Franklin's theory explained how charges could be dispelled (such as those in Leyden jars) and how they could be passed through a chain of people.
The fluid theories of electricity eventually became updated to include the effects of magnetism, and electrons (upon their discovery).
This theory is generally attributed to Charles François de Cisternay du Fay.
du Fay's theory suggested that electricity was composed of two liquids, which could flow through solid bodies.
[3] This theory dealt mainly with explaining electrical attraction and repulsion, rather than how an object could be charged or discharged.
du Fay observed this while repeating an experiment created by Otto von Guericke, wherein a thin material, such as a feather or leaf, would repel a charged object after making contact with it.
du Fay observed that the “leaf-gold is first attracted by the tube; and acquires an electricity be approaching it; and of consequence is immediately repell’d by it.”[3] This seemed to confirm for du Fay that the leaf was being pushed as a ‘current’ of electricity flowed around and through it.
[7] Franklin was able to apply this thinking by explaining unexplained phenomena of the time, such as the Leyden jar, a basic charge storing device similar to a capacitor.
[7] The one-fluid theory shows a significant shift in how the scientific community thought about electricity.
[6] Franklin's theory also provides the basis for conventional current, the thinking of electricity as being the movement of positive charges.
Franklin suggested that lightning was just a larger version of the small sparks that appeared between two charged objects.
[8] Ørsted's work was the basis for a theory by French physicist André-Marie Ampère, which unified the relation between magnetism and electricity.