Experiments in electricity now became the prevailing mania. Louis XV. of France set the fashion among crowned heads of having his soldiers electrified, to see what benefit he, or they, would derive from it. On the instigation of Abbé Nollet, considered a man of high scientific attainments, and who made several important discoveries in electricity, the King submitted, in his own presence, 180 of the tallest men of his life-guards, fastened hand to hand by iron wires, to repeated charges from a connected group of Leyden jars. The big fellows were not visibly influenced by the electric shocks, experiencing not so much as the historical nose-bleeding of Professor Winckler of Leipzig, still less the dumbness of his worthy spouse. On the contrary, the wire-bound royal guards, conscious of but very slight sensations from the electric shocks, and feeling somewhat indignant at this, and of being made scientific tools without at least getting a strong bump on the head, spoke out strongly, declaring the whole matter to be an imposture.
Having failed to electrify his soldiers, Louis XV. tried his monks. It struck his Most Christian Majesty that perhaps the human creatures who had the honour of fighting for him were endowed by nature with rather tough hides, and that the case might be different in regard to the softer beings upon whom devolved the task of praying for him. Accordingly, the King issued orders that all the monks of the grand convent of the Carthusians at Paris, over 700 in number, should be electrified by the same connected group of Leyden jars which had been tried upon the company of life-guards. The result was entirely different, and most gratifying to the King. The shock had no sooner been given when the whole file of monks gave an instantaneous jump, uttering a howl at the same time. There were some eye-witnesses of the affair who asserted that the Carthusians jumped and howled even before the shock had been given, on seeing some one approach the Leyden jar; but this was officially denied. King Louis XV. was so delighted with this result of his scientific investigations, that he proposed to submit all the monks of all the monasteries of France successively to the process of being electrified, so that it might be accurately ascertained upon what religious orders and communities it took the greatest effect. His Majesty likewise was pleased to suggest, that, after all the monks had been electrified, the nuns might be tried in their turn. But the proposal was vetoed at Rome. There came definite orders from the Supreme Pontiff forbidding the contact of any more persons in the service of the holy Catholic Church with the sinful electric wire; and the Carthusians of Paris remained the last monks, as they had been the first, brought to jump and howl at the touch of a Leyden jar.