Page:Philosophical magazine 23 series 4.djvu/30

14 Prof. Maxwell on the Theory of Molecular Vortices not flow through them, electrical effects are propagated through them, and the amount of these effects differs according to the nature of the body; so that equally good insulators may act differently as dielectrics.

Here then we have two independent qualities of bodies, one by which they allow of the passage of electricity through them, and the other by which they allow of electrical action being transmitted through them without any electricity being allowed to pass. A conducting body may be compared to a porous membrane which opposes more or less resistance to the passage of a fluid, while a dielectric is like an elastic membrane which may be impervious to the fluid, but transmits the pressure of the fluid on one side to that on the other.

As long as electromotive force acts on a conductor, it produces a current which, as it meets with resistance, occasions a continual transformation of electrical energy into heat, which is incapable of being restored again as electrical energy by any reversion of the process.

Electromotive force acting on a dielectric produces a state of polarization of its parts similar in distribution to the polarity of the particles of iron under the influence of a magnet and, like the magnetic polarization, capable of being described as a state in which every particle has its poles in opposite conditions.

In a dielectric under induction, we may conceive that the electricity in each molecule is so displaced that one side is rendered positively, and the other negatively electrical, but that the electricity remains entirely connected with the molecule, and does not pass from one molecule to another.

The effect of this action on the whole dielectric mass is to produce a general displacement of the electricity in a certain direction. This displacement does not amount to a current, because when it has attained a certain value it remains constant, but it is the commencement of a current, and its variations constitute currents in the positive or negative direction, according as the displacement is increasing or diminishing. The amount of the displacement depends on the nature of the body, and on the electromotive force; so that if $$h$$ is the displacement, $$R$$ the electromotive force, and $$E$$ a coefficient depending on the nature of the dielectric,

$R=-4\pi E^{2}h;\,$

and if $$r$$ is the value of the electric current due to displacement,

$r=\frac{dh}{dt}.$