Note 40 — Chapter XII · THE EQUATIONS OF ELECTROMAGNETICS AND LORENTZ’S THEORY
Reading edition
Although no experimental results could be claimed to have justified any such assumption, Maxwell introduced it unhesitatingly into his theory. His celebrated equations of electromagnetics represented, therefore, the results of experiment, supplemented by this additional hypothetical assumption. The advisability of making this hypothesis was accentuated when it was found to ensure the law of the conservation of electricity.