ume. I found it clear and
strong--an intellectual tonic, as bracing and pleasant to my mind as
the keen air of the mountains was to my body. From time to time I
jotted down thoughts regarding it, intending afterwards to work them
up into a coherent whole. Other duties, however, interfered with the
complete carrying out of this intention, and what I wrote last summer
I now publish, not hoping to be able, within any reasonable time, to
render my defence of scientific method more complete.

Mr. Mozley refers at the outset of his task to the movement against
miracles which of late years has taken place, and which determined his
choice of a subject. He acquits modern science of having had any
great share in the production of this movement. The objection against
miracles, he says, does not arise from any minute knowledge of the
laws of nature, but simply because they are opposed to that plain and
obvious order of nature which everybody sees. The present movement
is, he thinks, to be ascribed to the greater earnestness and
penetration of the present age. Formerly miracles were accepted
without question, because without reflection; but the exercise of the
'historic imagination' is a characteristic of our own time. Men are
now accustomed to place before themselves vivid images of historic
facts; and when a miracle rises to view, they halt before the
astounding occurrence, and, realising it with the same clearness as if
it were now passing before their eyes, they ask themselves, 'Can this
have taken place?' In some instances the effort to answer this
question has led to a disbelief in miracles, in others to a
strengthening of belief. The aim of Mr. Mozley's lectures is to show
that the strengthening of belief is the logical result which ought to
follow from the examination of the facts.

Attempts have been made by religious men to bring the Scripture
miracles within the scope of the order of nature, but all such
attempts are rejected by Mr. Mozley as utterly futile and wide of the
mark. Regarding miracles as a necessary accompaniment of a revelation,
their evidential value in his eyes depends entirely upon their
deviation from the order of nature. Thus deviating, they suggest and
illustrate a power higher than nature, a 'personal will;' and they
commend the person in whom this power is vested as a messenger from on
high. Without these credentials such a messenger would have no right
to demand belief, even were his as