The Catholic bulletin., 1917-09-22
POPULAR APoLoeETIcs.
Adapted from the German of Rev
Peter Mikes, S. j., by Rev.
James Watcher.
"a. Miracles and Disturbance of the
Natural Laws. IS.

Objection: BY miracles the whole
world-order, the natural laws, would
be abolished or at least made unre-
liable. We could no longer depend
on the natural laws; every moment
the physicist, the chemist, the
astronomer could be disturbed in his
observations and calculations by "acts
of the moods and arbitrary actions of
the Creator.
Answer: u This is an entirely
unfounded fear, because the wisdom
of God does not need miracles at
every moment, but only rarely, and
not from moods, but for reasonable,
higher ends.
Does an unexpected holiday abolish
all discipline of school? Even the
most imaginative pupil does not think
that from that day on all going to
school has ceased.
Does a royal amnesty abolish all
penal laws? Evidently not, especially
If they are OF rare occurrence. The
laws of the state are thereby not made
unreliable.
What king can do in the moral
world without hurt or harm, that God
can do in the physical world; and just
as little as Europe's quiet is disturbed
by an amnesty, just so little need sci
entists be disturbed in their calcula-
tions and lose their calmness by an
occasional miracle.
1t is ridiculous to see Feuerbachs S
(t1872), an infidel philosophers, fear
of miracles, when he writes: To-day
water is wet, tomorrow it may be dry
Today the sun moves, tomorrow it
may stand still. At the we'll
l know not whether what | see
as water is really water, and whether
my wash, instead of becoming white,
will perhaps become red as blood; for
the miracle-power can purposely de-
ceive me with a quid pro quo (substi-
tution) :" COLLECTED Works,
Germ. ed, l. p. y.
That is not the reality of every day
life, but only Feuerbach's imagina-
ton.
y Miracles are said to disturb the
laws of nature! If Christ by word
heals sick person has therefore
AhSAASAAC LIIOI = NdIuCs nave Duy ST.
clans become breadless because of
the miracles at certain pilgrimage
places? In spite of the two multiplica-
tions of bread the contemporaries of
Christ did not believe that the laws
governing their crops had been abol-
ished. And even if Christ raised
three dead persons to life, and some
saints did the same, no man has ever
feared that now life and death have
become confused, or that our fathers,
grandfathers or great-grand-father
would arise from their graves and
reclaim our houses, fields, money and
other property. Where now is the
much feared disturbance of nature in
spite of many miracles?
The Creator, Who established the
wonderful order in the world, is more
concerned about it's preservation
than his learned children" who ex-
press their fears on this small planet.
The great theologian and philoso-
pher, DR.. Hermann Schell (f19O6),
writes (Religion und Offenbarung-
Religion and Reyelation-p. 319):
The laws of nature say nothing,
whether perhaps other corresponding
causes are present or absent in space
and time, which can question their
definite relations or hinder them from
the very start. The law of grayita-
tion is not abolished if a new cause
comes into play which hinders the
fall of the body, defects the notion
or turns the development into an
other direction. The law gov
erning the progress of an illness is
just as little rendered doubtful by a
miraculous healing as by the interfer-
enee of physician or the action of
medicine"
81 Our opponents always refer in
science to facts, and rightly so. In
like manner let them show on the
basis of facts that the Creator, Who
according to our conviction has often
worked miracles, has disturbed the
order of the world. Till they have
done that they may put their mind
at ease as to "hobgoblins and magic
spirits who could at every moment
cross their experiments
The. truth of the fact is, not the
laws of nature are disturbed by mira
cles, but infidels and their way of
thinking, their conscience and mode
of life.
If the infidel scientist Buechner
(f1S99) (Kraft und Stoff-Force and
Matter-p. 36) cries out: How
would it be possible, if the unchange-
able order in which things move
would be disturbed every time by
miracle, without making an irrepar-
able rent through the whole world?"
we have but smile for such pathos.
The miracle of the multiplication of
bread has certainly not made "an
irreparable rent through the whole
world" not even through the grain
storehouses and bakeries of the
world. 1t really arouses ones curl
osity to discover the ''irreparable
rent" which the miraculous escape of
the three youths from the Babylonian
furnace made through the whole
world" or which went perhaps only
through the Babylonian cooking