THOUGHTS ON NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. 47 



The best static machines in our laboratories hardly 

 give forth T^GOO" of a coulomb per second. They 

 would have, consequently, to work unceasingly for 

 a little over thirty years to give the quantity of 

 electricity contained within the atoms of one gramme 

 of hydrogen. 



As electricity exists in a state of considerable 

 concentration in chemical compounds, it is evident 

 that the atom might have been regarded long since 

 as a veritable condenser of energy. To grasp there- 

 after the notion that the quantity of this energy 

 must be enormous, it was only necessary to appreci- 

 ate the magnitude of the attractions and repulsions 

 which are produced by the electric charges before 

 us. It is curious to note that several physicists have 

 touched the fringe of this question without perceiving 

 its consequences. For example, Cornu pointed out 

 that if it were possible to concentrate a charge of 

 one coulomb on a very small sphere, and to bring 

 it within one centimetre of another sphere likewise 

 having a charge of one coulomb, the force created 

 by this repulsion would equal g 18 dynes, or about 

 9 billions of kilogrammes. 



Now, we have seen above that by the dissociation 

 of water we can obtain from one gramme of hydrogen 

 an electric charge of 96,000 coulombs. It would be 

 enough and this is exactly the hypothesis lately 

 enunciated by J. J. Thomson to dispose the electric 

 particles at suitable distances within the atom, to 

 obtain, through their attractions, repulsions, and 

 rotations, extremely powerful energies in an ex- 

 tremely small space. The difficulty was not, there- 



