CHAPTER IV
ELECTRIFICATION BY MECHANICAL MEANS
It has been shown in the last chapter that potential may be considered as an attribute of space produced by the presence of a charged conductor. In every point of the space surrounding such a conductor, there acts a force pushing positive electricity one way and negative electricity the opposite way. If the charged body is positively electrified, the potential will be positive all around it, but higher close to the body and lower the farther we recede from it. We must conceive a charge as a something which is adhering to a conducting surface; where there is no conductor there can be no charge, though there may be potential. Now the very definition of a conductor is a body over the surface of which electricity can distribute itself without hindrance, that is to say, only under the influence of the potential force that pushes it. The region of space surrounding the charged
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