senting with perfect accuracy the laws of the actions, in all their forms, simple and complex, should yet be fallacious as a view of the cause of the actions. Any true view of electricity must include, or at least be consistent with, the other classes of the phenomena, as well as this statical electrical action; such as the conditions of excitation and retention of electricity; to which we may add, the connexion of electricity with magnetism and with chemistry;-a vast field, as yet dimly seen. Now, even with regard to the simplest of these questions, the cause of the retention of electricity at the surface of bodies, it appears to be impossible to maintain Coulomb's opinion, that this is effected by the resistance of air to the passage of electricity. The other questions are such as Coulomb did not attempt to touch; they refer, indeed, principally to laws not suspected at his time. How wide and profound a theory must be which deals worthily with these, we shall obtain some indications in the succeeding part of our history. But it may be said on the other side, that we have the evidence of our senses for the reality of an electric fluid;-we see it in the spark; we hear it in the explosion; we feel it in the shock; and it produces the effects of mechanical violence, piercing and tearing the bodies through which it passes. And those who are disposed to assert a real fluid on such grounds, may appear to be justified in doing so, by one of Newton's 'Rules of Philosophizing,' in which he directs the philosopher to assume, in his theories, causes which are true.' The usual interpretation of a 'vera causa,' has been, that it implies causes which, independently of theoretical calculations, are known to exist by their mechanical effects; as gravity was familiarly known to exist on the earth, before it was extended to the heavens. The electric fluid might seem to be such a vera causa. To this I should venture to reply, that this reasoning shows how delusive the Newtonian rule, so interpreted, may be. For a moment's consideration will satisfy us that none of the circumstances, above adduced, can really prove material currents, rather than vibrations, or other modes of agency. The spark and shock are quite insufficient to supply such a proof. Sound is vibrations,-light is vibrations; vibrations may affect our nerves, and may rend a body, as when glasses are broken by sounds. Therefore all these supposed indications of the reality of the electric fluid are utterly fallacious. In truth, this mode of applying Newton's rule consists in elevating our first rude and unscientific impressions into a supremacy over the results of calculation, generalization, and systematic induction.1 16 Thus our conclusion with regard to this subject is, that if we wish to form a stable physical theory of electricity, we must take into account, not only the laws of statical electricity, which we have been chiefly considering, but the laws of other kinds of agency, different from the electric, yet connected with it. For the electricity of which we have hitherto spoken, and which is commonly excited by friction, is identical with galvanic action, which is a result of chemical combinations, and belongs to chemical philosophy. The connexion of these different kinds of electricity with one another leads us into a new domain; but we must, in the first place, consider their mechanical laws. We now proceed to another branch of the same subject, Magnetism. 16 On the subject of this New- 1835. I may seem there to have tonian Rule of Philosophizing, spoken more favourably of the see further Phil. Ind. Sc. B. xii. Theory as a Physical Theory than c. 13. I have given an account I have done here. This difference of the history and evidence of the is principally due to a consideraTheory of Electricity in the Re- tion of the present aspect of the ports of the British Association for Theory of Heat. EFFICE, ut interea fera munera militiaï O charming Goddess, whose mysterious sway, Do thou, what time thy fondling arms are thrown Do thou, thy Rome to save, thy power to prove, |