Read Ebook: An Essay to Shew the Cause of Electricity; and Why Some Things are Non-Electricable. In Which Is Also Consider'd Its Influence in the Blasts on Human Bodies in the Blights on Trees in the Damps in Mines; And as It May Affect the Sensitive Plant &c. by Freke John

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 82 lines and 13466 words, and 2 pages

ESSAY

TO SHEW THE

CAUSE

ELECTRICITY;

AND

Why Some Things are Non-Electricable.

In which is also Consider'd

PRESIDENT

OF THE

ROYAL SOCIETY.

Those who have the Honour of your Acquaintance, and thence know your many excellent Qualifications, must applaud my Choice in dedicating this small Piece to you; whose Name, if there be any Merit in the Performance, will, before any other, add a Lustre to it. I am, with the highest Esteem,

JOHN FREKE.

The PREFACE.

ESSAY

To Shew

I proceed now to consider, how this Fire, so dispersed, may be collected; and have given to it, in electrical Experiments, a Force equal to, and of the same Nature with, Lightning.

To illustrate this, wax a small Thread, or slide a Rope swiftly thro' your Fingers, and you are liable to burn them: Which probably arises from their grinding in, betwixt your Fingers and the Rope, so many more Particles of Fire than naturally come together when left to float in the Air.

If this Reasoning be allow'd to be just , then it follows, that the Air, which is violently ground or rubb'd betwixt your Hand and a glass Tube, or betwixt a glass Ball whirl'd briskly, and rubb'd with a Piece of Leather, as they are used in electrical Experiments, I say, the Air, so rubb'd, may leave behind it that Quantity of agitated Fire which causes Electricity.

For, suppose the Ball or Tube inveloped with a Quantity of this Fire moving spirally round them, with the utmost Velocity; and it can no more depart from its Company than you find Sparks of Fire which fly from Steel on a Knife-grinder's Wheel are liable to do. Every body almost can remember to have seen them adhere to the Wheel, and frequently pursue each other quite round it.

As I have mention'd Friction, I cannot help observing how unphilosophical and unmeaning it is, for any one to advance, that Fire is caused by Friction; when I think he may as well say, that Water is caused by Pumping.

We know, that a Cart or Coach-Wheel, for Want of Grease, by Friction will be set on Fire; and Fire-Canes, rubbed together smartly, will take Fire; but neither of these, I believe, nor any thing else, will beget or generate the Element of Fire. They must either collect it out of the Air, or else it must be lodged within them, as we find it to be in Steel in an eminent Degree: For, if you drop the Filings of Steel through the Flame of a Candle, it sends out the most fierce Fire of any thing in Nature.

The Reason to be given why a greater Quantity of Fire is produced from Steel-Filings, than from any other Thing, I take to be owing to a larger Share of that Element which is impacted in it from its being made out of Iron long impregnated with Fire.

Now, as I am endeavouring to shew to you the natural Cohesion of Fire, and the Propensity there is in it to extend itself, I shall offer to your Consideration a very familiar Instance to prove it; which is that of the Snuff of a Candle just blown out. You cannot but have observ'd at how great a Distance from the Snuff the Flame will descend down the Smoke, and light it.

I shall further take the Liberty to observe to you another Proof of this; which, I think, will not only shew a Propensity in Fire to cohere, but will greatly strengthen my Conjecture, that this Fire, produced in Electricity, is extracted from that I have supposed to be universally dispersed.

Though I apprehend that the Four Elements of Fire, Water, Earth, and Air, may never have been increased or diminished, since the Great GOD of Order created them, yet I can also apprehend each of them unequally dispers'd in the Universe by various Causes and Events: And when this happens, those which were intended, when in their due Order, to make every thing happy and easy, in their disordered State will create nothing but Confusion.

For Instance, the chief Use of Water seems intended, when descending in warm and gentle Showers, or flowing in kind and easy Streams, to chear and nourish all Kinds of Vegetation, as well in Trees and Plants, as in Herbs and Flowers: But suppose, by the Contrivance of Man, or by the Accidents of Nature, a large Quantity of it lodged on the Tops of high Hills, if it breaks its Bank, it will never stop, till it finds a natural resting Place; and in its Torrent it will overwhelm and destroy those Trees and Plants, with the Herbs and Flowers, it was intended to nourish.

The like may be said of the Fire, which I have been supposing uniformly dispersed over the Creation; which, if its Properties are to invigorate all Nature, you must of course suppose its Power not to be controul'd; but that it passes through all the Animal, Mineral, and Vegetable Creation, whilst they stand in need of Life, or any Increase.

But as I have been conjecturing what different Purposes Water in its disorder'd State may produce, so the same Consideration may be had concerning Fire in its disorder'd State: When too much of it is brought together, either by the Contrivance of Man, or by the Disorders in the other Elements; is it not reasonable to suppose, that it will, according to its natural Appointment, get about its Business, and break as soon as it can from its Confinement?

A very learned and eminent Author, who is now living, says, "That all Life, whether it be vegetable, sensitive, or animal, is only a kindled Fire of Life in such a Variety of States: And every dead insensitive Thing is only so because its Fire is quenched."

