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the term nature in this sense, but not to include miracles. 
He said, — ■“ The only distinct meaning of the word natural 
is stated , fixed , or settled; since what is natural as much 
requires and presupposes an intelligent agent. to render it 
so, that is, to effect it continually , or at stated times, as what 
is supernatural or miraculous does to effect .it for once.”* 
Then, again, “ nature” is sometimes used to include simply 
the works of nature ( natura naturata). But even here the 
term is ambiguous and variously modified, for it ^is some- 
times made to include both mind and matter ; at other times 
it is used of matter to the exclusion of mind. “ The term 
nature (said Sir "VV. Hamilton) is used sometimes m a wider, 
sometimes in a narrower extension. When employed in its 
most extensive meaning, it embraces the two worlds of mind 
and matter. When employed in its more restricted significa- 
tion, it is a synonym for the latter only, and is then used in 
contradistinction to the former .... With us the term 
nature is more vaguely extensive than the terms physics, 
physical , physiology , physiological, or even the adjective 
natural ; whereas, in the philosophy of Germany, Natui and 
its correlatives, whether of Greek or Latin derivation, are, in 
general, expressive of matter in contrast to the world of 
intelligence.”!- . . ,, 
Then, again, not only is the question of miracles otten 
clouded by this ambiguous term “nature,” but we have 
another word, “law,” used as vaguely. “All things (said 
Hooker) that have some operation, not violent or casual, — that 
which doth assign unto each thing the kind, that which doth 
moderate the force and power, that which doth appoint the 
form and measure of working, the same we term a law.”J 
“ It is a perversion of language (said Hr. Paley) to assign 
any law as the efficient operative cause of anything.” § “ The 
rules of navigation (said Hr. Reid) never steered a ship, and 
the law of gravity never moved a planet.” “ Those who go 
about (said Hale) to attribute the origination of mankind (or 
any other effect) to a bare order or law of nature as the primi- 
tive effecter thereof, speak that which is perfectly irrational 
and unintelligible ; for although a law or rule is the method 
and order by which an intelligent being may act, yet a Jaw, 01 
rule, or order, is a dead, unactive, uneffective thing of itself, 
without an agent that useth it, and exerciseth it as his rule 
and method of action.” || “ In the language of modern 
* Anal., ch. i. t Reid’s Works, p. 206, note. 
% Eec. Pol., book I. § Nat. Theol., ch. i. 
|1 Prim. Origin. Horn., ch, yii. 
