Miracles

The word miracle is from the Latin miraculum “a wonderful thing; a marvel.” But the world is full of wonderful things. Every sunrise, every stick and stone, every living thing, is full of marvels, and the best efforts of scientists and scholars have not unfolded to our view a hundredth of them. We who have minds to recognize the wonders of the universe are dull of wit, and we allow ourselves to grow quickly accustomed to a round of daily and hourly experiences which, taken singly and with attention, would stir our souls with awe, admiration, and loving worship of Almighty God. “The world,” says G.K.C., “will never perish from lack of wonders, but only from lack of wonder.” Think, to press home the point, how great a marvel would be a sunrise if only one such event were recorded in the experience of mankind. There would be libraries about it. Scientific treatises, doctoral theses, imaginative reconstructions, romances in its setting, would fill almost endless bookshelves. And, unquestionably, there would be other libraries, quite as extensive, written by the persons who proclaim themselves cool and levelheaded appraisers of fact ; the agnostics, the skeptics, the whole evil army of “debunkers.” These would prove to exhaustion (in all senses) that the sunrise was a silly fabrication of some ancient joker or gullible rustic; likely enough, it would be attributed to the craftiness of some medieval monk. Of course, the cool and level-headed gentlemen would assure us, it never occurred at all. “Sunrises,” they would say smugly, “simply do not happen.”

Yes, the world is an overwhelming complexity of marvels, But we do not call the world or its marvels by the name of miracle. For miracle means, in our technical use of the world, something not only marvellous but extraordinary. In other words, a miracle is something not in the usual course of nature. Further, a miracle is an event produced (directly or through an instrument) by the power of Almighty God. Finally, a miracle is an event which can be observed in this world of bodies; it is a sensible event. When, for example, God, through the ministry of His ordained representative, causes bread and wine to be changed substantially into the Body and Blood of Christ, we have an overpowering marvel, an extraordinary marvel, and a marvel divinely produced. Yet we do not call this marvel by the name of miracle, since it cannot be observed with bodily eyes. Again, when a soul is pardoned, its sins taken away by the divinely given power of the Sacrament of Penance, there is a change wrought in the soul more startling and more glorious than the raising up of a dead man to life. Yet we do not call this a miracle, for the senses of man have no means of laying hold of it directly. Such a marvel is often called a moral miracle, but this is an extension of the term miracle, and not an employment of the word in strict and proper meaning. For a miracle is, strictly considered, an event in the sensible order.

We may, therefore, define miracle as a marvellous event in the sensible order, outside the usual course of nature, produced by the power of God.

St. Thomas Aquinas (Lib. Sent. II, d. 18) wisely points out the fact that the phrase, “outside the course of nature” means just what it says. This phrase does not mean that a miracle is of rare occurrence; it means that miracles, whether rare or frequent, are not events within the usual course of nature; they are not things which nature includes in her normal processes or, to resort to expressive slang, “takes in her stride.” Thus St. Thomas: “It (a miracle) does not involve rarity of occurrence; it excludes the accustomed course of nature. Therefore, if sight were given to the blind every day, this would still be a miracle, for it would be something beyond the natural course which we recognize as usual in things.”

b) KINDS OF MIRACLES

We may distinguish miracles on the basis of substantial fact, of the subject in which or to which they occur, and of the manner in which they occur.

a) Miracles of substantial fact (miracula quoad substantiam facti) are such divinely produced events as nature and natural forces could in no wise produce or explain. The very event or fact is miraculous. Such a miracle would be, for instance, the simultaneous location of two bodily beings in one and the same place.

a) Miracles of substantial fact (miracula quoad substantiam facti) are such divinely produced events as nature and natural forces could in no wise produce or explain. The very event or fact is miraculous. Such a miracle would be, for instance, the simultaneous location of two bodily beings in one and the same place.

b) Miracles of subject (miracula quoad subjectum) are divinely produced events or effects which could be produced by natural forces but not in the person or thing in which, as a fact, they occur. For the thing or the person in which or to which an effect occurs is called the subject of the occurrence; in a more familiar phrase, the thing or the person is subjected to the process of activity which produces the effect or event. As an example of a miracle of subject, Father Lortie (Elementa Philosophiae Christianae, Vol. II, p. 80; ed. 1929) offers the calling back to life of one dead. “Nature,” he says, “gives life, but not to a corpse.” It is not miraculous for a man to be alive; it is miraculous for a corpse to serve as the subject of life-giving powers.

