Reader. Yes, I admit the unchangeability of the laws of nature; but I most strongly protest against your rash inference that therefore miracles are impossible.
Büchner. Yet my reasoning is very plain. “The law of nature, observes Moleschott, is a stringent expression of necessity. There exists in it neither exception nor limitation; and no imaginable power can disregard this necessity. A stone not supported will in all eternity fall towards the centre of the earth; and there never was, and never will be, a command for the sun to stand still” (p. 33).
Reader. Is this what you call “reasoning”?
Büchner. Yes. “The experience of thousands of years has impressed upon the investigator the firmest conviction of the immutability of the laws of nature, so that there cannot remain the least doubt in respect to this great truth” (p. 34).
Reader. This I grant.
Büchner. “Science has gradually taken all the positions of the childish belief of the peoples; it has snatched thunder and lightning from the hands of the gods ...” (ibid.)
Reader. It was Christianity, not science, that conquered the gods.
Büchner. “The eclipse of the stars and the stupendous powers of the Titans of the olden times have been grasped by the fingers of man” (ibid.)
Reader. How can the fingers of man grasp the eclipses and the Titans?
Büchner. “That which appeared inexplicably miraculous, and the work of a supernatural power, has, by the torch of science, proved to be the effect of hitherto unknown natural forces” (ibid.)