a new creation, is not a raising of the old mortal body; those who become new men in this life have new bodies in the world to come. Awaking from sleep, we do not possess the whole of the body with which we lay down; during the state of unconsciousness a part of ourselves, already dead, is lost-the loss preparing for future gain. In the final sleep of our body, there will be a putting off of all that is dead, and a clothing upon with that which possesses fulness and newness of life.

The Bible reveals many unexpected departures from rule, the happening of unusual things, the production of great by small, vice versâ, and marvellous unlikelies, which have counterpart in many interesting natural varieties. Hydrogen is believed to be a gaseous metal, bromine is the only liquid non-metallic element, mercury is the only liquid metallic element, and gallium melts by heat of the hand. Some metals are so soft that they can be indented with the nail, others can be cut with a knife. Compounds of nitrogen and oxygen, things which destroy if inspired more than a few seconds, form laughing-gas; substances become differently constituted at different pressures, stable or unstable, of great heat or intense cold. Selenium is found in various allotropic forms. Carbon is the diamond, graphite, coke, soot, lampblack, wood charcoal, animal charcoal, tinder. Probably all elements are able to assume every form of solid, fluid, gas. These varieties, existing where none are looked for; departures from rule where and when rule seems strictest; production by means apparently inadequate; the existence of the unlikely where the unlikely is almost impossible; take their place as part of the ordinary course and work

of nature, and may be fairly counted natural features of the supernatural. Strictly speaking, nevertheless, they are not so much enhancements of the natural, as embodiments of the more mysterious truth: that, in every moment of time and portion of space, "things must exist, not only after the manner in which they are manifested to us, but in every manner which infinite understanding can conceive" (Spinoza, by Frederick Pollock, p. 167).

It may be said, the examples do not illustrate miracles except as showing varieties and mysteries in nature. Let it be so: a natural event occurs in a course of nature according to some known or unknown, general or special rule; a supernatural takes place by some other general or special rule brought into determinate relation with the known and the knowable. The region of the unknown not less exceeds the known than the finite is exceeded by infinitude. No materialist seriously maintains that the universe consists of infinite space, empty-except for those things which we happen at any moment to perceive. The same substances exist in different shapes and states; all properties need conditions to call them forth; and many bodies, changed from one state to another, can again be changed from the second to the first. These varieties come into the world-not as things of perturbation and unnaturalness; but that we may hear a voice, know of laws, and be so attuned to spiritual music, that our souls partake of new potencies, be subject to new laws, and enter new stages, in the universal plan of teleological development. For example-"Faith is the evidence of things not seen," but there is a personal subjective evidence which reveals

the unseen. This high personal experience—like things that are the same yet differ-has a peculiarity in every man, indicates that there are no bounds to infinite being, that existence has divers aspects to intelligence other than ours, and rises above ordinary mind even as the unusual is out of the common.

Those not able to discern inner meaning and power, do not discover the purpose and complicate process by which mountains are raised, crumbled, dissolved, and carried into the sea; see no mystery in the dew and rain and cloud; nor find the wonderful in any natural operation. They may, however, learn of miracles by the fact that every vital process, and every mental exercise, is more artistic than any outer operation by poet, or painter, or sculptor. The marble under the artist's hands, receiving blow by blow and touch by touch, seems to live in our spirit when it has attained the perfect image of manly strength or feminine beauty. The vital process in human nature, constructs in manner exquisite, by operation mysterious, with plan felicitous, with result wonderful, the embryo-the child-the man. Not a dead form, as the marble, but a living creature. Not incapable of thought, as the statue, but instinct with intelligence. The vital and mental process manifests a higher intelligence than is displayed by artistic elaboration of marble. It is also the object of a yet more subtle operation: that manifestation of the spirit which is given to every man that he may profit withal (I Cor. xii. 7). Hence the calm firmness, the serene sense of duty, which devout men display. Their faith is not only the adhesion of reason, but a humble loving confidence of the spirit. They do not believe perforce—

as by miracle, but are won by the beauty of holiness, are touched by a sense of Heaven. Our God is master of His work even to the smallest detail of execution. "The fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth . . . whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption " (Eph. v. 9, iv. 30).

There are men, of the inspiration that made martyrs mighty, who overcome the world, whose spirit within the flesh proceeds beyond the flesh, who live and walk with God-partake of God. They exhibit the truth thus set forth-" Whatever exists must exist as much as it can; and that whose nature is to exist, or which exists of itself, is under no possible restraint, either internal or external, which could set bounds to its existence" (Spinoza, Frederick Pollock, p. 166). The marvels surrounding them, wrought by them, performed on their behalf, are not disturbances of nature or unnatural; but indications that the present nature of things is not eternally fixed, that material existence is not unchangeable. These men have an inner sense, a spiritual faculty, which enables them to know, discern, and use something akin to the supernatural (1 Cor. ii. 15, xii. 8-10). The phenomena which accompany certain morbid conditions of the brain furnish almost a parody of the spiritual state. De Quincey states that in some of his dreams-"The sea appeared to him paved with innumerable forms, supplicating, wrathful, or despairing; rising in myriads, in generations, for ages; that, again, an imaginary architecture was pictured to him in vivid and unsupportable splendour, capable of increasing in size and infinite reproduction." Sometimes he seemed to live fifty or one hundred years in a single night; he

had feelings which seemed to last a thousand years, or rather for a lapse of time which exceeded the limits of human experience. In men of genius, the high, imaginative, creative power, partakes of the wonderful. Το these, the meanest flower that grows comes as a messenger from God. They share "the large æther and the purple light" with which the Supernatural clotheth all things.

"Largior hic campos æther et lumine vestit
Purpureo."

VIRGIL, Æneid, vi. 640.

They know that all is miraculous from the least to the greatest, from an imperceptible insect to an archangel. They remember our Lord's words about miracles (Luke x. 20), and rejoice rather in those religious and moral blessings which glorify body and soul. They are conscious of being drawn into the regions of the blessed, that the affinity of their spirit with the Divine Spirit is sealed, their heart and mind so ascend that they would be glad to return to earth no more. Such experiences are mental analogies by which they lay hold of the powers of the world to come, and feel beginnings of immortality.

We cast in our lot with these heroes, not with those who render life but a dim and dusky stage, the sweet Eden-garden scenes and fair heavenly perspective thrust out of sight.

"We trust we have not wasted breath: