THE SUPERNATURAL. 



he must admit, and indeed does admit, that such 

 inconsistency is found in fact. 



Theological and philosophical writers fre- 

 quently use the Supernatural as synonymous 

 with the Superhuman. But of course this is 

 not the sense in which any one can have any 

 difficulty in believing in it. The powers and 

 works of Nature are all superhuman — more than 

 Man can account for in their origin — more than 

 he can resist in their energy — more than he can 

 understand in their effects. This, then, cannot 

 be the sense in which so many minds find it hard 

 to accept the Supernatural ; nor can it be the 

 sense in which others cling to it as of the very 

 essence of their religious faith. What, then, is 

 that other sense in which the difficulty arises ? 

 Perhaps we shall best find it by seeking the idea 

 which is competing with it, and by which it has 

 been displaced. It is the Natural which has 

 been casting out the Supernatural — the idea of 

 Natural Law, — the universal reign of a fixed Order 

 of things. This idea is a product of that im- 

 mense development of the physical sciences which 

 is characteristic of our time. We cannot read a 



