The Eclipse of Faith Part 19

"But I do not admit that the creation of any thing or of all things is of the nature of a miracle."

Harrington smiled. "I am afraid," said he, "that to common sense, to fair reasoning, to any philosopher worthy of the name there would be no difference except in magnitude, between such an event as the sudden appearance of an animal (say man) for the first time in our world, or the first appearance of a tree (such a thing never having been before), and the restoration to life of a dead man. Each is, to all intents and purposes, a violation of the previous established series of antecedents and consequents, and comes strictly within the limits of our definition of a miracle; and a miracle, you know is impossible. The only difference will be, that the miracle in the one case will be greater and more astonis.h.i.+ng than that in the other."

"But it is impossible, in the face of geologists, to contend that there have not been many such revolutions in the history of the world as these. Man himself is of comparatively recent introduction into our system."

"I cannot help what the geologists affirm. If we are to abide by our principle, we have no warrant to believe that there have been any such violations, or infractions, or revolutions of nature's laws in the world's history. If they contend for the interpolation of events in the history of the universe, which, by our criterion, are of the nature of miracles, and we are convinced that miracles are impossible, we must reject the conclusions of geologists."

"But may we not say, that the great epochs in the history of the universe are themselves but the manifestation of law?"

"In no other sense, I think, than the advocate of miracles is ent.i.tled to say that the intercalation of miracles in the world's history is also according to law,--parts, though minute parts, of a universal plan, and permitted for reasons worthy of the Creator. To both, or neither, is the same answer open. Your objection is, I think, a mere sophistical evasion of the difficulty. There is no difference whatever in the nature of the events, except that the variation from the 'established series of sequences' is infinitely greater in those portentous revolutions of the universe to which the geologist points your attention. The application of our principle (as you affirm with me) will justify us in at once p.r.o.nouncing any variation from the 'established series' whether occurring yesterday, a year ago, a thousand years ago, or a million of years ago, incredible; it will, in the same manner, justify the men of any age in saying the same of all previous ages; and I, therefore, while contending for your principle with you, carry it consistently out, and affirm that the series of antecedents and consequents (as we now find it) must be regarded as eternal, because creation would do what a miracle is supposed to do, and a miracle, you know, is impossible. You are silent."

"I am not able to retract acquiescence in the principle, and I am as little inclined to concede the conclusions you would draw from it."

"As you please; only, in the latter case, provide me with an answer.

If you saw now introduced on the earth for the first time a being as unlike than as man is unlike the other animals,--say with seven senses, wings on his shoulders, a pair of eyes behind his head as well as in front of it, and the tail of a peac.o.c.k, by way of finis.h.i.+ng him off handsomely,--would you not call such a phenomenon a miracle?"

"I think I should," said Fellowes, laughing.

"And if the creature died, leaving no issue, would you continue to call it so?"

"Yes."

"But if you found that he was the head of a race, as man was, and a whole nation of such monsters springing from him, then would you say that this wonderful intrusion into the sphere of our experience was no miracle, but that it was merely according to law?"

"I should."

"Verily, my dear friend, I am afraid the world will laugh at us for making such fantastical distinctions. This infraction of 'established sequences' ceases to be miraculous, if the wonder is perpetuated and sufficiently multiplied! Meantime, what becomes of the prodigy during the time in which it is uncertain whether any thing will come of it or not? You will say, I suppose, (the interpolation in the 'series' of phenomena being just what I have supposed,) that it is uncertain whether it is to be regarded as miraculous or not, till we know whether it is to be repealed or not."

"I think I must, if I adhere to the principle I am now defending."

"Very well; only in the mean time you are in the ludicrous position of facing a phenomenon of which you do not know whether you will call it a miracle or not,--the contingency, meantime, on which it is to be decided, not at all, as I contend, affecting the matter; since you allow that it is the infraction of the previously established order of sequences, as known to uniform experience, which const.i.tutes a miracle! If so, I must maintain that the creation of man was, for the same reasons, of the essence of a miracle. You seem to think there is no objection to the admission of miracles, provided they are astounding and numerous enough; or provided they are a long time about, instead of being instantaneously wrought. I must remind you, that to the principle of our argument these things are quite immaterial. Whether the revolution by which the established order of sequences is absolutely infringed,--the face of the universe or of our globe transformed, or an entirely new race (as, for example, man) originated,--I say, whether such change be produced slowly or quickly is of no consequence in the world to our argument. It is whether or not a series of phenomena be produced as absolutely transcending the sphere of all experience, as those events we admit to be impossible, called 'miracles.' That the introduction of man upon the earth for the first time (for you will not allow his race eternal), or the origination of a sun, is not at all to be reckoned as transcending that experience, I cannot understand.

Nor can I understand it a bit better by your saying that it, is in conformity with the vague something you are pleased to call a law.

It is a safe phrase, however; for as neither you nor any one else can interpret it, no one can refute you. This law is a most convenient thing! It repeals, it appears to me, all other laws,--even those of logic. Perhaps would be better to say that miracles are no miracles when they are 'lawful' miracles. No! let us keep our principle intact from all such dangerous admissions as these. In that way only are we safe."

"Safe do you call it? I see not how, if we carry out this principle in the way and to the extent you propose, we can reply to the atheist or to the pantheist, who tells us that the universe is but an eternal evolution of phenomena in one infinite series, or in an eternal recurrence of finite cycles."

"And what is that to you or me? How can we help our principle (if we are to hold it at all) leading to some such conclusion? We are, I presume, anxious to know the truth. You see that Strauss, who is the most strenuous a.s.sertor of the impossibility of miracles, is also a pantheist. I know not whether you may not become one yourself."

