An answer to a charge against the English universities contained in the supplement to the Edinburgh encyclopaedia / [John Kidd].

  • John Kidd
Date:
1818
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An answer to a charge against the English universities contained in the supplement to the Edinburgh encyclopaedia / [John Kidd]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    20/56 (page 14)
    to me: in one of which, a curious electrical effect produced by the Torpedo is mentioned hy Plu- tarch ; in the other, a very singular conjecture respecting the separate nature of Light and Heat is offered by Lucretius. Plutarch, in an account which he gives of the Torpedo, says, ct It is mentioned by those who “ have made the experiment, that upon pouring “ water on a living Torpedo, a sensation of “ numbness is felt in the hand of the person ec that pours the water; the shock probably “ being conveyed upwards from the body of “ the animal, through the stream of the water a. In referring to Thomson’s Annals of Philosophy for February 1817, page 149, it will be seen, that after an interval of nearly two thousand years, the same fact is mentioned by a writer who wras probably not aware of the antiquity of the anec- dote. The Annals mention, that in a paper written by a gentleman of the name of Todd, and read before the Royal Society on Dec. 5, 1816, the author states a circumstance respecting the Torpedo, which he has been told, he con- ceives, on good authority, though he never wit- a Enot 5s iropecri, 7ri~gav ctvr>twett^eov Xa/x/SawTES, av exiriay ^ucrot [Nc^x»i sc. Torpedo], x.otTa.o-x.Eba.vvvvTEi; v$u>p ccwQe», ulo-Sx- yiO-Scti T« wccOiSi uvcct^xo,to<; *** xa‘ Tr>y “Z4- (SXvvovros, u<; ecuxe, 5kx tu i!5aros T§£9ro/xtVy y.al 7Tgo9r£7ro>-0oTof. Plat. Op. Moral. Wyttenb. t. iv. p. 643.