b) Miracles of subject (miracula quoad subjectum) are divinely produced events or effects which could be produced by natural forces but not in the person or thing in which, as a fact, they occur. For the thing or the person in which or to which an effect occurs is called the subject of the occurrence; in a more familiar phrase, the thing or the person is subjected to the process of activity which produces the effect or event. As an example of a miracle of subject, Father Lortie (Elementa Philosophiae Christianae, Vol. II, p. 80; ed. 1929) offers the calling back to life of one dead. “Nature,” he says, “gives life, but not to a corpse.” It is not miraculous for a man to be alive; it is miraculous for a corpse to serve as the subject of life-giving powers.

c) Miracles of manner or mode (miracula quoad modum) are divinely produced events or effects which could indeed be produced by natural powers but not in the same way as they are miraculously produced. Thus, the sudden healing of an open wound is a miracle of manner. Nature tends to heal wounds, but not instantaneously.

c) Miracles of manner or mode (miracula quoad modum) are divinely produced events or effects which could indeed be produced by natural powers but not in the same way as they are miraculously produced. Thus, the sudden healing of an open wound is a miracle of manner. Nature tends to heal wounds, but not instantaneously.

2. Miracles may be distinguished as above nature, beyond nature, and contrary to nature, or, in other words, as supernatural, preternatural, and contranatural. Of course, all miracles are supernatural in the sense that they are wrought by the power of God. But the present distinction is based upon the remoteness or approximation of the miracle to the course of nature. This distinction of miracles is one that overlaps the triple distinction made above; but it is valuable, in that it gives a new angle, a new “slant,” for the mind which seeks an adequate classification of miraculous events.

a) A miracle is supernatural or above nature when it is an event wholly beyond the powers of nature to produce, whether this be a matter of substantial fact or of the subject in which or to which the miraculous effect is wrought.

a) A miracle is supernatural or above nature when it is an event wholly beyond the powers of nature to produce, whether this be a matter of substantial fact or of the subject in which or to which the miraculous effect is wrought.

b) A miracle is preternatural or beyond nature when it lies in mode or manner outside the usual course of nature.

b) A miracle is preternatural or beyond nature when it lies in mode or manner outside the usual course of nature.

c) A miracle is contra-natural or contrary to nature when it conflicts with the natural tendencies of the subject in which it is done. Thus, as we have elsewhere noticed, the miracle which allowed the Hebrew youths to walk unscathed in the fiery furnace, was not only beyond the natural tendencies and powers of the fire to burn (or of the combustible matter to be burned), but it went flat against these tendencies. Indeed, a miracle contrary to nature seems to have the character of the miraculous on all three counts: substantial fact, subject, and mode.

c) A miracle is contra-natural or contrary to nature when it conflicts with the natural tendencies of the subject in which it is done. Thus, as we have elsewhere noticed, the miracle which allowed the Hebrew youths to walk unscathed in the fiery furnace, was not only beyond the natural tendencies and powers of the fire to burn (or of the combustible matter to be burned), but it went flat against these tendencies. Indeed, a miracle contrary to nature seems to have the character of the miraculous on all three counts: substantial fact, subject, and mode.

c) POSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES

A thing is possible when it can become an actuality; when it can exist or be done. A thing is tntrinsically or metaphysically possible when there is no self-contradiction in the very thought which represents it as an actuality. A thing is extrinsically possible when there exists a power which can cause it to become actual. Of course, such a power always exists when we extend our view of things possible to include the omnipotence of God as well as the powers of nature. A thing intrinsically possible is thus extrinsically possible to God; if it lies within the power of created nature to produce, it is called physically possible; if it lies within the range of human powers when used in the normal way (that is, without extraordinary effort), it is called morally possible. To put the whole matter in other words: A thing that can be thought of as existing,—whether, as a fact, it exists or not, or is ever to exist,—is intrinsically possible. A thing for the actual production of which an adequate cause exists is extrinsically possible. All things intrinsically possible are extrinsically possible to God. Things intrinsically possible which are also extrinsically possible to the powers of created nature are physically possible. Things physically possible which man can produe without unusual and undue effort or sacrifice are morally possible.

Things which are not intrinsically possible cannot be produced at all. This is not saying that the power of God is limited. For what is intrinsically impossible is a contradiction in itself, and amounts to nothing at all. Thus, ‘‘a square circle” is an inconceivable thing; it is not a thing but the denial of a thing ; it means a circle that is not a circle; the terms “square” and “circle” cancel each other. Therefore a square circle is simply a non-entity. Hence when one hears the question, “Can God make a square circle (or any self-contradictory, and hence intrinsically impossible thing) ?” one knows that the answer is, “No, for what you propose as a thing for God’s making is not a thing at all ; it is nothing whatever.”

