Royal Institution. 315 



discharge took place, the extremity of the platinum wire was fused, 

 and the molten platinum attached to the wire, but kept up by the 

 peculiar repulsive effect of the discharge was exhibited, as it were, 

 suspended in mid-air, giving an intense light, throwing off scintilla- 

 tions in directions away from the water, and only detaching itself 

 from the wire when agitated. 



Hero water in the vaporous state must be transferred, for the im- 

 mersed electrode gave off gas, without doubt oxygen, and the mole- 

 cular action on the negative fused platinum resembled, if it were not 

 identical in character with, the currents observed on the surface of 

 mercury when made negative in an electrolyte. 



It may be objected to the theory proposed, that electrical effects 

 are obtained in what is called a vacuum, where there is no interme- 

 dium to be polarized ; but this objection, though not applicable to the 

 projection of the terminals, could hardly be discussed until experi- 

 mentalists had gone much further than at present in the production 

 of a vacuum ; the experiments of Davy and others had shown that 

 we are far off from obtaining anything like a vacuum where delicate 

 investigations are concerned. 



The view of the ancient philosophers that Nature abhors a vacuum 

 which had been much cavilled at, and was supposed to be exploded 

 by the discovery of Torricelli, Mr. Grove thought had been unjustly 

 censured : giving the expression some degree of metaphorical license, 

 it afforded a fine evidence of the extent and accuracy of observation 

 of those who were unacquainted with inductive philosophy as a system, 

 but who necessarily pursued it in practice. Whether a vacuum was 

 possible might be an open question, experimentally it was unknown. 



Lastly, in answer to those who might ask, to what practical results 

 do researches such as these lead ? what accession of physical comfort 

 or luxury do they bring ? Mr. Grove took occasion to offer his 

 humble protest against opinions now perhaps too generally prevalent, 

 that science was to be viewed only or mainly in its utilitarian or 

 practical bearings. Even regarding it in this aspect, were it not for 

 the devotion which the love of knowledge, which the yearning anxiety 

 to penetrate into the mysteries of our being and of surrounding ex- 

 istences induced ; the practical results of science would not have 

 been attained ; the band of martyrs to science from Socrates to Galileo 

 would not have thought and suffered without a higher incentive than 

 the acquisition of utilitarian results : without disparaging these results, 

 indeed regarding them as necessary consequences of any advance in 

 scientific knowledge, he considered that the love of truth and know- 

 ledge for themselves was the great animating principle of those who 

 rightly pursued science ; that, baSed upon an enduring quality of our 

 Common nature, this feeling was rooted in far firmer foundations, 

 that it led to greater and inure self-sacrificing exertions than any 

 capable of being induced by the hopes of augmenting social acquisi- 

 tions, and was an attribute and an evidence of the non-transient part 

 of our being. 



