on language _Sarcenet_, placed
quickly on the amber, after it has been rubbed, * hinders the attraction of
the body; but if it is interposed in the intervening space, it does not
entirely obstruct it. Moisture also from spent air, and any breath blown
from the mouth, as well as water put on the amber, immediately extinguishes
its force. But oil, which is light and pure, does not hinder it; for
although amber * be rubbed with a warm finger dipped in oil, still it
attracts. But * if that amber, after the rubbing, is moistened with _aqua
vitae_ or spirits of wine, it does not attract; for it is heavier than oil,
denser, and when added to oil sinks beneath it. For oil is light and rare,
and does not resist the most delicate effluvia. A breath therefore,
proceeding from a body which had been compacted from humour or from a
watery liquid, reaches the body to be attracted; the body that is reached
is united with the attracting body, and the one body lying near the other
within the peculiar radius of its effluvia makes one out of two; united,
they come together into the closest accord, and this is commonly called
attraction. This unity, according to {57} the opinion of Pythagoras, is the
principle of all things, and through participation in it each several thing
is said to be one. For since no action can take place by means of matter
unless by contact, these electricks are not seen to touch, but, as was
necessary, something is sent from the one to the other, something which may
touch closely and be the beginning of that incitement. All bodies are
united and, as it were, cemented together in some way by moisture; so that
a wet body, when it touches another body, attracts it, if it is small. So
wet bodies on the surface of water attract wet bodies. But the peculiar
electrical effluvia, which are the most subtile material of diffuse humour,
entice corpuscles. Air (the common effluvium of the earth) not only unites
the disjointed parts, but the earth calls bodies back to itself by means of
the intervening air; otherwise bodies which are in higher places would not
so eagerly make for the earth. Electrical effluvia differ greatly from air;
and as air is the effluvium of the earth, so electricks have their own
effluvia and properties, each of them having by reason of its peculiar
effluvia a singular tendency toward unity, a motion toward its origin and
fount, and toward the body emitting the effluvia. But those substances
which by attrit