Here, where we are considering miracles, the question of possibility does not extend to physical and moral possibility at all; for a miracle is, by definition, outside the course of nature (human and nonhuman), and is produced by the power of God. Now, all things that are things, all that have no conflict and contradiction in the very concept by which the mind grasps, or tries to grasp, them, are intrinsically possible, and also extrinsically possible to God. Yet, indirectly, some such thing might be relatively impossible to God; that is, while possible, considered in itself or absolutely, it would be in conflict with God’s wisdom, goodness, justice, or other perfection. Thus, while it would be possible, absolutely speaking, for God to annihilate a human soul, such an action would conflict with the goodness and justice of God, as well as with the divine wisdom (for it would surely not be the work of wisdom to create a spiritual being capable of endless life and naturally desirous of such life, and at the same time to doom it to utter extinction). Hence, annihilation of a soul is absolutely possible, but relatively impossible to God; it is called relatively impossible because its impossibility arises out of its relation to the divine perfections. The technical manner of expressing all this is to say that the annihilation of a soul is possible to God’s absolute power, but not possible to God’s ordinated power, that is, to God’s power as viewed in its essential ordering or relation to the other divine perfections (with which, indeed, it is substantially one and indivisible).

We assert that miracles are intrinsically possible, and by this assertion we mean that miracles are not self-contradictory things which are not even conceivable as actualities. Further, we assert that miracles are extrinsically possible, and this means not only that miracles are possible to God’s absolute power (so much is evident from the fact that miracles are intrinsically possible) but that they are possible to God’s ordinated power as well. In other words, miracles are possible in themselves, and they involve no conflict with God’s perfections.

I. Miracles are intrinsically possible—The intrinsic possibility of miracles is denied by materialists and rationalists. The materialists blindly maintain, in the face of overwhelming evidence against them, that nothing exists but matter, or bodily being, with its connatural powers; hence they are constrained to exclude miracles as self-contradictory, that is, as involving a conflict of matter with itself, since matter would be manifestly not itself but above itself in producing a miraculous effect. The rationalists deny that anything exists or can exist which human reason is incapable of explaining to the full; hence they find miracles self-contradictory as involving supernatural and mysterious power.

We assert that miracles are intrinsically possible. If they were not; if they were intrinsically impossible, so that the very concept of a miracle as an actuality would involve self-contradiction, this state of things would find explanation in one of two reasons, viz., either that the order of nature is absolute and changeless, and so essentially necessary that it can have no exception or derogation; or that the powers of nature are infinite and cannot be exceeded. But neither of these two reasons is verified in fact. We have already seen that the order of nature is not essential or necessary, but contingent. And we learned in our very first lessons in cosmology that the world of bodies is necessarily finite; and what is finite in being is esentially finite in its powers. Hence it is not true that the order of nature is absolute, essential, necessary, changeless ; nor is it true that the powers of nature are infinite. It follows that the concept of miracles involves no self-contradiction. But when the concept of a thing involves no selfcontradiction, the thing is intrinsically possible. Therefore, miracles are intrinsically possible.

2. Miracles are extrinsically possible—Anyone who acknowledges the existence of God, the Creator and Conserver, must acknowledge that all things intrinsically possible are extrinsically possible to the absolute power of God. The extrinsic possibility of miracles is denied by atheists, who deny God’s existence; by the deists, who deny God’s conserving and governing activity in the world (for they affirm that God, having created the world, has, so to speak, tossed it aside, and has no further interest in it) ; by the positivists, who will accept no suprasensible explanation of even sensible events. None of these doctrinaires will acknowledge the existence of any available adequate cause for miraculous events, and hence they deny the extrinsic possibility of miracles.

Against positivists, atheists, deists, and shallow doubters, we assert the fact of God’s activity in the world, and the further fact that God can intervene to cause the wondrous effects called miracles. The science of theodicy proves that God is not only the Creator, but that He is the Preserver, the Governor, and the Provider, whose activity, under these titles, is required for the existence and functioning of the world. Further, theodicy proves that God concurs in all the positive activities of His creatures. We cannot pause here to repeat several chapters of theodicy, but we may briefly present an argument,—perfectly conclusive and sufficient in itself,—against the mistaken opinion that miracles are extrinsically impossible.

