Nov. 16, 1883.] 



KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



307 



iUbtrUiSi* 



MIRACLES.* 



SIR EDMUND BECKETT considers that Professor 

 Huxley's restatement of Hume's well-known argument 

 against miracles, with corrections and improvements, 

 requires an express answer ; and he gives a very express 

 answer to it in the small book before us, He first considers 

 the case of Huxley versus Hume, and then the case of 

 Hume, Huxley and others versus miracles. As might be 

 expected of so staunch a laudator temporis acii, Sir Edmund 

 Beckett becomes counsel for the defendant in both cases. 

 In the former he makes rather too serious an attack on 

 Professor Huxley's remark that " in reaU/i/ the defini- 

 tion of a miracle as a violation of the laws of Nature 

 is an employment of language which on the face of it 

 cannot be justified." For Professor Huxley is here only 

 asserting what, if we wished to be precisians in language, 

 we should regard as the true meaning of the word Nature — 

 viz., that which is, " the sum of phenomena presented to 

 our experience ; the totality of events past, present, and to 

 come." Of course this definition would settle the whole 

 question of the possibility of the supernatural very simply; 

 but for our own part we cannot find that Professor Huxley 

 means this definition otherwise than as what ought to be, 

 not what is, the accepted meaning of the word Nature ; he 

 nowhere lays stress on the perfectly obvious inference from 

 this definition if it ivere the accepted one, which it 

 certainly is not t 



Sir Edmund Beckett disposes very eflectually of the 

 feeble explanation of certain miracles described in the New 

 Testament as events which really occurred, but were per- 

 fectly natural. He leaves unnoticed the argument based 

 on the facts that (1) identical events are related as having 

 occurred in much earlier times, and (2) at first they were 

 so related in direct association with a well-known Nature 

 myth. Yet, in the present position of the subject, it is to 

 this point chiefly that the advocates on either side should 

 direct their attention. 



It is indeed rather difficult to understand for whom this 

 work is intended. Those on one side take a certain view 

 which those on the other side are bound to believe that 

 they must not take ; " and so," to use Sir Edmund Beckett's 

 own words about a similar case between Protestants and 

 Roman Catholics, "argument is useless." 



Yet like everything else of Sir Edmund Beckett's 

 writing the book is well worth reading. Of course, there 

 is an assumption throughout that those against whom he 

 is arguing are not only mistaken but know they are, and 

 that their whole argument is almost too obvio\isly worth- 

 less to be worth answering. But though coloured with 

 this afJectation, the " pleading " is capital from first to last. 

 It may convince no one who holds at the outset the con- 

 trary view ; but it will interest and please many of them. 



* A Review of Hume and Huxley on Miracles, by Sir Edmund 

 Beckett. (London: Society for Promoting Clii-istian Knowledge.) 



+ In a clever note, our author takes to task those wlio object to 

 the use of the word " Infidel" by Christians, " when Christians are 

 called so in Turkey." He says rightly enough that words should 

 be used in England as everybody in England understands them. 

 He conveniently overlooks, however, the fact that the objection to 

 the word Infidel as used by many, is precisely that while its use is 

 justified on the score of its etymology, common u.sago has given to 

 it a force which is not justified in ninety-nine cases out of a 

 huiulrod whore it is used. The word Infidel, say many of those on 

 whoso behalf Sir Edmund pleads, moans one who does not boliovo 

 in sacred truths ; such and such men do not believe in what I 

 hold to be sacred truths : I may truly call them Infidels ; it is 

 not ray fault if common usage gives to this term a different 



SOME CHRISTMAS WORKS. 



Messes. Griffith &, Farean publish some charming 

 works for Christmas time and for Christmas presents. 

 Amongst them we note Keble's " Evening Hymn," beauti- 

 fully illu.strated ; Edgar Poe's " Raven," a charming 

 edition ; " Nora's Trust ; or, Uncle Ned's Money," a tale 

 of the workaday world, by Mrs. Gellie (M.E.D.), a capital 

 story for girls ; " Middy and Ensign," by G. Manville 

 Fenn, meant for boys, but very interesting reading for 

 grown folk ; " Paddy Finn," by W. H. G. Kingston, like 

 all his books for boys, e.xcellent ; " Chums," a story for 

 youngsters, by Harleigh Severne (illustrated by Harry 

 Furniss) : " Punch," by Miss E. C. Phillips ; " May to 

 Christmas at Thornhill," by l\Irs. D. P. Sanford, very 

 prettily illustrated ; " A Christmas Pudding for Young 

 Eaters," by L. C. Skey ; '< Lily and Her Brothers," by 

 C. E. L. ; " Growing Up," by Jennett Humphreys ; 

 " Friends, though Divided," a tale of the Civil War, by 

 G. A. Henty, and " From Cadet to Captain," by J. Percy 

 Groves, both well worth reading by older persons than 

 they are written for ; and " The Court and the Cottage," 

 by Emma Marshall, whose only fault is that it ends so 

 sadly that many young people are likely to cry over it. The 

 following are among the books for children : — " The Fool's 

 Paradise," "Mirth and Fun for Old and Y'"oung" (very 

 good indeed), " Holly Berries and Holly Series," by Ida 

 Waugh. 



Telegraphing Chinese. — Owing to the peculiarity of 

 the Chinese characters, each of which represents a word, 

 not a letter, as in our western tongues, the Danish Tele- 

 graph Company (the Great Northern) working the new 

 Chinese lines have adopted the following device. There are 

 from five to six thousand characters or words in the ordi- 

 nary Chinese language, and the company have provided a 

 wooden block or type for each of these. On one end of 

 this block the character is cut or stamped out, and on the 

 other end is a number representing the character. The 

 clerk receives a message in numbers and takes the block of 

 each number transmitted and stamps with the opposite end 

 the propsr Chinese character on the message form. 



significance, and makes it nearly akin to Miscreant. Xo 

 one cares to see the word Infidel restored to its true signi- 

 ficance : it is the wrong application of the word in its accepted 

 significance to those whom it only fits in its etymological 

 significance which is objected to, and with excellent reason. 

 So again of the word " Keligion." " Some writers of that school" 

 (Sir Edmund Beckett docs not say what school) "tell us that 

 Religion has nothing to do with a belief in God, because it may 

 mean something else etymologically : we might as well tell them 

 that they have no right to use ' gravity ' for universal attraction, 

 though every educated person understands it so. Such writing is 

 mere folly, if it were not done for mischief and delusion." But 

 the real trouble is very different. It is that many of Sir E. 

 Beckett's school (we suppose), when they come across some who 

 are wanting in Religion regarded in the accepted way as a belief 

 in certain doctrines, choose to speak of them as if necessarily 

 wanting therefore in Religion as the word is etymologically inter- 

 preted, that is, as necessarily without the binding influence of 

 any restraint from wickedness and immorality. It is a matter 

 of little moment whether the word Religion is understood to mean 

 belief in a future life (say) or that feeling which keeps men from 

 wrong doing : but it is a mistake worth correcting, because it is a 

 gross injustice, when men use it both ways (netting with it first and 

 spearing with it afterwards), saying, Such a man has no belief in 

 such and such doctrines ; that is he is without Religion ; and there- 

 fore, since Religion means etymologically what keeps men back 

 from evil, he is ready for all manner of evil-doing. Thus the word 

 Inlidol when justified in its etymological sense is unjustly applied 

 in its familiar and very ditVerent sense; while, per contra, the word 

 Religion when justified in its familiar sense is unjustly applied in 

 its eCjiuological sense. Such speaking '• is mere folly, if it were 

 not meant for mischief and delusion." 



