s faculties, and develop them by exercise."

"I think," said the other, "your premises perfectly innocent; I
shall not contest them."

"A little further." said Harrington, "we may go together; and then,
if I mistake not, you will pause before you go one step further.
This, then, is the normal condition of humanity?"

"Yes."

"Do you think the first man was like us in these respects?"

"I cannot tell."

"I dare engage you cannot,--it is a very natural answer. But he either
was, I suppose, or was not. That, I think, you will grant me." He
assented, though rather reluctantly.

"Pray please yourself," said Harrington; "for it is quite immaterial
to me which alternative you take. If man was in our condition, then,
though the 'lawful miracle' by which he was brought into the world
might have made him a baby of six feet high, he would have been no
more than a baby still. All that was to constitute him a man,--all
those habits by which alone his existence was capable of being
preserved,--and without which he must have perished immediately after
his creation, in which case you and I should have been spared the
necessity of all this discussion on the subject, would have to be
learned; and his existence during that time--and a long time it must
have been, having no teachers and aids, as we have--must have been
preserved by a--miracle. If he were taught by the Creator himself,
then we have the miracle in that direction. If he were not brought
into the world under the same conditions of development as we are,
but with habits ready made,--if, indeed, that be not a contradiction,
--then we have a miracle in that direction; if he had his faculties
preternaturally quickened and expanded, so as to acquire
instantaneously, or possess by instinct, what we acquire by a long
and slow process, and not for many years,--then we have a miracle in
that direction. If you do not like these suppositions, I see but
one other; and that is that; being a baby,--though, as I said, a
baby six feet high,--he had an angel nurse sent down expressly to
attend him, and to push or wheel him about the walls of paradise
in a celestial go-cart. But then I think that in this last
particular we shall hardly say that we have got rid of a miracle,
though it would doubtless be a miracle of a very ludicrous kind. If
you can imagine any other supposition, I shall be glad to hear it."

"I acknowledge I can form no supposition on the subject."

"Only remember t