The Cairo bulletin. [volume] (Cairo, Ill.) 1872-1878, 1873-03-02

neral government, by showing that
the laws Of nature can be and have
been subordinatsd to the higher laws
Of : NOR, !. kingdom. .
| III. Again, whatever evidence can
be produced to settle the actually of
creation at all, Is to the same extent
evidence for the production and reason.
ableness Of miracles, since the miracu.
lous element constitutes the very basis
of creative power; and hence every
proof Of the fact that matter has not
been and will not be eternally self.
existent, is logical and scientific tes-
timony to the reasonableness of mira.
Giles, and to the reality Of their pro-
duction at some period Of
the past. All evidences Of any muta-
tions in matter, or of any limitations
which prevail in and over it, must &C.
cordingly aid the argument for the
reasonableness Of miracles, just to the
same extent, as they demonstrate the
non eternity Of matter and the differ.
ence between mind and materiality.
In this view, the reasonableness of
miracles may be established on the
most scientific foundation anu in fact
If matter had been eternal, still mira.
cles would not be necessary at all, and
there would be no ground for assuming
their impossibility. 1t is, indeed, very
much to be doubted whether we are
qualified to say, Of any event, that it is
probable or improbable, even where
we know some Of the causes work,
ard have some inklings of the inten.
ton the part ofagents employed for it
cannot be denied that the accomplish.
ment Of an event may seem almost Ger.
tain to one man, and wholly improba-
bic and unlikely to another. The
completely Of causes, agents aud pur-
poses which may exist in the universe
and the range Of Divine operations
(even if We admit for argument al
though We do not believe it, the etern.
ity Of matter), may be so great that it
uld be strangely presumptuous for
wisest Of men to judge what would
or would not be possible to Deity in,
his government Of the woodland a
child not yet acquainted with the al.
phabet of letters, might more reason
ably judge of the purposes aud actions
Of the government, touching what can,
or canuot be legally done in these
United States. Hence, if the eternity
of matter could be proved, which il
cannot be, it would not weigh a straw
against the reasonableness OF miracles
On the supposition of the eternity of
matter, it merely follows that We can.
not tell whether miricles are probable
or improbable aud then the candid
are left to weigh the evidence for q
miracle the same as they do the evi.
dence for any other event, holding
themselves in the light Of an impartial
jury, trying the facts in question as
they would any other facts, and bound
to decide wholly and solely according to
the evidence aud testimony in the case.
But on the supposition Of the creation
Of matter, i, as clearly follows that
miracles are actual facts, which are not
ouly reasonable, but which have
already occurred in the period
Of creative antiquity, if not at many
other periods also; which of course
fully establish the reasonableness Of
miracle, independent OF the additional
weight which they may derive from
testimony regarding their production,
on the part Of eye and ear witnesses.
III. Man has made the demand for
miracles and so, unless the general
tendency Of the human mind be alto.
gether deceptive and wrong, a meta.
physical presumption is formed for
the reasonableuess of miracles. The
general course Of nature has enough
uniformness to lay foundation which
will give value to experience but it
has, also, something calculated to an.
swer every leading tendency of the
human mind. The spirit Of the age
just now is to verge across the line,
either one way or the other and we
bee the human intellect oscillating, like
q clocks pendulum, from one extreme
to another, from skepticism TO creduli,y
and from credulity to skcpticsm.
The infdel lecturer who told you, at
tho Athencum, the other day, that
skepticism was bearing everything be-
fore it in Boston, might have added
that the people there used to burn
witches and do various other supersti-
tious wrongs. The tendency to re-.
action explains his problem fully.
The Bostonians, if correctly represented
by the gentleman, who halls from there,
have vibrated from the extreme of one
evil to that Of another; yetin this case,
as in almost every other, the real truth
is not found in either extreme. Those
who believe in Q frequent supernatural
Intervention and those who attribute
everything solely to the operation of
the ordinary causes of nature, alike re-
fuse to recognize the true light of rea-
son and the voice Of science. Nature
must have, in some sense, uniform
course, else the value of experience
would be too small; yet there must
have been supernatural intervention,
Of somekind, fer the benefit of man,
else there cannot be any key of ex.
PLANTATION for the general tendency of
| the human mind to credit the super-