The reason why : $b a careful collection of many hundreds of reasons for things which, though generally believed, are imperfectly understood. A book of condensed scientific knowledge for the million — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The reason why : $b a careful collection of many hundreds of reasons for things which, though generally believed, are imperfectly understood. A book of condensed scientific knowledge for the million
John Stuart Mill · en
The wonderful force of _electricity_ astonishes us all the more
when we view it in contrast with that equally wonderful element,
_light_. We have seen that light travels with a velocity of
192,000 miles in a second, but that it falls upon a delicate
balance so gently, that it produces no perceptible effect. As far
as we know the nature of _electricity_, it is even _more ethereal_
than _light_; yet, while the _ether of light_ falls harmlessly and
imperceptibly--even with the momentum of a flight of _ninety-five
millions of miles_, the _ether of electricity_, bursting from
a cloud only _five hundred yards_ distant, will split massive
stones, level tall towers with the dust, strike majestic trees
to the ground, and instantly extinguish the life of man! _Why_
does _the one ether_ come divested of all mechanical force, while
that which seems to be _even more ethereal_ than it, is capable
of exerting the mightiest force over material things? Does it not
appear that the Creator of the universe has established these
paradoxes of power to testify his Omnipotence--to show to man that
with Him all things are possible; and that, in the grand cosmicism
of the universe, every attribute of Omnipotence has been fulfilled?
[Verse: "And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and
there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne,
saying, It is done."--REV. XVI.]
Let us now consider man's relation to this Omnipotence. He sees
that electricity smites the tall edifice, and observes that in
doing so it displays a choice of a certain substance through
which it passes harmlessly, and that its violence is manifested
only when its path is interrupted. Man, taking advantage of this
preference of electricity for a particular conductor, stretches
out an arm of that substance, and points it upwards to the
clouds; electricity accepts the invitation, and passes harmlessly
to the earth. But this not all: man learns by observation that
electricity resides in all matter; that it may be collected or
dispersed; that it travels along a good conductor at the rate
of _half-a-million of miles in a second of time_; he constructs
a battery, a kind of scientific fortress, in which he encamps
the great warrior of nature; and then, laying down a conducting
wire, he liberates the mighty force: but its flight must be on
the path which man has defined, and its journey must cease at the
terminus which man has decreed, where, by a simple contrivance of
his ingenuity (the movements of a magnetic needle), the electric
current is made to deliver whatever message of importance he
desires to convey. Thus, the element which in an instant might
deprive man of life, is subdued by him, and made the obedient
messenger of his will.
CHAPTER XXX.