106 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. V 



As for his health, he adds : — 



I have amended wonderfully in the course of the last 

 six weeks, and my doctor tells me I am going to be com- 

 pletely patched up — seams caulked and made seaworthy, 

 so the old hulk may make another cruise. 



We shall see. At any rate I have been aide and 

 willing to write lately, and that is more than I can say 

 for myself for the first three-quarters of the year. 



... I was so pleased to see you were in trouble about 

 your house. Good for you to have a taste of it for yourself. 



To this controversy he contributed four articles ; 

 three directly in defence of Agnosticism, the fourth 

 on the value of the underlying question of testimony 

 to the miraculous. 



The first article, " Agnosticism," appeared in the 

 February number of the Nineteenth Century. No 

 sooner was this finished than he began a fresh piece 

 of work, "which," he writes, "is all about miracles, 

 and will be rather amusing." This, on the "Value 

 of Testimony to the Miraculous," appeared in the 

 following number of the Nineteenth Century. It did 

 not form part of the controversy on hand, though it 

 bore indirectly upon the first principles of agnosticism. 

 The question at issue, he urges, is not the possibility 

 of miracles, but the evidence to their occurrence, and 

 if from preconceptions or ignorance the evidence be 

 worthless the historical reality of the facts attested 

 vanishes. The cardinal point, then, "is completely, 

 as the author of Robert Elsmere says, the value of 

 testimony." 



