THE REIGN OF LAW. 



ital error in dealing- with any question of 

 philosophy. Half the perplexities of men are 

 traceable to obscurity of thought hiding and 

 breeding under obscurity of language. "The 

 Supernatural" is a term employed often in 

 different, and sometimes in contradictory, senses. 

 It is difficult to make out whether M. Guizot 

 himself means to identify belief in the Super- 

 natural with belief in the existence of a God, 

 or with belief in a particular mode of Divine 

 action. But these are ideas quite separable and 

 distinct. There may be some men who dis- 

 believe in the Supernatural only because they are 

 absolute atheists ; but it is certain that there are 

 others who have great difficulty in believing in 

 the Supernatural who are not atheists. What 

 they doubt or deny is, not that God exists, but 

 that He ever acts, or perhaps can act, unless in 

 and through what they call the " Laws of Nature." 

 M. Guizot, indeed, tells us that " God is the 

 Supernatural in a Person." But this is a rhetorical 

 figure rather than a definition. He may, indeed, 

 contend that it is inconsistent to believe in a God, 

 and yet to disbelieve in the Supernatural ; but 



