SCIENTIFIC EXPECTATIONS.

Grey River Argus, Volume XV, Issue 1823, 9 June 1874, Page 3

SCIENTIFIC EXPECTATIONS.

[WASHINGTON CHRONICLE.]

Wendell Phillips recently, in a lncture on the genuis and mechanism of the Saxon race, on the wonderful achievments it has wrought out in science, draws a very beautiful picture of what electricity is yet destined to accomplish. He says : " We stand' to-day in Boston and laboriously lay a wire to San Francisco, five thousand miles away, and with one .nan at each end of the wire send a message, and think it a grand achievement. But the men at each end know what is sent, and could betray the confidence reposed in them if they pleased. We think we have reached the goal, but the patient ingenuity of the Saxon blood, of the Yankee race, will keep at work until finally in your grandchildren's day it will send a message from San Francisco to Boston without a wire> No man at either end will know what the message is, and it will run both ways at the same time. We are only touching just on the edge or fringe of the garment, and undoubtedly electricity, superseding steam, will light our houses, perhaps lift us into the air, carry us across the world, and absolutely make m^ the lord, without a movement, of creation." No doubt Mr Phillips, in giving expression to thisbeautif ul thought, may nave felt with his hearers somewhat exaggerated in his flight of imagination, and that what he then prophesied was to be the work of an age far ahead of our own — that the reality of such a dream was not destined for our time, and that its revelations belonged to the recesses of a far future. But we feel some pride in telling Mr Phillips that we are much nearer the point of the electrical period he speaks of than, perhaps, he imagines. There' is at this moment a citizen of Washington, and whose name, is Dr M. Loomis, who is prepared to demonstrate to any flcientist in the world the truth and practicability of what he (Mr Phillips) advances >as a mere theory. Dr Loomis baa given many of the best years of his life to the study of electrical science, and has proven, to his own satisfaction and that of others, the utility of this great motor as a means of communication, of light and heat, and a thousand other purposes ending into the physical and mechanical iin> Vement of mankind. His plan is to reach certain altitudes by natural and mechanical appliances, so as to form a connection with the natural current of electricity surrounding the earth, and in which it floats, and with the aid of magnetic plates or needles he proposes to telegraph from any two given points; it matters not what the distance in, without the aid of wire, cable, or the present artificial battery. His means of forming a complete circuit between the natural strata of electricity above and that which is constantly passing through the earth will be by artificial wires connecting with the earth and the two points of altitude connected with the electricity above. This is much better explained by a diagram, but any electrician can easily understand what we mean. These connections once securely made, and man can, for all ages to come, draw from the inexhaustible reservoir above an element that will not only supersede steam, light and warm our houses, but in its adaptibility even surpass the extravagant prediction of Mr Phillips. Yes, such is oufaith in the irresistible and inevitablr laws of the Almighty that we believe thie powerful element— electricity— will even- - tually become the road of communication between this and other inhabitable worlds. This may be stretching the possibility pretty hard, but not any more so than science has done hithertof ore. Dr Loomis has received a charter from Con* gress with corporate powers to organise a stock' company to test the utility of his theory, but unfortunately it is bo grand in

its inception that moneyed men shrink from it; and aa they can sco no immediate dividend— forgetting that there is a future beyond their own — they treat it as mythical, and that there ever was a man like Morse, who not only suffered and was laughed at, but lived to see the vindication of his perseverance and the triumph of his theory. Dr Loomis occupies the same position to day ; he labors under much the same obstacles, and is restrained by some opposition ; and we fear that, unless the Government or some liberal gift of capital renders the aid required, his grand idea will have to wait for a more enlightened age. This should not be ; and we hope American pride will not suffer it to pass out of our hands, and the credit and honor be reaped by others.