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THOUGHT XIV.

AUTOMATISM OF NATURE.

Through some awkwardness on my part, I touched a wire leading from the battery, and the discharge went through my body. Life was absolutely blotted out for a very sensible interval, without a trace of pain. In a second or so consciousness returned . . . The appearance which my body presented to myself was that of a number of separate pieces. The arms, for example, were detached from the trunk, and seemed suspended in the air."-JOHN TYNDALL.

THE occurrence, mentioned by Professor Tyndall, proves that the human body is capable of very remarkable changes, so unlike its ordinary condition, as to resemble a blotting out of life. By automatic action on the part of nature the whole frame can pass from a state of consciousness to another resembling death. Though natural, this seems akin to the supernatural. We do not identify miracles with occurrences such as Tyndall mentions, yet both resemble each other as the outward manifestation of an inner unseen operation. Somnambulism affords another illustration of the same kind. Though the body sleeps, the inner self is partially awake. There is, so to speak, a resurrection of the spirit within the body dead in sleep. In other cases, where there is a total loss of memory, the body seems to die before it becomes a corpse.

Between the verification of any one miracle, and a verification of miracles generally, there is a great difference. As parts of a great plan, miracles are probable, reasonable, natural. The historical evidential proof of miracles generally, and of many individually, is greater than can be given as to the life and actions of Julius Cæsar. Take away miracles, and the very life, laws, customs, and national monuments of the Jewish people are unexplainable. The scientific argument is stronger than the historical, stronger even than that derived from our own eyesight of any one marvel: for in one, mistake is possible. A miracle, like the translation of Elijah, or the resurrection of Lazarus, or prophecy like the foresight of Isaiah, occurring—say once in every two centuries, could possibly be explained by an unknown law of intermittent exercise, which endowed one human being with levitation, another with the faculty of suspending and restoring consciousness, and endued high intellect with remarkable power of prevision. Not so when we scientifically regard miracles, in the whole, as sign manuals from Infinite Wisdom of a process by which men are led to happiness by way of holiness; as divine seals to a revelation of doctrines, precepts, promises, by which, through sanctification of the inner world of spirit, the outer world of matter is to be freed from evil and made resplendent in virtue.

The question of miracles, at its first presentation, appears to some thinkers much as the heavens do to those who are not familiar with astronomy. Our first thought, as we look at the sky, is-the stars are sprinkled by confusion. The next thought is as to the vastness of

space and manifoldness of worlds. After examination and reflection, our reason discovers an arrangement— "Quem коσμоv Græci nomine ornamenti appellavere κοσμον eum nos a perfecta elegantiaque absoluta mundum" (Pliny) an intelligible plan, motions and forces which can be calculated, events which may be predicted, harmonious interaction, subordination and compensation, which by means of constant change and variety ensure permanence and comprehensive unity.

That is not all. Mr. J. S. Mill (“Logic,” B. 3, c. xxi. §1) states-There is "no difficulty in conceiving that in some one of the many firmaments into which sidereal astronomy now divides the universe, events may succeed one another at random without any fixed law. Nor can anything in our experience, or in our mental nature, constitute a sufficient, or indeed any reason, for believing that this is nowhere the case." He is right: in some regions things possibly go at random-chaos may prevail, of which the dreams of the feverish are a sort of sample. "Modern geometers have shown that such differences are perfectly conceivable, and that an indefinite number of consistent geometrical systems may be framed with axioms contradicting in various ways those of Euclid and this in the range of three dimensions, without any reference to the more knotty question whether space of more than three dimensions is conceivable or not" (Spinoza, by Frederick Pollock, p. 174). The apparent local permanence which we find is not necessarily universal, not a fated but a reasonable limited fixity, such as our understanding approves, connected with that living growth and advance which makes the world seem self-contained; and, though

greatly automatic in government, not press as a yoke of resistless destiny on our common lot, causing the iron to enter our soul, but manifesting a generous purpose of some inward presence, moving life to a hidden music'a melody that's sweetly pitched in tune."

ས་

For living things to have the faculty of life in themselves, seed in themselves, for kind to bring forth after their kind, is a wonderful automatism! There are strange manifestations of it: a spontaneousness in plants by which distant parts are suppressed, or over-developed ; bones of animals are lengthened or shortened, strengthened or lightened, straightened or bent, to suit particular functions and habits. So far is this carried that, little by little, everything seems working towards some good in the way it is best fit for, and adapting itself to even the least of surrounding things. New species are formed; and sometimes, at a leap, as by a burst of freedom, wonderful life and unusual powers enter and manifest themselves.

We do not think much of the luminosity induced in many substances by mechanical or chemical action; nor of those vivid illuminations which disappear so soon as the source ceases to be in the presence of the illuminated object, though sufficiently remarkable. Vessels containing sea-water, crowded with luminous animals, may be so placed that their illuminations put together, and reflected upon different parts of the room, make it seem on fire. The strangeness is, that irrational creatures seem to have a power of choice, as if capable of purpose. Noctiluca a flagellata infusorian, many medusæ, the shell-fish Pholas, numbers of better known marine things, are remarkable for luminosity. The wonders grow when

we come to other living things. Though the mode of producing light is nearly unknown, we are sure that the will of the animal plays a peculiar part-actually calling into existence, using, controlling for its own purposes, many and various natural powers. The luminosity of the glow-worm and of the fire-fly, and of their bodies— even when the head has been removed, and of their ova, is by automatic kindling of their own lights. Such automatous use of power within and without; the interference, not constant but intermittent, is not an accident; not a power exercised in a void, and in relation to nothing; not a tendency tending from that which has no existence; but a light kindled from the depths of a deeper spontaneity to lead the profoundly rational to new discoveries and cognitions as to nature having life in itself by a sort of freedom-not by fate. The most meagre existences are in sure alliance with the unseen but supreme rule of a world in which their own visible part is small.

Many invertebrates cast off limbs and grow new ones, e.g. Star-fish, and Brittle Stars in impure water: the casting off is automatic and wilful, according to the case. Birds, when robbed of their eggs, lay again and again that they may ensure a progeny. Animals shape their conduct so as to use means for attainment of an end. That continual, varying, advancing, or retrograding evolution, in which not only the need but the will of animals counts for something, is evidence of interference and intervention-by which the whole of nature fashions a part, and a part makes use of the whole. We recognize in nature an unconscious activity of reason--not yet reason, we trace it in crystals, in sensitive plants, in sea