Earthbathing and Religion
Over the next few years, Graham developed a new medical therapy, which he called "earthbathing."
In 1786, Graham gave public exhibitions of earthbathing in Panton Street in London, and lectured buried up to the neck in earth.
In July 1788, Graham was "born again." He renounced his past, including his electrical treatments. Graham founded a new church in his home in Lochend’s Close in Edinburgh's Old Town, but was soon overcome by a form of religious mania (later identified by Freud as the Messiah Complex) that seems to have dogged him for some time.
Graham travelled widely around Britain exhibiting his earthbathing therapy, and at the end of 1792, he began to experiment with extended fasting to prolong his life.
Graham died very suddenly at his home in Edinburgh in 1794, his death recorded in Old Parish Records as having taken place on 24 December, although other sources suggest he died on his birthday, 23 June.
Read more about this topic: James Graham (sexologist)
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“... it was religion that saved me. Our ugly church and parochial school provided me with my only aesthetic outlet, in the words of the Mass and the litanies and the old Latin hymns, in the Easter lilies around the altar, rosaries, ornamented prayer books, votive lamps, holy cards stamped in gold and decorated with flower wreaths and a saint’s picture.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)