A miracle takes place in one of three ways. God either (a) produces an effect of creatural causes without employing these causes; or (b) produces an effect which is beyond the scope and power of creatural causes; or (c) impedes an effect which would naturally have to follow from the activity of a creatural cause. Now, God can certainly do any and all of these three things. Therefore, God can produce a miracle. For God can (a) produce the effect of a creatural cause without employing such a cause; for God gave to creatures all their being and all their powers for operation, and what He can give He Himself possesses. Further, God can (b) produce an effect which is beyond the scope and power of creatural causes, for creatural causes are finite, whereas God is infinite in being and in power. Finally, God can (c) impede an effect which would naturally have to follow from the activity of a creatural cause, since the actual effect of creatural activity does not belong to the essence of the active creatures. Even man can impede the natural effect of a creatural cause,—as, for example, a man can impede the destructive action of fire by protecting combustible material with a heavy envelope of asbestos; or he can impede the growth of a plant by placing it in unsuitable soil or by giving it insufficient light—and what man, a creature can do, is surely not to be denied to the infinite might of God.

Objections against the extrinsic possibility of miracles are usually framed in such wise that miracles appear to be in conflict with the divine perfections, and hence impossible to the ordinated power of God. It will be of profit here to consider a few of these objections.

a) God’s eternal and changeless will has set the course of nature by establishing physical laws. Hence, a miracle would come into conflict with the immutability or changelessness of God. We answer that the immutable will of God decrees everything from eternity, and the miracle, which we regard in the light of an exception to the course of nature, is just as much a matter of eternal decree as the course of nature itself. In other words, the miracle as well as the continuous and regular course of nature, is eternally and changelessly decreed. Hence, the mira- cle involves no conflict with divine immutability.

a) God’s eternal and changeless will has set the course of nature by establishing physical laws. Hence, a miracle would come into conflict with the immutability or changelessness of God. We answer that the immutable will of God decrees everything from eternity, and the miracle, which we regard in the light of an exception to the course of nature, is just as much a matter of eternal decree as the course of nature itself. In other words, the miracle as well as the continuous and regular course of nature, is eternally and changelessly decreed. Hence, the mira- cle involves no conflict with divine immutability.

b) The laws of nature, like the moral law, are from God. Since it would conflict with God’s holiness to derogate or change the moral law, or to permit any exception, it seems that the same thing must be said about the laws of nature. We answer that there is no parity between the laws of nature and the moral law. The moral law directs free creatures towards God ; the laws of nature regulate creatures primarily in their relations with one another. The laws of nature have no conceivable direct bearing upon the holiness of the Creator.

b) The laws of nature, like the moral law, are from God. Since it would conflict with God’s holiness to derogate or change the moral law, or to permit any exception, it seems that the same thing must be said about the laws of nature. We answer that there is no parity between the laws of nature and the moral law. The moral law directs free creatures towards God ; the laws of nature regulate creatures primarily in their relations with one another. The laws of nature have no conceivable direct bearing upon the holiness of the Creator.

c) The laws of nature are expressions of the divine wisdom; hence, any derogation of these laws would be in conflict with God’s wisdom, and is therefore extrinsically impossible. We answer once more that the divine wisdom is expressed not only in the ordinary course of nature but also, and more markedly, in miraculous events which lie outside that course as determined by the laws of nature. God’s wisdom has planned not only the usual course of nature, but the exceptional things which we call miracles. All are part of one eternal plan, and the plan is divinely wise.

c) The laws of nature are expressions of the divine wisdom; hence, any derogation of these laws would be in conflict with God’s wisdom, and is therefore extrinsically impossible. We answer once more that the divine wisdom is expressed not only in the ordinary course of nature but also, and more markedly, in miraculous events which lie outside that course as determined by the laws of nature. God’s wisdom has planned not only the usual course of nature, but the exceptional things which we call miracles. All are part of one eternal plan, and the plan is divinely wise.

d) IDENTIFICATION OF MIRACLES

When we identify a thing we know it for what it is. The point here to be undertaken is the proof that we can know a miracle, can recognize it as such. There are persons who maintain that, while miracles must be admitted as possible, they are unknowable. These persons say, “Of course, you can know that a sensible event, even a marvellous and unusual sensible event, has occurred; but you cannot know that this event is truly miraculous. Perhaps it is the effect of some hidden powers of nature with which science has not as yet acquainted us.” Thus, in effect, spoke Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778). Others, like Ernest Renan (1823-1892), say that miracles could be known as such only if some bench of experts could choose the subject for the miracle and have it performed under their careful scientific scrutiny.

