436 THE INTELLECTUAL RISE IN ELECTRICITY. 



Newton's discovery was announced lie claimed it as al- 

 ready his own, though without sufficient grounds. 



While the Gilbertian theory would probably have soon 

 succumbed to the changed conditions, the Newtonian 

 conception more directly led to its disappearance, not by 

 refuting so much as by displacing it. Why, is best shown 

 by tracing the contrast between the two theories, and at 

 the same time this will bring us by the shortest route to 

 the vantage ground whence Newton's remarkable part in 

 the development of electricity can be most clearly dis- 

 cerned. 



"The force which emanates from the moon," says Gil- 

 bert, u reaches to the earth, and in like manner the mag- 

 netic virtue of the earth pervades the region of the moon; 

 both correspond and conspire by the joint action of both 

 according to a proportion and conformity of motions." 1 

 Newton says that the earth draws the moon and the moon 

 the earth. 



"The earth," continues Gilbert, "has more effect be- 

 cause of its superior mass." "The motion which the 

 moon receives from the earth bears to the motion which 

 the earth- receives* from the moon the same proportion as 

 the mass of the earth bears to the mass of the moon," says 

 Newton, with mathematical brevity. 



1 Gilbert: Physiologia Nova. Amsterdam, 1651. 



Bishop Wilkins, writing in 1638, says: 



"This great Globe of Earth and Water hath been proved by many 

 Observations to participate of Magnetical Properties. And as the Load- 

 stone does cast forth its own Vigour round about its Body, in a Magnet- 

 ical Compass, so likewise does our Earth. The difference is, that it is 

 another kind of Affection which causes the Union betwixt the Iron and 

 Loadstone from that which makes Bodies move unto the Earth. The 

 former is some kind of nearness and similitude in their Natures, for 

 which Philosophy, as yet, has not found a particular Name. The latter 

 does not arise from that peculiar Quality whereby the Earth is properly 

 distinguish'd from the other Elements, which is its Condensity. Of 

 which the more any thing does participate, by so much the stronger will 

 be the desire of union to it. So Gold and other Metals which are most 

 close in their Composition are likewise most swift in their Motion of 

 Descent." The Discovery of a New World. 



