Article May 20, 1916 Issue

"The sharp surplus of materiality"

HAWLEY O. TAYLOR, PH.D.

The more familiar one is with the details of some lines of human investigation, the more he is impressed with the aptness of Mrs. Eddy's views on that phase of thought as brought out in the text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." This has been my experience, as a physicist, when reading the definition of electricity on page 293 of this book: "Electricity is the sharp surplus of materiality which counterfeits the true essence of spirituality or truth,—the great difference being that electricity is not intelligent, while spiritual truth is Mind."

About a century ago electricity was considered to be a fluid which passed from one body to another, and if a body possessed more than the normal amount, it was regarded as positively electrified, but if less, as negatively electrified. Electricity was therefore not regarded as the real substance of a body, but rather as a fluid possessed by it. This was the view generally held when Mrs. Eddy wrote, "Electricity is not a vital fluid," as we read on the page above referred to. After the discovery of radium in 1898, the study of the construction of the atom was greatly stimulated, since the radium atom was found to be in process of disintegration,—a phenomenon at variance with the former theory of the indestructibility of the atom. As a result of this study, atoms are now considered to be minute solar systems, each having for its nucleus, or sun, a positive charge of electricity, and for its planets electrons, or negative charges of electricity, circling with velocities in the order of one hundred thousand miles a second around this nucleus.

According to this theory there are myriads of these little solar systems in every drop of water and in every grain of sand, and when they are undisturbed and in a state of equilibrium, no electrical phenomena are observed. Atoms differ in the number and arrangement of their electrons, and in some substances they have a stronger hold on their electrons than is the case with other substances; again, there are substances having atoms prone to pick up stray electrons. Thus, catskin gives up some electrons with comparative ease, while hard rubber clings to its own and picks up others. Rub these two substances together and the hard rubber will rob the catskin of electrons, and thus having more than its normal number, will exhibit negative electrification; that is, when touched by the hand it will give off its excess of electrons, which we see or feel as a spark of electricity. The catskin, being deficient in electrons, will exhibit positive electrification; that is, when touched by the hand, electrons will pass from the hand to it as a spark of electricity. The rubbing had disturbed and loosened some of the electrons of the catskin and they were picked up by the atoms of the hard rubber.

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