Mr. F. Guthrie on Iodide of Acetyle. 183 
electrical force we may be led toadopt. They evidently indicate 
a disposition in the electrical molecules to increased action when 
grouped closely about each other ; when subjected to a state of 
linear extension, they become placed, as it were, further without 
each other’s influence, and appear to repose with greater tran- 
quillity on a conducting surface considered as a portion of a 
charged system (12). It is well known that when two similarly 
electrified bodies are brought into the presence of each other, 
the electrometer indications of these two bodies begin to increase, 
and continue to exhibit further excitement as the bodies are 
caused to approach each other. Now it is quite apparent that 
the molecules of an electrical stratum will be further with- 
out each other’s influence when accumulated on a long rect- 
angular plate, R, fig. 21, than on a circular plate P of equal sur- 
face. I am not, however, prepared to enter upon any theoretical 
explanation of these phenomena, much less do I adduce them in 
opposition to any accepted theory of electricity. Whether the 
several facts I have been considering be explicable or not upon a 
given theory, I by no means pretend to determine; my object 
is the progress of scientific truth untrammelled by hypothesis, 
not theoretical disquisition: there is, perhaps, nothing more cal- 
culated to retard the advance of natural knowledge than undue 
subserviency to what may be designated as philosophical doc- 
trine. The mind enslaved by opinion looks beyond the truth 
to the establishment of a long-cherished hypothesis; and the 
question at last is not as to the value of recently discovered facts, 
but as to their agreement with theory. It was thus with the 
Ptolemaists: rather than endanger their doctrine of planetary 
motion, they encumbered the heavens with cycles and epicycles 
in order to maintain it. My own impression is, that so far from 
common electrical action being of the complex and difficult nature 
usually assigned to it, it is of an extremely simple form, and that 
all its statical phenomena are capable of being reconciled and 
calculated upon a few very general and very simple elementary 
principles. 
6 Windsor Villas, Plymouth, 
July 20, 1857. 
XXI. On Iodide of Acetyle. By FrepEerick GururRie*. 
mae iodide of the oxygen-containing radical acetyle, or 
othyle, is formed when the oxide of that radical, or anhy- 
drous acetic acid, is brought into contact with either of the 
iodides of phosphorus. 
To prepare it, an equivalent of anhydrous acetic acid is poured 
* Communicated by the Author. 
