* i6B '^ClfE'MlCAh Tft"EOKY. 



Dissertation on -fban «Sch has for its heat and light, whicli therefore; froni 

 €fftcts*orhe if ^^^^^ unconfinable nature, escape. The action of ekctrib 

 Itficht, and com- fluid, on a combustible substance,'is only to increase its 

 us ion. temperature, and to produce combustion ; for the substance 



is already saturated with that matter which electricity 

 offers to it. But let us present to the electric matter a sub- 

 stance of a different nature, a binary compound, consisting 

 of the bases of oxigen gas and an inflammable substance, or 

 what is called a product of combustion ; here the action is 

 widely different, no heat is evolved, no light a\\ cais, brft thft 

 substances received the electric matter in a latent state, and 

 is resolved into two binary compounds, an inflammable sub' 

 stance, and cxigen gas. This process may be exemplified^ 

 in a common case of combustion, in which both the neces- 

 sary compounds are in the gaseous form. If a certain quan- 

 tity of oxigen gas be m.ixed with hydrogen gas, we shall have 

 the four ?iibstances necessary for combustion, oxigen, light, 

 the base of an inflammable, and heat. The electr-c spark 

 being applied to this mixture, causes the bases of the oxigen 

 and hydrogen gases to unite, and the light ar^d heat to escape ; 

 iv6r6 therefore we have the 'product of combustion, which is 

 a substance void of light and heat, and it will bff necessary to 

 offer light and heat to it, to reproduce the oxigen and hy- 

 drogen gases } but we may offer sensible light and heat to 

 them in profusion and no union will be produced ; if we 

 heat it ever so greatly it will only be evaporated. Heatand 

 light exist in the gases we have, mentioned in an impercepti- 

 ble 'form, and to induce an union, we must offer them in the 

 same state. This form of light and heat is nothing else than 

 the electric fluid, and hence, by passing electricity through 

 the water, it is resolved into its primitive gases. 



Electric matter, as it is produced from the common ma- 

 chine, is of a compound nature, a combination cf the matters 

 of heat and light; being therefore introduced into water, 

 myriads of minute bubbles e.-cape, which are oxigen and 

 hydrogen gases wixed together. But of late years a different 

 modification of the electric matter has been observed, in 

 which the principle may be divided, with matter ©f heat 

 J scaping at one point, and the matter of light at another. 

 So that by intr(.diKing the points of the gnh.TJiic machine 

 / under 



