First edition of the first major scientific treatise by an English man based on experimental methods of research and the foundation work of magnetism and electrical science. Gilbert uses here for the first time the terms "electricity," "electric force," and "electric attraction."

Book I "deals with the history of magnetism from the earliest legends about the lodestone to the facts and theories known to Gilbert's contemporaries In the last chapter of book I, Gilbert introduced his new basic idea which was to explain all terrestrial magnetic phenomena: his postulate that the earth is a giant lodestone and thus had magnetic properties The remaining five books of the De magnete are concerned with the five magnetic movements: coition, direction, variation, declination, and revolutio...[ Read more ]

First edition of the first major scientific treatise by an English man based on experimental methods of research and the foundation work of magnetism and electrical science. Gilbert uses here for the first time the terms "electricity," "electric force," and "electric attraction."

Book I "deals with the history of magnetism from the earliest legends about the lodestone to the facts and theories known to Gilbert's contemporaries... In the last chapter of book I, Gilbert introduced his new basic idea which was to explain all terrestrial magnetic phenomena: his postulate that the earth is a giant lodestone and thus had magnetic properties... The remaining five books of the De magnete are concerned with the five magnetic movements: coition, direction, variation, declination, and revolution. Before he began his discussion of coition, however, Gilbert carefully distinguished the attraction due to the amber effect from that caused by the lodestone. This section, chapter 2 of book II, established the study of the amber effect as a discipline separate from that of magnetic phenomena, introduced the vocabulary of electrics, and is the basis for Gilbert's place in the history of electricity." --Dictionary of Scientific Biography, V, p.397.

首部由英國人撰寫、建基於硏究實驗方法的科學專著，磁學和電學的開山之作。