CONVERSATION V.

ON THE CHEMICAL AGENCIES OF ELECTRICITY.

MRS. B.

Before we proceed further it will be necessary to give you some account
of certain properties of electricity, which have of late years been
discovered to have an essential connection with the phenomena of
chemistry.

CAROLINE.

It is ELECTRICITY, if I recollect right, which comes next in our list of
simple substances?

MRS. B.

I have placed electricity in that list, rather from the necessity of
classing it somewhere, than from any conviction that it has a right to
that situation, for we are as yet so ignorant of its intimate nature,
that we are unable to determine, not only whether it is simple or
compound, but whether it is in fact a material agent; or, as Sir H. Davy
has hinted, whether it may not be merely a property inherent in matter.
As, however, it is necessary to adopt some hypothesis for the
explanation of the discoveries which this agent has enabled us to make,
I have chosen the opinion, at present most prevalent, which supposes the
existence of two kinds of electricity, distinguished by the names of
_positive_ and _negative_ electricity.

CAROLINE.

Well, I must confess, I do not feel nearly so interested in a science in
which so much uncertainty prevails, as in those which rest upon
established principles; I never was fond of electricity, because,
however beautiful and curious the phenomena it exhibits may be, the
theories, by which they were explained, appeared to me so various, so
obscure and inadequate, that I always remained dissatisfied. I was in
hopes that the new discoveries in electricity had thrown so great a
light on the subject, that every thing respecting it would now have been
clearly explained.

MRS. B.

That is a point which we are yet far from having attained. But, in spite
of the imperfection of our theories, you will be amply repaid by the
importance and novelty of the subject. The number of new facts which
have already been ascertained, and the immense prospect of discovery
which has lately been opened to us, will, I hope, ultimately lead to a
perfect elucidation of this branch of natural science; but at present
you must be contented with studying the effects, and in some degree
explaining the phenomena, without aspiring to a precise knowledge of the
remote cause of electricity.

You have already obtained some notions of electricity: in our present
conversation, therefore, I shall confine myself to t