An history of magic witchcraft and animal magnetism

Colquhoun’s study traces beliefs about magic and witchcraft alongside 19th-century interest in mesmerism or animal magnetism, presenting these subjects as part of a broader history of human attempts to explain hidden forces. Historically, it reflects Victorian efforts to compare supernatural belief with emerging theories of psychology and vital energy, and it discusses classical, medieval, and modern examples.

John Campbell Colquhoun was a nineteenth-century Scottish writer associated with religious and philosophical reflection, but he is not widely known as a major esoteric author. If this is the correct person, his contribution appears to lie more in devotional or speculative religious prose than in a clearly defined occult corpus.