eet."

All natural operations are to them divine operations. "Nature," said Dr.
Martineau, "is God's mask, not his competitor." While his agency in
Nature may be _recognized_ at one time more than at another, it _exists_
at any time fully as much as at any other. In the interest of this
fundamental truth of religion they affirm that miracles in the
traditional sense of the word, and in their traditional limitation to
the small measure of time and space covered by Biblical narratives,
never occurred. Events reputed miraculous have indeed occurred, but
simply as unusual, inexplicable phenomena in the natural order of
things, the natural products of exceptionally endowed life, and, whether
in ancient time or modern, the same sort of thing the world over. To the
argument that this involves denial of a supernatural Revelation they
reply that it is mere reasoning in a circle. For if one begs the
question at the outset by defining supernatural Revelation as revelation
necessarily evidenced by miraculous divine intervention, then, of
course, denial of this is denial of that, and how is the argument
advanced? But, besides this, the question-begging definition is a
fallacious confusing of the contents of the Revelation with its
concomitants, and of its essentially spiritual character with phenomena
in the sphere of the senses.

The turning-point in this argument between the two parties in the Church
has been reached in the antipodal change, already referred to, from the
old to the new apologetics,--a change whose inevitable consequences do
not yet seem to be clearly discerned by either party in the discussion.
The contention that denial of miracles as traditionally understood
carries denial of supernatural Revelation has been virtually set aside,
with its question-begging definition and circular reasoning, by the
apologetics now current among believers in at least a minimum of miracle
in the traditional sense of the word,--especially in the two chief
miracles of the virgin birth and the physical resurrection of Jesus. As
an eminent representative of these the late Dr. A. B. Bruce may be
cited. These adduce "the moral miracle," the sinlessness of Jesus, as
evidential for the reality of the physical miracles as its "congruous
accompaniments." "If," says Dr. Bruce, "we receive Him as the great
moral miracle, we shall receive much more for His sake."[36] But what a
turn-about of the traditional argument on the evidences! The older