An Entertainment for Angels

193 Pages·2003·1.64 MB·English

by  Patricia Fara

AN ENTERTAINMENT
FOR ANGELS
PATRICIA FARA
'A concise, lively account'
Jenny Uglow
author of The Lunar Men
Electricity in the Enlightenment
REVOLUTIONS IN SCIENCE
An Entertainment for Angels
Electricity in the Enlightenment
Patricia Fara
Series editor: Jon Turney
ICON BOOKS UK
TOTEM BOOKS USA
Published in the UK in 2002 Published in the USA in 2002
by Icon Books Ltd., Grange Road, by Totem Books
Duxford, Cambridge CB2 4QF Inquiries to: Icon Books Ltd.,
E-mail: [email protected] Grange Road, Duxford,
www.iconbooks.co.uk Cambridge CB2 4QF, UK
Sold in the UK, Europe, South Africa Distributed to the trade in the USA
and Asia by Faber and Faber Ltd., by National Book Network Inc.,
3 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AU 4720 Boston Way, Lanham,
or their agents Maryland 20706
Distributed in the UK, Europe, Distributed in Canada by
South Africa and Asia by Penguin Books Canada,
Macmillan Distribution Ltd., 10 Alcorn Avenue, Suite 300,
Houndmills, Basingstoke RG21 6XS Toronto, Ontario M4V 3B2
Published in Australia in 2002 ISBN 1 84046 348 1
by Allen & Unwin Pty. Ltd.,
PO Box 8500, 83 Alexander Street,
Crows Nest, NSW 2065
Text copyright © 2002 Patricia Fara
The author has asserted her moral rights.
Series editor: Jon Turney
Originating editor: Simon Flynn
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any
means, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.
Typesetting by Hands Fotoset
Printed and bound in the UK by
Mackays of Chatham plc
Contents
List of Illustrations iv
Introduction 1
Part I Illuminations: The Light of Reason 5
Chapter 1: Interpretations 9
Chapter 2: Electricity and Enlightenment 12
Part II Shocking Inventions: Instruments 25
Chapter 1: Robert Boyle and the Air-pump 30
Chapter 2: Francis Hauksbee and the
Electrical Machine 38
Chapter 3: Stephen Gray and the Charity Boy 42
Chapter 4: Pieter van Musschenbroek and the
Leyden Jar 51
Part III Lightning Cures: Applications 63
Chapter 1: Benjamin Franklin 67
Chapter 2: Knobs or Points? 76
Chapter 3: The Business of Medicine 82
Chapter 4: Therapeutic Shocks 91
Part IV Sparks of Imagination: Theories 99
Chapter 1: Problems 103
Chapter 2: Fluids and Atmospheres 111
Chapter 3: Theological Aethers 116
Chapter 4: Measurement and Mathematics 123
Part V The Flow of Life: Current Electricity 133
Chapter 1: Henry Cavendish and the Torpedo 137
Chapter 2: Luigi Galvani and his Frogs 145
Chapter 3: Alessandro Volta and his Pile 153
Chapter 4: Resuscitation 165
Further Reading 171
Notes 173
Other titles available from Icon / Totem 178
List of Illustrations
1 Benjamin Franklin 6
2 A New Electrical Machine for the Table 14
3 Robert Boyle’s first air-pump 31
4 Wright of Derby, ‘The Alchymist’ 35
5 The hanging boy 45
6 Benjamin Rackstrow’s beatification 48
7 The Leyden experiment, and the flow of
electrical matter 53
8 Adam Walker’s electrical experiments 59
9 Benjamin Wilson’s experiment at the Pantheon
in 1777 80
10 ‘The Quacks’: James Graham and Gustavus
Katterfelto 86
11 Monitoring electric therapy with Timothy Lane’s
electrometer 89
12 Charles Coulomb’s torsion balance 126
13 Henry Cavendish’s artificial torpedo 142
14 Luigi Galvani’s frogs 149
15 Alessandro Volta’s pile 157
Dedication
For Helen and Katherine
Acknowledgements
I should like to thank Simon Flynn and Jon Turney
for their very helpful editorial suggestions. I am also
extremely grateful to Jim Secord and Simon Schaffer,
who have made it possible for me to write this book.
Picture Acknowledgements
The illustrations on pages 14, 31, 45, 48, 53, 59,
80, 89, 126, 142, 149 and 157 are reproduced by
permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University
Library.
Introduction
What gave my Book the more sudden and
general Celebrity, was the Success of one of
its propos’d Experiments ... for drawing
Lightning from the Clouds. This engag’d the
public Attention every where.
Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, 1788
The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was fascinated by
scientific experiments. One of his friends described
how he would pull out an electrical machine from the
clutter on his desk, and charge himself up ‘so that
the fierce, crackling sparks flew forth; and ...
his long, wild locks bristled and stood on end’. His
eyes gleaming with enthusiasm, Shelley prophesied
that science would find a way to keep poor people
warm during the coldest winters. ‘What a mighty
instrument would electricity be’, enthused Shelley, as
he envisaged a future when ‘by means of electrical
kites we may draw down the lightning from heaven!
... an immense volume of electricity, the whole
ammunition of a mighty thunderstorm; and this
1
being directed to some point would there produce
the most stupendous results.’1
Drawing‘Lightning from the Clouds’: this vision-
ary dream had been converted into reality by an
American printer, Benjamin Franklin. Like Shelley,
Franklin valued electricity for its potential benefits
as well as its exciting effects. He was one of the
eighteenth century’s leading diplomats, internation-
ally acclaimed for his enlightened attitude and
democratic ideals. Yet he was also a prominent
electrical researcher, famous for his numerous
inventions and groundbreaking theories that had
helped to establish the new science of electricity.
Although he did not embark on his electrical career
until he was forty, Franklin’s scientific eminence
paralleled his political reputation.
Electricity was the greatest scientific invention of
the Enlightenment. Shelley was showing off his skills
in 1810, but only a hundred years earlier, electrical
science had not existed. Virtually the only way to
produce electricity was by rubbing amber or a
compliant cat, and even experts knew little that had
not been familiar to the Greeks. Yet by the middle of
the eighteenth century, electrical experiments were
being performed all over Europe with new, powerful
instruments that could produce, store and discharge
static electricity.
2
Far from being an arcane preoccupation reserved
for privileged intellectuals, electricity rapidly became
a topic of conversation throughout society. Super-
latives abounded: electricity was ‘replete with
wonders’, ‘as surprising as a miracle!’, ‘favourite
object and pursuit of the age’. It was, one admirer
exclaimed,‘an Entertainment for Angels, rather than
for Men’.2 Lecturers held their audiences spellbound
as feathers jumped through the air, water jets
glowed, and glasses of spirits were set aflame by the
touch of a sword.
Many wealthy families bought their own appar-
atus, and aristocratic women produced miniature
lightning flashes from their fingers and their whale-
bone petticoats, or titillated their admirers with a
sensational – if rather painful – electric kiss. At the
Hanoverian court, electric entertainment replaced
dancing; in Edinburgh, myrtle trees were found to
blossom earlier after a dose of electricity; while in
Paris, electrified animals were found to lose weight
(this was attributed to increased perspiration).
One early enthusiast was John Wesley, the
Methodist preacher, who had learned about
electricity from reading a book by Franklin. As
Wesley travelled around England with his own
electrical machine, he marvelled: ‘What an amazing
scene is here opened, for after-ages to improve
3