"I do not think we are at all in a condition to consider any such case, about which we cannot know any thing," replied Fellowes.
"Neither do I; but pardon me,—the question I asked does not depend upon any such knowledge; it is a question which is wholly independent whether of our ignorance or our knowledge. Granting, as you do, that man was created, but that it was no miracle, nor any thing analogous to one (as you say), still either he was created subject to our conditions of development and preservation, or he was not; if he was not, then I fear we have in form the miracle we wish to evade; if he was, then I fear also that there are but the three imaginable modes of obviating the difficulty which I have so liberally provided; and supposing there were a thousand. I fear still that they all involve a departure from the 'uniform course of Nature.'"
"But I do not see," replied Fellowes, "that it is absolutely necessary, supposing that the first man was thrown upon the green of paradise."
"Or in a forest, or on a moor," said Harrington, "for you know nothing of paradise."
"Well, then, in a forest, or on a moor;—I say if man were cast out there, the same helpless being which all his posterity are,—unfortified, as the lower animals are, by feathers or hair, or by instincts equal to theirs,—who can affirm that it was beyond the possibilities of his nature, that he might survive this cruel experiment? crawl, perhaps, for an indefinite period on all fours, live on berries, and at last—by very slow degrees doubtless, but still at last—emerge into—-"
"The dignity of a savage," cried Harrington, "as the first step towards something better,—his Creator having beneficently created him something infinitely worse! Surely, you must be returning to a savage yourself, even to hint at such a pedigree. But I have done: till those cases of which certain philosophers have said so much have been authenticated; till you can produce an instance of a new-born babe, exposed on a mountain-side, in all the helplessness of his natal hour, and self-preserved,—nay, two of them,—for you must at least have a pair of these 'babes in the wood'; and till, moreover, it can be shown that they would have survived this experiment so as to preserve the characteristics of humanity a little better than the 'wild boy of Germany,' and were fit to be the heads of the human family,—I shall at times be strangely tempted to embrace any theory as infinitely more probable. I cannot think it was in this way that our first parents made their entree into the world. I hope not, for the credit of the Creator, as well as for the happiness of his offspring. Of the moral bearings of such a brutal theory, I say nothing; but if it can be true, all I can say is, that I am glad that you and I, my dear Fellowes, are not the immediate children but so fortunate as to be only the great-great —great-great-grandchildren of God! You have well called it a 'cruel experiment'; according to this, the first Father of all thrust forth his children into the world to be for an indefinite time worse than the beasts, who were carefully provided against miserable man's inconveniences! Certainly, I think you may alter the account of man's creation given in Genesis, to great advantage. Instead of God's saying, 'Let us create man in our image, he must be supposed to have said, 'Let us create man in the image of a BEAST: and in the image of a BEAST created he him, male and female created he them'; and very imperfect beasts they must have been, after all. This is that old savage theory which I had supposed was pretty well abandoned. If the necessity of denying miracles imposes any necessity of believing that, I fear that I shall sooner be got to believe a thousand."
"Well," said Fellowes, who seemed ashamed of this theory, but knew not how to abandon it; "I cannot believe there have been any miracles, and, what is more, I will not."
"That is perhaps the best reason you have given yet," said Harrington. "The Will is indeed your only irresistible logician. You are one degree, at all events, better off than I, for I can hardly say either that I believe, or that I do not believe, in miracles."
"And yet," continued Harrington, after a pause, "two or three other strange consequences seem to follow from that seemingly undeniable principle on which we base the conclusion that there neither has been nor can be any such thing as a miracle: in other words, a departure from the established series of sequences which, as tested by our own experience and by that of other men, we are convinced is stable. Will you see with me whether there is any fair mode of escaping from them? I should be very glad if I could do so."
"What are they?"