upon as originally derived from the invisible universe, while the forces which give rise to transmutations of energy probably take their origin in the same region.

'We have now reached a stage from which we can very easily dispose of any scientific difficulty regarding miracles. For if the invisible was able to produce the present visible universe with all its energy, it could, of course, à fortiori, very easily produce such transmutations of energy from the one universe into the other as would account for the events which took place in Judæa [at the advent of our Lord]. Those events are therefore no longer to be regarded as absolute breaks of continuity, a thing which we have agreed to consider impossible, but only as the result of a peculiar action of the invisible upon the visible universe.

'It appears to us as almost self-evident, that Christ, if He came to us from the invisible world, could hardly (with reverence be it spoken) have done so without some peculiar sort of communication being established between the two worlds.'-Professors B. Stewart and P. G. Tait, The Unseen Universe, pp. 199, 247, 248 (10th edition).

NOTE XI. p. 195.

ISAAC TAYLOR ON THE ARGUMENT FROM
CONGRUITY.

'But is it not "reasoning in a circle" thus to believe the miracles because the religion is felt to be from heaven, and to believe the religion because it has been attested by miracles? Grant it that this is reasoning in a circle, when thus formally stated; but it does not follow that therefore the reasoning is not valid. A misapprehension on this ground has too easily been admitted, as well on the side of those who have con

ducted the Christian argument as with those who have impugned it. A sophism, boldly obtruded on the one side, has been timidly dealt with on the other.

'The very firmest of our convictions come to us in this same mode,—that is, not in the way of a sequence of evidences, following each other as links in a chain, and carrying with them the conclusion; but in the way of the CONGRUITY of co-ordinate evidences, meeting or collapsing in the conclusion. This is not the same thing as what is called "cumulative proof,” nor is it proof derived from the coincidence of facts. Those impressions which command the reason and the feelings in the most imperative manner, and which in fact we find it impossible to resist, are the result of the meeting of congruous elements; they are the product of causes which, though independent, are felt so to fit the one to the other, that each as soon as it is seen in combination authenticates the other; and, in allowing the two to carry our convictions, we are not yielding to the sophism which consists in alternately putting the premise [and conclusion] in the place of each other, but are recognising a principle which is always true in the very structure of the human mind.

‘Let the case be this—that you have to do with one who offers to your eye his credentials--his diploma, duly signed and sealed, and which declare him to be a Personage of the highest rank. All seems genuine in these evidences. At the same time, the style and tone, the air and behaviour, of this Personage, and all that he says, and what he informs you of, and the instructions he gives you, are in every respect consistent with his pretensions, as set forth in the instrument which he brings with him. It is not in such a case that you alternately believe his credentials to be genuine, because his deportment and his language are becoming to his alleged rank; and then, that you yield to the impression which has been made upon your feelings by his deportment, because you have already admitted the credentials to be true. Your

belief is the product of a simultaneous accordance of the two species of proof: it is a combined force that carries conviction; it is not a succession of proofs in line.

'The same force of congruity, not a catena of proofs, gives us the most trustworthy of those impressions upon the strength of which we act in the daily occasions of life; and it is the same Law of Belief which rules us also in the highest of all arguments—that which issues in a devout regard to Him, by and through whom all things are. On this same ground, where logic halts, an instinctive reasoning prevails, which takes its force from the confluence of lines of reasoning.'-Isaac Taylor, The Restoration of Belief, pp. 94 f.

NOTE XII. p. 196.

MIRACLES NATURALLY TO BE EXPECTED OF CHRIST.

'We could not conceive of [Christ] as not doing such works; and those to whom we presented Him as Lord and Saviour might very well answer, Strange that one should come to deliver men from the bondage of nature which was crushing them, and yet Himself have been subject to its heaviest laws,-Himself "Wonderful” (Isa. ix. 6), and yet His appearance accompanied by no analogous wonders in nature,—claiming to be the Life, and yet Himself helpless in the encounter with death; however much He may have promised in word, never realizing any part of His promises in deed; giving nothing in hand, no first-fruits of power, no pledges of greater things to come. They would have a right to ask, "Why did He give no signs that He came to connect the visible with the invisible world?"-Trench, The Miracles of our Lord, pp. 102 f.

NOTE XIII. p. 224.

ALLEGED EVIDENTIAL UNIMPORTANCE OF THE
RESURRECTION OF CHRIST.

'M. Prudot, in his work La Résurrection de Jésus Christ, p. 299, gives a declaration signed at a general conference of pastors and elders of the French Protestant Church, held in Paris A.D. 1865, which contains the following statement:

"The undersigned pastors and laymen, considering that the modern religious conscience, instructed in the school of Jesus Christ Himself, and slowly developed by eighteen centuries of Christian education, has learned, on the one side, not to make the divinity of the Master's teaching depend upon His bodily reappearances; on the other, to consider as independent of this fact the certainty of eternal life, in such a manner that faith henceforth rests, not upon the perilous arguments of critical erudition unapproachable to simple believers, but upon the evidence of the truth itself:

"Declare that, divided as they are among themselves upon the historical question, they frankly acknowledge the right of distinguishing between this question and Christianity itself, and of founding the living and simple demonstration of faith upon the agreement of the holy word of Jesus Christ with the principles and needs of the human soul."-Professor Milligan, The Resurrection of our Lord, p. 259.

'It is difficult now, whether we look at the first rise of Christianity or at its later history, to admit that it hangs by a thread, as St. Paul declares, logically attached to the testimony of Cephas, and the Twelve, and the Five Hundred.'-Natural Religion, p. 253.

NOTE XIV. p. 245.

THE THEORY OF PROBABILITIES APPLIED TO THE EVIDENCE FOR CHRIST'S RESURRECTION.

It may be of importance to some minds that we should attempt to represent by the mathematical 'Theory of Probabilities' what are the chances that the witnesses to the risen Saviour were deceived by their senses. Of course, any attempt of the kind can only be an approximation, an illustration and aid to thought rather than a result mathematically exact.

The Law of Probabilities bearing on the case is thus laid down by Todhunter in his Algebra: (722) ' If there be any number of independent events, the probability that they will all happen is the product of their respective probabilities of happening.' To make this clear by a simple illustration, let us suppose that we have a bag with a hundred balls in it, of which one is white and ninety-nine are black. The chance that we draw the white ball at the first trial is only 1 to 100, or as it is represented arithmetically, Too. The chance that we draw the white ball twice in succession is found by multiplying together the chance of drawing it the first time, which is 100, by the chance of drawing it the second time, which is, of course, also To. In other words, the chance of drawing the white ball the first and second times in succession is box Too or To.boo, i.e. I to 10,000. The chance of drawing it three times in succession is only 1 to 1,000,000, i.e. 100 × 100 × 100, or 1.000.000. In short, we get the ultimate chance by multiplying the original chance into itself the same number of times as the white ball is supposed to be drawn in succession. More briefly, the chance of drawing it n times in succession will be (16)".

Now it is extremely easy to apply this principle to