Nature's deepest laws, her only true laws, are
her invisible ones. All analyses (I think you know enough to understand
my terms), whether of appearances, of causes, or of elements, only lead
us down to fresh appearances--we cannot see a law, let the power of our
lens be ever so immense. The true causes remain just as impalpable,
as unfathomable as ever, eluding equally our microscope and our
induction--ever tending towards some great primal law, as Mr. Grove has
well shown lately in his most valuable pamphlet--some great primal law, I
say, manifesting itself, according to circumstances, in countless diverse
and unexpected forms--till all that the philosopher as well as the divine
can say, is--the Spirit of Life, impalpable, transcendental, direct from
God, is the only real cause. 'It bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest
the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, or whither it
goeth.' What, if miracles should be the orderly result of some such deep,
most orderly, and yet most spiritual law?"
"I feel the force of your argument, but--"
"But you will confess, at least, that you, after the fashion of the crowd,
have begun your argument by begging the very question in dispute, and may
have, after all, created the very difficulty which torments you.
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