24 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE 



precisely under this condemnation. For what is his log- 

 ical ground for concluding that the miracles of the New 

 Testament illustrate Divine power ? May they not be the 

 result of expanded human power? A miracle he defines 

 as something impossible to man. But how does he know 

 that the miracles of the New Testament are impossible 

 to man? Seek as he may, he has absolutely no reason 

 to adduce save this — that man has never hitherto accom- 

 plished such things. But does the fact that man has 

 never raised the dead prove that he can never raise the 

 dead? "Assuredly not," must be Mr. Mozley's reply; 

 *'for this would be pushing experience beyond the limit 

 it has now reached— which I pronounce unlawful. ' ' Then 

 a period may come when man will be able to raise the 

 dead. If this be conceded — and I do not see how Mr. 

 Mozley can avoid the concession — it destroys the neces- 

 sity of inferring Christ's Divinity from His miracles. 

 He, it may be contended, antedated the humanity of 

 the future; as a mighty tidal wave leaves high upon 

 the beach a mark which by-and-by becomes the general 

 level of the ocean. Turn the matter as you will, no 

 other warrant will be found for the all-important con- 

 clusion that Christ's miracles demonstrate Divine power 

 than an argument which has been stigmatized by Mr. 

 Mozley as a "rope of sand" — the argument from expe- 

 rience. 



The learned Bampton Lecturer would be in this posi- 

 tion, even had he seen with his own eyes every miracle 

 recorded in the New Testament. But he has not seen 

 these miracles; and his intellectual pligfit is therefore 

 worse. He accepts these miracles on testimony. Why 

 does he believe that testimony ? How does he know that 



