PHYSICS, EIGHTEENTH CENT. ELECTRICITY. 333. 



His active and honourable life ended on the lyth of April, 1790. when 

 he was in the eighty-fifth year of his age. 



Franklin at once utilized his discoveries and experiments by his 

 plan of protecting buildings and ships from thunderstrokes. But his 

 views were not announced without provoking doubts and raising con- 

 troversies. A very warm dispute arose among the members of the Royal 

 Society of London concerning the best form of lightning-conductors. 

 Some supported Franklin's views as to the advantage of using pointed 

 conductors ; others, and notably Wilson, obstinately advocated the 

 superiority of conductors furnished with a ball instead of a point. The 

 contention was carried on for some time with no little warmth, and 

 papers relating to it occupy a very large space of several successive 

 -volumes of the "Transactions." 



In 1772 the Government requested the opinion of the Royal Society 

 as to the best means of protecting po\vder-magazines from lightning. 

 A committee of the Society, consisting of Franklin, Cavendish, Watson, 

 Robertson, and Wilson, recommended^////^ lightning-conductors. 

 Wilson appended a protest, giving it as his opinion that points solicit 

 the lightning, and that blunted conductors were the proper thing. 

 Pointed conductors were fixed, yet it so happened that a magazine at 

 Purfleet was struck by lightning and slightly injured, though the powder 

 did not explode. The Government again asked the advice of the 

 Society, and a second committee again pronounced in favour of the 

 pointed conductors, much to Wilson's annoyance. He made experi- 

 ments, drew up a long paper, which caused a lengthy discussion, with 

 the same result as before. The Government were made to believe 

 that the decision was not concurred in by the Society at large, and 

 finally the question of pointed vtrsus "knobbed" conductors became 

 almost a political one. It is said that George III. even privately 

 asked Sir John Pringle, the President of the Society, to support Wilson's 

 views; and when the President expressed his desire always to act in 

 accordance with his Majesty's wishes, adding, " But, Sire, I cannot re- 

 verse the laws and operations of nature," the story goes that the King 

 replied, " Then, Sir John, you had perhaps better resign." It appears 

 that the monarch actually had knobs put up on the conductors in his. 

 palace, and the occasion gave rise to the following epigram : 



While you, great George, for knowledge hunt, 

 And sharp conductors, change for blunt, 



The nation 's out of joint ; 

 Franklin a wiser course pursues, 

 And all your thunder useless views, 



By keeping to the point. 



It would be tedious for the reader to peruse a mere list of the nu- 

 merous discoveries in electricity which now rapidly succeeded each 

 other, and to describe them in detail would be impossible within our 

 limits, however interesting it might be for the student of this branch 



