ABSTRACT
ELECTRICITY was not anew subject in the nineteenth century, but it was then that it was to receive its greatest theoretical extension and, in the form of the telegraph, to become an indispensable part of social life. Yet it was only at the end of the century, with the development of electric light and electric power, that its full practical capacities were beginning to be realized. The twentieth century was to be the electrical age. In electricity, unlike other aspects of technology, practice lagged far behind theory. The reasons for this were multiple, but as we shall see they were far more social and economic than technical.
