MIEACLES, SCIENCE^ AND PRAYER. 



289 



strong desire to advance the cause of Truth without neglecting 

 honest criticism and to rather develop the teaching of a paper 

 than to cut it to pieces. 



Having made this preliminary remark I will say one or two 

 words on what some of the speakers have said. 



I cannot quite understand why Dr. Wyld should have criticised 

 me, for, as he says, declaring that a miracle was a suspension of 

 the laws of nature; when on the principle I have gone I have 

 distinctly said that I did not think anything of the kind. 1 do 

 not think we ought to say that a miracle is a suspension of the 

 laws of nature, and that is the whole principle on which my 

 reasoning has gone, both in the book I have referred to and this 

 paper. It would be committing ourselves to a very unwise and 

 unsound position. Then, when it comes to a question of miracles 

 being the direct action of spirit on matter, I think that loses 

 sight of one particular point in Christianity and Bible miracles 

 generally. 



Then as to the definition of a miracle as being an accelei'ation 

 of the process of nature, it appears to me that is pretty fairly 

 disposed of. There is no necessity for a miracle to be an accele- 

 ration. There are instances in our Lord's miracles, I agree, where 

 they often were accelerations of the laws of nature, because they 

 were designed to do good and all of them were beneficent. 



A friend of mine made a very telling remark about the origin 

 of the whole of the Solar system. He said it was supposed to have 

 come from matter (even on scientific hypotheses), equally diffused 

 through space, gradually collecting by the action of gravitation 

 and then great heat, and so on ; but if matter were equally 

 diffused through space, I imagine that would be a miracle to start 

 with, even if that scientific hypothesis were accepted. 



Allusion IS made to the use of the word natural in Mr. Clarke's 

 letter, but he has not noted that I defined what I meant by natural — ■ 



" The word natural in the present paper is regarded as referring 

 to inorganic matter — as including all visible phenomena whose 

 laws are capable of being ascertained. Without definitions argu- 

 ment is interminable. Spinoza, for instance, defines the natural 

 order as relating not only to the visible universe, but to an 

 infinity of things beyond." 



The meeting was then adjourned. 