We assert that we can have true knowledge of miracles. We can know them as historical facts and we can know them as things divinely produced outside the course of nature. To employ the technical language of philosophy, we can know miracles as true events both on the score of their historical truth and on the score of their philosophical truth; that is, we can know them as true happenings, and as truly miraculous happenings. We must say a word on both points.

I. We can know miracles on the score of their historical truth—Miracles are, by definition, sensible effects or events. They take place in the world which we view with bodily eyes and touch with bodily hands. Therefore, as facts, miracles are quite as readily to be observed and known as any natural facts. Indeed, since the miraculous facts are extraordinary, they attract our more eager and watchful notice, and we are likely to study and examine them with far greater attention than we devote to the ordinary events which we see happening daily. When, for example, there is a sudden healing of a wound at Lourdes, the fact is attested by eminent physicians who have examined the wound and the patient with great care both before and after the miraculous happening. Certainly they are not in doubt about the wondrous event as a fact, however they may doubt or differ in explaining the fact. The famous Doctor Carel has declared, in answer to the objection currently heard that it is “unscientific” and “not the thing” to believe in miracles, that he believes in the miracles of Lourdes because he must trust the testimony of his own senses. Miraculous facts, as marvellous and unusual facts, are certainly knowable. In technical terms, miracles are knowable on the score of their historical truth.

2. We can know miracles on the score of their philosophical truth—To know a miracle as such, as a supernatural rather than a natural happening, it is enough to be able to recognize as a fact: that natural powers could not produce this effect; that they could not produce such an effect in this precise subject in which the effect is discerned; or that natural powers could not produce such an effect in this precise man- ner in which it is seen to occur. Now, on all these points we can have true and certain knowledge. If, for example, we consider the tree which withered away at the word of Christ, we recognize the fact that natural powers cannot explain the event. The natural powers of the tree itself tend all the other way. And if it be objected that certain mysterious powers,—normally hidden and inoperative,—of atmosphere or of light or of other natural element have produced this sudden and startling effect, we ask why these powers operated in such an astounding fashion at a word of command; there appears to be a miracle still, at least a miracle of mode or manner. Take the event all around, and it is manifestly an effort which natural powers, naturally acting, cannot produce, no matter what the hidden resources of nature may be. Again, when Christ restored sight to the man born blind, as recorded in that masterful ninth chapter of St. John’s Gospel, we have a clear example of an effect which could not, by any natural power, recognized or hidden, be produced in this subject in this way. For, while natural powers operate in the development of the human body, and tend to build up the seeing eye, these powers do not operate to give sight to an adult who has lacked it since birth; nor do they operate to build up the organ and faculty of vision in an instantaneous way in consequence of the use of a little common clay and water. It is a mere quibble to assert that miracles cannot be known to stand outside the ordinary course of nature. If miracles can be known at all,—and we have seen that they can be known,—they can be known in their philosophical character as meeting the definition of truly miraculous events.

When a person suffering from organic lesions, or wasted by years of disease, is cured by immersion in certain waters, it will not do to seek the explanation of the event in “hidden powers of nature.” Why do these hidden powers operate for the instantaneous cure of one person and not at all for the cure of another person suffering a like malady? Why do they operate today for a person for whom they have proved utterly ineffective on many previous days? Nature is not a conflict and a contradiction in itself. It is the very core of the gospel of science that nature is consistent, regular, not given to exceptional or capricious action. Why appeal to such a nature to explain what is in flat disagreement with its recognized mode of operation? To heal even a slight wound, to cure even a minor disorder, nature requires the codperation of time, and of considerable time. This is the way of nature; in this manner nature always acts. Nature builds bit by bit; nature adds cell to cell, protoplasm to protoplasm. Therefore, a sudden healing, an instantaneous cure, is clearly outside the course of nature. It is merely silly to appeal to hidden powers of nature which would negative all the science which is built upon the recognized powers and modes of nature’s operations. It would be like saying that perhaps this phenomenon called daylight is due to some hidden powers of darkness, not realizing that if darkness acts in this fashion it exhibits a suicidal tendency never observable in the whole realm of natural objects and phenomena. Natural things do not operate in such fashion as to negate or destroy themselves. Yet the “hidden power” theory blandly assumes that they do so operate.

