88 PROF. H. LANGHORNE ORCHARD, M.A., B.SC., ON 
is a metal, or soda is an alkali, or mesmerism is a species of 
(animal) magnetism. 
Should it be objected that miracles imply the supernatural, 
the answer is that the existence of the supernatural is among the 
strongest affirmations of science. Though daily occupied with 
matters cognizable by the senses, science is ever endeavouring 
to penetrate the veil of the unseen. Unsatistied with her tiny 
heritage of the known, she presses through all limitations 
toward the vast stretches of the unknown, and in a great 
solitude lifts up her hands unto God. “The desert,” says the 
Arab, “is the garden of Allah.” To science “an atheist in the 
desert is unimaginable.” That science testifies to the existence 
of the supernatural is recognized by leading scientists and 
others. Lord Kelvin tells us that “science, if you think truly, 
forces to a belief in God.” Stewart and Tait* say that “the 
existence of the Creator of all things is absolutely self-evident.” 
Newtont declares that “The First Cause certainly is not 
mechanical.” H. Spencer speaks of “the one absolute certainty 
that we are ever in the presence of an Infinite and Eternal 
Energy from which all things proceed.” It is also evident that 
God is a Person; for, being the First Cause, He cannot be 
limited, but He would be limited were He without consciousness, 
will, or any other attribute of personality. Another thing 
worth our notice in this connection, as has been recently 
pointed out by A. T. Schofield, M.D.t is that science, in its 
inquiries into nature, always proceeds on the supposition that 
she is intelligible to us, and therefore that she is the work of 
Mind infinitely greater than, but not infinitely dissimilar 
from, our own minds. Since it is the function of science to 
examine into every phenomenon which takes place in nature, 
and since she bears witness to the existence of a Supernatural 
Person, it follows that miracles are proper objects of her 
attention. 
Il. Miracles in General.—(a) Ave miracles possible? (6) Are 
miracles probable ? (¢) Have miracles actually occurred ? = 
(a) The first thing to be determined in a scientific investi- 
gation of miracles is—‘ Are they possible?” They are 
occurrences which, by hypothesis, are exceptional and strange, 
apparently interrupting the continuity of nature. There are, 
* The Unseen Universe. 
+ Optics, 384. f ; 
t “Science and the Unseen World,” a paper read before the Victoria 
Institute, January 18th, 1909. 
