“And those who pretend it to be moved by water, or air, or magnetism, one of which (meaning water) even our most famous author did in the beginning affirm it to be moved by, is so very weak that I don’t at all think it deserving to be considered.
“And what is still worse, to pretend it to be a cheat is a manner of proceeding which is neither consistent with equity nor common sense. As long as arts and sciences have the misfortune of depending on the direction of such like persons, no progress toward truth can be made, but I shall make it sufficiently appear that there is yet more truth behind the hill than ever has been brought to light. There be persons who, when disappointed of gain, turn their shafts against those who have circumvented them.
“All those who know anything of philosophy know that gravity is generally (and chiefly by Sir Isaac Newton and his followers) denied to be essential to matter, which I shall not only prove the contrary of, but I shall likewise show the properties in matter, on which the principle depends, to be the most glorious means to prove the existence of God, and to establish natural religion.”
Is it not rather remarkable that, after a sleep of nearly two centuries, it is again claimed that gravity is inherent in all matter?
It has been very generally supposed that Keely is working at haphazard, as it were; in other words, that he has no theory to go upon. Professor Brinton writes of Keely’s theories: “Mr. Keely has a coherent and intelligent theory of things, or philosophy, on which he lays out his work and proceeds in his experiments.” March 6th, the same professor writes: “Keely’s paper on Latent Force in intermolecular spaces is clear enough and instructive, but the average reader will find the perusal up-hill work, from lack of preliminary teaching. Naturally, Mr. Keely, whose mind has been busy with this topic for years, and who is more familiar with it than with any other, does not appreciate how blankly ignorant of it is the average reader. Also naturally he writes above the heads of his audience.”
A correspondent in Invention, London, writes December 12, 1891: We have at various times in these columns alluded to the investigations of the Philadelphia scientist, J. W. Keely, and this researcher—who is now stated to be engaged in finding a method whereby the power[1] which he professes to have discovered can be employed as a motor in the place of steam—is just now the object of considerable attention in the press of the United States. To summarize the present state of the criticism to which this man is subjected, we may mention that for some time past The New York Herald, among other papers, has been printing a series of articles that have been recently prepared by an American inventor named Browne, professing to show how Keely has, for nearly twenty years, been deceiving expert engineers, shrewd men of the world, some few university professors and others, by the use of compressed air, obtaining testimonials of his discovery of an unknown force in nature. In reading his articles any one who has seen the photographs—as the writer has done—of the researching instruments discarded by Keely, in past years, and those that he is now employing in their place, cannot fail to detect the misstatements and misrepresentations made.
Mr. Browne (?) even overrides the testimony of the late Professor Leidy, Dr. Willcox, Dr. Koenig, Dr. Brinton—the Baltimore physicist—Dr. Tuttle, and the engineers Linville and Le Van, all of whom have tested the force used by Keely, and admitted that no electricity, no magnetism, no compressed air is used. Without endorsing in the slightest anything that Keely has discovered, or claims to have discovered, we think that, with the English love of fair play, both sides should always fairly be heard before either is condemned, and as Mr. Keely has consented to instruct a well-known English physicist in his method of producing the force handled, there is every chance of the truth being known, and the correct state of the matter divulged to the scientific world at large, when, mayhap, this rival inventor may have to retract his assertions or stand a suit for libel. We do not say it will be so—we only assert it may be. Professor Brinton, who has made a study of Keely’s methods, writes this month to a friend in London:—“The exposé of Keely’s alleged methods continues each week. Some of the proposed explanations are plausible, others are plainly absurd. They only serve to attract renewed attention to Keely. I have written to the editor to ask him to arrange a meeting for me with the writer, but I have not yet been able to discover the Mr. Browne,[2] of Brooklyn, who is the supposititious author.”
Mr. Keely has chosen the successor[3] of Professor Tyndall, at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, as the physicist to whom he will communicate his method. This will be welcome news indeed to scientists on both sides of the Atlantic, and the result will be awaited with anxiety alike by both the friends and foes of Keely. We shall watch for the result, as will our American confrères.—Wm. Norman Brown.
[1] Mr. Keely explains the energy he is handling to be a condition of sympathetic vibration, associated with the Polar stream of our planet, positively and negatively. [↑]