Therefore, there is no force in the assertion that we cannot say that an effect or event is outside the scope of natural powers until we have recognized and examined all the laws of nature in all their most minute expressions and details. We may not know,— indeed we do not know,—all the powers of nature or all the applications of nature’s laws. But we know nature sufficiently to know that it is not, at the same time, something else. To explain, by an appeal to what is known as constant and uniform, an event which is at variance with constancy and uniformity, is to admit that there may be mutually contradictory laws in nature. And if we admit that, we may as well have done at once with all talk of science and of laws. Then no scientific conclusion could ever again be relied upon as certain. We are not prepared to surrender to the absurdity and enforced silence of skepticism in this abrupt fashion. Therefore we reject as specious the statement that we must know all the complex details of all of nature’s plans and workings before we can say that an event is outside her powers.

But can it be known that a wondrous event outside the ordinary course of nature is really produced by the power of Almighty God? May it not happen, at least occasionally, that an event described as miraculous is the work of malign spirits? The answer is that there is a test and a criterion of works. “By their fruits you shall know them” is not only a commonsense truth to guide us in the choice of associates or in the judgment of a human enterprise; it is a sure criterion of works and effects in nature. The character of a person used as the instrument of a miraculous happening, the whole complexity of circumstances in which the miracle occurs, the doctrine it is meant to establish, the end sought by the persons concerned in it,—all these things will manifest clearly enough whether or not “the finger of God is here.”

Miracles can be known as facts, and in their true character as miraculous events. But it is not the part of wisdom to proclaim an event miraculous until that event has been soberly examined and tested by common sense and common reason against the background of common human experience. One must not cry “Miracle!” as soon as something startling is encountered. We do not justly exclaim so over the radio, the telephone, or even over those subtle and little known influences of mind upon mind which we call by the creepy name of telepathy. No, nature must be allowed to press her claims and, if possible, made to prove her case. Only when it is quite manifest that an occurrence does, as a fact, lie outside the course of nature; only when it is evident beyond prudent doubt that the occurrence is an event divinely wrought, are we free to call it miraculous. It is true that rarity of occurrence does not touch the essence of the miraculous; nevertheless, it is a fact that miracles do not happen very frequently, and this fact should be a sobering and steadying influence in the face of the unusual or the astounding; it should induce caution; it should help one to defer judgment until the case has long lain under the calm and steady view of reason. For it is as nonsensical to call every new and exciting discovery or experience miraculous as it is to deny that any experience can be miraculous. Now, it is a telling comment on the state of mind of the skeptics, the doubters, and the antagonists of the miraculous, that they are the very first to cry ““Miracle!’ when they encounter anything which their little equipment of science or prejudice is unable to handle and explain. It is they who trample the sod of the cemetery when the rumor gets abroad that wondrous things are happening at a certain grave. It is they who, in lesser matters, swallow wholesale the advertisements which promise ‘“‘miraculous” results from the use of certain goods or medicines. It is they who take the wonder-working reducing powders, who use the thaumatergic tooth-paste, who invest in get-richquick schemes, who renew their youth like the eagle’s by absorbing rays from sun-lamps and swallowing pills vibrant with vitamines. It is they who, while never without the word “superstitious” hanging at tongue’s end as a contemptuous appraisal of a sane man’s faith, are actually the most superstitious creatures in the universe.

What of those who would have a miracle performed for their express benefit upon a chosen subject and in the presence of those mythical beings called “experts”? It is manifest that man, who cannot perform any miracle, cannot construct the setting in which a miracle must occur or fix the conditions in which it is to occur. The suggestion is flippant, impudent, and, on the face of it, absurd. Says Mr. G. K. Chesterton very wisely in his Orthodoxy (p. 282), “One may here surely dismiss that quite brainless piece of pedantry which talks about the need for ‘scientific conditions’ in connection with alleged spiritual phenomena. If we are asking whether a dead soul can communicate with a living, it is ludicrous to insist that it shall be under conditions in which no two living souls in their senses would seriously communicate with each other… . It is just as unscientific as it is unphilosophical to be surprised that in an unsympathetic atmosphere certain extraordinary sympathies do not arise. It is as if I said that I could not tell if there was a fog because the air was not clear enough; or as if I insisted on perfect sunlight in order to see a solar eclipse.”

SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE

In this Article we have described and defined miracle. We have classified miracles as of substantial fact, of subject, and of mode; as miracles above nature, beyond nature, and contrary to nature. We have discussed the possibility of miracles, and have shown that miracles are intrinsically possible as involving no essential self-contradiction; further, we have seen that miracles are extrinsically possible, not only to the absolute power of God, but to His ordinated power as well. We have shown that miracles can be known, both on the score of their historical truth as facts, and on the score of their philosophical truth as truly miraculous facts.