Theological Seminary. PRmCETON, N. J. ^V 210 .R64 1874 Case Romanes, Georcr« t^u 1894. ''^o^ge John, 1848 j: Shelf rh-K-i m*. ' I i^oo.t ^aws ^^^yer and genera, A.- i^ M-':^ r. CHRISTIAN PRAYER AND GENERAL LAWS. CHRISTIAN PRAYER AND GENERAL LAWS, BEING THE BURNEY PRIZE ESSAY FOR THE YEAR 1873, THE PHYSICAL EFFICACY OF PRAYER. Ay GEORGE J.^OMANES, M.A., LATE SCHOLAR IN NATURAL SCIENCE OF GONVILLE AND CAIUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. Hontron : MACMILLAN AND CO. 1874. [A^l Rights reserved, '\ Camiiriftge: PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. TO P. W. LATHAM, M.A, M.D, F.R.C.R, etc, AS A TOKEN OF THE AUTHOR'S GRATITUDE FOR PROFESSIONAL AID OF THE HIGHEST VALUE GENEROUSLY RENDERED UNDER PECULIARLY ADVERSE CONDITIONS, THIS ESSAY IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED. ADVERTISEMENT. The late Richard Burney, Esq., M.A., of Christ's College, Cambridge, previously to his death on the 30th Nov. 1845, empowered his Cousin, Mr Archdeacon Burney, to offer, through the Vice-Chancellor, to the University of Cambridge, the sum of ^£"3,500 Reduced Three per Cent. Stock, for the purpose of establishing an Annual Prize, to be awarded to the Graduate who should produce the best Essay on a subject to be set by the Vice-Chancellor. On the day after this offer was communicated to the Vice-Chancellor, IMr Burney died; but his sister and executrix. Miss J. Caroline Burney, being desirous of carrying her brother's intentions into effect, gene- rously renewed the offer. The Prize is to be awarded to a Graduate of the University, who is not of more than three years' stand- ing from admission to his first degree when the Essays are sent in, and who shall produce the best English Essay "on some moral or metaphysical subject, on the Existence, Nature, and Attributes of God, or on the Truth and Evidence of the Christian Religion." The successful Candidate is required to print his Essay; and after having delivered, or caused to be delivered, a copy of it to the University Library, the Library of Christ's College, the University Libraries of Oxford, vili Advc7'tiseincnt. Dublin, and Edinburgh, and to each of the Adjudicators of the Prize, he is to receive from the Vice-Chancellor the year's interest of the Stock, from which sum the Candidate is to pay the expenses of printing the Essay. The Vice-Chancellor, the Master of Christ's Col- lege, and the Norrisian Professor of Divinity, are the Examiners of the Compositions and the Adjudicators of the Prize. In the event of the exercises of two of the Can- didates being deemed by the Examiners to possess equal merit, if one of such Candidates be a member of Christ's College, the Prize is to be adjudged to him. The thesis proposed by the Vice-Chancellor for the year 1873, was as follows: — " Christian Prayer considered in 7'elation to the belief that the AlmigJity governs the World by ge7teral lazusT The prize was awarded to the author of the follow- ing Essay. PREFACE. As the subject of this Essay was expressly confined to Prayer in its relation to General Laws, I was precluded from discussing any of the purely a posteriori objections w4iich have been urged against the doctrine of the physical efficacy of Prayer. Similarly, such of the a priori objections as are not founded on the conception of Natural Law, had to be neglected. The former category includes Mr Galton's article in the Fortnightly Review for August ist, 1872, — an article which, in my opinion, is of greater argumentative worth than all the rest of the literature upon the same side put together; — and the latter, most of the views set forth by the Rev. Messrs. Robertson, Brooks, Knight, and others. In making this apology, I should like it to be understood that I deem the limitation imposed by the Title of this Treatise a very wise one. The subject embraced by that Title is amply sufficient for a single Essay to discuss, if the discussion is to be in any wise exhaustive. And, I may add, in the present case it seems to me especially desirable X Preface. that the discussion should be, as much as possible, of this character; seeing that this aspect of the Prayer-question is so closely allied to the yet more important question, regarding the antecedent im- probability attaching to the occurrence of Miracles. As, therefore, in dealing with the former, I felt that I was also of necessity dealing with the latter; I trust that any arguments which, in view of the one question, may be thought to be over-elabor- ated, will, in view of the other, be acquitted of this charge. It may be stated that all additions which have been made to this Essay since the decision of the Adjudicators was given, are shewn to be such by the date which is appended, thus [1874]. May, rS;4. CHAPTER I. § I. History may be defined as the record of human thought. No doubt, as a science, history refers to the words and the deeds of previous generations, no less than to their intellectual processes : forasmuch, however, as the two former are but the sensible expressions of the latter, history may be considered as being, in its broadest and its truest sense, the record of our intelligence. If then this is the essential nature of history, it follows that the highest function devolving upon it to perform, is the registration of that which most characterizes human thought in its relation to time, viz., its progress. Hence it is that all other interest attaching to the study of history, dwarfs in the presence of this its highest func- tion. Taking a general survey of the world's intellectual progress as chronicled by history, the most striking feature presented is certainly the ever-increasing per- ception of the truth that Unity pervades Nature. The primitive religions (with the conspicuous exception of the Jewish and its derivatives) agreed, amid their dis- cordance on all other subjects, in teaching Polytheism, or the doctrine of a multiplicity of powers in the Uni- verse. Gradually, and in direct proportion to the pro- 2 Christian Prayer and General Laws. gress of intelligence, the diffused and segregated influ- ences previously believed in became more and more concentrated, and so few in number ; until, in the days of the Classic Mythology, every deity, or class of deities, had its specified name. As the Classic Philosophy, however, gradually enfolded the Classical Religions, the multifarious gods and demi-gods of the former became less and less the objects of general credence, until they finally disappeared before the advance of Christianity. The latter, hand in hand with Philosophy, extirpated during the middle ages every vestige of the Polytheistic creeds, and the recognition among civilized men of the One God, as a Power if not a Person, became all but universal. A great advance, however, yet remained to be achieved. Although a Unity of Power became thus generally acknowledged as a principle pervading the Universe, the variety of its manifestations appeared no less endless than were the gods and demons of the primitive religions. Indeed, as these gods and demons were but the personifying explanation of the more strik- ing among these manifestations, the latter were more numerous than the former. So long, therefore, as man continued to regard the innumerable diversities occurring in nature as so many disconnected results, due to causes independent of one another, save through their depend- ence upon their common source ; he had merely suc- ceeded in divesting his mind of the superstitious belief in a multiplicity of personal agents. The disconnected results he perceived at this stage, presented themselves to his understanding as an infinitude of variations in the character of the Supreme Essence : — he saw a Unity of Being manifested in a Diversity of Operation. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 3 Thus, although the intellect of man had doubtless made a great advance when it recognized Unity as an essential attribute of the Self-existing Substance, it was not until that intellect began to look without its own nature, and seriously to contemplate, in the objective Cosmos around it, the modes in which that Substance proximately manifested itself, that human intelligence began to see how the order of that Cosmos was main- tained, not, as hitherto tacitly or avowedly supposed, by a multiplicity of ever-changing agencies continually emanating from the Indivisible Substance, but, as it were, by a Unity within a Unity : — by a Uniformity of Action within a Unity of Being. The birth of the Physical Sciences thus marked an era in Philosophy of unparalleled importance. It then became "obvious to the deeper thinkers, that external nature lent itself readily to the subjective conditions under which alone observation is possible. Similarities without rendered possible conceptions within.... There evidently was not a chaos w^ithout, a cosmos within, but the macrocosm responded to and harmonized with the microcosm'." And as thus at their birth, so throughout their development, the Physical Sciences have uninterruptedly tended to establish the doctrine, as the guiding principle of their methods, that all causes and effects with which they have to deal are mutually inter- related, and so inter-related, that, were the knowledge of them sufficiently extended, all natural phaenomena would be reducible " to logical deduction from one permeating principle^:" and this cardinal doctrine of the Physical Sciences, thus primarily elaborated for their own guid- 1 G. G. Scott, Burney Prize, i868, p. 58. ^ James Stuart. 4 CJiristian Prayer and General Lazvs. ance, has throughout its progress continually reacted upon Philosophy; until the original and diffused con- ceptions as to cause and effect entertained by the latter, have gradually undergone a process of concentration, if not of agreement ; each embodying more or less of the Physical conception, which has for its nucleus the doctrine of necessary, unconditional sequence, or, at least, of the perpetual uniformity of Natural Law. § 2. Thus, as in early times, Polytheism was gi-adu- ally supplanted by Monotheism, so in later times, An- thropomorphism has been steadily superseded by modern Deism — belief in the immediate nature of the Supreme Government, by belief in the conduct of that Govern- ment through General Laws. This one doctrine which all the sciences unite in teaching, and all the modern systems of philosophy unite in echoing, has now attained its highest phase of certainty. For, whatever may be the number and im- portance of the General Laws which yet remain to be dis- covered, their discovery, when made, cannot any further advance the doctrine we are considering; since men's minds are now, or ought to be, prepared for any amount of further development in this direction. Thus it is that the influence of Science upon Religion must now be considered as having ceased. For it has been in respect of this doctrine, and this doctrine alone, that Science has exerted upon Religion an influence of any kind — in this respect, and in this alone, is it true that the former has always been "the purifier" of the latter\ But in this respect it is most true ; and the fact of its being so has ever been the cause, and the only cause, of that intense embitterment which has, from the first and un- 1 Herbert Spencer, First Principles, p. 102. CJiristian Prayer and General Laivs. 5 interruptedly, characterized tlie relations between these two great departments of thought. " Of all antagonisms of belief, the oldest, the wddest, the most profound, and the most important is that between Science and Religion'." Why is this? Not, surely, from any mere speculative interest attaching to the great question in dispute? Assuredly not. At each stage of advance men felt that the God, whom even their forefathers had called "a God that hideth Himself," was receding yet further and further into the dimness of mystery; and as concession after concession was wrung from Theology, men felt more and more that Prayer was in danger of being shewn, in cruel truth, but a " vain beat- ing of the air." In proportion as the dominion of General Laws was advanced, men began to fear that Re- ligion was losing all that made it religious; that belief in the " Living God" as the Upholder of the Universe, was becoming progressively absorbed by the antagonistic demonstration, that if such a God existed at all. His action must be removed to an indefinite degree. Men began to fear that the Deity their prayers addressed was in danger of being shewn a mere spiritual idol, fashioned by their own intellect and now in course of demolition, as the grosser idols "made with hands" had been be- fore. For men began to feel that the attribute which in their minds was most characteristic of their spiritual Deity, was precisely that with which the former material deities had been most universally accredited — super- intendence of physical phaenomena; and this was just the attribute v/hich the doctrine in question assailed. Men began to feel that the ardour of growing intelli- gence, which had previously melted down the grosser 1 Ibid.^ p. II. 6 Christian Prayer and General Laws. superstitions of their forefathers, had now begun to thaw out their own; that their more advanced concep- tions as to the ultimate mystery of the Universe served but to merge the difficulty one stage higher; that these more advanced conceptions were now beginning to reveal yet a higher phase, and to shew that the theory of Personal Agency, which Superstition had embodied in one form and Religion in another, was a theory which, as it had ever been entertained without reason, so could now only be entertained against it; that the human intellect in its progress, had now at last caught sight of the great and fundamental truth that the Deity, whom all nations, races, and religions, from all time had delighted to invoke as " Father," was really only such to them in the sense that a cause is father to its effect; that the God of the Universe was the self-adjusting suffi- ciency of Nature ; and that the Reign in Nature was the Reign of Law. Shall we say that men thought thus? — Shall we not rather say that never, " since the world be- gan," have men thought thus so much as now? For we are not so much concerned with the masses of mankind, as with the leaders of their thought; and now, when men of Science, Literature and Philosophy, not in iso- lated instances, but as the intellectually orthodox posi- tion, bow to this Dominion of Law as being to them supreme, confessing as their belief that that Religion is only truly religious, which beyond this Dominion aspires to know naught else; now, when the demonstration of this Dominion has thus been steadily pushed to its high- est phase of certainty, and the minds of men are confi- dently awaiting the discovery of other General Laws, and Laws which are yet more General; — now, surely, it be- comes the duty of each individual to pause and con- Christian Prayer and General Laws. 7 sider for himself the bearing of this new doctrine upon the old faith. Is it true that " The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear Him, in those that hope in His mercy"? — Or have we found the true reason why "the wicked live, become old, yea are mighty in power," why " the rod of God is not upon them," and why " they spend their days in wealth"? Even because we have proved that theirs is the only true philosophy, so tersely contained in the words that follow: — "What is the Al- mighty that we should serve Him? And what profit should we have if we pray unto Him?" § 3. In the present discussion it is desirable, for the sake of definition, that the following points should be noticed at the outset. It is necessary to assume intelligence and regard for man as attributes of the First Cause : othenvise there is no room for argument. These attributes have indeed been wisely granted in the title of this Essay ; but, even had they not been so granted, they would require to have been assumed. From this assumption two ideas naturally arise. Firstly, as the intelligence of the First Cause is not an idea which Science or Philosophy is bound to accept, does not an assumption of this attribute tend to pre- judicate the question at issue, /. ^., unfairly to invalidate the Scientific^ and Philosophical objections to Christian Prayer^? The discussion of this point is of so great importance, that it had better, for the present, be deferred. ^ For the sake of brevity, the word Science will throughout be used in the sense of Physical Science only. 2 For the sake of brevity, the word Prayer will throughout be used (except when other qualifications are stated) in the sense of prayer for physical results. 8 Christian Prayer and General Laws. Secondly, supposing an Intelligent First Cause to answer Prayer, does the wording of the belief set forth in the Title necessitate the further beHef, that such answer must in all cases be granted through General Laws ; or is that belief free from this necessity ? — Can it consistently with itself suppose that the Almighty, while ruling the Universe by means of General Laws, makes an exception in the case of Prayer, and sometimes or always answers it by immediate action ? Although this at first sight appears an important question with regard to our subject, examination will shew that it is not such in reality. To begin with an illustration. When Christ, at a piteous human cry, by a word stilled the raging of the waters. His disciples^ "marvelled, saying, What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him !" They stated their account of the surprising oc- currence simply as it happened, and subsequent genera- tions upon that account have formed two opinions as to the manner in which the wonder was performed. One of these opinions agrees with the impression which we must suppose to have been produced upon the witnesses, and has been best formulated by Hume^, who defines a miracle as " a transgression of a Law of Nature by a par- ticular volition of the Deity." The other opinion has been concisely formulated thus : — " A miracle is the superseding of a lower rule of working by a higher^" Now the point which concerns us at present is this, — whichever of these views we may suppose to be correct, one thing is certain (supposing, of course, the facts to ^ It matters not who these dvdpoiirot were. ^ Essay on Miracles, note 2, ** Liddon. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 9 have been as recorded), viz., that so far as the disciples had any means of knowing, one view might be as correct as the other. Even if we suppose (for the sake of the illustration) that the more refined idea of miraculous agency ever occurred to them, it is certain that the actual estimation they entertained of the work would not have been in the least modified ; for if such ever did occur to them, they would immediately have reflected that, whatever the mode of causation employed might be, it was certainly beyond the scope of human understanding. The effect was all that they, from the very nature of their faculties, were able to appreciate; and whatever speculations they might entertain as to the cause, these would not have modified by a single letter that outburst of human astonishment, "What manner of man is this ! for He commandeth even the winds and the water, and they obey Him." Now let us apply this illustration to the case before us. We will suppose the same power to be still at work, and all things still the same, with this difference only — the ultimate effects must no longer appear to be miraculous in character. But let us remove this element of difference from the illustration, and it is an illustra- tion no longer — it becomes identical with the case which it illustrates. We, no less than they, can only think of this inscrutable causality in terms of its effects — to us no less than to them is it true, that the question whether a particular result (supposing it to be produced in answer to Prayer) is brought about through the agency of General Laws, or independently of these Laws, is a question altogether beyond the scope of our faculties to decide. Now the presence of the miraculous element causes, lO Christian Prayer and General Laws. as we have just seen, an important difference between the two cases ; and for this reason. When this element is observably present, the mind at once feels that it is in proximity with a power sufficient either to suspend or to modify the ordinary course of Natural Law. Why? Because the production of this feeling is the end for which the miracle is wrought. Hence, when the proximity of this power is not intended to be sensibly recognized, then, manifestly, the ultimate effect will appear to result (whether or not it really does so) in the ordinary course of Natural Law. So that the two cases may be stated antithetically thus : — A miracle (sup- posing it to be real) is an ultimate result, in which a power is sensibly exhibited over the normal action of Natural Law; but whether exhibited by a suspen- sion or by a modification of such Law is unknown. An answer to Prayer (supposing it to be real) is an ultimate result, in which there is no sensible exhibition of power over the normal action of Natural Law; and whether it is effected by a suspension or by a modifica- tion of such Law is unknown. Hence, so far as the belief in government by General Laws is concerned, the question as to whether or not the case of an answer to Prayer differs from other modes of Divine action may be dropped ; although it must subsequently be resumed in another connection. Further, it is hoped that the point has now been made clear, that whether or not Prayer is answered through the normal action of General Laws, it must equally in all cases, excepting in those of miracles, appear to be so answered. § 4. We may now briefly indicate the nature of the objections which it is the purpose of this Essay to Christian Prayer and G eneral Laws. li discuss. It has already been pointed out that the greatest conquest of human thought which history records, is the recognition of the truth that General Laws pervade the observable Domain of Physical Nature; and it has been likewise shewn that this conquest has been effected solely through the agency of Science. Now, as this conquest was originally due to the scientific methods, so at the present day, a mind versed in these methods feels with a force almost impossible to others, the magnitude of the present difficulty. There is, mdeed nothing easier to understand than the general nature of this difficulty, but it requires a scientific training to appreciate its weight. " It is hazardous ground for any general moral reasoner to take to discuss subjects of evidence which essentially involve that higher ap- preciation of physical truth which can be attamed only by an accurate and comprehensive acquaintance with the connected series of the physical and mathe- matical sciences." It is only when a man has spent vears of toil, in thoroughly acquainting himself with the investigations of others in the field of Natural Science, or in pursuing such investigations of his own, that the conviction is forced upon his mind as an axiom, tha the operation of Law does not admit of differential rigidity An ordinary man may assent to this proposi- tion, but it is almost impossible for him to realize it- to feel that it is inconceivable that it should be other- wise-with the same intensity as a man, who has long been disciplined in taking minute quantitative cognizance of natural phsenomena. Science asserts as loudly as she asserts any one of her most indisputable demon- strations, that "without the disturbance of a natural law quite as serious as the stoppage of an eclipse, or the 12 Christian Prayer and General Laws. rolling of the river St Lawrence up the Falls of Niagara, no act of humiliation, individual or national, can call one shower from heaven, or deflect towards us a single beam of the sun\" A man of Science will continue : — 'I do not say what the Almighty can or cannot do, and it is for each of us, no doubt, to frame our own conceptions as to what He does ; but I do say, and say most con- fidently, that supernatural power does not admit of degrees, — that every time the Litany is rehearsed in our churches, we ask for prodigies of power quite as great as any of those we have just heard read from the Old Testament. Such being, I will not say my faith, but my knowledge, I balance the probabilities in my own mind, and I discover the difference between them to be so ludicrously disproportionate, that I feel it is only a question of the time which must elapse, before an adequate knowledge of the Physical Sciences filters into the minds of the people at large, when the present wide-spread belief will be assigned to its place beside those in sorcery and witchcraft. Such being my per- suasion, I long for a better inculcation of this know- ledge among the masses ; for men would then abandon this the last of their pernicious superstitions; they would then, instead of wasting their time and energy over senseless oblations, apply themselves to help them- selves by the modes and means appointed in Nature; they would then perceive that the study of Nature's Laws conduces more to their well-being than ignorant addresses to the Law-Maker ; for they would then begin to notice that savants have lived where saints have perished, and to acknowledge that the Anti-Christ of ^ Prof. Tyndall, Fragments of Science, p. 36 (" Prayer and Natural Law"). Christian Prayer and General Lazus. 