92 THE ORIGIN OF CREATION. 



and forms of matter, the similarity and evidences of the same 

 natural law will be observed in the whole of them. 



Magnetism was first discovered in a peculiar kind of stone or 

 metal, by its attracting pieces of iron ; such stones were called 

 magnets. By rubbing a magnet over a piece of steel, it was 

 found to impart a force or power to the steel, so that it became 

 a magnet, and when poised upon a point where it was free to 

 act, its ends would incline towards the ends or poles of the 

 earth. Magnets when thus poised, are observed to influence 

 each other by attracting their opposite ends, or poles, and by 

 repelling their similar ends. 



At this point we would like to give an explanation of the 

 " magnetic curves " formed by filings between two poles of a 

 magnet, an experiment which has long been known to scientific 

 men, but never explained. It was Faraday's misfortune, that 

 he should have been born before the law of atomagnetism was 

 discovered, for Tyndall in his New York lectures stated, that 

 these magnetic curves, or " lines of force" : "so fascinated Fara- 

 day, that the greater portion of his intellectual life was devoted 

 to pondering over them." It seems strange that we can explain 

 in five minutes, what Faraday consumed a whole lifetime in only 

 trying to discover, yet such is the case. These curves are 

 caused simply by the attraction of the opposite poles of the 

 magnet ; and the reason they form lines, is that each hair, or 

 branch of filings, must repel every other hair starting from the 

 same pole, because similar poles repel, whereas only opposite 

 poles attract. This is the whole mystery, and any one With a 

 magnet and filings can speedily test the truth of it. 



We have already said in our chapter on Heat, that the force of 

 atomagnetism when undisturbed is in straight lines, and we see 



