VII. 

 MAGNETISM. 



ELECTRICITY and magnetism hardly lend them- 

 selves at all to the uses of such a book as the 

 present one. Paradoxes are views contrary 

 to general and natural expectation. The views 

 may be correct or false, but for a paradox 

 to be interesting it should, as a rule, be jus- 

 tifiable. To be of general interest to others 

 than persons of special knowledge, paradoxes 

 should be concerned with matters of a familiar 

 nature, and their justification and explanation 

 should be capable of being readily understood 

 by intelligent laymen, as based not too indirectly 

 upon facts and principles of common experi- 

 ence. 



Now, to the natural man the only elec- 

 trical and magnetic phenomena of ordinary 

 experience are thunder and lightning, sparks 

 from stroked hair, and attraction by the load- 

 stone. These are astonishing enough, but the 

 most accomplished science cannot explain them 

 in the sense of showing how they arise as special 

 manifestations of well-known and easily intel- 

 ligible principles of universal acceptance and 

 application, such as the law of conservation of 



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