ETHER, is usually understood of a thin, subtle matter, or medium, much finer and rarer than air; which commencing from the limits of our atmosphere, possesses the whole heavenly space.—The word is Greek, ἀέρας, supposed to be formed from the verb ἀείναι, "to burn, to flame;" some of the ancients, particularly Anaxagoras, supposing it of the nature of fire.
The philosophers cannot conceive that the largest part of the creation should be perfectly void; and therefore they fill it with a species of matter under the denomination of ether. But they vary extremely as to the nature and character of this ether. Some conceive it as a body sui generis, appointed only to fill up the vacuities between the heavenly bodies; and therefore confined to the regions above our atmosphere. Others suppose it of so subtile and penetrating a nature, as to pervade the air, and other bodies, and possess the pores and intervals thereof. Others deny the existence of any such specific matter; and think the air itself, by that immense tenacity and expansion it is found capable of, may diffuse itself through the interstellar spaces, and be the only matter found therein.
In effect, ether, being no object of our sense, but the mere work of imagination, brought only upon the stage for the sake of hypothesis, or to solve some phænomenon, real or imaginary; authors take the liberty to modify it how they please. Some suppose it of an elementary nature, like other bodies; and only distinguished by its tenacity, and the other affections consequent thereon: which is the philosophical ether. Others will have it of another species, and not elementary; but rather a sort of fifth element, of a purer, more refined, and spirituous nature, than the substances about our earth; and void of the common affections thereof, as gravity, &c. The heavenly spaces being the suppos'd region or residence of a more exalted class of beings, the medium must be more exalted in proportion. Such is the ancient and popular idea of ether, or ethereal matter. See Ethereal.
The term ether being thus embarrassed with a variety of ideas, and arbitrarily applied to so many different things; the later and leverer philosophers choose to set it aside, and in lieu thereof substitute other more determinate ones. Thus, the Cartesians use the term materia subtilis; which is their ether; and Sir Isaac Newton, sometimes a subtile spirit, as in the close of his Principia; and sometimes a subtile or ethereal medium, as in his Optics.
The truth is, there are abundance of considerations, which seem to evince the existence of some matter in the air, much finer than the air itself. There is an unknown something, which remains behind when the air is taken away; as appears from certain effects which we see produced in vacuo. Heat, Sir Isaac Newton observes, is communicated through a vacuum, almost as readily as through air: but such communication cannot be without some interjacent body, to act as a medium. And such body may be subtile enough to penetrate the pores of glass; and may be very well concluded to permeate those of all other bodies, and consequently be diffused through all the parts of space: which answers to the full character of an ether.
The existence of such an ethereal medium being settled, that author proceeds to its properties; inferring it to be not only rarer and more fluid than air, but exceedingly more elastic and active: in virtue of which properties, he shews, that a great part of the phenomena of nature may be produced by it. To the weight, e.g. of this medium, he attributes gravitation, or the weight of all other bodies; and to its elasticity, the elastic force of the air and of nervous fibres, and the emission, refraction, reflection, and other phenomena of light; as also, sensation, muscular motion, &c. In fine, this same matter seems the primus mobile, the first source or spring of physical action in the modern system. The Cartesian ether is supposed not only to pervade, but adequately to fill, all the vacuities of bodies; and thus to make an absolute plenum in the universe.
But Sir Isaac Newton overturns this opinion, from divers considerations; by shewing, that the celestial spaces are void of all sensible resistance: for, hence it follows, that the matter contained therein must be immensely rare, in regard the resistance of bodies is chiefly as their density; so that if the heavens were thus adequately filled with a medium or matter, how subtle soever, they would resist the motion of the planets and comets much more than quicksilver, or gold.
The late discoveries in electricity have thrown great light upon this subject, and rendered it extremely probable, that the ether so often talked of is no other than the electric fluid, or solar light, which diffuses itself throughout the whole system of nature. See ELECTRICITY, FIRE, HEAT, LIGHT, &c.