—Its effects on society—Uproar in the House of Commons—Escape of Knight—Apprehension of Sir John Blunt—Recapture of Knight at Tirlemont—His second escape—Persons connected with the scheme examined—Their respective punishments—Concluding remarks

THE TULIPOMANIA.

Conrad Gesner—Tulips brought from Vienna to England—Rage for the tulip among the Dutch—Its great value—Curious anecdote of a sailor and a tulip—Regular marts for tulips—Tulips employed as a means of speculation—Great depreciation in their value—End of the mania

THE ALCHYMISTS.

Introductory remarks—Pretended antiquity of the art—Geber—Alfarabi—Avicenna—Albertus Magnus—Thomas Aquinas—Artephius—Alain de Lisle—Arnold de Villeneuve—Pietro d’Apone—Raymond Lulli—Roger Bacon—Pope John XXII.—Jean de Meung—Nicholas Flamel—George Ripley—Basil Valentine—Bernard of Trèves—Trithemius—The Maréchal de Rays—Jacques Cœur—Inferior adepts—Progress of the infatuation during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries—Augurello—Cornelius Agrippa—Paracelsus—George Agricola—Denys Zachaire—Dr. Dee and Edward Kelly—The Cosmopolite—Sendivogius—The Rosicrucians—Michael Mayer—Robert Fludd—Jacob Böhmen—John Heydon—Joseph Francis Borri—Alchymical writers of the seventeenth century—Delisle—Albert Aluys—Count de St. Germain—Cagliostro—Present state of the science

MODERN PROPHECIES.

Terror of the approaching day of judgment—A comet the signal of that day—The prophecy of Whiston—The people of Leeds greatly alarmed at that event—The plague in Milan—Fortune-tellers and Astrologers—Prophecy concerning the overflow of the Thames—Mother Shipton—Merlin—Heywood—Peter of Pontefract—Robert Nixon—Almanac-makers

FORTUNE-TELLING.

Presumption and weakness of man—Union of Fortune-tellers and Alchymists—Judicial astrology encouraged in England from the time of Elizabeth to William and Mary—Lilly the astrologer consulted by the House of Commons as to the cause of the Fire of London—Encouragement of the art in France and Germany—Nostradamus—Basil of Florence—Antiochus Tibertus—Kepler—Necromancy—Roger Bacon, Albertus Magnus, Arnold Villeneuve—Geomancy—Augury—Divination: list of various species of divination—Oneiro-criticism (interpretation of dreams)—Omens

THE MAGNETISERS.

The influence of imagination in curing diseases—Mineral magnetisers—Paracelsus—Kircher the Jesuit—Sebastian Wirdig—William Maxwell—The Convulsionaries of St. Medard—Father Hell—Mesmer, the founder of Animal Magnetism—D’Eslon, his disciple—M. de Puysegur—Dr. Mainauduc’s success in London—Holloway, Loutherbourg, Mary Pratt, &c.—Perkins’s “Metallic Tractors”—Decline of the science

INFLUENCE OF POLITICS AND RELIGION ON THE HAIR AND BEARD.

Early modes of wearing the hair and beard—Excommunication and outlawry decreed against curls—Louis VII.’s submission thereto the cause of the long wars between England and France—Charles V. of Spain and his courtiers—Peter the Great—His tax upon beards—Revival of beards and moustaches after the French Revolution of 1830—The King of Bavaria (1838) orders all civilians wearing moustaches to be arrested and shaved—Examples from Bayeux tapestry