MIRACLES 



The belief in supernatural miracles is in contradiction 

 to pure reason, which lays the foundations of all science. 

 Kant, who won so great a vogue for the term "pure 

 reason," understood by this originally "reason as inde- 

 pendent of experience." The phrase was used in a 

 narrower sense subsequently to express independence of 

 dogma and prejudice, as the base of pure and unprej- 

 udiced science. In this sense we oppose pure reason to 

 superstition. 



I have dealt in the sixteenth chapter of the Riddle 

 with the important question of the relations of knowledge 

 and faith. But I must return to the subject here, as 

 what I said has given rise to a good deal of misunder- 

 standing and criticism. I by no means claimed, as my 

 opponents allege, to "know everything," or to have 

 solved every problem. In fact, I said repeatedly that 

 there are narrow limits to our knowledge, and always 

 will be. I had also expressly stated that the irresistible 

 impulse to learn in the intelligent man, or reason's 

 constant demand to know causes, presses us to fill up the 

 gaps in our knowledge by faith. But I had at the same 

 time pointed out the contrast between scientific (natural) 

 and religious (supernatural) faith. The one leads us to 

 form hypotheses and theories; the other ends in myths 

 and superstition. Scientific faith fills the gaps in our 

 knowledge of natural law with temporary hypotheses ; 

 but mystic religious faith contradicts natural law, and 

 transcends its limits in the form of a belief in miracles- 



The great triumph of the progress of science in the 

 nineteenth century, its theoretical value in the formation^ 

 of a rational philosophy of life, and its practical value on 

 the various sides of modern civilization, consist, above 

 all, in the absolute recognition of fixed natural laws. 

 That relation of things to each other, which we call 

 causation, makes it possible for us to understand and 

 explain facts. We feel that our thirst for a knowledge 



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