13 Daniel is right where it is written of him, " In his estate he shall worship the god of forces." ' § 5. Such is a type of the objections raised from the Physical Sciences. Before commenting on them, it is desirable in this place to state some further objections which have been raised from Metaphysics. Without pausing to give the stereotyped proof of the existence of the First Cause, the Infinite, and the Abso- lute ; we may proceed at once to the difficulties which are raised upon it. ' How can the Caused react upon the First Cause ? for, if it does so, the latter has ceased to be the First Cause. It profits nothing to say that the First Cause acts from condescension, for then the desire of man becomes the true First Cause of the particular effect desired and executed. But if the First Cause ceases to be the First Cause of one effect, it ceases to be the First Cause of any effect ; for the only meaning of the term First Cause is, that it is the First Cause of all effects. ' How can the Finite act upon the Infinite ? for the Infinite must include all existence, and so all action; if, therefore, it is acted upon, it ceases to be the Infinite. ' How can the Relative influence the Absolute ? for the only meaning of the term Absolute, is that which is beyond relation ; whereas influence of necessity impHes relation.' 'These remarks would apply to Prayer under any creed, that recognized the necessity of believing in the existence of the First Cause, the Infinite, and the Abso- lute. But how does the superadded belief in the govern- ment by General Laws affect the question ? Manifestly it increases the difficulty of believing in the physical 14 Christian Prayer and General Laws. efficacy of Prayer ; for it is a positive argument added to the negative ones above stated. It is just such a practical out-come as we should have expected from our metaphysical conclusions. The First Cause is now sup- posed to be removed indefinitely far off from this the sphere of its ultimate effects. Penetrate as we may into ever-increasing generalities, there is always a dim horizon of generalities lying beyond. To suppose, then, that Prayer is physically efficacious, becomes more mentally inconceivable than ever. We do but multiply impossi- bilities of thought by this addition to our creed ; for we are now required to believe, not only that the Caused, the Finite, and the Relative, react upon the Uncaused, the Infinite, and the Absolute ; but also that they thus react through the intervention of a practically infinite series of changes. If it is difficult to conceive of A acting immediately upon B ; much more is it difficult to con- ceive of such action, when A is separated from B by a chain of practically infinite length. If it is hard to imagine a floating leaf at the origin of a great river, di- recting the course of the rushing stream ; much more is it hard to imagine that same leaf, when it has eventually arrived through ever widening and deepening channels at the broad delta below, reacting against all that mighty length of current it has traversed, and, with the power of a deity, changing the course of that current at its fountain-head.' § 6. Such are the objections raised by the Physical and Metaphysical Sciences. If the former have been understated, it is merely from the want of space to render them more fully ; for, myself a student of these Sciences, I am thoroughly alive to the potency of their influence upon the mind in this connection; and I CJiristian Prayer and General Laivs. 15 know from experience the magnitude of the difficulty which a mind so influenced is obhged to encounter, when it endeavours to emancipate itself from the thral- dom of its petty conceptions, and to take a broader and a deeper view of the mystery that surrounds us. Such being the case, I can offer no apology for confining the subject of this Essay to the almost exclusive con- sideration of these objections. On the one hand "in an age of physical research like the present, all highly cultivated minds and duly advanced intellects have imbibed, more or less, the lessons of the inductive philosophy ^ ; " and, on the other hand, this philosophy "is a system far enough from the surface to make it appear deep, but does not go sufficiently far do^vn to reach the foundation I" There are, hence, numberless minds at the present time, too much prepared to deem the scientific aspect of the present question a foregone conclusion. And this tendency is increased by the fact, that the other aspect requires for its justification an honest effort of thought, in a direction in which, of all others, the scientific mind is least disposed to travel. For the latter reason my endeavour throughout will be, above all things to avoid abstruseness. Metaphysics, indeed, cannot be avoided (even were it desirable in a Burney Essay that they should) — the subject being purely metaphysical : but that abstruseness which so often occurs in this department of thought, and of which the scientific mind is so particularly intolerant, will, as far as possible, be avoided ; not only for the last-named reason, but also because I conceive that an argument which admits of a thorough institution upon a lower ^ Essays and Reviews, p. 133. . 3 Dj. M'Cosh, Method of Divine Government, 7th edition, p. 183. i6 Christian Prayer and General Laws. stage of speculative abstniseness, should not, on principle, be raised to a higher ; since every advance in abstruse- ness is a further indication of the intrinsic difficulty of the subject, and so of the liability to error. Thus it is that, were I not persuaded that the objections to Prayer which we are about to examine admit of easy refutation by "common sense metaphysics," I should not have undertaken to write upon the subject at all ; conscious as I am that this subject belongs to such a province, that it would then have required for its adequate treat- ment a writer who had given his principal attention to Philosophy. § 7, We must now recur to a question already pro- pounded, viz., does not the assumption of the existence of the Almighty unfairly invalidate the scientific position? No doubt, in strict argument, a writer upon the present subject is not necessarily required to entertain this ques- tion : forasmuch, however, as I am convinced that it is mainly from a want of giving it due attention, that the objections we have to consider appear to some minds so plausible, I deem it highly desirable to expose its shallowness, for the sake of intensifying conviction by the removal of an unfair prejudication. What is the character of Science considered as a department of thought? Clearly, in the first place, it is purely intellectual. The moral feeling of individuals may be moulded or affected by contact with Science, but this does not affect the character of Science itself; and so does not modify the weight of objections raised by Science to any belief external to itself The present objections, then, in so far as they are scientific, must be purely intellectual. But not only is Science purely intellectual ; it is likewise purely objective : it deals with Christian Prayer and General Laws. if the concrete and the actual, not with the abstract and the hypothetical. No doubt a mind engaged in scientific enquiry must frequently make draughts upon the Un- known ; and the *' imagination," guided by previous knowledge, is of indispensable "scientific use" when roaming in the regions of the Probable. Nay, it is not too much to assert that Science would have made no progress whatever, had not this its pioneer always preceded it into this region. But we must be careful to distinguish between the process of scientific thought, and the product of scientific thought, i.e., scientific dis- covery. While it is necessary for a scientific investiga- tor to quit the region of the Known for the Unknown — a journey implied by the very term "scientific re- search," — yet in doing so he leaves, for the time being, the territory of Science proper; and he only extends that territory in the direction of his advance, when he has succeeded in reclaiming a portion of the Unknown or the Probable to the Known and the Proveable\ But, although there is thus a great difference between scien- tific thought and scientific discovery, they are alike in this, — they both refer to the Proximate : for the object of the former is the attainment of the latter, and the Discoverable must always be the Proximate. Hence, in whatever degree scientific thought wanders from the contemplation of the Proximate, in that degree it has ceased to be scientific — has become specu- lative. Thus, Science is the child of Physical Law, and is but true to its genetic nature when it seeks to resolve al] things into terms of matter, force, and motion. ^ This statement is not strictly accurate, because a probability may be so high as to amount for practical purposes to a certainty. R. Z 1 8 Christian Prayer ajid General Lazus. Materialism is the philosophy of Science, not by con- vention, but of necessity; for Science deals exclusively with the Proximate, and the Proximate is Material. But after Science has attained its highest successes, — after it has reduced all things to terms of its ultimate ideas, and reconstructed these ultimate ideas again into the comprehensible " How" of all things, — even after it has shewn us the physical basis of life and the mechanical equivalent of thought, — Science has done nothing more than systematize our experience — it has left us still within the Proximate. "The utmost pos- sibility for us, is an interpretation of the process of things as it presents itself to our limited consciousness ; but how this process is related to the actual process we are unable to conceive, much less to know." If Physical Law is, as we have said, the mother of Science, it is no less certain that it is destined to be its tomb : it is to Science the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. § 8. Religion refers to the Ultimate or it refers to nothing. Further, that Ultimate is to Religion a Person \ This is true of the religious sentiment in general, but that special phase of it with which we are concerned is not a sentiment only. It is not the presence of the soul's aspirations, nor a recognition of our dependence upon a higher power, and the desire to express the consequent feelings of praise and thankfulness, — it is not even the beautiful adaptation of the Christian ^ Spencei-'s definition of Religion, viz., *' an d /rzt?;-/ theory of tlie Universe " is true so far as it goes ; but belief in personal ai^ency in some form or other is of the essence of religion. In other words, to apply the term "Religion" to any other form of belief is merely to abuse it. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 19 religion to these the highest wants of man— that has gained for that rehgion the adherence, through many centuries, of the choice of human intellect Let us take what view we may regarding the truth of Chris- tianity, but— in common argumentative justice, if not in ordinary respect for our own intellectual faculties- let us acknowledge that Christianity has done in the world's history what it has done, and is now what it is, in virtue of the evidence— be it true or be it false — in favour of a Revelation. This is not the place to vindicate that evidence, but it is necessary to dwell briefly upon its character. From what we have just stated, it must be seen that Christianity differs from Science in being partly moral and partly intellectual — there being a great difference between a Religion and evidence in favour of a Revelation. Considered as a whole, it may be defined as a department of thought having reference to the Ultimate. In so far as it is moral, it is independent of all other departments of intellectual enquiry; but in so far as it is intellectual, the condition of its existence is that of dependence upon other departments. Our present object is to see how this dependence is reduced to a minimum. While the intellectual credentials of Christianity penetrate many departments of intellectual operation, such as history, philosophy, and morality ; the evidence itself, considered in its totality, is rendered by this very diffusion, unique. The very multitude of the intellectual pillars on which it is supported makes it independent of each constituent individual; so that it cannot be destroyed without the destruction of all the chief departments of human thought. But not only is the evidence in favour of a revelation rendered inde- 2—2 20 Christian Prayer and General Laws. pendent of each department of thought by its diffusion through all : it is further insulated by its intrinsic cha- racter. For it is self-evident that the character of a department of thought is determined by the character of its object; consequently the Evidences, considered merely as such, /. d, in reference to their one Object, are essentially distinct from all other departments of thought. Thus we find that the Christian Evidences are not only rendered independent (so far at least as the maintenance of their intellectual character admits), of all other departments of thought considered severally; but that they are further insulated from all such de- partments considered collectively. § 9. These considerations then, viz., that the Evi- dences are partly moral and partly intellectual, — that in so far as they are moral they have nothing whatever to do with Science, Science being purely intellectual, — that even in so far as they are intellectual they are rendered by their diffusion almost independent of Science, — and lastly that, considered as a department of thought, they are, in their intrinsic nature, distinct from all other departments considered collectively; — these considerations render obvious what we are now engaged in shewing, viz., that it is no disparagement to the objections raised by Science to assume that the First Cause possesses an intelligent regard for man. For these considerations clearly establish two positions : firstly, that any reasons we may have for believing this to be the case, are reasons independefit of Science ; and, secondly, that the department of the Evidences is so fundamentally distinct from that of Science, that the latter can have no voice in the general question as to whether the First Cause is, or is not, " the Almighty." Christian Prayer and General Laws. 21 Now, no matter how small our '• independent " reasons may be in favour of an affirmative to the general question, it can be no disparagement to this special objection to assume the conclusions to which these reasons tend. For we are not endeavouring to ascertain any probability relating to the general question, but merely to consider the two sides of this particular question; and to do this most fairly we should consider it as separate from the general one. Only if Science were able to demonstrate the falsehood of the Evidences of Christianity, and so to settle the general question in the negative, would the assumption of its affirmative be a disparagement to this special question. It may be asked, — But why are we not entitled to add whatever strength of improbability there is as to the general question, to the improbability we can shew to obtain regarding the special ? We answer, — Because to do this would be to confuse tlie functions of the departments of thought with those of thought itself. After an indi- vidual mind has satisfied itself regarding the weight of the objections advanced by Science, it is then, no doubt, the duty of that mind to add this result to any im- probability which it believes to exist on the side of an affirmative to the general question ; but the only fair way of estimating the value of the special improbability, is to consider it apart. § 10. At the risk of being tedious I shall adduce an illustration, in order to render this point perfectly clear. Probabilities may be fairly likened to forces, existing only in relation to other forces : they are the resultants, both in direction and magnitude, of previous proba- bilities- Like forces, too, probabilities are usually com- plex; the resultant being caused by the incidence of 22 Christian Prayer and General Laws. numerous other probabilities, most of which are them- selves the resultants of previous systems. Now the probability that Prayer is ineffectual is compounded of two other probabilities ; first, the proba- bility that the Trpwrov kwovv is not even a ©eos a-yi/wo-ro?, much less a IlaTijp iXenj^oiVj and, second, the probability that if the First Cause has an intelligent regard for man, this regard should not manifest itself in answering Prayer; or, which is the same thing, the improbability that it should. Now concerning the first probability, Science has no voice — the evidence by which it is increased or decreased being, as we have seen, altogether without the range of scientific enquiry. Those who have most honestly examined that evidence, best know the number and complexity of the contending resultants of the many systems of probabilities which contribute to form the final resultant, the assumed direction and magnitude of which the title of the present Essay sets forth. Now, in making this assumption, we are in nowise invalidating the scientific objections; for the only business on which we are now engaged is to discover, as nearly as possible, the value of the scientific element in the system, — the other element belonging, as we have repeatedly seen, to a distinct and widely different department. As the total resultant regarding the specific question is not granted, it can only be ascertained by a composition of its constituents; and the fairest way of arriving at the true value of each constituent is to consider it separately — to assume the other constituent neutralized. When, by another line of investigation, an individual mind has, to the best of its ability, ascertained in the other department the resultant probability as to the general question, both in magnitude and direction ; then, Christian Prayer and General Laws. 2^ no doubt, it becomes the duty of that mind to com- pound that resultant with this probability established by Science as to the specific question, in order to obtain the ultimate and total result with regard to the latter; but it is no less clearly the duty of each department to abstain from encroaching upon the other. Before, however, such a mind can make this composition, it is necessary that it should know the measurement of this scientific constituent. For the sake, therefore, of measuring, in the fairest possible manner, the degree of strength residing in the scientific constituent, let us assume the other neutralized. § II. We are now in a position to appreciate the nature of the purifying influence, which, as we saw at the commencement. Science has continuously exerted upon Religion. The human mind will not rest satisfied with the single contemplation either of the Proximate or of the Ultimate j and this necessity in the human mind of dual thought, because natural, must be deemed legitimate. But this duality of human thought is not confined to its process, it is projected more or less into its product — is not restricted to the intellect, but colours reciprocally the two corresponding departments of intellectual enquiry. This mutual diffusion of in- fluence between the two departments is no doubt theo- retically illegitimate, but is practically unavoidable. The consequence is that each department, in so far as it penetrates the other, becomes liable to be influenced by whatever changes that other department may have to undergo : but this liability is incurred only to the extent in which the penetration has obtained. Were the line of demarcation between the departments as clearly defined in thought as it is in reality, no such 24 Christian Prayer and General Laws. liability could exist : as it is, this liability increases in direct proportion to tlie want of this definition. Hence, as we should have expected, in all the accounts which history affords of the controversies between Science and Theology, the battle-ground has ever been this border-land of illegitimate diffusion ; and it is within the precincts of this territory alone that the purifying agency of Science on Religion has been exerted. Briefly then. Religion transcends Science, — the former reposing upon the Ultimate, and the latter upon the Proximate. Any modification, therefore, which Science may impose upon religious ideas of the Proximate — ideas which are, in reality, extra-religious, — cannot influence religious ideas of the Ultimate — ideas which are, in reality, the only truly religious. § 12. We have arrived, then, at the following general conclusions. We have seen that it is no disparagement to the scientific objections, to discuss them upon the supposition that the First Cause has an intelligent regard for man : — on the contrary, to discuss them upon any other ground, or ground on which this supposition is not clearly defined, would be to endow these objections with an initial bias that would be argumentatively unjust. We have also observed that the legitimate sphere of Science is rigidly confined within the Proximate, while that of Religion is similarly restricted to the Ultimate ; and we have noticed, as a striking illustration of this point, a fact, which is, indeed, its necessary consequence, viz., that great difficulties are encountered when the two provinces are made artificially to overlap. Lastly, we have observed that the purifying influence of Science on Religion, has ever been confined to the filtering of the scientific element from the religious when Christian Prayer and Gejieral Laws. 25 these had commingled, — to the correction of religious ideas as to the proximate government of God when these were erroneous, and which, in so far as they had ob- tained, were extra-religious. The point, then, which we have specially to bear in mind throughout the following chapters is, that Science deals exclusively with the proximate government of the First Cause ; while Religion refers to that Cause as a Person, to its character, its relations and intentions towards man', — but is in no wise concerned with causation. 1 It will be seen that this definition of religion differs from that of Spencer, who maintains, in effect, that Religion becomes irreligious in the proportion in which it endeavours to explain the mystery it acknowledges — i.e., in the proportion in which it aspires to deal with the character and intentions of the First Cause. It may be well to point out that this difference between the two definitions does not arise from any defect in the logical sequences by which they are respectively attained, but merely from a dif- ference of premises. For while Mr Spencer tacitly ignores the possibility of a revelation, such possibility is in the present treatise recognized. The logical consequence of tlie former premise is, that religion is not merely irreligious but irrational, in proportion as it aspires to know the Unknowable ; while the logical conse- quence of the latter premise is, that religion is not merely irre- ligious but irrational, in proportion as it fails to respond to whatever degree of evidence there may exist in favour of a revelation. I cannot lose this opportunity of noticing the singularly un- fortunate character of the term "Unknowable," as applied by Hamilton to designate the Ultimate, and afterwards appropriated by Spencer as a verbal epitome of the doctrine of Comte. It is unfortunate, because the assertion that the Ultimate is unknowable involves, not only the unphilosophical assumption that a revelation is in the nature of things impossible, but likewise a necessary contradiction — to wit, that we possess at least this much knowledge concerning the Ultimate, that if it is intelligent, it cannot reveal 26 Christian Prayer and General Laws. The establishment, therefore, of the scientific doc- trine of the government of the world by General Laws, which we at the beginning saw was the only sense in which Science has been the purifier of Religion, but which in the process has been throughout its develop- ment the only cause of antagonism between Religion and Science, is thus seen to be altogether foreign to Religion as a department of thought; and while, at each successive stage of Science's development. Religion seemed to be losing all that made it religious, by the withdrawal of the object of its worship within ever- increasing shades of distance, — this has only been the case because Religion has never fully recognized the magnitude of its office. Far beyond our faculties of sense, of thought, and of imagination, — indefinitely itself or its wishes to man. [The Author finds that thus far he has been anticipated in his criticism by Mr J. Martineau. 1874.] The first-mentioned fallacy appears to reside in not recognizing the ambiguity which attaches to the verb to knozv, and its derivatives. As applied to causation — that is, in a scientific sense — it simply means to have explained, — that is, to have perceived a cause more ultimate than that to which the verb is applied. Now, as self- existence is clearly not susceptible of explanation, the Ultimate must of necessity be, in a scientific sense, unknowable. In other words, if the Ultimate is intelligent, its existence must, in this sense, be a mystery to itself; or, to descend to our own level, even if an intelligent First Cause were to impart a revelation of demonstrative value, this revelation could tell us nothing more of self-existence than that it is what it is. This fact, however, is widely different from that which the unqualified use of the term Unknowable conveys ; viz., that not only the existence, but likewise the modes and the attributes of the Ultimate are beyond the limits of possible knowledge. It may be true that on philosophical grounds alone these modes and attributes are beyond these limits : it certainly does not follow, that in the nature of things a partial revelation of these modes and attributes is therefore impossible. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 27 far without the region of this the proximate manifesta- tion of His power, is the tabernacle of the dwelhng- place of the Most High ; and if Rehgion has felt that the extension of the dominion of General Laws has, in the smallest degree, affected its relation to its Object, it is only because Religion has failed to see that that Object is rendered none the less personal, because the further removed, — nor the less moral, because the more incomprehensible. With these preliminaries thus well understood, let us now proceed to investigate the objections raised by Science to a practice sanctioned by Religion. It is a question which Science, as a department of thought referring to the Proximate, has a full and perfect right to raise ; and it thus becomes a question, the discussion of which Religion, inasmuch as it is intellectual, is bound to entertain. CHAPTER II, § I. As the metaphysical objections are of a merely technical nature, it is better to dispose of them before discussing the phyisical. It is a sufficient answer to the first of these objec- tions, that the frame of mind conducing to any petition is as much an effect of the First Cause, as would the answer be if vouchsafed. For the petition being thus equally with its answer contained within the First Cause, we have no better reason to say that the former, any more than the latter, reacts upon that Cause. This difficulty is one which can only be raised by novices in speculative philo- sophy. They have an undefined notion of human will differing from all other created things in its freedom of action ; and they carry this notion into the highest term of the speculative series : now, this term has been arrived at by a wholly different route from that by which the freedom of the will is inferred : placing, then, the one doctrine in opposition to the other, they point to the antithesis as an insuperable obstacle to the belief in the validity of Prayer. This difficulty, however, is no greater in the case of Prayer, supposing it efficacious, than in the case of any other effectual action of which the human will is capable. The only difference is that in the case Christian Prayer and General Laws. 29 of Prayer the difficulty is rendered more apparent, in consequence of the influence of the First Cause being directly involved, instead of being tacitly assumed \ § 2. Taking the other two objections together, we have first to observe that there are two very different sig- nifications attaching to the words infinite and absolute. If they are used as subjects, they become mere abstractions; if they are used as predicates, they become intelligible con- cretes. We may, for instance, speak of infinite space, or absolute goodness, with a definite meaning; but when we speak of the Infinite, or the Absolute, as substantives, we employ indefinite abstractions. It would be a mis- take, however, to brand the latter as " senseless abstrac- tions^," since, as abstractions and when not unphilosophi- cally treated, they are at least as valuable as any other 1 The objection thus refuted has been advanced in a great variety of verbal forms. As the above statement of it, however, is the essence of all such, the refutation there given must be considered general. As an example of the various forms we may take the following. "Were they (the series of physical pre-arrangements) ever altered at the suggestion of a creature, either they were imperfect before the suggestion was made, or they were made less perfect by means of it. If previously perfect, the change would be undivine ; if not perfect until the change, we could with difficulty believe in the perfection of Him who made it." " Belief in an all- comprehending Intelligence which saw the end from the beginning, and determined beforehand the history of every inorganic atom, and the evolution of each sentient structure, is a postulate of rational theology : and that in the guidance of the Universe its great Superintendent acts according to laws set up from everlasting is no less axiomatic." All such objections, involving as they do the more ultimate difficulty of fore-ordination and free-will, should be rigidly excluded from the present specific question ; since they have no more bearing upon it than upon any other in which the human will is concerned. 2 Mill, Examination of Hamilton, p. 45. 30 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. mere abstraction. Now, it seems to me that it is of the essence of an abstraction, to contain all the possible con- cretes of which it is the abstraction ; and that it is of the essence of concretes that they should not be mutually annihilative : if so, it follows that no abstraction can con- tain two mutually annihilative concretes. An abstraction may thus be looked upon as a genus which contains all its possible concretes as species, and which is by this very fact precluded from containing the opposites of these species ; since it is of the essence of these species that their opposites should be non-existent. If this view is correct, we can perceive and avoid errors occurring upon both sides of the issue between Hamilton, Mansel, Spencer, etc., on the one hand, and Mill on the other. The latter, it must seem, is perfectly right in shewing that it is as unphilosophical to attach any concrete mean- ing to these abstractions, as it would be to do so in the case of any other abstraction whatever, — to suppose that these abstractions themselves and as such have a concrete existence ^ But Mr Mill is wrong in asserting that "the Infinite" must be at once "infinitely great," and "infi- nitely little j" and " the Absolute " ' " absolutely wise and absolutely stupid^" The Infinite may be either infinitely great or infinitely little, and the Absolute may be either absolutely wise or absolutely stupid ; but neither can be both the one and the other, since the species are oppo- sites, and so mutually exclusive. Applying then these considerations to the case before us, it is evident that the objections can have no rational meaning, unless the terms in question are employed in their concrete sense. Now there is nothing inconceivable in the idea of an infinitely powerful and absolutely bene- 1 Ibid. chap. IV. ' p. 43. CJnnstian Prayer and Getteral Laws. 31 ficent Being answering the petitions of His sentient creatures : on the contrary, this idea is the very ground from which these petitions take their rise. To those, however, who are not satisfied with these views concerning the species of the Unconditioned, but adhere to their strictly logical significations, it must be suflicient to answer, as we answered when treating of the First Cause, that the difficulty which arises from our collision with the Infinite and the Absolute in this sense is not confined to Prayer, but extends to every subject concerning which it is possible to think. And this argu- ment is here intensified by the fact, that the very same logical processes which prove the logical existence of the abstractions we are considering, likewise and as incon- testably prove that they are mutually annihilative when predicated of the same Being. All adjuncts to these metaphysical objections, such as the rhetorical metaphors of the type before given, rest upon the physical objections. To these, then, as con- stituting the subject of the present Essay, let us now, at length, proceed. § 3. Mr Herbert Spencer* has somewhere observed, that it is necessary to the discussion of any subject that it should be reduced to a single proposition. Hence it is fortunate that, in the present case, no one can experience any difficulty in throwing the scientific objections into this form. True it is that writers upon this subject almost invariably obscure the real question at issue, by intro- ducing other and altogether distinct questions, such as the pernicious influence on man of belief in the efficacy of Prayer, the impossibility of answering con- tradictory petitions, the impiety of addressing suggestions 1 Principles of Psychology^ Vol. Ii. 32 Christian Pj^ayer and General Laws. to the Deity, and so forth. All such questions, how- ever, being entirely extraneous to the one in hand, will be carefully excluded, as they should be from all writings professing to deal with the scientific objections to Prayer \ Now, into whatever verbal form we may choose to throw the proposition we have to consider, that proposition itself must possess two characters : it must be con- ditional, and it must be universal. No one can assert that the Almighty does not answer Prayer, but merely that if He does. He must interfere with the normal course of nature : also the proposition must be universal, in no case whatever can Prayer be answered without such interference. The examination, then, of this proposition forms the main subject of this Essay. Let us first enquire whe- ther it is adduced as establishing a necessity or merely a probability. The answer lies on the surface : if the pro- position is adduced as establishing a necessity, it mani- festly should not be thrown into a conditional form. That it must be thrown into a conditional form is self-evident ; but, lest the reason why it must, should not be at once perceived, it may not be superfluous to give it. A neces- sity can only rest upon a demonstration ; but from the nature of the case science is unable to demonstrate that Prayer is never answered, because the sphere of science is, as we have seen, restricted to the Proximate. All, therefore, that science can do is to argue from the known to the unknown, and thus, by analogy, to infer that Prayer is ineffectual. By the mere fact, however, of this appeal to analogy, science has ceased to be scientific — ^ I have entertained the foregoing metaphysical objections, because the term "Almighty" includes the conceptions on which they are founded. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 33 has become speculative; has ceased to prove, and en- deavours only to presume. But although analogical arguments cannot Yrom their nature establish a necessity, they may, as we shall subse- quently see, establish any degree of probability. Hence the business before us is critically and impartially to analyse the scientific proposition, with the view of ascer- taining as nearly as possible the degree of probability which it contains. § 4. As the term " Physical Law," or its equivalents, must occur in the proposition we have thus to analyse, it becomes necessary to point out what has already been pointed out by other writers times without number, viz., the ambiguity which attaches to it. The only rational interpretation of the term admits, indeed, of an easy and precise definition, which may be thus stated : — A Phy- sical Law is the formula of a physical sequence, which, so far as human observation extends, is invariable \ But from this definition there immediately arises the ques- tion, — Is this -sequence necessary? — is that, which obser- vation has determined to be invariable relatively, also invariable absolutely? These are, manifestly, questions which cannot be answered, and hence the ambiguity of the term. Now this ambiguity is not, as a rule, suf- ficiently recognized by disputants, and even when it is so, the balance of probability appears to some minds to preponderate towards an affirmative answer to those questions, as decidedly as to other minds it seems to tend towards a negative. Hence to those of the former school, the term Physical Law habitually bears the signification of 1 The Duke of Argyle in his Reign of La7U gives five distinct de- finitions of this term ; but in so far as they do not embody the meta- physical conception of cause, the above definition includes them all. R. 3 34 CJiristiaii Prayer and General Laws. a mere instrument of the Divine Will, perfectly obe- dient in its ministry, and indefinitely plastic in its opera- tion ; while to those of the latter, it no less constantly represents a practically independent directive influence of unalterable rigidity, upon which eternal order univers- ally depends. Without pausing to examine the respective merits of these rival creeds, we shall, for the sake of definition in argument, assume that the latter represents the truth. It is the belief entertained by those who raise the class of objections to Prayer which we are considering, and the belief upon which those objections are founded. The supposition, therefore, of its truth, while it endows these objections with their full weight, likewise, in so doing, affords the most unprejudiced ground for their dis- cussion. § 5. We have recently seen that Science, in order to establish its universal proposition, is under the necessity of appealing to Analogy. The reason of this necessity is our inabiUty to follow the sequence of cause and effect in any one line beyond some determinate point. The fact of this barrier to our progress existing on all sides, is but the practical expression of our ignorance of second causes. It now devolves upon us to estimate the proba- ble amount of this ignorance. The endeavour is not, of course, to estimate the extent of the Unknown, which would be absurd ; but merely, from the data afforded us by the known conditions of knowledge, to indicate by a priori considerations the probabilities there are as to that extent. In dealing with this subject it would be as impossible to attain, as it would be undesirable to attempt, complete originality. So far, however, as the general doctrine of Christian Prayer and General Laws. 35 " the relativity of knowledge " admits of special develop- ment in its bearing upon the subject before us, so far is originality desirable. Further, as it is also desirable, for reasons before indicated, to avoid abstruseness as much as possible, the conclusions which by other writers have been attained by metaphysical considerations of a more or less technical kind, will now be reached by considera- tions more \\\ accordance with the disposition of a mind accustomed to scientific thought. As the vastness of this subject, however, is only equalled by its vagueness, if these considerations are sometimes found to be deficient in precision, it must be remembered that they are only advanced in order to test the direction in which the general current of probability in this matter is flowing. Every oscillation of the needle need not be observed, if only it eventually points with certainty in one direction. § 6. One great section of writers upon miracles employ an argument against the a priori objection to them, which, although its manner of presentation usually admits of im- provement, is nevertheless undoubtedly valid. In the form of an exhaustive statement the argument may be rendered thus: — The whole a priori objection to miracles, so far as it rests on the doctrine of General Laws, goes upon the implied supposition that a miracle, to be such, must be supernatural — i.e.^ a violation of the established Laws of Nature. But this character is not necessary either for the nature, or for the object of a miracle. For the nature is maintained, and the object answered in the same de- M gree, if the miracle is merely superhuman — />., produced by secondary causes to the knowledge of which human experience can never attain. That such a class of secondary causes should exist, may appear more or less improbable, but can never be considered impossible, 3—2 36 CJiristian Prayer and General Laws. without assuming that our knowledge of physical causa- tion is absolute. Now this applies with equal force to the subject of the present Essay, and to develope it will be the object of the first step in the following examination. It must be observed that this first step in our argument is not in- tended Xo prove that such a class of second causes exists ; but merely to shew that it is more or less probable that they may; and, further, that if they do, they must of necessity escape the scrutiny of Science. § 7. He who is most conversant with the natural sciences, either singly or collectively, and with the me- thods of scientific research, will be the man who will most readily admit how limited is the range of our scien- tific knowledge. The fact of the practical results of science having been so numerous and important, added to the fact that the field of scientific research affords the best opportunity for intellectual competition, and so the best background for throwing out into strong relief those individuals who possess the greatest powers of mind — these are the lenses which magnify science in the eyes of the people at large. But the natural philosopher, v/hile he may justly plume the science which he follows on the enormous progress it has recently made, and as justly complain that the uninitiated are unable intelligently to appreciate its amount, is nevertheless conscious that the very training which enables him to value the attainments of science, compels him at the same time to feel, with an intensity impossible to the untrained, how utterly insig- nificant they really are. Considered relatively to former centuries, the dimensions to which science has developed in this are certainly astonishing; but, considered abso- lutely, these dimensions dwindle almost to nothing — serve Christian Prayer and General Laws. 37 but to indicate the magnitude of that which Hes beyond. For every fresh discovery, and every new district that is opened by it for further investigation, while it enlarges the sphere of the Known, still more increases our percep- tion of the magnitude of the Unknown. So that not only is it true that Discovery can never satisfy Inquiry, but, since the sphere of the Inquirable always encloses that of the Discoverable, the increase of the latter entails that of the former, not m a similar degree, but, as it were, in accordance with the law of areas varying as the radius squared. How long this process is to last, it would be foreign to our subject to inquire : we must observe, how- ever, that there is much misapprehension in some quar- ters with regard to this matter. Mr Mill's arguments are irrefutable, and they lead to the conclusion that when all generalizations shall have been merged into the fewest possible number, the latter must still be numerous. To this we should add that, even when all the sciences shall have become purely deductive (if this be possible), al- though the sphere of the Researchable will then, com- paratively speaking, have been filled up, the sphere of the Inquirable will never have been so large. Thus the prime result of scientific investigation is to reveal to ourselves the denseness of our ignorance. So far no one will be more willing to go with us than a man of science. We will now ask him to go with us in the opposite direction. As he acknowledges that the greatest organizations of scientific thought land us in ignorance comparatively total, we will now ask him to reduce those organizations to terms of their ultimate ideas. In each of these, viz., space, time, matter, force, and motion, every reader of modern philosophy will recognize that which is wholly inconceivable. It is not a matter 38 Christian Prayer and General Laws. of knowing or not knowing, of understanding or not understanding; but, in dealing with these ultimate scientific ideas, all alike must acknowledge that they are mere symbols of thought, which must for ever remain utterly unthinkable. From this it follows that the only office of Science is the tracing back of phaenomena to the point at which they emerge from the ocean of the Un- knowable, and the following of their course forward until they are again engulfed by its waters. And if such is the indisputable nature of that which underlies all science, it follows that even what we think we know we do not understand — that all our knowledge, absolutely considered, is merely another phase of our ignorance. " We know phaenomenally and yet, marvellous as it is, we know that we know phaenomenally." We know that our ignorance is great, and yet we know that we know not how ignorant we are. Thus, whether we follow Science upwards to its highest generalizations, or down- wards to its fundamental data, we find it alike embraced by ignorance — a sphere "hung upon nothing," floating in a boundless space of Nescience. § 8. In the last section we have briefly considered what may be termed our objective ignorance of second causes, or ignorance entailed by the nature of the things examined. We shall now briefly consider our sub- jective ignorance of second causes, or ignorance entailed by the nature of our faculties. The one class of con- siderations is, of course, but the obverse aspect of the other ; but it is necessary that we should enter upon it, in order to bring out into a yet stronger relief the profound nature of our ignorance. " Quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis." Nothing can be more evident than that we are entirely Christian Prayer and General Laws. 39 dependent for our knowledge of the Universe upon our five senses : what are the diameters and the directions of these our intellectual apertures ? § 9. We shall first consider the negative aspect of the case. Descartes and Berkeley may be deemed the founders of the doctrine that man, being dependent upon his senses for his information regarding the external world, can know nothing of things as they are in them- selves. The doctrine may be summarized thus : — We can only maintain consciousness in one of two states, viz., either in a state of sensation (including perception), or of reflection. Now the only change that can be pro- duced in consciousness by external objects must be so produced through the medium of the senses ; and, as consciousness can only exist in virtue of a change of states, it follows that external objects can only be repre- sented to the reflective state, by first being presented to the sensational state. Hence, the mind receives nothing from external objects, save the changes in sen- sational states which the latter occasion. But it is evi- dent that these sensational states cannot exist, as such, in the objects themselves — that they are merely sub- jective affections of the percipient mind. Hence, it is utterly impossible for man to know or to conceive of any objective reality as such ; since, before he can be aware even of its existence, the reality must be translated into the appearance, which alone he can appreciate. Now the reasoning so far is incontrovertible, and it may well appear strange how any dispute could have arisen out of it. The fact, however, is, that the confusion of thought upon this subject is not in anywise occasioned by the above considerations, but arises from endowing them with a force they do not possess. Although it is 40 Christian Prayer and General Laws. perfectly true that we cannot know anything in its reality, it is evidently a case of non scqiiitur to suppose that on this account no such reality exists. Whatever basis "material idealism" may have to stand upon, it best consults its own interests by refraining from the endeavour to press this truth into its service. The point then which we have to bear in mind as admitting of no dispute is, that we are precluded by the nature of our faculties from knowing any objective existence, as it is in its substantial reality. This truth has great importance for us at the stage we have now reached. § lo. Let us suppose that any object X is present to our senses, and that its attributes as apparent through their medium to the mind are A^ B, C ; and that the realities corresponding to A, B, C are respectively a, b^ c. Now it is evident that although A, B, and C are each present to consciousness as simple and inde- composable attributes of X, it by no means follows that their corresponding realities are in truth elemental. On the contrary, the groups, ^, rmaybe compounded to any extent in each of its divisions, e.g., thus: a, a, a", a!" \ b, b' ; 6'///^7/ absence of sensation. To this it mav be retorted, — ' It does not follow that because thought is impossible in the absence of sensation, therefore in the presence of sensation thought has no other source from which to draw its ultimate materials.' And this rejoinder would be sufficiently cogent, were we speaking of thought in general, for then our proposition would be incapable of proof Far from this, however, we are only dealing with our ability to apprehend physical phsenomena, and that such ability is wholly dependent upon our sensational states, our hospital reports abun- dantly prove'. iVnd if this is the case, the considerations just advanced seem to justify the belief that our mental faculties themselves are, in their appreciation of things physical, determined with exclusive reference to our animal requirements. No doubt by cultivation in certain directions, by habits of reflection acquired by indi- viduals and ever intensified during transmission, and by the division of intellectual labour ; the human mind has developed its innate faculties to a degree so far excelling that which is required for a mere animal existence, that it might well be supposed to refer to an altogether different order of things, — the animal existence being the adjunct to the mental, rather than the reverse. Never- theless, a difference of degree, however great, does not constitute a difference of kind; and however far the ^ For the psychological condition of a man bom blind and suddenly restored to sight, see Adam Smith's Mctaphysic; anJ External Senses: for that of a person deaf and blind, "Laura Bridgman." Compare also Carpenter's Iliimaii F/;ysiclogy, 7th FaI. p. 61 1, 4—2 52 Christian Prayer and General Laws. human intellect may have succeeded in extending the lines of its initial endowments, it can never alter the nature of these endowments themselves. However un- like the growing organism may be to the germ from which it originated, the former is dependent upon the latter for its substance, its dimensions, and its form. § 15. The conclusions thus arrived at admit of easy confirmation from psychological deductions. Long be- fore the evolution theory was thought of as applying to [)sychology, it was pretty generally recognized by students of the science that objective existence can only be {)erceived by the mind in certain modes relative to our faculties, sensational and intellectual, since objective existence can only be known by the mind "under modifications determined by these faculties themselves \" This general inference, however, it seems to me, admitted of the retort : — How are we to know that the mind is not originally endowed with powers of intuitively appre- hending objective existences in their reality? Some one mode of internal perception must, as it were, have Ijeen chosen by the Deity as the endowment of human intelligence, and is it not, at least, just as probable that that mode is the one which most harmonizes with external realities, as that it should be any other single mode'? ^ Hamilton. 2 It is to be observed that in the absence of the evolution theory this question is unanswerable : it is not, however, on this account formidable. On the contrary, it is feeble to an indefinite degree, because embodying a conjecture which can never be raised even to the lowest stage of probability. All that upon this subject can be legitimately supplied by any system of psychology is, that the mind ''instinctively infers unknown causes from known [because subjective] effects;" but whether or not the inference concerning Christian Prayer and General Laws. 53 As the science of psychology is still, in respect of progress, in its infancy, and the theory of evolution, as distinguished from a mere speculation, not yet a gene- ration old, we need not wonder that opinions may now legitimately vary as to the extent in which that theory affects that science. As, however, many among students of physical science recognize in the evolution theory a proximate, or scientific, explanation of the phsenomena of mind ; and as not a {^\n among students of philosophy subscribe to the belief that "it is this theory alone which furnishes a solution of the controversies between the disciples of Locke a.nd Kant;" it would be a serious omission not to point out in this place how that theory, if accepted, cuts to the root of natural realism, in so far as this is distinguished from cosmothetic idealism of the third order. It does so because it sup- plies the reason why intelligence has, in all its rela- tions to the external world — sensational and otherwise — been moulded to the particular form in which it exists. Hence, if we accept this theory, we cannot, without violating the law of parsimony, look for other causes. The law of intelligence is formulated by the author and master of the philosophy in question as being, " that the strengths of the inner cohesions between psychical states must be proportionate to the persistences of the outer relations symbolized ^" Such being the case, the development of intelligence is " secured by the one simple principle that experience of the outer rela- tions produces inner cohesions, and makes the inner the character, as distinguished from the existence, of these causes is correct, and if so to what degree — these are matters, not of probability, but of opinion. 1 Psychology, Vol. i. p. 439. 54 Christian Prayer and General Laws, cohesions strong in proportion as the outer relations are persistent\" Again, "what do we say of cases in which the inner order does not completely answer to the outer order ? We say that they imply a low degree of intellect, or a limited experience, or but a partial enlightenment. And the disappearance of these dis- crepances between thoughts and facts, we speak of as an advance in intelligence"." If then these are the conditions under which human intelligence has become existent, it follows deductively from the nature of these conditions, that intelligence can never contemplate physical events from other than a single stand-point ; and that this stand-point is deter- mined Avith exclusive reference to our animal necessities. Whatever degree of advance intelligence is destined to make in the future, we may be sure that it can never r!se above its source — can never take cognizance of other relations in its environment than those which pertain, however remotely, to that class under which and by which alone it has been evolved. If there exist any such other relations (and we cannot but suppose that there must), their perception has, as it were, been carefully sifted away from our intelligence, — that class alone being eliminated, as the objects of possible thought, which there was a dire necessity for retaining. § 1 6. It is almost unnecessary to point out that the foregoing considerations have no reference to man's spiritual nature, since whatever view we take of this — whether we consider it as separate from, or as including his animal intelligence, — his moral obligations would be equally unaffected by the proximate source of his intel- 1 Psychology, Vol. I. p. 440. 2 Ibid. p. 410. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 5S iectual faculties. Man would be none the less human were his origin proved to be derivative, nor would conscience be the less supreme even though evolved. All we are now engaged in shewing is, that in the inter- pretation of natural phaenomena we are restricted to the use of intellectual faculties, whose character is determined with reference to our animal wants and not to our mental desires. And just as we appear to have a con- necting link between the sensible and the insensible in magnetism, so we appear to have a similar link between the intelligible and the unintelligible in the interstellar ether. We are bound to think of it as possessing some of the essential properties of matter, and not others: it thus becomes semi-intelligible, because partially op- posed to faculties which refer exclusively to the material order. We might add that in the case of consciousness and the intellectual operations, we happen, as it were by accident, to be acquainted with the existence of a wholly unintelligible order, because, so far as we know or are able to conceive, wholly removed from the material. It thus becomes evident that, even apart from the evolution theory, not only is there probably a region of second causes which is imperceptible, but also that, even could it be perceived, it would probably be uninteUigible. And the easy corollary on the preceding is, that even that which is perceptible is not necessarily intelligible'. 1 This presentation contains and extends that of Sir W. Hamilton. "The relations of knowledge are those which arise from the reciprocal dependence of the subject and the object of thought" [^Lediires, Vol. I. p. 146). " ^ the condition of relatimty be not purified, there results the impossible to thought, that is what may exist but what we are unable to conceive as existing" {Discus- sions, pp. 178, 179). 56 Christian Prayer and General Laws. For if the perceptible and the intelHgible are determined with reference to our animal existence, it follows that the one need only coincide with the other in so far as the coincidence is necessary or desirable for that exist- ence. And this d, priori conclusion is supported by the indisputable couplet of facts before noticed, viz., that whether w^e trace scientific ideas to their source or to their termination, we are alike landed in the domain of the inconceivable. We have, therefore, no warrant for sup- posing that even what our senses are able to perceive, our intellectual faculties are able to appreciate. There may be ultimate scientific ideas of which our intelligence is unable to take cognizance ; and there may be innu- merable combinations amongst the ideas we have, of which, nevertheless, we are unable to conceive. § 17. Most of the foregoing considerations will, no doubt, appear to the man of science to be of little value because of so indefinite a character. He has been accus- tomed in his modes of thought to rigour and exactitude — to believe only so far as he can prove. But to carry this affection of mind into a province which confessedly tran- scends knowledge, is merely to take a dwarfed and nar- row view of the case. No doubt conservatism of thought is most desirable when the subject investigated admits of precision; but where this is not the case, it becomes irrational to close our eyes to probabilities merely be- cause they are not precise. In short, that mode of thought w^hich is the only legitimate one to apply to the knowable, is just the mode of all others the most illegiti- mate when applied to the unknowable. The general conclusions, then, which the foregoing considerations establish, may be thus briefly summarized. Our ignorance of second causes is not only certainly Christian Prayer and General Laws. 57 great, and great to an indefinite degree, but in all proba- bility necessarily so— not only is there certainly an indefi- nitely large tract of second causes unknown, but ni all probability there exist innumerable second causes ni their nature unknowable. " The philosophy of the conditioned proves that things there are which viay, nay must, be true of which the understanding is wholly unable to con- strue to itself the possibihty'." § 1 8. To a mind acquainted with the a priori argu- ment against miracles and the kindred subject we are now considering, the above conclusions will, no doubt, appear beside the question. Fully admitting that our ignorance of second causes is indefinitely great, such a mind will feel that we are, nevertheless, suft^ciently acquainted with them to know that their action is determined by " ada- mantine Law." And to such an extent will such a mind be imbued with this conviction, that it will be irritably intolerant of any suggestion to the contrary. ' As well,' it will be said, ' might we believe with our grandfathers that the geological strata had been purposely interfered with by miraculous agency in order to deceive the im- pious, as brook the idea for a moment that the Reign of Law terminates with human experience. What then is the use of shewing how limited that experience is, so long as it is sufficient to indicate that Reign?' All such statements as these have the appeal to ana- logy at their foundation. It therefore becomes imperative briefly to enunciate the character of analogical arguments. We have already seen that science in making this appeal to analogy has ceased to be scientific ; if, therefore, men of science object to logical enunciations in this matter, 1 Sir W. Hamilton's Discussions, p. 597- 58 Christian Prayer and General Laws. they must remember that they have brought them upon themselves; — if they have quitted their own province, they must expect to encounter the forces of the province they invade. § 19. Analogy is strictly a Aoycovo/xotori^s', or resem- blance of relations. " There is no word, however, that is used more loosely or in a greater variety of senses^" " In ordinary language it has come to mean any resemblance between things which enables us to believe of one what we know of the other ^" Further, there is no mode of argument which admits of such a variety in the degrees of its cogency : "it may amount to nothing, or it may be a perfect and conclusive induction ^" But whatever the sense in which the word analogy may be used, or what- ever degree of cogency arguments founded upon it may possess, the latter must all admit of being reduced (in accordance with the primary conception of the process) to a formula of proportion. " In every analogical argu- ment there must be two ratios, and, of course, two terms in each ratio. The ratios must be distinct, but all four terms need not ; one term may be repeated in each ratio, and so three distinct terms are sufficient. One ratio being better known than the other, serves to explain Thus much as to the essential nature of analogical argu- ments in general being premised, I think no logician will take exception to the following canon : — The argumenta- tive value of any particular analogy, varies inversely as the difference between the ratio known and the ratio un- ' Aristotle. See Whately's Rhetoric, p. 58. ^ Mill, Logic. '^ Jevons, Logic, 226. * Mill, Loiric. 5 Wilkinson. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 59 known ; whetlier this difference consists in the number or in the importance of the relations involved \ Now this is true of all cases, but it will, I think, be further conceded that there are two essentially distinct classes of the un- knoAvn ratio ; one in which its limits are perceived, and the other in which they are not perceived. In cases where they are perceived, the exact value of the analogy can be determined : in cases where they are not per- ceived, the value of the analogy fails in direct proportion to the degree in which such perception fails. For any failure in such perception entails, not only a correspond- ing degree of ignorance as to the amount of difference between the two ratios in respect of their extcjit ; but also an indefinite amount of possibility that the unknown ratio may present a difference from the known in respect of likeness or kind. As these distinctions will subsequently be found of great importance in the general argument, it may be de- sirable to render them more evident by means of an illustration. Let us suppose that a geologist is exploring a newly discovered country, and finds in the first portion of it which he examines a certain complex superposition of strata, which he recognizes as identical with that of another country where he knows this order of superposi- tion to be uninterrupted and universal. If the limits of the country he is exploring are known to him, he will be able to estimate the exact degree of analogical probability there is, as to whether the particular superposition of strata in question is likewise in this case universal. But 1 When this Essay was almost completed, the Author's attention directed itself for the first time to Prof. Bain's canon (see Inductive Logic, page 143). The striking similarity between that canon and the above, is therefore purely unintentional. 6o Christian Prayer and General Laws. if the limits of the country he is exploring are unknown to him, it is manifest that he is, proportionably to his ignorance upon this point, precluded from estimating this analogical probability. And his inability to make this estimation refers, not only to the probable extent of the observed superposition, relative to the size of the whole country; but also to the probable degree in which the rest of the strata differ from the observed portion in character. § 20. Applying then these considerations as to the nature and value of analogical arguments to the case of the scientific appeal to this method, we have first to observe that the analogy instituted is not unassailable even in its known ratio. In other words, we have no warrant to predicate of any Natural Law wdiatever that it is eternal and universal. For the only means we have of ascertaining the existence of any Law, is by observing its operation within the limits of experience. When, there- fore, we pass beyond the jurisdiction, so to speak, of those limits, we are necessarily unable to bring any particular Law to the test of experience ; and consequently we are unable to assert whether or not beyond these limits it is in operation. This view is upheld by Mr Mansel with great ability, who extends it even to the law of causation ; asserting it to be quite possible that beyond experience the sequence of phaenomena may be either independent of all Laws whatever, or be determined by Laws which are continually changing. " We cannot," he says, *' conceive this state of things, but we can suppose it ; and this very inability to conceive a phsenomenon as taking place without a cause — in other words, this sub- jective necessity of the law of cause and effect — results merely from the conditions of our experience." "We Christian Prayei' and General Laws. 6 1 cannot," he continues, " conceive a course of nature without uniform succession, as we cannot conceive a being who sees without eyes, or hears without ears ; because we cannot, under existing circumstances, expe- rience the necessary intuition. But such things may notwithstanding exist ; and under other circumstances, they might become objects of possible conception, the laws of the process of conception remaining un- altered'." It is so rare a thing to hnd the opinions of this author endorsed by Mr Mill, that the eulogy of the latter upon those j\ist set forth is significant. He writes, " This expo- sition, I do not hesitate to say, contains more sound phi- losophy than is to be found on the same subject in all Sir W. Hamilton's writings." Again, in his system of logic, Mr Mill says : " It must be remarked that the reasons for this reliance [/. e., even in the law of causa- tion] do not hold in circumstances unknown to us, and beyond the possible range of our experience. In distant parts of the stellar regions, where the phsenomena may be entirely unlike those with which we are acquainted, it would be folly to affirm confidently that this general law prevails, any more than those special ones which we have found to hold universally on our own planet"." Now it is evident that if we suppose any known Law to be of a merely local or relative application, the whole of the a priori objections which we are considering immediately disintegrate. For, if any one Natural Law is granted to be variable, either in respect of the extent or the manner of its operation ; it becomes impossible to assign the diversity of the effects which may ensue upon its being ^ Prolegomena Logica, p. 149. ^ Logic, Vol. II. p. loS. 62 Christian Prayer and General Laivs. compounded with other and invariable Laws. To take a simple case, let us suppose that there are five invariable Laws which, by their mutual interoperation, are able to produce as many different effects as there are possible permutations amongst themselves ; that is, i2o\ Let us now suppose that a sixth Law is introduced, subject to the same conditions : the possible effects would now be 720. But if the sixth Law varied in only one direction — i, e., with one alternative of action — the possible effects would be 1440. Now each of these new effects, viz., 1440—720 — 720, would themselves become causes of other compounded effects, and so on. No one will be more willing to admit the truth of these considerations than a man of science. They will, however, at first sight, appear to him beside the question ; for, so long as it is admitted (as of course it is) that Natural Laws are relatively invariable, it appears at first sight as though the fact of any LaAv being variable or non- existent beyond experience, could not affect the opera- tion of that Law within experience. That this, however, is not necessarily so, v/e can readily perceive. For, taking the case of variabiHty of action, it is evident that a Law X which is invariably x within experience, but which is indifferently x ox y beyond experience, if as x produces the effects abe... &c., in the one sphere, will also as x produce abe... &c., in the other. As j, however, it will produce the effects a/5y... &c., and these themselves be- coming causes in the remote sphere (whether cf space ^ It is to be observed that Laws differ from Causes. Five in- variable Causes could only produce one effect, but five invariable Laws could produce an indefinite number of effects, the number depending upon the possible diversity of the material and mechanical agents through which the Laws operate. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 6'^ or time), may propagate their influence to the sphere of experience — an influence which, although lost to cog- nizance amid the general intermixture of effects, would none the less produce its full measure of result. I do not urge these considerations as being of much weight ; and, indeed, should not have advanced them at all but for the sake of a symmetrical argument. iVt the same time, it must be added, we have no means of gauging the possibilities or the probabilities in this mat- ter ; so that while different minds are at full argumenta- tive liberty to attach any degree of weight they choose to the italicized word rnay^ no one is at liberty to deem his opinion of more value than an unsubstantiated hypo- thesis. This much, however, we may safely afiirm — if such variability is ever propagated, from no matter how remote a point, into the sphere of experience — such vari- ability must, as we have said, within that sphere produce its full measure of result ; so that, if any Natural Law is not absolutely what it appears to be relatively, it is im- possible for us to estimate the total relative effects of its operation. § 21. We now enter upon a more important and a less mystical portion of our argument, viz., the estimation of the second ratio in the analogy we are considering. It is for the purpose of this estimation that it has been necessary to enter at so great a length into the subject of our ignorance regarding the total operation of second causes. The application of that lengthy discussion to the subject now before us is sufficiently obvious. For, waiving the objection to the first ratio just adduced, and assuming that all Natural Laws with which we are ac- quainted are universal, and absolutely unconditional, it is evident from what has been said upon our ignorance 64 Christian Prayer and General Laws. of second causes, that the unknown ratio is in this case not only certainly of very great extent, but also that it has its limits wholly beyond perception. According then to the canon already laid down, the value of the analogy is not only certainly low, but low to an indefinite degree. And this degree of lowness (whatever it may be) is of the kind which necessitates the presence of an indefinite degree of possibility, that the unknown ratio may differ from the known in likeness or kind. Now, in contradiction to these truths, the scientific appeal to analogy is made with the object of proving, not only that General Laws obtain throughout the entire series of second causes, but also that their character is through- out identical with that which we proximately observe, — that the whole domain of second causes, whatever its extent may be, is precisely the same as that with which we are partially acquainted, and in no wise understand, — that there cannot exist a class of second causes whose operation is (not only other than intelligible, but) other than that class with which experience is thus acquainted, — that the particular interactions among those second causes with which we are thus partially acquainted (and which constitute an indefinitely small portion of the whole), because we have observed them to be true rela- tively to this our limited knowledge, therefore must be true absolutely — cannot be modified by any changes or interactions taking place in the unknown domain of second causes. In other words, this analogy presumes to infer that the Almighty, Whose knowledge of second causes is conceded to be absolute, cannot, without vio- lating their normal course, make them produce any par- ticular effect He may desire ; only because experience shews that we, whose ignorance of their nature and ex- Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 6^ tent is confessed, are unable to perceive the mode in which He could so operate. It is of no avail for ob- jectors to employ the fu quoqiie manner of argument, b)- pointing out that it is as impossible for us to prove that the Almighty does answer Prayer through Natural Law, as it is for them to prove that He does not ; for this onh- leaves the matter in uncertainty, which is the only issue we are contending for. We are not engaged in proving that the Almighty does so answer Prayer, but merely in removing a presumption that He does not. Even, there- fore, were we able dimly to perceive the manner in which He might so answer it — /. ^., the qualities in which the unknowable Laws might be conceived to differ from the knowable — this would not be the place to point them out -. " On the great Postulate of experience we are to accept uncontradicted experience as true. But where there has been no experience we can believe nothing. We are not obliged to show that a thing is not; the burden lies upon whoever maintains that the thing is"." To sum up. If our knowledge of physical causation were absolute, we might be able to show some necessarv reason why the Almighty does not answer Prayer through the normal course of Natural Law : as it is, the proba- bility established is low in proportion to the degree in which our knowledge is removed from being absolute — /. ^., in proportion to the weakness of the analogy. Did we ^ See chap. V. ^ Prof. Bain no doubt intends this as a statement of the ante- cedent improbability attaching to the occurrence of miracles ; and it is a beautifully concise and perfectly true statement of the case. Scientifically the fact of such occurrence is hopelessly uncertain : but it does not follow that this uncertainty cannot for this reason admit of being dispelled on other grounds. See chap. iv. § 19. Prof. Bain, Inductive Logic, p. 152. R. 5 Christian Prayer and General Laws. know the precise distance by which it is thus removed — /. e., the degree of that weakness — we might be able to measure the amount of the probabiUty : as it is, our abihty to institute this measurement decreases in pro- portion to our inabihty to estimate our ignorance. § 2 2. A candid opponent will here observe : — ' These arguments certainly establish the position that a class of unknowable second causes must in all likelihood be supposed to exist ; and that as these must, to a greater or less extent, influence the known class, thus far it is not improbable that numerous, and necessarily unintelligible, though strictly normal changes, taking place in the imperceptible class, might produce effects in the perceptible, which would correctly be deemed miraculous. But this, after all, is not the real question at issue. Freely admitting that an unknowable class of second causes exists, we must yet believe that their inter-operations are governed by Laws as unconditional and as incapable of caprice, as are the Laws which pre- side over the known class. It is doubtless true that the analogy by which we infer that the Reign of Law beyond experience is precisely similar to the Reign of Law within experience, is essentially a case of ' enumeratio simplex ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria,' and so per- ceptibly a very feeble one — more especially as it has been pointed out that if 'a lower rule of working' is ever ' superseded by a higher,' the fact must purposely be hidden from our cognizance; — and it is also doubt- lessly true that this analogy is yet more feeble to an indefinite, because an imperceptible, degree. But it would be a great mistake to suppose that the analogy is really as weak as it is thus represented to be; for the strength of this analogy is derived, not from a mere Christian Prayer ami General Laws, 6j observation of cases within experience, but from the transcendental probability that Nature is everywhere uniform. Although, therefore, as a mere analogy, it is a case of simple enumeration, it is at the same time a pledge assuring us of the mode of universal causa- tion; and in the presence of this pledge thus afforded by experience, we must refuse to believe that ' strictly normal changes' taking place beyond experience, can 'produce miraculous effects' within experience, unless it can be shewn that the transcendental probability ou which we rely is a delusion and a snare. All, there- fore, that the foregoing considerations do is to remove the question a stage further back. This question is more ultimate, and admits of being briefly stated thus : — Is the Divine method of physical Government constant, whether conducted through the mediation of known, unknown, or unknowable Laws?' This statement of the case serves to introduce us to the second division of our argument. It will be observed from what has been said in the last section, that the only meaning which can attach to the word " constant " in this statement is, constant in accordance with our ideas of constancy ; so that the question may be more cor- rectly presented thus : — Does our conception of Natural Law afford an infallible index of the method of Divine Government, taken as a whole? In entering upon this new division of our subject, it will not be forgotten that the conclusion to which the now closing division has, it would appear, unavoidably led, is, that in so far as any objection to miracles and the like is founded 07iiy upon the observed nature of known Laws, apart from any meta- physical considerations as to the method of the Divine Government considered as a whole, and the means we 5—2 6S CJiristimi Prayer ajid General Lazvs. possess of estimating this, so far must such objections be deemed, to a certainly great, and a further indefinite degree, valueless. The importance of this conclusion will not be under- valued by those conversant with the literature of this and kindred subjects. It practically nullifies the scientific objections to Prayer in the cruder forms of their presenta- tion. No doubt all such forms of presentation are dimly supposed to refer to the more ultimate question, if, indeed, the subject of the former is not confusedly fancied, in some way or other, to include the latter. No two sub- jects, however, can be more widely distinct — the one forming but an indefinitely limited portion of the other ; and it is for the sake of throwing this distinction into the strongest possible light, that the arrangement of the pre- sent Essay has been adopted. All arguments, then, founded upon the bare ground of physical knowledge, however imposing their superficial aspect may appear, are in reahty indefinitely unstable, since from the nature of the present case we must dig into the stiff soil of metaphysics, before an argument of any kind in support of the scientific proposition can be established. Let us then apply ourselves to this work, for the purpose of showing that the arguments in support of that proposition admit of a yet further reduction in the degree of their stability. CHAPTER III. § I, What are the relations subsisting between the Almighty and His Creation ? We have first the relation of cause to effect— a relation which in ordinary cases admits of no more uUimate reduction. In the present instance, however, w^e have as a datum something more than an ordinary cause ; we have the First Cause. Now the idea of a First Cause, although necessary, is derivative. It is necessary, in order to terminate in a thinkable man- ner the sequence of cause and effect, which surrounds and permeates experience; but it is derived from that very sequence which it endeavours to end. I am aware that in making this assertion I am touching upon a moot point in philosophy, and one which it would be foreign to the purpose in hand to discuss. I have, however, merely given my view as to the origin of the idea in question, in order to shew that this view is not incompatible with the statement immediately to be adduced. To those w^ho hold the opposite opinion, viz., that the idea of a First Cause is a primary intuition, the following statement will appear self-evident. This statement is, that prime causa- tion differs from secondary in kind. That this must be so, even upon the derivation hypothesis, is manifest ; for the mere fact of that hypothesis instituting a resting-place in the sequence at all, shews that it postulates a differ- ence in kind between the influence of the First, and that JO Christian Prayer and General Lazvs, of all other causes. Some writers bave endeavovtred to draw a distinction between causation as a necessary- inference from action, and as a necessary inference fronn existence ; alleging that the former is tlie true ground of the conception in question — existence " not requiring to be accounted for in the same way that material action is." Now, we have nothing to do with this question heyond stating that, even upon this view, the above state- ment remains unaffected ; since, upon the one doctrine, action becomes as essential an instance of cause and effect, as existence is upon the other. We may aiTive at the same conclusion thus : — Did i\\(i two orders of causative influence differ from one another in degree only, they must differ in a j^i-actically infinite degree, (since the influence of the First Cause ex- tends through all the lines of second causes, and these are practically infinite in number and direction,) and a practically infinite difference in degree is, to finite minds, identical with a difference in kind. Lastly, it may be shewn that the very mention of the First Cause as an existence, is contingent upon the sup- ]:)Osition that it is an influence sui generis. For this cause must be self-existent, while all other causes are derived : but the self-existent cause must differ from all originated causes, not in degree only, but in kind. " Between the (n-eating and the created, there must be a distinction transcending any of the distinctions existing between different divisions of the created. That which is un- caused cannot be assimilated to that which is caused : the two being, in the very naming, antithetically op- posed \" Now these are no mere meaningless mysticisms — ^ Spencer. Christian Prayer and General Laws, 71 they belong to the very essence of the term we are con- sidering :—^>., the term cannot be employed without carrying with it the conclusion they contain. We may, if we like, altogether refuse to think of the First Cause; but, if we think of it, in the very act of framing our idea, we of necessity assume that it differs from all else m character and kind. § 2. When we impose the limitation of intelligence upon the First Cause, we open up a field of numerous, complex, and indefinite relations; for these are not merely such as subsist generally between the conscious and the unconscious, the intelligent and the non-intelli- gent, the subject and the object. In this case the un- conscious has no being apart from the conscious— the object exists within and is sustained by the subject. In short, when we impose this limitation and conceive of the Origin of Things, no longer in the aspect of a mindless Cause, but in that of a Deity; the relations between the causing and the caused become utteriy inconceivable, although, as we must suppose, unutterably numerous. § 3. Philosophy no less than theology compels us to predicate infinity as an attribute of the Unconditioned. Now the genus infinity contains, when ascribed to the Deity, the species with which we are more intimateh- concerned,-the attribute of Omnipotence. The relations introduced by this further ascription are of great import- ance to the present argument. The term nai/TOKparwp is expounded by Barrow' as presenting five ideas, viz., that of authority over all things (omnipotestas), power to effect all things (ommpo- tentia), actual exercise of such authority and power (omnipotentatus), possession of all things (omnitenentia) i Sermon XI. J 2 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. and the upholding of all things (omnicontinentia). Pear- son more concisely generalizes these meanings, in accord- ance with the etymology of the word, as containing two ideas, viz., that of universal power, and that of universal rule. The first of these establishes an unthinkable rela- tionship, which, nevertheless, must be deemed an actual one, viz., that of potential Creator to the non-existent ; "God's actual dominion being no otherwise necessary, than upon supposition of a precedent act of creation \" Kant divides the conception of nothing into four parts". The first of these is, " Empty conception without an object" — i.e., an intelligibly possible, though non- existent entity: the second is, " Empty object of a con- ception " — i.e., "a conception of the absence of an object '!' the third is, " Empty intuition wdthout ob- ject" — i.e., a mere form of intuition, which is itself no object, such as space or time: the fourth is, "Empty object without conception" — i.e., "the object of a con- ception which is self-contradictory," and therefore im- possible. It is only with the first and last of these divi- sions that we are concerned : — with the first, because an Omnipotent Creator must be able at any moment to con- vert an " empty conception " into its corresponding "object:" with the last, because even an Omnipotent Creator cannot effect contradictories : — " Deus propterea qucedam non potest, quia omnipotens est." In both cases, however, it must be observed that our faculties are inadequate to decide as to what is or is not possible or congruous to the Deity. " God cannot do things which are really contradictory, but He can reconcile things which may seem to us to be contradictory." We must, ^ Pearson. " See Critique of Pure Reason, Bohn's Trans, p. 208. Christian Prayer and General Laivs. yi therefore, for the present exceptional purpose, add two other divisions, viz., Empty, and to our faculties incon- ceivable, object of a conception ; and, Empty, and to our faculties inconceivable, object without conception. The former of these may be of great importance in the rela- tion we are now considering : the latter can be of no importance whatever. No doubt these considerations will appear of so abstract a character as scarcely to merit attention, and they would not have been adduced had they not lain so directly in our path. Nevertheless, it must appear that the relation of an Intelligent and Almighty Cause to an infinity of potential effects, may be of all relations the most profound. We now turn to the other relation implied by the term Almighty, viz., that of Omnipotent Ruler to the Ruled. As this is the relation which the whole of the present Essay is more or less engaged in considering, it is needless in this place to do much more than men- tion it. It must be observed, however, that this relation includes the attributes ascribed to the Deity by Scrip- ture, — not necessarily, indeed, as ascribed, for the ascrip- tion is confessedly adapted to human intelligence ; but as presenting in the language of human ideas the most faithful possible designation of their symbolized realities. § 4. I have now briefly enumerated all the relations which are known to subsist between the Almighty and the Universe; or, more correctly, all such relations as are necessarily implied by the mention of the former. My object in doing so has been to render yet more con- spicuous the immeasurable extent of our ignorance con- cerning those which remain. We are thus indeed shown to possess a knowledge of a few relations, as it were 74 Christian Prayer and General Laws. m the abstract ; but, on examination, these will be found to serve only as torches to reveal the immensity of the surrounding darkness. None of these abstract relations supply us with any real knowledge concerning what may be termed the effective ones : they serve only, like the ideas of space and time, as the formal conditions of an endless number of possible concretes. " Lo, these are part of His ways ] but how little a portion is heard of Him ! Canst thou by searching find out God ? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell ; what canst thou know?" Now this fact — the fact that our ignorance concerning these relations is inconceivably immeasurable — being of vital importance to the present argument, it is desirable clearly to understand the position which the objections we are considering occupy with regard to it. § 5. The scientific proposition asserts that a Being, Who is acknowledged to stand to the World in the rela- tions just set forth, never produces a certain class of effects. Now such an assertion can only rest upon one or more of three grounds : — either, proximately, because experience shews that He does not ; or, ultimately, be- cause we have reason to believe that such is not His intention ; or, intermediately, because we have reason to believe that some obstacle prevents Him. Now the first of these grounds must be excluded, unless the defenders of the proposition can show some reason why we should expect this causative influence to be taken cognizance of by our experience, supposing that influence to be exerted. That they cannot do this, while, on the contrary, it can be shewn that there is a necessary reason why such influ- ence, if exerted, should be hidden from experience, we Christian Prayer a7id General Laivs. 75 have already seen. Similarly we have seen that the se- cond ground must be excluded, science having no voice in questions which involve the ultimate volitions of the Deity. We come then to the third ground as the sole and only one on which the scientific proposition is founded. And this is the issue which a thoughtful op- ponent will not hesitate to accept. He will perceive that the whole of the present question arises from the sup- posed existence of such an impediment — the existence of General Laws. He will further perceive that it does not signify, for the purposes of the present discussion, whe- ther this impediment is ultimately supposed to exist in- dependently of the Divine will, or in accordance with it ; that is, whether or not this third ground of objection merges into the second one : for, whether in reality it does so or not, the proposition under consideration is, as we have seen, by its nature precluded from estimating the fact. We may therefore in this place, without any prejudice to that proposition, assume that its sense amounts to this : — The Government of the World by General Laws is to the Deity an obstacle, which effectually prevents his answering Prayer, supposing Him desirous of doing so. Now in estimating the ability or inability of any agent to accomplish any definite action, it is surely a sound canon that the value of our estimation decreases in direct proportion to the decrease in the sufficiency of our knowledge, concerning the whole of the relations sub- sisting between the agent and the patient. Therefore, if our knowledge of these relations is such as to acquaint us with the existence of an apparent preventive to any course of action we may be considering, the probability that this apparent preventive is an actual one varies '/6 Christian Prayer and General Laws. inversely as the difference between the number and im- portance of the relations known, and those of the rela- tions unknown. And, just as in the case of analogical arguments, those instances in which the exact limits of the unknown relations are perceived, afford an oppor- tunity for estimating the exact value of this probability ; while, in cases where those limits are not perceived, the possibility of making this estimation — or, which is the same thing, the probability of its being accurate when made — varies directly as the possibility of perceiving those limits. If it is not self-evident that this canon is valid, we shall most easily perceive it to be so by taking any case in which our ignorance of the relations involved is en- tailed by their futurity; for a little thought will then render it obvious, that it is only because of the truths set forth in this canon that prediction is more fallible than perception. A merchant, for instance, of the last genera- tion might well have deemed it a priori incredible, that his firm in London should ever be able to purchase stock in New York in less time than it could then purchase it in Liverpool. It would so appear because he knew all the relations then subsisting between his firm and New York ; and he knew that one of these relations was an intervening ocean, which it took six or seven weeks to cross ; and he knew that other of these relations were such, that stock could only be purchased by communica- tion conveyed in a material form. Yet the introduction of a single new relation has now rendered perceptible that which was previously incredible. § 6. Applying then this canon, the argument stands thus : — We have already seen that science has no voice in the question as to whether or not the First Cause has Christian Prayer and General Laws. 'jj an intelligent regard for man, or a desire to answer his petitions : if we suppose such regard to exist, the effect of this canon is to prove that science, if it is to sustain its universal proposition, must shew some reason why the Almighty should not be able, without violating the course of Nature, to produce any particular physical effect in answer to Prayer, not, observe, as before pointed out, through the agency of unknown causes, but even through known or strictly analogous ones\ But, by the terms of the canon, science is necessarily unable to do this, in the same degree that it is unable to perceive the totality of relations subsisting between the Almighty and the Universe. In other words, as we previously saw that the probability established by the scientific objections, de- creased in exact proportion to our ignorance of second causes ; so we now perceive that this probability yet fur- ther decreases, in exact proportion to our ignorance of the relations subsisting between the First and second causes — always supposing the former to act exclusively through the whole course of the latter. § 7, I have presented this second division of our argument in its most concrete form, in order that it may be clearly apprehended. It is to be observed that this presentation goes deeper, and includes that which is usu- ally given in arguments to prove that the Deity may pro- duce miraculous effects, &c., through the operation of known Laws. The usual presentation virtually amounts to drawing an analogy between human directive influ- ence and the Supreme Directive Influence — in supposing the Deity to stand to Law in the same relation as we ^ It will, of course, be observed that this argument throughout applies both to known and unknown causes; but the former alone are considered in order to shew the full strenjrth of the argument. 78 Christian Prayer and General Laws. might imagine an immensely advanced human inteUi- gence to stand to it. Now this presentation, for reasons afterwards to be mentioned, is thoroughly valid, and has the advantage of being easily understood. The present, however, appears to me to be the fundamental statement of the case, since it is not legitimate to confine the pos- sible relations of the Supreme Intelligence to Law by any known relations, however extended. In giving this presentation it is unnecessary to burden it with details ; for these would not only be incompatible with the reasonable limits of an Essay, but would carry us into an abstruseness that would be undesirable. It is, however, necessary to expand and explain the general presentation already given. § 8. At first sight, then, it may seem that the notion of "impediment" contained in that presentation is not strictly fair to the scientific position. " It is not for me,"' the supporter of this position may urge, "to limit the out-goings of Almighty power ^ :" ' I do not say what He can or cannot do ; I merely assert that if He answers Prayer, He must do so in some other way than through the operation of knowai Laws.' This proposition, how- ever, and every other possible proposition of the kind, is tantamount to saying that the Almighty cannot answer Prayer in the mode indicated — is merely another verbal form of asserting that, so far as this mode is concerned, an effectual impediment exists. Now what is the w^arrant for this assertion ? A man of science will doubtless answer: — 'The warrant is con- veyed by the very mention of the term " General Laws ;" for the only meaning of that term is that the production of particular effects through their agency is impossible.' 1 Tyndall. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 79 Impossible, however, to whom ? We cannot say to the Almighty, without assuming a complete knowledge re- garding those very relations, of our total ignorance of which we are now treating. That the production of particular effects — particular, that is, as having a special reference to the petitioner — through General Laws is to us impossible ; and that the production of such effects by the operation of second causes of any kind upon other second causes is perhaps Hkewise impossible — these are points which in this place, for the sake of perspicuity, we may readily concede. Their concession, however, does not help us one step towards deciding the wholly distinct question now in dispute. Our life-long familiarity with General Laws (let us suppose) renders it hard to imagine that there can be a Being, 1\'hose rela- lation to them is such that He produces indifterently special or general — or even, let us say, few or many — effects through their agency; but it is evident that we can only assert the contrary, by virtually if not avowedly instituting a supposed similarity between the relations of the Almighty to the Universe, and the relations of second causes to each other. § 9. We thus discover the presence of a new and totally distinct analogy, which, though less upon the surface, is no less essential to the maintenance of the scientific proposition, than is the one already examined. We have seen that the value of our estimation as to what the Almighty can or cannot effect through the agency of known or analogous Laws, varies inversely as our igno- rance of the relations subsisting between the Almighty and the Universe ; and we have seen that this ignorance is, as to positive information, worse than total. There- fore science, to have any pretence of a standing-ground 8o Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. at all, is compelled to fall back upon that from which all her ideas of causation are derived ; and, first, considering the relations in which known second causes (ourselves included) stand to General Laws, she then assumes an identity, or a similarity of relations to subsist between these and the First Cause. Otherwise there would plainly be no room for argument at all ; for, if no such analogy is supposed to exist, our ignorance of the last- named relations would then be avowedly total; and, General Laws being thus conceded to be in these rela- tions a wholly undefinable entity, the question as to what the Deity could or could not effect through their agency, would become wholly beyond the power of reason to infer. Therefore, even if science could prove to demon- stration that Natural Law is throughout its extent such as we know it, it would still remain for science to prove that some likeness subsists between the mode in which the operation of the First and that of second causes is conducted, — so far at least as General Laws are con- cerned. Hence, as we previously saw that the value of the scientific proposition decreased in proportion to the weakness of the former analogy; so we now perceive that this proposition depends for its existence upon its success in establishing the present analogy. Let us estimate its value. § ID. We have already seen that, so far as we can argue upon such a subject at all, we have every reason to suppose that prime causation differs from secondary in kind. Now this fact is at the outset a serious objection to the present analogy, even were that analogy in other respects unexceptionable. It may be true that the argu- ments which substantiate this fact are of a mystical and Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 8i merely logical nature; but, as they are the only argu- ments available, the conclusion to which they tend must in all reason be accepted. Hence it follows that we cannot reasonably institute any analogy between the causative action of the Deity and that of other causes — cannot, from our knowledge of the latter, frame a shadow of logical probability as to what the former can or cannot effect through their agency. Laying this objection aside, however, and supposing that we are unable to shev/ that prime causation differs in any wise from secondary ; supposing even that we are unable to infer this, and consequently that the analogy has been fairly and logically instituted ; we shall see that even as an analogy it is intrinsically of the weakest pos- sible kind. When dealing with the nature of analogical arguments in general, it was pointed out that the greater the number of unknown relations in proportion to the known, the weaker these arguments were. More recently we have seen that of all relations concerning which it is pos- sible for man to think, the most unknowable and the most inconceivable, both in their nature and their mag- nitude, are those relations which constitute the unknown ratio of the present analogy. And this a posteriori con- clusion admits of easy confirmation a priori^ since it is evident that these relations must ultimately embody all things whatever which are to man unknown or unknow- able. Hence it is certainly not too much to say, that the present analogy is of the weakest possible kind. It may serve to intensify our appreciation of this fact, if we look at the matter in another light. All causes with which we are acquainted, however much they may differ from one another, agree in this — their action is R- 6 82 Christian Prayer and General Laws. determined by General Laws. Now it is this fact, and this fact alone, it appears to me, which renders all analo- gical reasoning whatever, not only valid, but possible. The savage who witnesses the daily recession and advance of the tide, and has heard from his fathers and forefathers that within their experience no exception to the phaenomenon has ever been observed, does not dream of the possibility that to-morrow's tide will not occur. Why is this? Simply because his own expe- rience and that of his forefathers has been formed within a region of General Laws. For whatever view we take as to the origin of human intelligence, the mere fact of its existing adaptation to surrounding conditions warrants us in assuming the truth of the evolution theory, as an illustration, if not an explanation, of the present point \ "When, then, intelligence became nascent, it encountered in all its relations the influence of General Laws ; and, throughout its development never escaping from that influence, became perfectly conformable to it. The rational faculty of the savage, then, having from its very origin been moulded by the operation of General Laws in external nature, and these General Laws having in- variably brought about similar results in similar cases ; it follows that all his rational faculty has to do in order to obtain a practically valid inference, is empirically to register the concomitants attending past phaenomena, and to anticipate the reappearance of the same phaeno- mena whenever the same concomitants arise. Thus it is that, although he may never have speculated upon the cause of the tide (and had he done so his conclusions would certainly have been erroneous), yet this makes no difference in the confidence with which he awaits its 1 See note at end of this section. CJiristiait Prayer and General Laivs. 83 recurrence ; for his whole experience, and the whole experience of intelligence before him, has uninterruptedly gone to shew that the mere fact of previous occurrence warrants an expectation of future recurrence, in a degree proportionate to the number of observations — and this solely because throughout the history of intelligence the same General Laws have been uninterruptedly in opera- tion. And, without examples, it is evident that these considerations apply equally to phagnomena of co-exist- ence, as to those of sequence. When we ascend a stage higher in the intellectual scale, we perceive the spirit of methodical investigation into the causes of phaenomena taking its rise. Civilized man is not content with a mere observation of facts ; he aspires to know the Why, and this not (as satisfies the barbarous) a merely conceivably or apparently probable Why, but the only possible Why: he is satisfied with nothing short of proof. Now, when the intellect thus '' climbs from the region of facts to that of lawsV' the confidence with which it awaits the recurrence of the phaenomena which it has explained is greatly intensified. In cases such as that of the tide, where the sequence is uninterrupted for an indefinite number of times, the expectation of its recurrence is, no doubt, for all prac- tical purposes, as strong in the savage as in the civilized man : but not so theoretically; for althou?:h the latter in common with tiie former " shares the belief that sum- mer will succeed spring, that winter will succeed autumn','' yet "he knows still further that this succession besides being permanent is, under the circumstances, necessary ; that the gravitating force exerted between the sun and a revolving sphere with its axis inclined to the plane of 1 Tyndall, Fragments, p. 56. ^ jn^^ p_ g., 6—:: 84 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. its orbit, 7Jiiist produce the observed succession of the seasons \" But the only reason why in such cases the empirical expectation (so to speak) is, even for practical purposes, as strong as the rational one, is because the General Laws at work — either from the fact of their being uncompounded with other Laws, or from the fact that the observable effects of their operation are frequently re- current — admit of the effects being empirically registered. In exact proportion, however, as the causes become com- plex, or the observable results rare or irregular, in that proportion does the empirical register fail^ and conse- quently the strength of the expectation formed upon it. Not so, however, with the rational expectation ; for this, being independent of empirical observations, is able to declare with certainty the effects Avhich must follow from known causes : instance an astronomer who awaits the occurrence of an eclipse with the same certainty as he does the recurrence of the seasons. But now let us ask, how does civilized man attain to this superior knowledge ? Assuredly in every case by analogical reasoning. He first observes, as the savage observes, the effects of un- known causes ; and then by discovery of the latter, rises from a mere observation to an explanation of the former. But this process — the great process of induction — would be impossible were it not for the ubiquitous influence of General Laws. It is only because in every case we postulate their underlying presence, that it becomes pos- sible for the mind to infer, that because the effects A and B resemble each other more or less, therefore there is a proportionable probability that a relation of common causality exists between them. And this inference would in every case be a certainty, were it not for the com- 1 Ibid. p. 6^. CJiristian Prayer and General Laivs. 8 plexity of the causes which are in most cases at work. We thus observe that, from its lowest to its highest deve- lopment, the perception of the value of analogy ultimately rests upon that from which it is derived — the Government of the Universe by General Laws. It is not, of course, necessary to the validity of any analogical argument that this its ultimate derivation should be perceived ; but it is none the less the real foundation of all \ It profits nothing to say, in opposition to this view, that the idea of analogy rests more ultimately upon that of the Unity of God ; because the only means we have of forming that more ultimate idea is by our proximate experience of the action of General Laws ; as is proved by the fact that primitive religions recognize no such unity. The fallacy, therefore, of arguing from the action of General Laws to the action of that which transcends them, becomes thus strikingly apparent. For it is simply to apply a derivative mode of argument to that which transcends that from which it was derived. It would be sufficiently illogical, because "infinitely precarious V to institute an analogy between the action of one Natural ^ It will be observed that upon the evokition theory we have here, it seems to me, a full and adequate explanation of the fact that "the principle by whidi we are disposed to extend our inference be- yond the liinit of experience, is a natural or ultimate principle of intelligence." (Sir William Hamilton's Lectures, Vol. iv. page i66.) From this fact (whatever be its explanation) there arises the over- powering tendency in our intelligence — noticed somewhere by Bain — to believe that what exists here and now, exists everywhere and always. This tendency should constantly be borne in mind by those who reason upon such subjects as the present; for it must evidently be pernicious, and the yielding to it irrational, in proportion to our recedure from the experiential order of things. 2 Butler. S6 Christian Prayer and General Lazus. Law and that of another — such, for instance, as that be- cause the planets travel in orbital curves in obedience to the Law of gravitation, therefore the heat and light radiated from their surfaces, and which are independent of that Law, should also move in orbital curves. But illogical as this obviously is, because glaringly opposed to common sense, it is not so fundamentally illogical as endeavouring to institute an analogy between the action of Natural Law — a sphere of action from which the idea of analogy alone arises, and in which alone it must ter- minate^ — and the action of that which in transcending Natural Law also transcends that sphered § IT. Thus the value of this analogy is virtually ;//// yet upon this analogy depends the whole weight of the probability we are estimating, ' But is it not simply unthinkable/ our imaginary opponent will urge, 'that ^ That is, of course, onl)'- so far as General Laws are concerned. Analogies such as that on which Butler's treatise is founded—?', e.^ analogies depending, not on the presupposition of invariable Laws, but on that of the unity of the Divine Nature — we are not now concerned with. ^ It is to be obsei-ved that even the the supposition of the idea of analogy being intuitive to specially-created man, does not materially affect the above argument; for it is from that supposition impossible to infer that analogical arguments are of any validity when applied to a sphere transcending General Laws. It is so because all that the supposition can possibly entitle us to assert is, that in this particular our intelligence has been originally endowed Avith a method of thought relative to General Laws, which is exactly suited to the sphere of existence in which it is placed; — cannot entitle us to infer that on this account there is no sphere of existence possible in which this intuitive method would not apply. On either supposition, therefore, the fact of our adaptation to our environment is all that we are supplied with, and in neither case can this fact afford any shadow of inferential probability, that analogical reasoning of this kind is of any validity beyond the sphere of General Laws. CJiristiaii Prayer and General Lazvs. >/ action of any kind should take place through General Laws v/ithout the production of general effects ?' Let us suppose that it is so, and how does this affect the ques- tion? It merely shews that the matter has now been carried into an unthinkable province j and this through no fault of the analysis, but because the proposition which it examines refers directly to that province. All, therefore, that it is incumbent on the present argument to shew is, not that the action of the First Cause is thinkable, not even that it is not such as the scientific proposition assumes it to be; but merely, and on the contrary, that such action being altogether unthinkable, that proposition is for this very reason invalid, presuming as it does to limit that action by the measure of the thinkable. Hence, the supporter of that proposition only weakens his argument, by again pointing out the fact that one of the ratios of its essential analogy is not merely indefinite, but also inconceivable. § 12. But now let us ask parenthetically. Is it true that such action is altogether inconceivable? I say " parenthetically,'' because it would be no disparagement to the present argument if the case were an inconceivable one ; since, as just observed, the very basis of that argu- ment is, that the relation of the Almighty to General Laws is not conceivable. If then we can shew, in no matter how small a degree, that the proposition itself is not altogether true, — /. e.^ that in this particular it is not altogether unthinkable that the action of the First Cause should be such as that proposition condemns as wholly unthinkable, — we shall have done more than the present argument requires. If we endeavour to symbolize in thought a universal cause which includes all effects whatever — i.e.. all other 88 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. causes as its effects, — and likewise the Laws according to which these causes act ; it v.ould seem that, unless we suppose this universal cause itself subject to a Law de- termining the channels, as it were, in which its causative activity is to flow, we must suppose that the production of one series of effects is as easy, so to speak, as the production of any other series, — confusion being in all cases equally avoided by the existence of General Laws, w^iich prevent any effects — i.e., any conditioned causes — from interfering with one another so as to produce dis- cord. Now, no series of effects can be considered infinite, without destroying the all-containing nature of their ultimate cause; for the Infinite cannot be itself contained^: but, if any series of effects is limited, there is no more reason against the existence of a special series, than of a series more general. Hence the only question that arises is, as to whether the Supreme Cause is subject to any Law such that it must of necessity act in certain directions, or not at all. The answer of pure logic to this question is clear and decided. " If it con- tains something which imposes such necessities or re- straints, this something must be higher than the First Cause, which is absurd. Thus the First Cause must be in every sense perfect, complete, total : including within 1 '"The inference of a First Cause assumes,' says Kant, 'the impossibility of an infinite ascending series of causes.' The manifest convergence of the various systems of causation which Science exhibits to us, seems to indicate that in the material world at least such a, series does not exist. However far beyond anything that man can ever grasp, that centre lies in which all things meet, it is towards a centre that all his knowledge tends; and indefinitely vast as the stupendous scheme of Nature must be, Infinity is the property not of it, but of its cause."— ^z/rw^j Prize., 1868, p. 34. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 89 itself all power, and transcending all Law\" But, dis- carding logic, is it not as easy, or rather why is it more difficult, to symbolize in thought the origination of a special series of effects, than that of a general ? " All change {i.e., every effect) is possible only through a continuous action of the causality^:" hence, on the supposition of a First Cause, the origination and continuance of one series of changes, although these may be conceived as less usual, are not a whit more essentially unthinkable, than those of any other series whatever. But the ob- jection that the answering of Prayer through known Laws is inconceivable, requires to its validity as an ob- jection, not merely that the origination of any series of effects should be inconceivable, but that the origination of a special series should be inore inconceivable than that of a general, — it being a necessary belief that " God is as universally the final as the efficient cause of His operations""." The truth appears to be that the real place at which the inconceivable in this matter should be posited, is in the hypothesis of a Self-existing Cause producing all series of eftects whatever; there being, as we have just seen, nothing more intrinsically unthinkable in the existence of a special series of effects than in that of a general; and the only difterence is that that of the former at first sight appears to be more so, in consequence of the originating agency (which imparts to each alike its unthinkable nature) being here directly referred to, while in the other case it is but tacitly assumed. But the real diffi- culty is not so much to conceive of this or that class of effects originating, as it is to conceive of any class of 1 Spencer, First Principles, p. 33. ^ Kant. 2 Pearson. 90 Christian Prayer and General Laws. effects originating, — to conceive of an Intelligence stand- ing in such relation to the Universe that all other causes whatever are but the effects of its Will. § 13. To conclude this division of our subject. It is a fo^vourite argument against the credibility of miracles, etc., that *' there is not the slightest analogy between an unknown or inexplicable phenomenon, and a supposed suspension of a known law.... Arbitrary interposition is wholly different in kind," etc. ^ Nov/, there is mani- festly no argument in such statements at all, unless it is assumed that a miracle does entail the suspension of a known Law; and our warrant for this assumption is the subject at present in dispute. How do we know, how can we know that a miracle (supposing it to occur) " is wholly different in kind," with regard to its causation, from any other phenomenon, whether unknown, inex- plicable, or otherwise"? All our knowledge and all our ideas of causation are only and can only be derived from the relation in which observed second causes stand to observed Laws; but once let us overstep the limits of second causes, and we must enter a province where we must suppose that General Laws encounter other and wholly new relations, — /.^., relations of which not only can we have no direct knowledge, but which even ana- logical inference is unable to touch. Yet, once admit that our ignorance of these relations is absolute, and, ^ Essays and Reviews, pp. 109, no. ^ It will of course be perceived that these remarks do not lend any countenance to the silly argument often met with, viz., that because some natural phaenomena are inexplicable, therefore some analogy exists between them and miracles. I have even heard it stated under the dome of St Paul's, that the fact of Christ turning water into wine is no more difficult of acceptance, than the fact of water becoming grape-juice in the cells of the grape ! Christian Prayer a? id General Laivs. 91 even were our knowledge of second causes no less ab- solute, and were the First Cause proved in all cases to act through the whole course of Natural Law; it follows that we should have no warrant whatever for supposing that the First Cause, in so acting, cannot in any case work a miracle, or produce effects having a special re- ference to Prayer. In the face of such ignorance as this, it is arbitrary assumption to speak of "arbitrary interpositions," if this term is meant to signify any difference in the Divine method of action absolutely considered; that is, considered in relation to the Deity as distinguished from ourselves. It is arbitrary assump- tion because, for ought we can know or even infer, the ultimate relations encountered by General Laws may be such that all effects whatever (including those we are specially considering), are finally due to the same method of the prime directive Power. " Since the mon- archy of the universe is a dominion unlimited in extent, and everlasting in duration, the general system of it must necessarily be quite beyond comprehension. And, since there appears such a subordination and reference of the several parts to each other, as to constitute it properly one administration or government, we cannot have a thorough knowledge of any part without knowing the whole. This surely should convince us that we are much less competent judges of the very small part which comes under our notice in this world than we are apt to imagine'." In a word, once admit that our ignorance of the relations we are considering is total, and it becomes impossible for us to assign limits to the causative ability of the Supreme Intelligence, acting through the agency of Law. 1 Butler, Ignorance of Man. 92 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. It is no doubt difficult, especially at first, and more difficult to some minds than others, to imagine that a miracle can really be precisely assimilated to other effects of the Divine influence; but v/e must all re- member that this difficulty is only what we should in any case expect to encounter. For, whether or not the relations subsisting between the Deity and His creation are such that all effects whatever stand in the same re- lation to His superintendence; we should alike expect, from our total ignorance of these relations, to find our- selves unable, either to anticipate the possible number of apparently different kinds of effects, prior to obser- vation; or, subsequent to observation, to conceive of the manner in which these relations can be similar. Thus it is manifestly absurd to declare that the Almighty cannot produce this and that effect through this and that agency, merely on the ground that we cannot ourselves so produce it, or conceive of the manner in which it could be so produced. A priori reasoning is a reasoning from cause to effect, and is assuredly a most powerful engine of thought, when we possess some reasonable amount of knowledge concerning the former in its re- lation to the latter: but when the cause is a free and inscrutable Intelligence, whose relation to its effects contains all that is to man unknown and unknowable, — then assuredly the substance of such reasoning evaporates ; and we are left to supply the void with any belief, conceivable or inconceivable, which there may be independent and adequate reason to accept. CHx\PTER IV. § I. Thus, the double appeal to analogy which is necessary for the very existence of the proposition we are considering, renders the probability we are estimating not only certainly very low, but lov/ to an exceedingly indehnite degree. Yet low as we have seen that pro- bability to be, we have not seen how low it is. For, the considerations recently adduced to shew our total ignorance concerning — nay, our utter inability even to conceive, the relations subsisting between the Almighty and the Universe, — these considerations clearly shew how completely unwarrantable is the supposition upon which we have hitherto been going, viz., that the Almighty in every case acts through the whole course of Natural Lav,^ Even if Science could render the probability as high as we have seen it to be low, that the Almighty can only answer Prayer through Law by violating Law, — even if Science were able to prove this to demonstration, it would still remain for Science to shew that the Almighty is under some necessity to act in obedience to certain rules. I am aware that in entering upon this division of our subject, I am taking up a position which many of the leading writers in support of miracles have abandoned. 94 CJiristian Prayer and General Lazus. The fact of their having done so, however, appears to me an error to be regretted, rather than an example to be followed. It is most certainly the first duty of an advocate for miracles, to shew that it is a gratuitous proposition, beyond proof and even inference, to assert that the Deity cannot produce such and such an effect through the agency of Law ; but it is none the less clearly his duty not to concede even the outposts of his general argument, unless he has thoroughly examined the full intrinsic meaning and all the logical consequences of the adverse argument. I am far from denying that this adverse arg-ument does, in this particular, at first sight appear overwhelming ; but I conceive that this fact only renders a penetrating scrutiny into its essential value the more imperative. By way then of indicating the direction in which such scrutiny should lie, we shall continue our examination into the value of the scientific proposition. § 2. In accordance with the law of excluded middle, we may make the following exhaustive proposition : — Either the Almighty does or does not in all cases act through the vvhole course of Natural Law\ If we suppose that He does, our supposition, in so far as it is rational, must rest on one or both of two grounds ; — either because universal experience testifies that He does, or because a priori considerations render it im- probable that He does not. Now, as repeatedly shewn, the first of these grounds must be carefully excluded, because, whatever weight any arguments founded upon it may be supposed to possess in the case of miracles, such arguments are, in the present connection, absolutely ^ The supposition that Law is self-acting is considered in § ir. Christian Prayer and Gcjicral Laws. 95 nulP. Thus we may at once dismiss all considerations founded on the uniformity of experience. § 3. Nevertheless, it is desirable to notice in pass- ing, that the essentially invalid nature of this class of objections is habitually disregarded by the majority of writers upon the present subject ; arguments being ad- duced of great apparent plausibility, which are, never- theless, wholly valueless, because resting upon this false foundation. As an example of this numerous and mis- leading class, we may notice the following, which is perhaps the most conspicuous. It is said, — " E.eligious men do not pray for eternal sunshine or for physical immortality. Why? Simply because they recognise that such v/ould be contrary to the will of God, as ra'caled in the laivs of external nature, and it rests with them to prove that one single physical event may validly be excluded from the list of the predetermined, before they call on us to pray with reference to it"." Again, "by degrees we learn to include all that seems at first sight anomalous within the majestic sweep of predetermined law. And is it not in exact proportion to our ignorance of what is fixed, that we make it the subject of our petitions^? " Evidently so, but not neces- sarily for the reason given in the former quotation. Our ignorance on this point is the measure of our inabiUty to appreciate the causative action of God : the faith, 1 The d priori argument against miracles is composed of two factors, I St, the improbability that a Natural Law should be suspended, and 2dly, the iinprobability that an otherwise uniform experience should be interrupted. These two factors are far from identical; and it is with the former only that we are concerned. 2 Rev. Mr Knight, Conteinp. Rev. Jan. 1873. 3 Ibid. g6 Christian Prayer and General Laivs. therefore, which sees independent reasons for the cessa- tion of that action within the sphere of the miraculous, and yet beUeves that it is not on this account in total abeyance, can only be consistent with itself by making the degree of its ignorance the measure of the legitimacy of its petitions. "This argument is against common sense, and is obviously founded on the assumption that the reasonableness or unreasonableness of a petition has no bearing whatever upon the possibility of its being granted'." "It is our conviction as to God's will, not any doubt as to His power, or His willingness in itself, to listen to our petition, which sets the limit to what we ask of Him in prayer^" In short, we must "pray with the spirit," but "with the understanding also;" and in the " moral sphere," no less than in the " physical," there are numerous miraculous manifestations of Divine power, which, although conceivable and even desirable, a religious man would nevertheless rightly deem it impious to pray for. Thus, so far as the objection refers to miracles only, it is manifestly absurd. There is, however, another subject touched upon by implication in the above extracts, and expanded by the anonymous writer in the Contemporary Review^ with whose uncourteous jargon we must all regret to see Prof Tyndall's name associated. This writer ironically divides " the realm " " of the natural and invariable order" from that of "the provi- dential," and adds, " Thus it is that class I. grows larger day by day, while class II. diminishes in like proportion. Where shall this progress stop^?" etc., indicating through- 1 Argyll, Contemp. Rev. Feb. 1873, p. 468. " Karslake, Theory of Prayer, p. 32. 3 Contemp. Rez>. Oct. 187-2. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 97 out his argument that the objecdon we have just con- sidered necessarily embodies, or is identical with, the wholly distinct question as to the value of Prayer ignorantly uttered, for things which are seen by a more advanced intelligence to be impossible or inexpedient. This question we shall subsequently have occasion to discuss, and it has only been mentioned here in order to eliminate it from the other with which it has been confused. § 4. We now revert to the a priori considerations in support of the supposition that the Almighty in every case operates mediately through the entire course of Natural Law. Now it does not devolve upon us to state these considerations, for the attitude we adopt towards them is, that the subject to which they refer is altogether beyond the range of philosophical discus- sion. All these a priori arguments must ultimately ground upon experience ; and, no matter how elaborate or admirably constructed they may be, they are, as arguments, valueless; for they refer to a province which is wholly beyond experience. As, then, the present endeavour is to cut away the very ground on which alone all such arguments can rest — i.e.^ to shew that experience is in this matter empty of authority — it would manifestly be a mere waste of time to refute these arguments separately. § 5. As this endeavour will, no doubt, be at the outset considered by opponents over-bold, I have the less compunction in presenting the strongest conceivable case. Before stating it, however, we may observe that throughout the coming argument we are not endeavour- ing to prove, or even to render it in the lowest degree probable, that the Almighty ever acts externally to Law ; R. 7 98 CJiristian Prayer and General Laws. but merely to shew that we have, and can have, no warrant to assert, or to infer, that He does not. Hence, the only position we are contending for, is, that the question is one which must ever remain in argumentative abeyance. Turning now to the case referred to, there is pro- bably no single proposition that can be propounded, which would appear to a man of science at first sight so extravagant or incredible, as that a physical effect can exist out of relation to other physical effects. Yet, if we allow that we have no right to assume the existence of any analogy between the causative influence of the First, and that of other causes ; by what right can we assert that isolated effects do not exist? If no such analogy obtains, we have no means of even approxi- mately conceiving of the manner in which the First Cause operates, and it becomes a gratuitous assumption to assert that this cause can only produce any single effect, by producing at the same time a variety of other effects. That the production of a multiplicity of effects is the condition of human activity, is axiomatic ; and it is, perhaps, scarcely less so, that throughout the range of second causes, the production of a multiplicity of effects is the condition of all activity whatever. But when we have said this, we have said all we can — we are unable, in the absence of analogy, to assert anything farther, or to infer anything more. A man of science will say : — ' But it is simply in- credible that physical effects can exist wholly out of relation to all other physical effects.' But is this true ? Is this supposition as to the existence of isolated effects a supposition intrinsically incredible, or is it not rendered so only by the super-added belief in the operation of Christian Prayer and Gencj^al Laws. 99 General Laws ? I think the answer is afforded without investigation, by the fact set forth in the opening section, viz., that prior to the behef in General Laws, all effects whatever were beheved to be more or less independent of one another \ ' But now that we possess the addi- tional belief,' it will be urged, ' the whole aspect of the case is altered : superior knowledge has shewn incredible that which superstition believed.' But the word " in- credible'" here tacitly appeals to the analogy which, as we have seen, we have no right to institute. It may be highly improbable that General Laws in any of their relations admit of the existence of isolated effects — that is, effects out of relation to all other effects, and, consequently, out of relation to these Laws, — but we cannot assert that this is incredible, without assuming an inferential knowledge of all these relations. Indeed, the assumption amounts to more than this; for, as we have just seen, there is nothing intrinsically incredible in the supposition that the Ahnighty may produce isolated effects, were it not for the existence of General Laws. Before, then, this existence can be considered an insupe7'able obstacle to the production of effects out of relation to General Laws,— /.d, before such production can be considered iftcredible — it is necessary to p^vve a 1 By this is not, of course, meant that physical causation was not appreciated in ancient, or even in primitive times ; but merely that all physical phsenomena being referred more or less immediately to the Divine agency, the necessity on the one hand of a proximate cause, and on the other of a commensurate effect, was not recog- nized : — hence the easy belief in supernatural manifestations. '■^ This word is here, of course, used in the sense of "being fully persuaded that some opinion is not true," and not in the sense of "a mere absence of belief" from **the insufficiency of proof."— Mill. 7—2 loo Christian Prayer and General Laws. knowledge of all the relations which are encountered by General Laws ; and, by parity of reasoning, whatever degree of improbahility that existence may be supposed to impart to the possibility of such production, that degree must be exactly equal to, because solely deter- mined by, the strength of the analogy before mentioned — this being the only other source of knowledge avail- able. § 6. We see, then, that there is nothing incredible in the supposition that isolated effects may exist in Nature. "But," it is retorted, "no physical fact can be conceived as unique, or without analogy and relation to others, and to the whole system of natural causes'." If by this statement is meant that we are unable to conceive of such effects, as it were in the concrete, I am perfectly willing to admit it ; for it is a mere truism to say that we cannot correctly represent that which we have never seen. But, if the word " conceive " is here meant to imply conception of such entities, as it were in the abstract, I meet the assertion with a flat denial. Mr Herbert Spencer devotes his chapter on the " multipHcation of effects" chiefly to prove the proposi- tion, that "universally the effect is more complex than the cause." Now this proposition is certainly true so far as it goes, but it is only one side of the truth ; for the proposition would be equally true were its terms reversed. Every effect is the resultant, not of a single cause (although one cause may be more conspicuous than the others), but of an indefinite number of past causes, just as it will be a cause of an indefinite number of future effects. If we take any one of Mr Spencer's ^ Ess'.'-ys and Ri-'ziaus, p. 142. Christian Prayer and General Laws, loi illustrations we shall find that it applies equally well to the converse proposition— the burning of a candle, for instance, being quite as much the effect of innumer- able causes, as it is the cause of innumerable effects. There is one case, however, in which the above-quoted formula is most true, viz., in that of the First Cause ; for this includes all other causes as its effects. Now, why is it inconceivable that this all-containing and all- generating cause, can only produce effects which are conformable to rules, themselves ordained by that cause ? We have already seen that there is nothing intrinsically beyond conception in the idea of isolated effects existing in Nature, were it not for the existence of General Laws : but if vv-e look upon General Laws as themselves but the directive channels appointed by the Creator, in which some conditioned causes are invariably to flow, it does not follow that all conditional causes must invariably flow in such channels— that those causes which do thus flow exhaust the causative influence of the Being who originated both them and their channels. Suppose the First Cause had only produced one effect : it is manifest that this could never have become a cause, and so could never have been subject to a Law determining its causative action. Suppose now the effects to have been dual instead of singular : does it follow that these must necessarily have stood in any immediate relation of causality to one another— that they could not have co-existed without producing a miniature universe of inter-operating causes ? If not, by what right do we assert that plural efl"ects cannot co-exist without such immediate inter-relation : or, which is the same thmg, by what right do we assert that in the Universe, as it at present exists, the First Cause cannot originate a single I02 Christian Pt^ayer and General Laws. effect like its only effect just imagined — i.e., an effect out of relation to all other effects ? It appears to me that we have no right whatever, and that the only reason why the idea seems at first sight an inconceivable one, is because we confiase the notion of Cause with that of Law. To us, no doubt, every cause must exist under laws ; but, unless we identify Law with Cause, we can establish no necessity why every cause whatever should so exist — i.e., why the First Cause cannot produce any effects, without simultaneously framing rules under which they are to act as causes. § 7. I say we cannot establish any such necessity : I think another class of considerations will shew that we cannot even establish a probability. This conclusion has indeed been previously arrived at by implication in the closing sentence of section 5^ \ but the following confirmations are worth giving, for they arrive at the conclusion by wholly different routes. We have already seen that it is only because of the existence of General Laws that the process of induction is possible. Now all knowledge, save the so-called intuitive, is ultimately derived from induction : hence, in the absence of General Laws, all such knowledge would be impossible. This fact alone is amply sufficient for our argument ; but, more than this, even the so- called intuitive knowledge is, according to the evolution theory, ultimately derived from the action of General Laws — is but the stereotyped adaptation of the race's intelligence to its environment : hence, upon this theory, even intuitive knowledge would, in the absence of General Laws, have been impossible. But these two ^ " The strength of the Analogy" having previously been shewn "virtually nil." Christian Prayer and Gejteral Laws. 103 kinds of knowledge are together the sole factors of experience : hence, in the absence of General Laws, our experience itself would vanish. I find that Kant has also arrived at this conclusion, although, of course, by a different route. He argues thus : — " Accordingly, when we know in experience that something happens, we always pre-suppose that some- thing precedes, whereupon it follows in conformity with a rule. For otherwise I could not say of the object, that it follows ; because the mere succession in my apprehension, if it be not determined by a rule in relation to something preceding, does not authorize succession in the object. Only, therefore, in reference to a rule, according to which phaenomena are determined in their sequence, that is, as they happen, by the pre- ceding state, can I make my subjective synthesis (of apprehension) objective, and it is only under this pre- supposition that even the experience of an event is possible \" Lastly, psychological deduction warrants the same conclusion. For we are able to think only in relations : if, therefore, any effect exists out of relation to other effects, not only is it of necessity insensible (because standing out of relation to our sense organs), but it is also of necessity, as a concrete, unthinkable. Now it has already been shewn that there is nothing essentially or abstractedly inconceivable in the supposi- tion that isolated effects may exist ; and we have just seen that if they do they must of necessity be imper- ceptible : we are hence deprived of all data for estimating the probability as to whether they do or do not. The relations in which General Laws stand to the Law-giver 1 Critique^ p. 146. 104 Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. may or may not be such as to admit of effects standing altogether out of relation to all other effects; but whether these relations do or do not admit of such effects, and whether, if they do, such effects exist, — these are questions concerning which not only are we ignorant, but as to which we are of necessity unable to distinguish even a shadow of probability. § 8. Now the case of isolated effects is, as before observed, the strongest which it is possible to imagine. If then we admit, as the foregoing considerations appear to compel us, that the question as to whether or not such effects exist — or, which is much the same thing, whether or not they can exist, — is a question altogether beyond the jurisdiction of experience to decide ; it necessarily follows that experience is wholly precluded from adjudicating upon the alternative proposition we are now considering. For, if any effect can exist out of relation to General Laws, it necessarily follows that, if at any point this insulation is broken, and the unrelated effect enters the domain of General Laws, at that point a new cause is introduced — the Almighty may not have operated through the whole course of Natural Law. And, if the existence of even an insulated effect — /. e., an effect perpetually out of relation to all General Laws — cannot be shewn improbable ; neither can an effect introduced, as it were, into the current of General Laws at any determinate point, be shewn improbable. For, until so introduced, it must be imperceptible ; and, after being introduced, its influence must be normal. True it is that its introduction may be rendered conspicuous by giving rise to startling phtenomena — i.e., to a miracle; but we have no reason to suppose that this conspicuity would be a necessary attendant on Christian Prayer and General Laws. 105 such introduction. On the contrary, so far as we can argue upon such a transcendental subject at all, it appears that, if such introduction ever takes place, it would, according to the doctrine of chances, be more likely to be inconspicuous. For by far the greater number of sequences are, from the composition of causes at work, and the multiplicity of effects produced, obscured, within a very short distance from their per- ceptible outcome. Hence, the chances are that the introduction of a foreign cause would be imperceptible, not only on account of the fact just stated, but also because from this fact it follows, that a smaller degree of potency in the new cause would be required in a case where its operation is imperceptible, than in a case where it is perceptible ; for, in most cases at least, according to the doctrine of chances, a smaller amount of potency properly directed would be required to occasion a given resultant in the case of a complex system of inter-operating effects, than in the case of a simple ; for, not only would the number of points at which the new cause might be introduced be thus augmented, and so a corresponding number of additional chances afforded for a suitable coalescence with some member of the system ; but also the proximity, which, in the case of a perceptible introduction, is a necessary condition, would, in the case we are considering, be unnecessary ; and hence an indefinite amount of oppor- tunity would be afforded for the new cause to acquire momentum, so to speak, by its accumulating influence in the system through which it would have to descend. § 9. A man of science will here exclaim, 'This is mere mysticism. Look for a moment at the other side, and behold the contrast ! The grandest generalization io6 Christian Prayer and General Laws, which human intellect has ever achieved is the recogni- tion of Law. This is the key that has unlocked the mysteries of Nature, — this is the doctrine which has infused harmony of action and unity of principle through- out the Universe. Shall we discard it merely for the sake of a few mystical conceptions, which would never have been seriously entertained but in support of a desperate cause? From the nature of the case it is impossible to demonstrate that the Almighty operates in every conceivable instance through the whole course of Law ; but, if inferential reasoning has any weight in any case, surely in the present case that weight is full. If that which all experience, all science, and all philoso- phy, unite in declaring, not merely the only true, but the only really conceivable mode of action, does not constitute a sufficiently firm basis for an inductive infer- ence, the sooner such argument is expunged from our logic, the better.' Such representations may be multiplied indefinitely, as all who are acquainted with the literature of miracles must be aware. Such representations, however, can only, it seems to me, be made by those who have never honestly considered the whole bearing of the case. As already stated, I believe the question to be of such a character that opinions may legitimately vary concerning the de- gree in which it is improbable that the Almighty should ever suspend a Natural Law ; but I think such variation is only legitimate within comparatively narrow limits — z.t continues: — "No natural species can boast of a more admirably co-ordinated structure, with its tapering head, slim body, deep chest, tucked-up abdomen, rat-like tail, and long mus- cular limbs, all adapted for extreme fleetness, and for running down weak prey." ^ This may not be the case with the dog, and almond. Christian Prayer and General Laivs. 163 viduals (and many other, though less conspicuous, ex- amples might be added) be compared with its wild parent- form, it is not too much to say that, in respect of its influence over type, human intelligence has manifested a power, which in character may be deemed almost creative. Or let us briefly contemplate, in the words of Mr Wallace, the influence of human intelligence over organic life upon a cosmical scale. " I\Ian has not only escaped 'natural selection' himself, but he is actually able to take away some of that power from Nature which before his appearance she universally exercised. We can anticipate the time when the earth will produce only cultivated plants and domestic animals ; when man's selection shall have supplanted 'natural selection;' and when the ocean will be the only domain in which that power can be exerted, which for countless cycles of ages ruled supreme over all the earth \" § II. Now the application of this indisputable fact — the fact that our intelligence is above all things charac- terized by its influence over the natural forces — to the construction of an argument in favour of Prayer, is sufficiently obvious. When we ascribe the attribute of intelligence to the First Cause, we of necessity imply that the quality is similar in kind to our own — otherwise our ascription can possess no meaning. If then our finite intelligence, objectively considered, is pre-eminently characterized by its combining influence over Natural Law, much more must the Infinite Intelligence be so characterized. If the mind of man is able through the agency of mindless Law to produce such vast and varied effects, how inconceivably great and diverse must be the possible effects similarly producible by the Mind of God, 1 Natural Selection, p. 326. II — 2 164 Christian Pi^ayer and General Laivs. supposing this so to operate. We have abeady seen, when treating of our profound ignorance regarding second causes, how necessarily confined our faculties are in their appreciation of cause and effect. We saw that this con- finement is necessitated for two reasons ; — first, because all experience is derived through the senses, and secondly, because the intellectual faculties are, in their appreciation of physical phaenomena, wholly dependent upon experi- ence. We can, however, readily imagine that an intelli- gence similar in kind to our own, but differing im- measurably in degree, and in no wise subject to these hmitations, could, were it so disposed, produce upon a practically illimitable scale special results, in a manner strictly analogous to that by which man produces similar results upon a comparatively limited scale. And not only can we infer this upon general a priori grounds; it seems to follow as a necessary corollary from the hypothesis of an unlimited advance upon human intelligence. For, in accordance with our previously adduced definition of intelligence considered objectively, we perceive that it must be in direct proportion as intelligence increases that its compounding or utilizing influence over Natural Law increases : consequently, so far as experience goes we find this to be strictly true. What is it that essentially distinguishes the actions of the higher animals (both instinctive and rational) from those of the lower, save that the former exhibit a greater variety and complexity in their adaptations to their environment ; and an intel- lectual adaptation to external forces is, objectively con- sidered, a guidance of these forces'. Again, what is it 1 e.g.^ the dam of a Beaver is a case of an intellectual adaptation by that animal to its environment, but obversely it is a utilization of the gravitating force of the stream, etc. Christian Prayer and General Laws. 165 that distinguishes the intellectual operations of man, objectively considered, from those of the higher animals, similarly considered, save that those of the former display higher artistic powers than those of the latter? Lastly, the progress of human intellect, whether of the individual or of the species, is, objectively considered, but the increase of its ability to combine the natural forces with ever-advancing degrees of number and complexity. To these considerations, founded ujDon the hmited nature of our intellectual faculties, we must now add, that so far as our own directive as distinguished from our appreciative ability is concerned, we are limited not only by a want of knowledge, but also by a want of power. Our intelligence can only act upon Natural Laws through the medium of our corporeal substance, and this being, proportionably to the masses and magnitudes of the matter and forces in Nature, infinitesimal in quantity, human agency, cosmically considered, is utterly swamped. Yet this is the result, not so much of a deficiency in the intellectual or appreciative power — i. e., the power of perceiving what ought to be done in order to produce a desired result, — as of a deficiency in the operative power, arising from the inadequacy of the material agent through which that power must of necessity be conducted. Human intelligence then, in its influence over Law, is limited in two directions — by a deficiency in know- ledge, and by a deficiency in power. In neither of these directions can we suppose any limitation to obtain in the Supreme Intelligence. Consequently, it becomes impossible for human intelligence to predicate the number and kinds of the special results which it is possible for the Final Directive Influence to produce, through the purposive combination of Natural Laws. 1 66 Christian Prayer and General Laws. § 12. There are only two objections to which the present argument is h!able\ It may be said: 'It is unfair to institute an analogy between the directive influence of the mind of man and the directive in- fluence of the Mind of God, for while that of the former is itself comprised within the domain of Nature, that of the latter transcends it.' We here touch upon the question as to the freedom of the will ; a question which is not only altogether extraneous to our present subject, but one which, even were it included, we should not require to consider. For even if we fully admit that the human will is not and cannot be free, in the sense of being exempt from Law, and so at liberty to frame its own desires, — this does not make any difference in the nature of the will's activity. Whatever we may suppose the origin of our desires to be, this does not affect the character of the results to which they give rise, and it is these results with which alone we are 1 For the sake of brevity I abstain from discussing a confirma- tion of this argument, which is deducible from Metaphysics. It may, however, be mentioned. Metaphysicians are agreed that the idea of cause is derived from the sense of effort — whether of body or mind is immaterial — which we experience when we originate any series of effects ; so that, were it not for such originating power in man, he could have no conception either of Cause or of Law. But, on the Theistic hypothesis, all causation is due to the Divine Will. Hence, on this hypothesis, the very idea of Cause and of Law is "derived from the agency of man, as the representative of God in this part of the universe Instead of there being a fixed unalterable order of cause and effect in the world, with which nothing can be supposed to interfere, it is from the very fact of there being such interference that the idea of causation as pervading the world of nature is derived." (Rev. W. Karslake, I'heory of Prayer, p. 22) [.874]. Christian Prayer and General Lazvs. 167 concerned \ Indeed this objection is but an intensifica- tion of the present argument. If man's intelHgence is not free, and he is yet able to direct the physical forces to so great an extent, how much more must an in- telligence which is absolutely free, possess a similar directive ability 1 — If human intelligence, altJwvgh forming " a part of Cosmos ^" is able thus to react upon it, much more must the External Intelligence be able so to act. In short, this objection would only be valid if the freedom of the Divine Intelligence could be proved to make it differ from human in kind, and in such kind as to affect its directive influence. As it is, the attribute of freedom only serves to endow that Intelligence with an additional advantage in this respect, because rendering it inde- pendent of all and every Law. It may be further objected that, as the analogy we have instituted between the Divine and human intel- ligence is illegitimate, therefore the conclusion founded upon it must be unfair. But this objection, again, is really an intensification of the present argument. No doubt the analogy referred to would be highly illegitimate, if by it we presumed to infer the whole character of the Divine Intelligence. Far from this, however, the analogy is only framed to include a single attribute of intelligence, which must exist as the condition of any intelligence — or, more correctly, which must form an essential part of that which alone we can conceive as intelligence, — 1 Prof. Tyndall has failed to perceive this obvious distinction. (See his letter to the Pall Mall Gazette, Oct, ii, 1865.) His other objections to this argument — which he allows to be "a strong one," — have no more application to it than to the Theistic theoiy in general. 2 Mr Knight. 1 68 Christian Prayer and General Laws. and which, under any view as to the nature of the Supreme IntelHgence, we are bound to think the latter possesses in the most pre-eminent degree. Further than this the analogy is confessedly absurd', and the fact of its being so constitutes the strength of the present ar- gument. If the human mind can do so much as it does in the way of directing the natural forces, how incon- ceivably immense must be the ability of the Final Directive Intelligence, transcending as it does so immeasurably its mere human analogue, and depending as all things do upon its Prime Directive Influence ! 1 So far, that is, as degrees are concerned. Compare Mr Scott's Essay '' Intellechial Character of the First Cause,'' Part II. § ii. Also Sir W. Hamilton's Lectures, Vol. ii. p. 29. CHAPTER VI. § I. We have now finished our examination of the scientific proposition. The title of this Essay, however, requires that the discussion of our subject should not end with this examination. We have hitherto been engaged in considering the question as to how far it is antecedently improbable that the Almighty should answer Prayer ; and we have seen that this antecedent impro- bability, although to superficial appearance of startling magnitude, is really without substance or solidity. It now devolves upon us to investigate the distinct question, as to whether or not He does answer Prayer ; for, waiving all arguments drawn from antecedent improbability to- gether with their refutation, this subject still remains untouched. The question. Can we believe in the efficacy of Prayer? has been answered in the affirmative, by destroying the supposition that we cannot : but the question. Ought we to believe in such efficacy ? remains to be discussed \ § 2. If the argument from ignorance on which we have throughout relied possesses any validity, it is evident that there is only one source to which we can look for an answer to the question propounded : only ^ G. Warington, Can we believe in Miracles 1 p. 227. 170 CJiristian Prayer and General Lazvs. from a Revelation can we define the utility of Prayer. Nevertheless, there are at least two a priori arguments which, independently of any doctrinal authority, tend to answer this question in the affirmative. Although these arguments are confessedly feeble, they are worth ren- dering because of their indeiDendent character. We have already seen that fore-ordination may be pointed to as an amply conceivable manner in which the Almighty could answer Prayer without violating Law. I think that this argument admits at once of intensifica- tion and of extension thus : — By our fundamental postu- late, the Almighty is the Author both of Nature and Morality; and as on the one hand Christianity is His scheme, and on the other the order of Nature but the expression of His Will, it is from these data a priori probable that in the framing, as it were, of the great conjoint scheme of Nature and Morality, the one should have been fore-ordained to harmonize with the other. ''There must not only be a correlation of physical forces and a correlation of moral forces, but the physical and moral forces must be also mutually correlated ^" Now every petition for physical benefits must be deemed acceptable to the Author of Christianity, for, as we shall subsequently see, whatever view we take on Biblical grounds as to the efficacy of such petitions, there can be no doubt that they are not unchristian. But the con- sideration, that every really Christian Prayer of this kind is acceptable to God, surely intensifies the argument from fore-ordination ; for it carries that argument further than is required — it not only shews that we have a con- ceivable manner in which the Almighty may answer Prayer, but it also establishes an a priori probability ^ Dr Littledale, On the Rationale of Prayer. CJiristian Prayer and General Lazvs. lyi that He does. We have already seen that we cannot suppose the Divine activity to be impeded by its own methods : consequently in the fore-ordination of all things that Will must (so far as we can see) have pro- vided, that every petition acceptable to itself should be so related to the co-existing physical conditions, that the latter should coincide with the former. § 3. The other independent argument alluded to is as follows : — We have already seen that, Natural Law being on the Theistic hypothesis but the synonym of the Divine Will, it follows that so long as this Will remains con- sistent, so long must the sequences occuring in Nature be necessary — otherwise such sequences would cease to be included within the domain of second causes, and so would require, either to become independent entities, or cease altogether to exist. But it is evident that this necessity of sequence obtains only because the Divine Will is consistent — that we cannot argue from this con- ditioned necessity (so to speak), that the Unconditioned Cause is itself under any external necessity to produce any one series of effects rather than another. The ques- tion, however, remains — Is it under any subjective necessity? — How far is it congruous in the Divine Na- ture to answer Prayer with physical equivalents? This question merges into that as to the nature of the Divine attributes ; for on the one hand, it is a contradiction in terms to say that a free will can act in opposition to itself; and on the other, we are precluded from thinking of the Divine Will in this matter as we do of human. For while the attributes of human intelligence are frequently in mutual opposition, to suppose the possibility of a corresponding conflict among the Divine attributes, 1^2 Christian Prayer and General Laivs. would be to mar the perfection of the Divinity, if not to destroy the unity of the First Cause. From these considerations it follows that, so far as Natural Theology supplies any evidence of the Divine Beneficence, so far have we a priori reason for thinking it probable, that the Deity is not indifferent to the peti- tions of His sentient and intelligent creatures ; and there- fore not inactive in granting physical equivalents, whenever such equivalents would really be for the benefit of the petitioner. And the obvious rejoinder that the 7Jiaximum degree of our physical happiness is in every case enjoyed independently of Prayer, is not merely a refined mode of begging the whole question in dispute ; but is an assumption, for making which we can have no warrant whatever. This argument, supplied on a priori grounds by Natural Theology, is greatly intensified when Revelation is accepted as authoritative ; for the general and unde- fined indications of the Divine Beneficence, afforded by Nature, are immensely extended and particularized by Revelation; so that the present argument is correspond- ingly strengthened when supplied with this additional standing-ground. § 4. The principal bearing of Revelation, however, upon our present subject, is not that of affording a prioj'i deductions from the character of the Deity as there declared, but that of supplying didactic information with expressed reference to this subject. It now devolves upon us briefly to investigate this information. The question we are now considering, viz., Ought we to believe in the physical validity of Prayer? manifestly involves the more ultimate one as to the CJiristian Prayer and General Lazvs. 173 authority of Revelation. This more ultimate question, however, is no less manifestly much too extensive for us even cursorily to enter upon. We are then in this posi- tion :^If we reject Revelation, the specific question we are considering lapses : if we accept Revelation, this question remains open for discussion : we are unable to enter upon the argumentative merits presented respec- tively by the two aspects of this alternative : we must therefore for the purposes of our subsequent, as of our previous argument, assume without reserve the truth of Revelation. As we have hitherto been groping our way in the dim obscurity or utter darkness of philosophical speculation, concerning a subject transcending philo- sophical enquiry; we now "give heed'' to Revelation as "to a light shining in a dark place :" as we have hitherto been endeavouring to ascertain the probability regarding the method of the Divine Government in a certain par- ticular from experience alone, we now come for express information to the "oracles of God." Given then a belief in the Divine authority of Scripture, and the field of enquiry now opening to us is one of greater promise than that which we are leaving. § 5. Indeed at first sight it appears as though under this division there were nothing to discuss. To an ordinary reader, the voice of the Bible upon this subject appears so uniform and explicit as not to admit of eva- sion. Again, the Fathers are unanimous in not even being conscious that it is possible to urge any rational or plausible objection to the physical efticacy of Prayer. Lastly, the present authoritative expounders of Scripture, viz., the Christian Churches, are no less unanimous upon this subject than were the Fathers. It appears then, at first sight, as though there were no possibihty of raising 1/4 CJiristian Prayer and General Laws. an objection to Prayer on theological grounds. Yet this has already been done to some extent, and no doubt will be done yet further by subsequent writers. Let us then here make an exhaustive statement of all such objections as it seems possible to raise, with the view of shewing their futility. The argument open to those who feel to conviction the force of the objections raised by Science to Christian Prayer, and who wish to compromise their conviction in this respect with their Christian Faith, runs thus : — ' We must altogether neglect the opinion of the Fathers, because the difficulty was not extant in their time. Similarly, the teaching of the Churches must by Protest- ants be neglected, because, in consequence of the time of their foundation, this teaching is but the reflection of that of the Fathers — so far, at least, as ignorance regard- ing this i^articular difficulty is concerned. We must, therefore, derive our opinions solely from the Scriptures, in accordance with the belief that these are of perennial adaptation to human intelligence, 'Now the objections raised by Science to Prayer are, in their essential nature, identical with those raised by Science to Miracles. But we Protestants all admit that the age of miracles is past; and, although we believe that they, or their equivalents, took place, yet the fact of their having now ceased shews that practically (whether really or not is here immaterial) there is some force in these a priori objections. In other words, it may be doubtful whether or not genuine miracles ever occurred, but there can be no doubt that they never occur now. But the Bible speaks of the physical validity of Prayer in precisely the same terms as it does of miracles, that is, as being among the things which are "not impossible to him that be- Christian Prayer and General Laws. ly^ lieveth." Nay, the two are expressly identified by Christ in at least two passages, viz., " For verily I say unto you. That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea ; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall beheve that those things which he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatso- ever he saith \" Again, " The Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea, and it shall obey you^" Now the fact that miracles, supposing them to have been pre- viously wrought, have now ceased, coupled with the fact that Scripture nowhere predicts their cessation, seems to form on mere Scriptural grounds a strong prima facie case against the efficacy of Prayer. For the hypothetical case is strictly parallel with the demonstrable : in both physical results are involved, and in the same manner ; both are spoken of in Scripture in exactly the same tone ; and the cessation of neither is predicted. The fact, then, that the one class of physical results is at present non- existent, affords a strong indication that the other is likewise so. For the only objection which can be urged against this commentary on Scripture is, that the one class had a special function to serve which the other had not — viz., attestation to Divine authority. But this has not much force, seeing that it is founded on no Scriptural warrant whatever — is merely a somewhat subtly-devised loop-hole to escape from an unpleasant conclusion. Further, nearly all the Apostolic miracles were wrought iti answer to Prayer: hence it is but natural that a confusion should have arisen in the minds of believing writers — they supposing the miracles wrought by them- 1 Mark xii. 23, 24. 2 Luke xviL 6. 176 Christian Prayer and General Latvs. selves to be the result of their petitions ; which at best they can only have been in a very subordinate sense, as shewing the power of a righteous man, — and even this subordinate sense would accord with the function of a miracle. In short, it is easy to see that there was, at the first institution of Christianity, a necessary reason for the success of Apostolic Prayer. But now that the ob- ject of a miracle has confessedly disappeared, it would be gratuitous to suppose that Prayer is still effectual ; for not only, as we have seen, is there no Scriptural war- rant for this supposition ; but even against the objection from function it is easily answered, that this confusion which naturally arose in the Apostles' mind between the function of Prayer and that of a succeeding miracle, is perfectly intelligible ; and, as the occurrence of miracle was the only means they had of estimating the validity of Prayer, not only is their method of identi- fying the one with the other just what we should have expected, but it thus affords us no Scriptural warrant for supposing that Prayer is of any validity apart from the object of a miracle.' § 6. Before commenting on these objections to Prayer, we may notice that they do not refer to any vital feature of the Christian Faith ; and so, if it be true that "there are tens of thousands in Christendom'" who feel these objections an impediment to their faith, such minds may rest satisfied with the above arguments, and find in them a reconciliation between their religious and their scientific beliefs. On us, however, it is incumbent to examine such arguments critically. In the first place it is evident, that the argument as to 1 Mr Knight's Defence before the Presbyteiy of Dundee. News- paper reports. Christian Prayer and Ge7ieral Laws. 177 the confusion aris'.ng in the Apostle's mind between the function of Prayer and that of a succeeding miracle, effectually rejects all proof as to the physical validity of Prayer, so far as this can be deduced from the Apostolic teaching. It would therefore be a needless waste of time to shew the unanimity which pervades the teaching upon this subject, for the fact is not denied by the argument in question. It thus becomes necessary for us to take our stand upon the gospels alone. Before doing so, however, it should be noticed, that the objection which thus ex- cludes Apostolic doctrine embodies a canon of interpreting Scripture in the highest degree dangerous. The epistles contain more of Christian doctrine than do the gospels, so that were the teaching of the former accepted only in so far as it was covered by that of the latter, Christianity would be to a large extent transformed. In making, therefore, this concession to the adverse argument, it must be understood that I do so under protest, and only because I believe that the gospels alone contain its suffi- cient refutation \ § 7. Before beginning with the words of Christ, we may point out a strong negative argument from the fact of His supposed silence. If it is true that the gospels leave the matter in uncertainty, this very fact constitutes a strong priimi facie case in favour of the belief that answers to Prayer are given. For the question in dispute is a question of great practical importance to all Chris- tians, and more especially so to the primitive ones : it materially affects our conceptions as to the relation in 1 For an enumeration of the physically-availing prayers mentioned in the Old Testament, see Dr Hessey's Recent Difficulties on Pi-ayer^ pp. 14 — 32. Exclusive of actual miracles, they amount to thirty cases. R. 12 178 Christian Prayer and General Laivs. which the Deity stands to us ; and has therefore a very direct bearing upon our spiritual culture. For these reasons we should certainly expect a finished Revelation to inform us concerning the uselessness of Prayer for temporal benefits, if such Prayer is really ineffectual. And this reasonable expectation is intensified by the fact, that the subject of Prayer occupies a prominent place in the teaching of Christ — numerous points connected with it, of much less interest and importance than the present one, being minutely developed. Further, Prayer for tem- poral benefits is certainly natural to man, being the necessary consequence of his belief in special providences. If this belief is erroneous^ — or. which is much the same thing, although this belief be well-founded, yet if the superadded belief in the efficacy of Prayer is unwarranted and false — we should expect a finished Revelation to tell us of such falsehood. Instead of this, however, Christ expressly teaches the duty of faith in special providence ; and declares such faith to be a test specially distinguish- ing His followers from the heathen. " Therefore take no thought, saying. What shall we eat? or. What shall we drink? or. Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after these things do the Gentiles (ra IQvt]) seek :) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things." There are numerous other passages to the same efi"ect, but this one has been chosen because there here seems to be an implied reference to Prayer ; for, shortly before and in the same discourse, the concluding phrase of the above quoted passage is employed with an ex- pressed reference to Prayer, and it occurs nowhere else. Also, shortly afterwards the subject of Prayer in con- nection with special providences is resumed. § 8. We now turn to the positive aspect of the case: — Christian Prayer and General Laws. I'jg Is it true that the gospels leave the matter in uncertainty? The first duty devolving upon us is clearly to meet the supposed difficulty, which arises from Christ identifying answers to Prayer with miraculous manifestations. To begin with an examination of the passages relied on, there are three and only three interjDretations open to us of their sense — we may consider them hyberbolical, figura- tive, or literal. The first of these must in fairness be excluded ; for it appears to me, as I think it must appear to all when their attention is directed to the subject, that the language of Christ is preeminently remarkable for the absence of hyperbole. There is likewise no reason to deem these words figurative ; for the context certainly refers to physical results, which, in one case at least, were expressly declared to have been wrought in virtue of Prayer \ We are forced therefore to fall back upon the literal interpretation, as being the only fair rendering of these passages. In doing so, however, it must be ob- served that, although the assurance be taken as literally true, the reservation it contains effectually ensures that the specified examples shall never be hterally accom- plished. For the very purpose with which these examples were adduced, was to shew that the faith of the Aposdes was inadequate to perform miracles requiring (as the implication certainly is) a smaller amount of efficient power, than would be required for the accomplishment of these supposed examples. Much less then can the faith of ordinary men aspire to the accomplishment of such results. To this should be added Alford's commentary on these passages, viz., that "such a state of mind entirely precludes the idea oiarbitrai-y exercise of power" ;" so that even an adequate faith would probably never have oc- 1 Matt. xvii. 21. 2 Greek Test. Matt. xxi. 11. 12 — 2 l8o Christian Prayer ajid General Laivs. casion to exert its influence — the presence of the requisite condition to such exertion being thus of all causes the most certain to prevent it. Why then, it may be asked, were such examples adduced ? The answer is supplied by Alford : — " Though we cannot reach this faith in its fulness, yet every approach to it (ver. 21) shall be endued with some of its wonderful power — in obtaining requests from God\" These examples were given in order to shew that there is nothing too difficult for faith to accomplish, if present in sufficient amount — they are but theoretically possible results, which there is no reason to suppose need ever or will ever be performed. Far, therefore, from grounding any presumption against the efficacy of Prayer, these passages afford it the strongest possible support — they expressly declare that the only reason why Prayer is ever anything other than wholly effectual, is because it does not contain a sufficient amount of the prayerful element ; and they clearly imply that the physical results attainable by Prayer are cominenstirate with the faith of the petitioner. We shall immediately see that both these points are in undisturbed harmony with the rest of Christ's teaching. § 9. It will be sufficient, for the substantiation of the last-mentioned doctrine, to give one or two references. To the centurion, at whose faith "Jesus marvelled," He said, " Go thy way ; and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee." Again, after asking the blind men whether they believed that He was able to restore their sight, Jesus " touched their eyes, saying. According to your faith be it unto you." Lastly, to the woman of Canaan, "Jesus answered and said, O woman great is thy faith : be it unto thee even as thou wilt." 1 Loc. cit. Christian Pi'ayer and General Laws. i8r Turning now to the other doctrine we have to sub- stantiate, we first observe that further on in the discourse from which we deduced both doctrines, the promise occurs : — "Ask, and it shall be given you ; seek, and ye shall find ; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." Now it is highly important to observe that "the only limitation to this promise, which, under various forms, is several times repeated by our Lord, is furnished in vv. 9 — II, and in James iv. 3, atretre kox ov Xa/i-^ai/ere* hiori KaK