changes in the order and procedure of nature, as are analogous to the miracles upon which Christians build, in part, the fabric of their faith. Now, whatever analogy there may be between certain geological changes, which the habitable globe may have undergone in conformity with the predetermined purpose of the Creator, and the changes which the calculating machine undergoes at particular points in conformity with the law of its construction-it cannot, for an instant, be admitted that there exists the slightest analogy between such apparently unforeseen, but really preascertained variations, and such miracles as feeding many thousands with seven loaves and a few fishes-or bringing the dead to life again. Every attempt to assimilate the miracles of the Bible with the anomalies either of nature or of art, ought to be distinctly repudiated; and, however readily it may be allowed that these may be so circumstanced as to exalt our notions of the prescience and overruling Providence of God, on the one hand, or of the wonders which the cultivated intellect of His creature man is capable of achieving, on the other, I quite agree with Mr. Whewell in thinking that, "in our conceptions of the Divine purpose and agency, we may and must go beyond the analogy of human contrivances.". Whewell, p. 360. Still Mr. Babbage has entitled himself to the praise of extraordinary ingenuity, and to our thanks, perhaps, for a new and unexpected proof of the fragility of Hume's argument against miracles, albeit depreciated by its having been made subservient to an inadmissible analogy. The friends of Revelation think, with Paley, not only that it belongs of right to the Creator of the world to depart upon all fitting occasions, from the ordinary course of nature, which He first established, and continues to maintain by laws of His own, but that, in support of such a Revelation as that which the Bible unfolds, it was both reasonable to expect, and even necessary, that there should be some miraculous attestation of its truth. To say that human experience is stronger than human testimony, and that no such testimony, therefore, can entitle a miracle to credit, is to deny that our eyes are given us to see withal, because vision may not always be perfect; or that there is any such thing as truth, because there are too many instances of departure from it. Neither is the Christian revelation proved, as Dr. Johnson justly observes, by miracles alone, but as connected with prophecies, and with the doctrines in confirmation of which miracles were wrought. If, moreover, I have not been able to concede to Mr. Babbage the credit he claims for his notions respecting miracles, I quite agree with him in thinking that the friends of Revelation have betrayed very unnecessary alarm at the discoveries of modern geologists, and the theories to which they have given birth; and whether the view which Mr. Babbage himself takes of the matter be correct or not, he is fully justified in condemning that faltering faith which makes men close their eyes to the most obvious truths. If there are facts to show that the earth must have undergone very great changes, at very distant intervals, before it attained its present state, it is surely wiser to suppose that the days of creation are unknown periods of time, than to persist in confining them to twenty-four hours, when there are facts before us which make this impossible. It will not do in this case to say that all things are possible with God; for the question does not respect what God might have done, but what He has done, and this can only be determined by an appeal to such records of creation as the indefatigable researches of geologists have abundantly brought to light. It is not to be wondered at that the Roman Catholic Hierarchy should take alarm at the progress of science, and the concurrent scrutiny of their exorbitant pretensions to infallibility, in the face of doctrines which are equally opposed to the common sense of man, and the written word of God sincerely and spiritually discerned. But there is no nation under greater obligations to science than the English; and the bare supposition that its legitimate pursuits can lead to results unfavourable to Revelation, is an affront to the Majesty of that Omniscient Being who is the Author and Giver of all good things; and, above all, for Protestants, who have no superstitions to guard, no unhallowed innovations to conceal; to dread the tendency of human philosophy, is in the highest degree discreditable. Only let the philosopher beware that he does not, by overstepping the limits allotted to human reason, forego the privileges of human redemption. That there is danger of his so doing there is far too much evidence before us at the present dayand if Mr. Babbage, in affirming "that the truths of Natural Religion rest on foundations far stronger than those of human testimony," means to say with Lord Brougham that Revelation is insecure without the prop of natural theology, he shews that he has very mistaken and inadequate notions of the foundations on which the Bible rests. Let him only meditate with but half the attention which he devotes to his mechanical calculations on the doctrines of the Bible, and the evidences which accompany them of their divine authority, and he may find reason for assenting to the truth of that superhuman declaration, that it is not by the wisdom of this world but by the preaching of the cross of Christ," that it has pleased God to save them that believe" (1 Cor. i. 21.), he may find that whilst, as a natural philosopher, he can declare with the holy Psalmist, "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth! who |