‘ 
36 Human Levitation. [January, 
stated (for we would no more rank her husband’s death 
among miracles than the liar’s recorded in Devizes market- 
place, since it was not predicted); or if the prediction in 
Matt., xvii., 27, was made and verified as the story implies ;* 
either of these, we may presume, would be held as thorough 
miracles as any on record or tradition. But where, in either 
of them, is there room to insert anything without physical 
cause, or to make a breach of continuity? Would Dr. 
Newman say the act of the fish picking up a shining coin 
was unnatural; or less natural at one time, the moment 
before being caught, than at any other time ? Would Mr. 
Lucas “run no risk of contradiction in affirming that 
nothing at the command of mere natural law could,” at 
that time, cause apoplexy in Sapphira? and, “‘ consequently, 
these events must be deemed miraculous.”” What have the 
question of miraculousness and that of naturalness to do 
with each other ? 
Dr. Newman repeated, in his ‘‘ Apologia,” this paradoxical 
distin@tion between the ‘“‘ miraculous” and the “ provi- 
dential,” and; on further inquiry, assured the present writer 
that ‘‘ special providences are one kind of Divine works, 
and miracles are another.” But on being asked for some 
notion of the difference, he was silent; and we believe that 
any number of divines or philosophers may be challenged in 
vain ever to make out a more real or objective distin¢tion 
here than if he had said, ‘‘ Stars near enough to have a 
detected parallax are one kind of Divine works, and those 
beyond present parallax-measuring are another kind.” 
Whether instruments exist that have detected a star’s 
parallax or not, is precisely and merely such a difference as 
* The passage is one of those most needing re-translation. ‘The takers of 
[temple]-shillings came to Peter, and said, Does not your master pay the 
[temple]-shillings? He saith, Yes. And as he entered the house, Jesus 
anticipated him, saying, What thinkest thou, Simon? From which do the 
kings of the earth take tax or toll? From their own sons, or from strangers ? 
And when he said [Vat. and Sin. MSS.] From strangers, Jesus said to him, 
In that case the sons are free. But lest we make these men stumble, go 
thou to the lake, cast hook, and the first fish rising do thou take, and having 
opened the mouth thereof, thou wilt find a florin, which take and give to them 
for me and forthee.”? Definite coins ought by no means to be rendered “a 
piece ” or “pieces,” and the monetary terms used in translating the New Tes- 
tament are most important, as influencing future language. The dyvapuoc, 
being a day’s wage, ought to be rendered a dollar, as long as our coinage has 
no term better than the ambiguous and most barbarous “crown” and ‘half- 
crown.” Lacking also any term like talents (for want of which we have such 
slang as ‘‘ponies” and ‘‘ monkeys”) this has to go untranslated. But pvag 
might be purses ; orarno and dpaypy should be florin ; and didpaxpa, shillings ; 
accdpiov, a groat ; Kodpdyrnc, a penny ; and Aexrd dvo 6 eore Kodpdyryc, ‘two 
obols, which make a penny,” giving this decent word a chance of superseding our 
wretched ‘‘ halfpenny.” 
