OHM ON THE GALVANIC CIRCUIT. 417 



demonstrate by a short statement of their consequences ; at the 

 same time I consider it necessary to observe, that both equa- 

 tions refer to all possible galvanic circuits Avhose state is per- 

 manent, consequently they comprise the voltaic combination 

 as a particular case, so that the theory of the pile needs no 

 separate comment. In order to be distinct, I shall con- 



stantly, instead of employing the equation u = -^^ y — O + c, 



Li 



only take the third figure, and therefore will merely remark 

 here, once for all, that all the consequences drawn from it hold 

 generally. 



In the next place, the circumstance that the separation of the 

 electricity, diffusing itself over the galvanic circuit, maintains 

 at the different places a permanent and unchangeable grada- 

 tion, although the force of the electricity is variable at one 

 and the same place, deserves a closer inspection. This is the 

 reason of that magic mutability of the phaenomena which 

 admits of our predetermining at pleasure the action of a given 

 place of the galvanic circuit on the electrometer, and enables 

 us to produce it instantly. To explain this peculiarity 

 I will return to figure 3. Since the figure of separation 

 F G H I K L, is always wholly determined from the nature of 

 any circuit ; but its position with respect to the circuit A D, as 

 was seen, is fixed by no inherent cause, but can assume any 

 change produced by a movement common to all its points 

 in the direction of the ordinates, the electrical condition of 

 each point of the circuit expressed by the mutual position of 

 the two lines, may be varied constantly, and at will, by ex- 

 ternal influences. When, for example, A D is at any time the 

 position representing the actual state of the circuit, so that, 

 therefore, the ordinate S Y" expresses by its length the force 

 of the electricity at the place of the circuit to which that or- 

 dinate belongs, then the electrical force corresponding to the 

 point A, at the same time will be represented by the line A F. 

 If now the point A be touched abductively, and thus be 

 entirely deprived of all its force, the line A D will be 

 brought into the position F M, and the force previously ex- 

 isting in the point S w ill be expressed by the length X" Y" ; 

 this force, therefore, has suddenly undergone a change, corre- 

 sponding to the length S X". The same change would have 

 occurred if the circuit had been touched abductively at the point 



