"I think it is. I am afraid, however, that at the very outset we should have some difficulty in determining one of the phrases used in this very definition,—namely, how we are to understand a law of nature. I do not ask whether law implies a lawgiver; you will assert it, and I shall not gainsay it: it is at present immaterial. But do you not mean by a law of nature (I am asking the question merely to ascertain whether or not we are thinking of the same thing) just this;—the fact that similar phenomena uniformly reappear in an observed series of antecedents and consequents, which series is invariable so far as we know, and so far as others know, whose experience we can test? Is not that what you mean? You do not, I presume, suppose you know any thing of the connection which binds together causes and effects, or the manner in which the secret bond (if there be any) which unites antecedents and consequents, in any natural phenomena, is maintained?"
"I certainly make no such pretensions; all that I mean by a law of nature is just what you have mentioned. I shall be well content to adhere to your explanation," answered Fellowes.
"So that when we observe similar phenomena reproduced in the aforesaid series of antecedents and consequents, we call that a law of nature, and affirm that violation of that law would be a miracle, and impossible?"
"Certainly."
"And further, do you not agree with me that such invariable series is sufficiently certified to us by our own uniform experience,—that of all our neighbors and friends,—and, in a word, that of all whose experience we can test?"
"I agree with you."
"I am content," replied Harrington; "but at the outset it seems to me that the expression I have used requires a little expansion to meet the sophistry of our opponents. I will either explain myself now, and then leave you to judge; or I will say no more of the matter here, but pursue our discussion, and let the difficulty (if there be one) disclose itself in the course of it, and be provided for as may be in our power."
"What is it?"
"It is this;—that it cannot, with truth, be said, in relation to many phenomena, that (so far as our experience informs us) they do follow each other in an absolutely invariable order; which phenomena, nevertheless, we believe to be as much under the dominion of law as the rest; and any violation of this law, I presume, you would think as much a miracle as any other. For example, we do not find the same remedies or the same regimen will produce the same effects upon different individuals at different times; again, the varieties of the weather, in every climate, are dependent upon so many causes, that it transcends all human skill to calculate them. Yet I dare say you can easily imagine certain degrees and continuity of change in these variable phenomena which you would not hesitate to call as much miracle as if the dead were raised, or the sun stayed in mid-heaven."
"Yes, unquestionably," replied Fellowes; "if I found, for instance that a dozen men could take an ounce of arsenic or half a pound of opium with impunity, I should not hesitate to regard it as a miracle, although the precise amount sufficient to kill in any particular case might not be capable of being ascertained. In the same manner, if I found that though the amount of heat and cold in summer and winter in our climate is subject to marked variations, yet that suddenly for several consecutive years we had more frost in July than in December; that gooseberries and currants were getting ripe on Christmas day, and men were skating on the Serpentine on the 10th of August, I should certainly argue that a change tantamount to a miracle had been wrought in nature."