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These arenas are open to the sky, for electric effects are not exhibited in roofed buildings, from fear of the explosions which would probably occur were antagonistic electricities brought in contact with each other in a covered space. The games exhibited are varied; but, in all, electricity has some part.

The characteristic of these two electricities is that a body of the vitreous electricity, for example, repels all such as are of the same electricity, and on the contrary attracts all those of the resinous electricity; so that the tube, made electrical, will repel glass, crystal, hair of animals, etc., when rendered electric, and will attract silk thread, paper, etc., though rendered electrical likewise.

In the first the point silently receives the current, while in the other the opposite electricities of the rod and cloud may meet with explosion; but the building will not necessarily be injured from this cause. M. Michel proposed to combine the advantages of the two systems by having the rod terminate in a spherical enlargement from which should project points in various directions.

The presence of these currents evokes a force of repulsion between the magnet and the wire; and to cause the one to approach the other, this repulsion must be overcome. The overcoming of this repulsion is, in fact, the work done in separating and impelling the two electricities.

A world which, as solid as it looks, is made all of aerial and even of spiritual stuff; permeated all by incalculable sleeping forces and electricities; and liable to go off, at any time, into the hugest developments, upon a scratch thoughtfully or thoughtlessly given on the right point: Nay, for every one of us, could not the sputter of a poor pistol-shot shrivel the Immensities together like a burnt scroll, and make the Heavens and the Earth pass away with a great noise?

"The flower is hidden until the electricities of the sun and light draw it forth into life and beauty." In speaking of the "choice of a husband," I referred to the only case I recollected where the lady's hesitation rendered a third meeting necessary. The exception was interesting.

This principle is that there are two distinct electricities, very different from each other, one of which I call vitreous electricity and the other resinous electricity. The first is that of glass, rock-crystal, precious stones, hair of animals, wool, and many other bodies. The second is that of amber, copal, gumsack, silk thread, paper, and a number of other substances.

He found that a glass rod rubbed with silk will repel another glass rod similarly rubbed, but that the silk would attract a rubbed glass rod. We express the facts in the well-known law that like electricities repel each other, and unlike attract. For a long time the nature of the distinctions between the two electricities was not understood.

The recomposition or neutralization of the two opposite electricities of the atmosphere and of the terrestrial globe is brought about by means of the moisture with which the lower strata of the air are more or less charged.

We cannot have a magnet with one pole: if we break a natural loadstone into a thousand pieces, each piece will have its two oppositely electrified poles complete within itself. In the voltaic circuit, again, we cannot have one current without its opposite. In the ordinary electric machine, the glass cylinder or plate, and the rubber, acquire opposite electricities.