we have taken of this subject, is unfounded. It is alleged, that it is first proving the miracle to have come from God by the doctrine, and then the doctrine to have come from Him by the miracle. But this is a misrepresentation of the nature of our argument. What we maintain is, that what is obviously false and immoral cannot proceed from God, and that even miracles could not prove doctrines of that character to be from Him. "We require the immorality and the falsehood to be removed from the doctrine -not to prove it, but to give it the susceptibility of being proved. The mere absence of any contradiction to morality or known truth will not itself prove the doctrine; but it will make the doctrine capable of being proved. It clears the way for the effect of the proper evidence. Now, that proper evidence is the miracle, an evidence that could not have overcome the barrier, either of known truth or of palpable immorality, but when this barrier is done away, works its full effect in favour of the doctrine at issue. The removal of a barrier is not tantamount to the rendering of a proof. It only affords room for the proof. There is no vicious circulation here. Though a miracle can demonstrate nothing in opposition to the evidence of the external senses, or even to the evidence of the moral sense that is within,-yet, when all hostility from these quarters is displaced, a miracle thus freed from the adverse or the disturbing force that would else have neutralized it, may in truth be the most effective of all demonstrations."

10. But, in truth, there is no reason to fear that we shall have to encounter the attestation of miracles accompanying false and immoral doctrine. The notion is entirely speculative and according to the view which we have taken, and have already given, it can never exist as a practical reality. Wherever we have miracles we trace the finger of God; and wherever we have this manifestation of his wonder-working hand, we have all the moral certainty that his own immaculate character can afford, that

* Chalmers' Evidence.

the doctrine taught is a doctrine according to godliness. The mere working of a miracle by a man who claimed to have a message from God to mankind, would be regarded as a proof of his veracity, and would remove the prior presumption against the reality of his claim. The manifestation of supernatural power as the sign of the messenger's veracity, would instantly remove the improbability of his being charged with a supernatural communication. When, in addition to this, we take into account the known virtue and good sense of the teacher, who thus vindicates his claim to inspiration, the tendency of the doctrine he delivers, and its effect on those who receive it, the evidence is the most full and complete that can well be conceived.

11. Dr Samuel Clarke observes on this subject, that there is no reason to object, as some have done, that we prove in a circle the doctrines by the miracles, and the miracles by the doctrine. For the miracles, in this way of reasoning, are not at all proved by the doctrine, but only the possibility and the good tendency, or at least the indifferency, are a necessary condition or circumstance, without which the doctrine is not capable of being proved by any miracles. They are indeed the miracles only that prove the doctrine, and not the doctrine that proves the miracles. But then, in order that the miracles may prove the doctrine, it is necessary that the doctrine be such as is in its nature capable of being proved. The doctrine is not first known or supposed to be true, and then the miracles proved by it. But the doctrine must be first known to be such as is possible to be true, and then miracles will prove that it actually is so. -In reference to the whole of this subject, I remark,

12. (I.) That miracles must be regarded as the primary and authenticating evidence of a divine revelation, and as having the precedence of prophecy and internal evidence. These indeed are confirmatory evidences of the greatest value; but the evidence of miracles is sufficient to furnish a divine attestation of the doctrine in support

of which they are wrought, just because they are, and must be, from God.

13. (II.) The assumed case of the possibility of a doctrine, in itself absurd and wicked, being attested by miracles, is entirely hypothetical. It is a case which cannot in the nature of things occur, and in regard to which, therefore, it is useless to reason. If, as has been already shown, a real miracle can be wrought by none but God, or by his appointment, as the supreme Governor of the world which he has made and preserves, it follows, that whenever a real miracle takes place, in attestation of any doctrine, that doctrine cannot be either unreasonable or impious; and if it should appear so to us, after the reality of the miracle is ascertained, our judgment must be erroneous. The miracle proves the doctrine, or the ground on which miracles are allowed to have any force of evidence at all, either supreme or subordinate, absolute or dependent, must be given up; for their evidence consists in this, that they are the works of God. The working of a miracle is an immediate and conclusive proof that the claim to a divine commission of him by whom it is wrought is real, and that he himself should be received as the messenger of God.

CHAPTER VII.

THERE IS NO PRESUMPTION ARISING FROM MIRACLES RECORDED BY HISTORIANS OF OTHER RELIGIONS, AGAINST THE MIRACLES WROUGHT IN PROOF OF CHRISTIANITY.-PRETENDED PAGAN MIRACLES. PRETENDED POPISH MIRACLES.

1. Ir seems strange that any one who is accustomed to contemplate the grandeur of nature, and philosophically to survey her operations, should cherish prejudices against miracles. What was creation but a miracle? The Deity, whose agency is present in all his works, acts by his natural laws in the usual course of things, but by the special operation of a miracle whenever he pleases. "When the

manifestation of the superior Power, or the production of effects to which the common laws of things are inadequate, becomes expedient, then, what is specially needed, specially ensues. The divine agency immediately acts, and produces visible effects beyond the power of natural causes to occasion; and thus evidences its own operation. That it would not thus interfere without an adequate reason, is the deduction of our judgment, which Horace has so forcibly expressed; but that it will always thus interfere whenever a sufficient occasion makes its agency expedient, our same judgment will as correctly infer. Authentic history declares that it has thus interposed, but on rare, and always on great occasions, and from sufficient reasons; and thus the special interference of divine agency, in the occurrence of miracles on great occasions and from sufficient reasons, is the suggestion of our past experience, and is the true philosophical probability."*

2. I repeat here what I have elsewhere stated, that the Bible, in the series of revelations which it contains, is the only religion that is or ever has been in the world, that laid claim on its first publication to the evidence of miracles. Paganism, or the numberless superstitions known by that common name, is out of the question. Mohammed disclaimed miracles, and owned that he had no commission or power to work them, being sent from God only as a prophet. Mr Hume, indeed, with the view of vilifying the miracles of Scripture, advocates the pagan and popish miracles. For this purpose, he introduces to our notice Alexander of Pontus, the fortune-teller, who imposed on the credulity of barbarians by falling in with their superstitions and Vespasian, who is reported by Tacitus to have cured a blind man in Alexandria, and a lame man by the mere touch of his foot. And these wonders, reputed to have been wrought by a strolling fortune-teller and a Roman emperor, are put in comparison with the miracles of the gospel! With the same view, he

:

* The Sacred History of the World, by S. Turner, v. i. P. 72.

expatiates on the pretended miracles of the Romish church. But with respect to them all, I observe,

3. First, They were wrought to support the dominant religion, and in the presence of those whose religious prejudices were to be flattered by them. Secondly, They were not professedly wrought to prove any thing: nor had they any connexion with any design of importance to mankind. Thirdly, Many of them are absurd, and all of them are wanting in evidence. They are not reported by any eyewitnesses of them, nor by any persons on whom they were wrought. Fourthly, They were not published till long after the time when they are said to have been performed. Fifthly, They were not first published in the place where they are said to have been wrought. And, sixthly, They were suffered to pass without examination, in the time when, and at the place where, they are said to have taken their rise.

4. When we come to examine the miracles of Scripture, we find that they were wrought in circumstances and for purposes totally different. They were closely connected with the system that pervades the whole of revelation, from the fall of Adam to the coming of Christ; a system that was gradually developed, but the development of which, as well as its full accomplishment, was accompanied by miracles. It seems impossible for any candid man to view the several parts of this " stupendous scheme, thus harmonizing and co-operating for the attainment of one specific object of the highest importance to the whole race of mankind, without being struck with the conviction of the absolute impossibility of imposture or enthusiasm in any part of the proceeding. We are compelled to acknowledge that they exhibit proofs of divine agency, carried on in one continued series; such as no other system has ever pretended to; such as not only surpasses all human ingenuity, but seems impossible to have been effected by any combination of created beings."*

* Van Mildert's Boyle's Lectures.