"Never," said Fellowes, vehemently; "never, I trust, shall I yield to that 'desolating pantheism' (as worthy Mr. Newman calls it) which is now so rife."

"I think Mr. Newman's principles ought to guide you thither. You seem to hold fast by his skirts at present; but I very much doubt whether you have yet reached the termination of your career. You have, you must admit, made advances quite as extraordinary before.

"We shall see.--But I suppose you have reached the end of the objections which your wayward scepticism suggests against a conclusion which we both admit; or have you any more?"

"O, plenty; and amongst the rest, I am afraid we must admit--whether we admit or not your expedient of law--a miracle, or something indistinguishable from it, as involved in the creation and preservation of the first man,--since you will have a first man."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, that supposing the creation of man to be no miracle, because he entered by law; or that that first fact (which would otherwise be miraculous) is not such, simply because it is the first of a series of such facts,--I should like to see whether we have not even then to deal with a miracle, or a fact as absolutely unique; and which was not connected with any series of similar facts."

"I think you would find it very hard to prove it."

"Nous verrons. I am sure we shall not disagree as to the fact that man, however he came into the world, sooner or later, by ordinary or extraordinary methods, by some lawful wedlock of nature, or by some miracle which is not 'lawful,' is endowed by nature with various faculties and susceptibilities."

"Certainly," said Fellowes, laughing; "if you demand my a.s.sent to nothing more than that, I shall easily admit your premises and deny your conclusion."

"You will also admit, I think, that the process by which man comes to the use of these faculties, and powers, and so forth, is very gradual?"

"a.s.suredly."

"And will you not also admit that the development and command of these is something very different from the, potentialities themselves, as my uncle here would call them?--that, for example, we have the faculty of vision; but that the art of seeing involves a slow laborious process, acquired not without the concurrent exercise of other senses: and that the apparatus for walking is perfect even in an infant; but that the art of walking is, in fact, a wonderful acquisition: further, that the command given us by these faculties, as actually exercised, is immensely greater than would be conferred by each alone. In one word, you will allow that man, when he comes to the use of his faculties, is, as has been well said, a bundle of habits, or, as Burke puts it, is a creature who, to a great extent, has the making of himself."

"I am much at my ease," said Fellowes; "I shall not dispute any of these premises either."

"And will you not also admit that, as man comes into the world now, a long time is required for this development; and that during that time he is absolutely dependent on the care of those who have already in their turn required similar care?"

"Seeing that we have had fathers and mothers,--as I suppose our grandfathers and grandmothers also had,--there can be as little doubt of this as of the preceding points," said Fellowes, rather condescendingly.

"And that many of the functions which thus task their care are necessary for our existence, and for any chance of our being able to develop into men."

"I think so, of course."

"So that, if an infant were exposed on a mountain-side or forest, you would have no doubt he would perish (unless it pleased some kind-hearted wolf to suckle him) before he could come to the use of his faculties, and develop them by exercise."

"I think," said the other, "your premises perfectly innocent; I shall not contest them."

"A little further." said Harrington, "we may go together; and then, if I mistake not, you will pause before you go one step further.

This, then, is the normal condition of humanity?"

"Yes."

"Do you think the first man was like us in these respects?"

"I cannot tell."

"I dare engage you cannot,--it is a very natural answer. But he either was, I suppose, or was not. That, I think, you will grant me." He a.s.sented, though rather reluctantly.

"Pray please yourself," said Harrington; "for it is quite immaterial to me which alternative you take. If man was in our condition, then, though the 'lawful miracle' by which he was brought into the world might have made him a baby of six feet high, he would have been no more than a baby still. All that was to const.i.tute him a man,--all those habits by which alone his existence was capable of being preserved,--and without which he must have perished immediately after his creation, in which case you and I should have been spared the necessity of all this discussion on the subject, would have to be learned; and his existence during that time--and a long time it must have been, having no teachers and aids, as we have--must have been preserved by a--miracle. If he were taught by the Creator himself, then we have the miracle in that direction. If he were not brought into the world under the same conditions of development as we are, but with habits ready made,--if, indeed, that be not a contradiction, --then we have a miracle in that direction; if he had his faculties preternaturally quickened and expanded, so as to acquire instantaneously, or possess by instinct, what we acquire by a long and slow process, and not for many years,--then we have a miracle in that direction. If you do not like these suppositions, I see but one other; and that is that; being a baby,--though, as I said, a baby six feet high,--he had an angel nurse sent down expressly to attend him, and to push or wheel him about the walls of paradise in a celestial go-cart. But then I think that in this last particular we shall hardly say that we have got rid of a miracle, though it would doubtless be a miracle of a very ludicrous kind. If you can imagine any other supposition, I shall be glad to hear it."

"I acknowledge I can form no supposition on the subject."

"Only remember that, if you could, the theory would still suppose man's actual preservation and development effected under totally different conditions from those which have formed the uniform experience of all his posterity; and so far from any subterfuge of a law stepping in, it is a single expedient provided for our first parent alone."

"I do not think we are at all in a condition to consider any such case, about which we cannot know any thing," replied Fellowes.

"Neither do I; but pardon me,--the question I asked does not depend upon any such knowledge; it is a question which is wholly independent whether of our ignorance or our knowledge. Granting, as you do, that man was created, but that it was no miracle, nor any thing a.n.a.logous to one (as you say), still either he was created subject to our conditions of development and preservation, or he was not; if he was not, then I fear we have in form the miracle we wish to evade; if he was, then I fear also that there are but the three imaginable modes of obviating the difficulty which I have so liberally provided; and supposing there were a thousand. I fear still that they all involve a departure from the 'uniform course of Nature.'"

"But I do not see," replied Fellowes, "that it is absolutely necessary, supposing that the first man was thrown upon the green of paradise."