They say miracles are past; and we have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar, things supernatural and causeless.

They say miracles are past.

So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown When judges have been babes; great floods have flown From simple sources, and great seas have dried When miracles have by the greatest been denied.

It must be so, for miracles are ceased And therefore we must needs admit the means How things are perfected.

There is no such thing as a miracle. That is, there is never an absolute reversal of any natural law. Every event, however unexpected by us, who are all more or less grossly ignorant of Nature and of Nature's laws, is the result of pre-existing causes, which develop results in ways and to extents strictly conformable to the energies set in motion. Supernormal events maybe, but nothing is supernatural.

Mysticism has been in the past and probably ever will be one of the great powers of the world and it is bad scholarship to pretend the contrary. You may argue against it but you should no more treat it with disrespect than a perfectly cultivated writ