6. The question is more familiar in its less for- midable shape, as regards miracles. (1) It maj' be held that facts convince us of miracle. History makes its investigation, and bears witness. It cannot demonstrate, but it announces a satisfac- tory probability. This is the attitude generally taken up by British scholars, e.g. in Dr. Sanday's recent Criticism of the Fourth Gospel (though lie has the wider as well as the narrower problem before him). (2) Secondly, there is the claim of dog- matic naturalism— ' miriicles do not happen'; for history, the mii'aele narrative is an interesting and instructive problem, the miracle itself a hallucina- tion a priori, be the alleged evidence what it may. This mood of mind is sometimes confessed, but much oftener is silently at work behind a disguise. (3) There is an attempt by Harnark In j-(riki> out a teHium quid: 'The historian caiiiinl rcunrd a miracle as a sure given histori<;il cxrui : Un- in doing so he destroys the mode ul <cjii~i.hi;iti(ni on which all historical investiuatiiiii I'-N.' Ili li. t in miracle is due to the 'unh|in' ini|irr~^i,in ' ,,H 'hrisr,- person, though 'there lias srhhnn h. i n a slinir.: religious faith which wiaihl not Innc .lra\Mi Ihr conclusion ' that Christ wrought mirat-h'- i // ' .,
Dogma, vol. i. Eng. tr. p. 65, note), 'lln
to mean that history is prevented frniu i Jj, with miracles by limitations of itsown,— iiinu.iin.ii., which do not necessarily imply the absence of miracle from the world of real events. (4) Against the point of view which excludes miracles a priori, we might set a point of view which welcomes them a priori as congruous to a Di\'ine revelation and Divine redemption. They are only signs — not the Divine content itself ; but are they not fit signs ?
7. On a first inspection, none of the views named is definitelv anti-Christian unless the second. Natur- alism, which refuses miracle out and out, is plainly pledged in logic to deny revelation. But, as we nave said, the importance of the whole matter lies in its further implications. The same difficult decision is called for — not face to face with miracle, but face to face with the Christ. And the logic of the <^irrf position — the logic which leads Harnack, while believing in revelation, to ban miracle as a thing the historian must not touch — will inevitably be applied by others to Jesus Himself. They will repeat or extend the claim to be historians, thorough historians, nothing but historians. They will de- scribe the teacher of Nazareth, the martyr of Calvary ; but the Christ of God will be a magni- tude as inaccessible to them as physical miracle is to Dr. Harnack (cf . art. ' Jesus ' in £ncyc. Bibl. ). And
if he is in the right, who can say that they are wrong ? Analysis must go on to the end, and that great stumbling-block, the supernatural, be re- vealed plain in our path. Even if not formally declared an impossibdity, supernatural revelation or redemption will be politely waved aside as irrelevant to the histoi'ian.
8. There is no question more Important at the present moment than this. What is, e.g., a 'his- torical ' view of the NT ? Is it a view of the NT in its historical actuality, looked at round and round ? Or is it a view hampered by the limita- tions of one of the special sciences ? Ambiguity is always dangerous. People omit the Divine ' Word ' under pretext of the second deiinitioii — That lies beyond the historian's province ! But presently they are found implying Qxejirst definition. History tells us everything ! There is no Divine ' Word ' at all — no supernatural salvation.
9. If history does not give full truth, what does ? We shall probably be t<jld, Metaphysics. The only court of appeal I'loiii ' scii'utific fact' is 'meta- physical reality.' M. taphy-ics is certainly pledged to many-sidediic — , tn all-idcdness. But the ques- tion remains, Iluw Itir i.an metaphysics discharge its task ? And, again, Can it do justice to the Christian origins ? Idealistic interpreters of Christianity_ are very willing to undertake the championship of the Christ idea (e.g. Pfleiderer), but their patronage is not extended to the Christ fact. At any rate the majority, and those who know their business best, are found reducing Jesus of Nazareth to a .iijnihnt, xery vaguely connected with any aliiiliiii; s|iiritual reality. To a philo- sophical inter]iriliv i( iiiiiains ' tooli.sliness that the Divine Word literally and in deed became fle.<!h. If the professional historian verges upon EliioniMu, his philosophical colleague rarely escapes [i.Hiiism. Neither of these positions amounts to hi-loiiial Christianity, which, amid increasing unceilaint y in detail, may and ought to have increasing certainty in the fundamental outlines.
10. In the present writer's judgment the attempt to make history a special science, too coy or too seientilie to dea'l with a (possibly real) supernatural, is li(i|„dessly .artilieial. Scientific history must de(il with ail till' demonstrable, nay, with all the I'liihahle, e\eiits nf the real past. This may inter- 1' 1 ■ with the rounded symmetry of the science;
if :ili loss, if it gives us wider and truer know- i,L;e ! Further, the writer's own belief is that Uiut a Christian bias, but) a Christian interpreta- tion is indispensable ; or, that experience Dears its witness (cf. the fourth position, § 6, as against the first ; still, he recognizes that many Christians and many useful theoloyical workers will find themselves alile in nininiiin the first position, and will prefer it). 1 1 i | .. i h , i ly true that faith mis- leads and overndeali/e^ (Dr! Moff'att) ; yet that is a half-truth, or rather it is much less than the half. Better a dazzled faith tl Amid superficial errors, Christ essential truth. Amid snneili Christian hist. Brians (an. 1 noii-Cl no lesH ilii.,w a«a\ tli-> I., rii.'