THE ATTITUDE OF SCIENCE TOWARDS MIRACLES. L2t 
In connection with the definition of a miracle (p. 83) Dr. Schofield 
asked for a definition of “ natural causes.” Perhaps a satisfactory 
answer is that a natural cause is a cause acting according to 
“natural laws” (or uniformities), “natural” meaning stated, fixed, 
and settled.* 
Responding later to a vote of thanks, the author called for one to 
the Chairman, which was carried by acclamation. 
Further reply by the AUTHOR :— 
I wish to thank Mr. Schwartz for some interesting criticism 
which deserves further comment. Some of his assertions seem 
inaccurate. He says that “It is a well-established psychological 
law that miracles are seen by those, and those only, who expect to 
see them.” Iam unaware of any such law, and he does not support 
the assertion by any authority. This so-called “law” does not 
appear to have been operative in, ¢.g., the feeding of the multitudes, 
Christ’s walking on the sea and His stilling of the storm, the 
opening of the doors of the Apostles’ prison. Mr. Schwartz argues 
that because Science has shown that some phenomena which had 
been attributed to supernatural agency have been traced to natural 
causes, therefore all such occurrences can be so explained. This is 
to fall into the fallacy well known in logic as ‘ Undistribution of 
the Middle Term.” To confound together the Bible miracles with 
the pretended “miracles” of medizval fame is not a scientific 
procedure. The Bible miracles (as is shown in the paper) stand the 
tests of Science, but the medizval “ miracles” do not do so. 
With regard to the argument that the early Christian age was 
superstitious, it may be answered that a superstitious people would 
be specially the class on whose behalf a theophany might be expected 
to be attended by miracle. We should also bear in mind that the 
Jews were not a credulous people, that the Apostle Paul—himself 
no mean example of culture—spent a longtime “ disputing daily in 
the school of one Tyrannus,” and that the Gospel was very early 
and successfully preached at such centres of culture as Athens, 
Corinth, Ephesus. If it be objected that many cultured people did 
not believe, the obvious reply is that many uncultured people did 
not believe. The explanation of unbelief is for both classes the 
same, namely, man’s guilty repugnance to the truth of the Gospel. 
* Butler. 
E23 
