concerned in the Phcenomena of ordinary Electricity, fyc. 119 



Davy. Besides, the copper connecting wire of a voltaic battery 

 will attract iron filings when the series is excited ; the filings 

 with respect to each other assuming a polar arrangement, as if 

 they were collected round a magnet. The arch of flame is accre- 

 dited as the electric current. 



But as the electric fluid exerts powers of attraction and repul- 

 sion very different from those of magnetism, some separate ele- 

 ment may be present in it which exercises these influences on 

 masses of matter, and produces other dynamic effects : it may 

 be different from the heat, light and magnetism, which are asso- 

 ciated with electricity. Perhaps this may be the basis of the 

 fluid ; and as a name to distinguish it will be convenient in the 

 sequel, it may be here called " electricity proper." 



But what is it that causes the attractions of the atoms which 

 compose heterogeneous matter, or in other words, occasions 

 chemical combination ? is it the same as that element just spoken 

 of which causes attraction and repulsion of masses of matter ? 

 Some of our eminent authorities have maintained that it is. In 

 my Essay on the Origin, Progress, and Present State of Gal- 

 vanism, I have endeavoured to defend the contrary opinion; 

 and in the sequel of the present essay some additional considera- 

 tions will be adduced having a similar tendency. 



The physiological phsenomena, comprising the shock and 

 muscular contractions, constitute an important series of effects ; 

 they will scarcely be supposed to be produced by the light, heat, 

 or magnetism of the electric fluid. They may perhaps be caused 

 by the element which I have designated by the name of " elec- 

 tricity proper," in the case of frictional electricity; but it will 

 be a part of the object of this essay to render it probable that, 

 in what is called voltaic electricity, a power exists of causing a 

 shock of a very different nature. 



Concerning the agent in the electric fluid which possesses the 

 remarkable property of coercing the magnetic needle into a 

 position transverse to the magnetic meridian, there is an import- 

 ant problem to be solved : Is it the same as that element of the 

 electric fluid which causes attraction and repulsion of masses of 

 matter — the electricity proper ? This is the grand question ; and 

 for the present I shall say no more, than that in the sequel many 

 arguments and facts will be adduced with a view of rendering it 

 probable that electricity proper is not the force which causes 

 deflection of the magnetic needle. It may be either some differ- 

 ent force, or all the forces conjointly. 



The conclusion at which I arrive is, as lias been already stated, 

 that what is called the electric fluid does not consist of one ho- 

 mogeneous element, but of several ; that the difference between 

 the various exhibitions of it which produce frictional, voltaic, 



