represents the sum of all the electric or magnetic charges in the field, divided by their respective distances from some given point: to this function Green gave the name potential, by which it has always since been known.[1]
Near the beginning of the memoir is established the celebrated formula connecting surface and volume integrals, which is now generally called Green's Theorem, and of which Poisson's result on the equivalent surface- and volume-distributions of magnetization is a particular application. By using this theorem to investigate the properties of the potential, Green arrived at many results of remarkable beauty and interest. We need only mention, as an example of the power of his method, the following:—Suppose that there is a hollow conducting shell, bounded by two closed surfaces, and that a number of electrified bodies are placed, some within and some without it, and let the inner surface and interior bodies be called the interior system, and the outer surface and exterior bodies be called the exterior system. Then all the electrical phenomena of the interior system, relative to attractions, repulsions, and densities, will be the same as if there were no exterior system, and the inner surface were a perfect conductor, put in communication with the earth; and all those of the exterior system will be the same as if the interior system did not exist, and the outer surface were a perfect conductor, containing a quantity of electricity equal to the whole of that originally contained in the shell itself and in all the interior bodies.
It will be evident that electrostatics had by this time attained a state of development in which further progress could be hoped for only in the mathematical superstructure, unless experiment should unexpectedly bring to light phenomena of an entirely new character. This will therefore be a convenient place to pause and consider the rise of another branch of electrical philosophy.
- ↑ Euler in 1744 (De methodis inveniendi ...) had spoken of the vis potentialis—would now be called the potential energy—possessed by an elastic body when bent.
