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implies an exertion of that power of God which we designate creation, as 
distinct from that power which is exerted in the providential govern- 
ment of the universe. Such a view seems to be laid down in several 
parts of this paper, especially in para. 35 ; and by the reference to the 
miracle of the loaves and fishes, it seems to imply that their multiplication 
necessarily involved the creation of matter not previously existing. I 
think it most unadvisable to include in our definition of a miracle any 
statement of the modus operandi which has been employed by God in its 
performance. Of the mode of the divine action we are profoundly ignorant ; 
and therefore to affirm that God must have acted in this or that particular 
way in the performance of a miracle, is only to involve the subject in a 
number of needless difficulties. I have been under the necessity of giving 
the deepest attention to this subject in answering Supernatural Religion. 
Its author has taken advantage of the imperfect definitions which theologians 
have given of miracles, and which opponents of Christianity have borrowed 
from them, to involve the whole subject in a complete fog. It has taken no 
less than six chapters of my answer to that work, to clear away the mists of 
confusion in which we have become involved. Among these imperfect 
definitions are the assertions that miracles are contrary to the laws of Dature ; 
that they are violations of them, that they are suspensions of them, or 
that they necessarily involve creative acts. I contend that there is nothing 
in the conception of a miracle which requires us to assume that the laws 
of nature have been either violated or suspended. The narratives of some 
of the miracles in the Old Testament directly affirm the contrary, as, for 
example, the passage of the Red Sea : for it is expressly asserted by the 
historian that the division of its waters was effected by God having employed 
the agency of an east wind for that purpose, a force already existing in 
nature. A similar affirmation is made as to the miracle of the locusts. Not 
one word is there to imply that they were created for the occasion : they 
were conveyed to Egypt by the agency of what we designate second causes. 
So again with respect to Peter’s walking on the water. The account in the 
evangelists makes it plain that the forces of nature were so far from being 
suspended ou the occasion, that they were in active energy all around him, 
for the moment his faith failed him he sank. The force of gravitation must 
therefore have been in active energy at the moment of the performance of 
the miracle. How it was effected we are profoundly ignorant ; but it is 
important to observe that the only thing which the miracle necessarily pre- 
supposes is, the presence of a power able to counterwork the force of gravita- 
tion by which Peter’s body was borne downwards. A similar power we 
exert whenever we lift a stone from the ground ; when we do so we neither 
violate nor suspend a single natural force. Surely what is possible to man 
must be possible with God. If man can regulate the forces of nature so 
that he can effectuate his purposes through their agency within his limited 
sphere, without violating or suspending them, much more can God within 
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