282 Mr. Faraday's Experimental Researches in Electricity. 



them, and has in reality the character of a first, essential, and 

 fundamental principle. Its comprehension is so important, 

 that I think we cannot proceed much further in the investiga- 

 tion of the laws of electricity without a more thorough under- 

 standing of its nature; how otherwise can we hope to com- 

 prehend the harmony and even unity of action which doubt- 

 less governs electrical excitement by friction, by chemical 

 means, by heat, by magnetic influence, by evaporation, and 

 even by the living being ? 



1 163. In the long-continued course of experimental inquiry 

 in which I have been engaged, this general result has pressed 

 upon me constantly, namely, the necessity of admitting two 

 forces, or two forms or directions of a force (516. 517.), 

 combined with the impossibility of separating these two forces 

 (or electricities) from each other, either in the phaenomena of 

 statical electricity or those of the current. In association 

 with this, the impossibility under any circumstances, as yet, 

 of absolutely charging matter of any kind with one or the 

 other electricity dwelt on my mind, and made me wish and 

 search for a clearer view than any that I was acquainted with, 

 of the way in which electrical powers and the particles of mat- 

 ter are related ; especially in inductive actions, upon which 

 almost all others appeared to rest. 



1164. When I discovered the general fact that electrolytes 

 refused to yield their elements to a current when in the solid 

 state, though they gave them forth freely if in the liquid con- 

 dition (380. 394. 402.), I thought I saw an opening to the elu- 

 cidation of inductive action, and the possible subjugation of 

 many dissimilar phaenomena to one law. For let the electro- 

 lyte be water, a plate of ice being coated with platina foil on 

 its two surfaces, and these coatings connected with any con- 

 tinued source of the two electrical powers, the ice will charge 

 like a Leyden arrangement, presenting a case of common in- 

 duction, but no current will pass. If the ice be liquefied, the 

 induction will fall to a certain degree, because a current can 

 now pass ; but its passing is dependent upon a peculiar mole- 

 cular arrangement of the particles consistent with the transfer 

 of the elements of the electrolyte in opposite directions, the 

 degree of discharge and the quantity of elements evolved being 

 exactly proportioned to each other (377. 783.). Whether 

 the charging of the metallic coating be effected by a powerful 

 electrical machine, a strong and large voltaic battery, or a 

 single pair of plates, makes no difference in the principle, but 

 only in the degree of action (360.). Common induction takes 

 place in each case if the electrolyte be solid, or if fluid che- 

 mical action and decomposition ensue, provided opposing ac- 



