MIEACLES, SCIENCE, AND PEAYER. 277 



only to see the fringe. And thus the mind ascends in imagina- 

 tion from the facts ascertained by the senses and the reason, to 

 a grand conception of an universal cosmos, as far transcending 

 the visible order of things as the distance of the furthest fixed 

 star exceeds the diameter of the earth on which ^ve live. 



Thus, then, we are encompassed on all sides by forces 

 which do not belong, strictly speaking, to the natural order, 

 and yet which are constantly profoundly modifying that order. 

 These forces, unlike forces simply physical, are not invariable 

 in their action, and their laws therefore cannot be ascertained. 

 ]\Ioreover. these forces are demonstrably part of an order 

 which transcends in importance the physical order which has 

 been subjected to their influence. What reason can be given, 

 then, against the possibility of an occasional introduction into 

 the visible universe of yet higher laws, designed to subserve 

 a yet more important pmpose? That there is sufficient 

 reason to account for such interpositions can hardly be denied. 

 The fact of the Fall, and of human depravity and human 

 misery in consequence of it, is a cause quite adequate to 

 explain them. The remedial agency, as described in the 

 Christian creeds, is in complete accordance with the course 

 of development up to the time of Christ's coming. A second 

 Adam appears in order to regenerate the children of the first. 

 Like all other beings since life was first introduced upon the 

 earth, He is grafted upon the former creation. Then, by a 

 spiritual process, not essentially different to or even more 

 miraculous than those of generation and nutrition to which 

 we have just referred, His life is mysteriously transmitted 

 to those who will accept it. But if, as the Christian scheme 

 presupposes, the humanity of the second Adam is consecrated 

 by personal union with the Divinity, it is impossible that the 

 Divine power residing in this new and Divine Man should not 

 have evidenced its presence by control over the powers of 

 nature admittedly subject to its sway. Hence the miracles 

 recorded in the New Testament. Granted that spiritual forces 

 overflow into the natural world, and it at once becomes emi- 

 nently reasonable that the history of Jesus Christ, if He were 

 what He claimed to be, should be occasion for an unusual display 

 of their activity. And the fact of the Resurrection, which is not 

 and cannotbe disproved, is asufficient historical warrantfor the 

 narratives of the Gospels. With the spiritual importance of 

 that fact we are not now concerned. But its occurrence is sup- 

 ported by a chain of other facts of immense, of overwhelming- 

 importance. It cannot be denied that it was the starting 



