322 On Mr Faraday's Experimental Researches. 



hypothesis respecting electro-chemical action, to which I think 

 he is also deficient in doing ju&tice, and in stating it correctly. 

 In his fifth dissertation, at page 681' of the Transactions, Mr 

 Faraday, speaking of electro-chemical effects described in Sir 

 H. Davy's first Bakerian Lecture, says, " The mode of action 

 by which the effects take place is stated very generally, so ge- 

 nerally indeed, tliat probably a dozen precise schemes of electro- 

 chemical action might be drawn up, differing essentially from 

 each other, yet all agreeing with the statement there given." 



Mr Faraday continues : — '* When Sir Humphrey Davy uses 

 more particular expressions, he seems to refer the decomposing 

 effects to the attractions of the poles. This is the case in the 

 ' general expression of facts' given at pp. 28 and 29 of the Phi- 

 losophical Transactions for 1807: also at p. 30. Again, at 

 p. 160 of the Elements of Chemical Philosophy, he speaks of the 

 great attracting powers of the surfaces of the poles. He men- 

 tions the probability of a succession of decompositions and re- 

 compositions throughout the fluid, agreeing in that respect with 

 Grotthuss ; and supposes that the attractive and repellent 

 agencies may be communicated from the metallic surfaces 

 throughout the whole of the menstruum, being communicated 

 from one particle to another particle of the same kind, and di- 

 minishing in strength from the place of the poles to the middle 

 point, which is necessarily neutral." 



Of the vagueness of my brother's views of electro-chemical 

 decomposition, admitting, as Mr Faraday thinks, of a dozen 

 precise schemes being drawn up from them, this is the first time 

 I have heard mention. During his lifetime, they do not appear 

 to have been so considered ; no systematic writer that I am aware 

 of, found with them fault of this kind, or was at a loss to ascer- 

 tain their meaning precisely. INIr Faraday indeed does not call 

 them va^tie, but general. The context, however, clearly proves 

 this is his meaning : for a statement may be both of the greatest 

 generality and of the greatest precision, but then it can have 

 only one meaning, and cannot admit of a dozen different intcr- 

 pretationF. 



My brother, in his last Bakerian Lecture, remarks, that the 

 same theory .of electro-chemical action had been the guide and 

 foundation of all his researches for twenty years; that is, from 



