81 



THE ELECTEIC ELEMENT. 



1867. 



ELECTRICAL SCIENCE, in its present state, curiously 

 shows how far the knowledge of phenomena may go, 

 without knowledge of the true nature of the agent 

 producing them. The first letters are wanting to the 

 alphabet of the science. We speak of positive and 

 negative electricity, of poles and currents, of induction, 

 of quantity and intensity, but w^ conceive and define 

 these conditions solely by their effects. Other pheno- 

 mena and names come in, denoting the magnetic 

 aspects of the electric element, but still failing to in- 

 terpret to us the nature of that power which gives 

 origin to the whole. This elementary ignorance, com- 

 mon to many parts of science, is more striking here 

 from the wonderful command obtained over the elec- 

 tric force in its various modes of evolution, concentra- 

 tion, conduction, and application to the uses of man. 

 We make what we needfully call its current, a mes- 

 senger swift as light itself, to the most distant parts of 

 the earth create, check, suspend, and re-create this 

 current as fast as human fingers can move and from 

 either end of the electric cable, lying in the depths of 

 the Atlantic, can detect the exact place of a fault in 

 the wires a thousand miles from land ! 



But with all this mastery over the agent, we are 