To pursue this kind of Reasoning concerning them: They are, in truth, the Excrements only from those Beings which once had Life in them; the Wax being the excrementitious Matter from Bees, which, when made, was to be capable of no further Increase or Addition to its Nature: For, as its primitive Use was only intended to make Combs or Cells to preserve the Honey through the different Changes of the Season, so if this Wax had been liable to Alterations from this Fire then the Cells would not have remained so intire as the wonderful Architects left them.

The more of the Air that passes through them, the quicker they burn; as when the Snuff of a Candle is taken off, which hindered the Quantity to pass thro' it, it increases the Flame; though, before, the same Materials were employ'd. The same may be said of clearing the Ashes from, and stirring the Fire; which impeded the Quantity of Air from leaving its Fire behind, in its Passage through the Coals.

Now, if you will suppose, with me, that this Air had been robb'd of its Fire, by its supporting and keeping alive such Things under-ground as its Business is to do every-where, and that Space was left full of stagnated Air, and therefore could not admit of fresh to enter, it became impossible for Fire, or any living Creature, to subsist there.

The Cure of this Evil is performed in Mines by a Horse-Mill, which works large Bellows, that drive fresh Air down a Shaft made for that Purpose.

Having thus far, I hope, prepared your Mind to understand what I apprehend the Element of Fire is, and what its Office seems to be, I will shew, if I can,

First, Why, in Electricity, Fire proceeds from an electrical Body, so as to light into a Flame many different Compositions.

Secondly, Why a Tube of Glass, when rubbed so as to be made electrical, will not only attract to it, but repel from it alternately, any light Body, as Leaf-Gold, Feathers, and the like: And also, why it will seem to send from it a Quantity of Wind, with a singing small Noise, if you hold it nigh to your Cheek and Ear.

Thirdly, Why, when any unelectrify'd Body touches any thing electrify'd, the Electricity breaks off with a smart Crack, and a Spark of Fire.

Fourthly, Why a Number of Men, who are joined together by holding any metallic Body betwixt them, if one of them touch a Piece of Iron electrify'd, the whole Company shall feel a violent Concussion, in proportion to the Largeness of the Body electrify'd.

To shew this Fire in a converging State, you may observe, when a Gun-barrel, or any long Bar of Iron, is to be electrify'd, and it is in a State of Suspension on silk Cords, which are non-electricable, you may perceive the Fire issue from a Piece of iron Wire coming from the glass Ball, in a lambent Flame, which draws to a Point, and then diverges, and drives itself on, till the Gun-barrel, or Bar, is electrify'd.

Its being a Gun-barrel can be no other Reason for its Preference in that Shape than in another; but I believe the Occasion of its being used here is, because the greatest Effect which has been shewn from Electricity, was sent from abroad; and that was caused by suspending a great Gun in a non-electricable silk Cord. The Gun seems to have been made use of here as being the greatest Quantity of Iron, and in the best Shape, they could get it for Suspension. And were a Person so suspended, if he held in his Hand a naked Sword, you might see such a lambent Flame passing from it, in a converging and diverging State, as before describ'd.

Lightning from hence may in some measure be accounted for; though I cannot so exactly tell what collects it together, as I can in this factitious Lightning here treated of, yet I can suppose, that the Cause of Lightning is produc'd from a great Quantity of this Fire before spoken of; which being driven together, and included in a limited State, or Covering of some Kind, when discharged from this Covering, it goes off in an Explosion, which is Thunder. The Lightning I need not describe, being intirely the same with Electricity; for it will kill without a Wound, and pass through every thing, as this seems to do.

I am to shew, first, the Cause of its kindling a Flame in certain compounded Liquors; which, if what I have supposed be true, that it is by the means spoken of that this Fire is collected and driven on, as I have said, it is plain to be seen, that at the Finger's End of a Person electrify'd, or at the End of a Sword, held as before described, being in a dark Room, a Flame issues from them: It is no Wonder then, that an inflammable Spirit, as is shewn, should take Fire from it.

But it may be asked, What causes these attractive and repulsive Faculties? I answer, The Attraction of fiery Particles one to another: For, if all Nature be agitated by this Fire, all Things have it in the common Proportion, as it was intended they should stand in Nature. And therefore, as I have endeavoured to shew, that Electricity is occasioned by crouding on any thing more of this Fire and Force than naturally belonged to it; and as the Flame of a Candle must of Necessity send out of it at its Point an Overplus ; so, for the same Reason, the Redundancy of what is crouded on may be consider'd as spending itself at each Extremity, that it may thereby reach itself out to any thing, and invite it to it; as I have shewn the Flame descending down the Smoak of a Candle just blown out to kindle it again, will do.

I come now to consider the Violence of this Fire; which, passing thro' the Pores of the glass Tube, may, as the Sound of Organ-Pipes, which proceeds only from their differently modifying the Air, cause the various hissing Noises you hear when the Tube is held nigh the Ear, from the Electricity passing through the different shaped Pores of it.

And furthermore the Wind may seem to arise, from the distant Parts of the electrical Force playing at some Space from the Tube; which thereby agitate and fan the ambient Air, so as to make it feel like Wind.

The third Thing I proposed to shew, is, Why the electrical Power departs from one Thing to another by giving a smart Crack, and send-out a Spark, which will set on fire many very inflammable Liquors.

Now, when this Fire of Electricity is issuing out at a Point into an inflammable Spirit, it can be no Wonder, that the Spirit, which is known to be full of Fire, should unite its Fire to that of Electricity.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet