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501ST ORDINARY GENERAL

MEETING.

HELD IN THE HOUSE OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF ARTS ON MONDAY, JANUARY 24TH, 1910, AT 4.30 P.M.

PROFESSOR E. HULL, LL.D., F.R.S. (VICE-PRESIDENT),
IN THE CHAIR.

The Minutes of the previous Meeting were read and confirmed, and the following announcements made on behalf of the Council:

The Rev. Canon R. B. Girdlestone, M.A., late Chairman of Council, had been appointed a Vice-President in the place of the late W. H. Hudleston, Esq., F.R.S.

The Rev. Griffith Thomas, D.D., Principal of Wycliffe Hall, Oxford,
had been appointed to a seat on the Council in the place of
Colonel T. H. Hendley, C.I.E., resigned.

Dr. W. A. Shann, of Woking, had been elected an Associate of the
Victoria Institute.

The CHAIRMAN then introduced Professor H. Langhorne Orchard, the author of the subsequent paper and winner of the Gunning Prize 1909. He was certain that all those present would derive the greatest pleasure and assistance from the paper, which he might mention had been placed first in their independent reports by all three of the arbiters appointed to consider the essays submitted for the Gunning Prize, so that at their subsequent meetings the task of recommending the award had not proved a difficult one, though none of them had agreed as to the order of the other excellent essays submitted.

Professor H. LANGHORNE ORCHARD, who was received with great applause, then proceeded to read the following paper :

:

THE ATTITUDE OF SCIENCE TOWARDS MIRACLES. Professor H. LANGHORNE ORCHARD, M.A., B.Sc. (Being the Gunning Prize Essay, 1909.)

By

I. Preliminary.-Definitions; Relations between Science and Miracles; Nature of Scientific Evidence.

II. Miracles in General.-Are they possible? Are they probable? Have miracles actually occurred?

III. The Bible Miracles.

Appendix on miraculous occurrences and "Miracles," other than those recorded in Holy Writ.

I. Preliminary. The aim of the following Essay is to arrive at a conclusion, as definite as possible, with regard to the attitude of Science towards Miracles. It is premised that the attitude of Science may, or may not, be coincident with that of Scientists.

*

We begin by defining our terms. What is Science? What is a Miracle? Science, says Whitney, is "knowledge gained by systematic observation, experiment, and reasoning; knowledge co-ordinated, arranged, and systematized." In the Encyclopaedic Dictionary we read that Science is "co-ordinated, arranged, and systematized" knowledge, and, again, "Science is a systematic species of knowledge which consists of rule and order"; the verb "know" meaning "having experience of," "perceive with certainty." "Science," says Chambers' Encyclopadia, "in its widest significance, is the correlation of all knowledge. To know a truth in its relation to other truths is to know it scientifically." Bouillet† enounces that " on appelle Science soit une connaissance certaine (par opposition à l'opinion, qui n'est que probable), soit un ensemble de connaissances contrôllées et systematisées par l'application d'une méthode." By Huxley Science is regarded as "the knowledge of fact."

*The Century Dictionary. Essay on Universities.

+ Dictionnaire Universel.

These definitions seem to justify the following:-Science is the investigation and study of things and phenomena in nature, with a view to their explanation and correlation in the great order of the universe. In doing this, she seeks to arrange and classify them, for the two-fold purpose of retaining knowledge gained and of employing it as a progressive means to further knowledge.

The

What is a Miracle? Thomas Aquinas* answers:-"Things that are done occasionally by Divine power outside of the usual established order of events are commonly called Miracles. We wonder when we see an effect and do not know the cause. absolutely wonderful is that which has a cause absolutely hidden. Now the cause absolutely hidden to every man is God." Hume says, "Nothing is esteemed a miracle if it ever happen in the common course of nature"; and, in his affirmation that miracles are "violations" of the laws of nature, has the intellectual sympathy of Spinoza.

A better definition is that given by Locket-"A miracle I take to be a sensible operation, which, being above the comprehension of the spectator, and in his opinion contrary to the established course of nature, is taken by men to be Divine." According to the Encyclopaedic Dictionary, a miracle is etymologically "anything which excites wonder, surprise, or astonishment," and it is "a supernatural event or act."

Butler considers that "A Miracle in its very notion, is relative to a course of nature, and implies something different from it, considered as being so." Isaac Taylor calls a miracle "a fragmentary instance of the eternal order of an upper world." Smythe Palmer would define a miracle "as a new effect introduced by a new cause, and that cause the will of God." Other interesting definitions are the following:-" The best idea which we can form of a miracle is that of an event or phenomenon which is fitted to suggest to us the action of a personal spiritual power" (Westcott). Miracles may be defined,'" "provisionally," as "Physical phenomena which are unaccountable by the known laws and processes of nature" (Girdlestone).§ A miracle is "An exception to the observed order of nature brought about by God in order to reveal His will or purpose

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* Summa contra Gentiles.

Analogy, Part ii.

+ Discourse of Miracles.

"The Scriptural Idea of Miracles.”

Institute, vol. xxxix.

Transactions of the Victoria

(Lias). By a miracle (using the word in its strictest sense), we mean a phenomenon which, either in itself or from the circumstances under which it is presented, suggests the immediate working of a personal power producing results not explicable by what we observe in the ordinary course of nature" (Westcott).†

On careful consideration of what is suggested, or implied, by the term "miracle," it is possible that none of the preceding definitions may be held to be adequate or satisfactory. In seeking one that is so, we note that it includes (1) something marvellous, (2) something exceptional, (3) something taking place in nature, (4) something not explicable by natural (or, human) causes, (5) something directly referable to supernatural action.

(1) That the thing is marvellous is affirmed by the name "miracle" (miraculum). (2) It must also be exceptional. The phenomena of the seasons and of day and night, are indeed very wonderful, yet they are not miracles. It has been pointed out that a sudden stoppage of the earth's rotation on her axis would be called a miracle, but we do not apply the term to the rotation, though the rotation is quite as wonderful. (3) A miracle is further thought of as taking place in nature. (4) It is not explicable by natural (or, human) causes. Though it fulfils the previous conditions, yet, if explicable by natural (or, human) causes, it is not a miracle. An eclipse, or the appearance of a new comet is not accounted a miracle; the telephone, the latest Dreadnought, an aeroplane, wireless telegraphy, or anything that man can do, or that any part of "" nature can do, however marvellous, we do not consider classifiable as "miracle." (5) It follows that, since every event must be referable to some cause, and the cause in this case is not a natural (or, human) one, it is supernatural.

46

Hence the following definition, put forward not without diffidence-A miracle is an exceptional marvel in nature, not explicable by natural causes, and therefore directly attributable to a supernatural cause.

*Are Miracles Credible?

+ The Gospel of the Resurrection, 4th Edition, p. 35.

Better thus-A Miracle is an exceptional marvel in nature which, not being explicable by any human or any natural cause, is attributable to some supernatural cause. (See the Author's further reply.)

A miracle is a connecting link between the natural and the supernatural. Speaking of Bible miracles, Trench says that a miracle "is a kind of finger-post of God."

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Relations between science and miracles: Are there in fact any relations? According to the late Archbishop Temple* science can deal only with such materials as are reducible to invariable laws. If any observation made by the senses is not capable of being brought under the laws which are found to govern all other observations, it is not yet brought under the dominion of science." The investigation of any newly observed fact "proceeds on the assumption that nature will be found uniform, and on no other assumption can science proceed at all." He points out that "this assumption of something permanent in things around us comes from the consciousness of something permanent within us. We know our own permanence, whatever else we know or do not know about ourselves, we are sure of our own personal identity through successive periods of life. And as our explanation of things outside begins by classing them with things inside we still continue to ascribe permanence to whatever underlies phenomena even when we have long ceased to ascribe individual wills to any except beings like ourselves. And without this assumption of permanence our whole science would come to the ground." He then goes on to say that experience shows the uniformity of the separate laws of nature, and that "the evidence for the uniformity of nature is the accumulated evidence for all the separate uniformities." With regard to the occurrence of miracle, his conclusion is "science has shown that the vast majority of events are due to derivative action regulated by laws. Here is an event which cannot be so explained any more than the action of our own free will can be so explained." "Science may fairly claim to have shown that miracles, if they happen at all, are exceedingly rare. To demonstrate that they never happen at all is impossible, from the very nature of the evidence on which science rests. But for the same reason science can never in its character of science admit that a miracle has happened. Science can only admit that, so far as the evidence goes, an event has happened which lies outside its province." From this it might be inferred that the present inquiry need proceed no further, that science and miracle are like two travellers, ignorant of and incapable of learning each other's language, who pass each other upon different sides of a

* "Relations between Religion and Science" (Bampton Lectures for 1884). + Ibid.

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