“Chemical activation of mystical states is as old as the most ancient psychedelic. William James described the phenomena with several anesthetics—chloroform, ether, and nitrous oxide . The following chloroform-induced mystical experience is a good example of a chemically induced cognitive dissonance : The knowledge that the mystical experience is a result of mundane chemistry does not negate the nagging (and lingering) sense of the certainty of God's existence . Note also that chloroform evoked the sensations of purity and truth without any reference to any specific idea or thought.
I cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then, as I gradually awoke from the influence of the anesthetics, the old sense of my relation to the world began to return, and the new sense of my relation to God began to fade. . . . Think of it. To have felt purity and tenderness and truth and absolute love, and then to find that I had after all had no revelation, but that I had been tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain. Yet, this question remains. Is it possible that the inner sense of reality . . . was not a delusion, but an actual experience? Is it possible that I felt what some of the saints have said that they always felt, the undemonstrable but indisputable certainty of God?”
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