"case, or no." Certainly it is a rule of philosophy to refer effects, if possible, to known causes rather than to imagine a cause for the occasion; and on the other hand, to be suspicious of alleged facts for which no cause can be assigned, or which are unaccountable. If then there is nothing in the Church more than in any other society of men, it is natural to attribute the miracles alleged to have been wrought in it, to natural causes, where that is possible, and to disparage the evidence where it is not so. But if the Church be possessed of supernatural powers, it is not unnatural to refer to them the facts reported, and to feel the same disposition to heighten their marvellousness as otherwise is felt to explain it away. Thus our view of the evidence will practically be decided by our views of theology. There are two providential systems in operation among us, the visible and the invisible, intersecting, as it were, each other, and having a certain territory in common; and in many cases we do not know the exact boundaries of each, as again we do not know the minute details of those facts which are ascribed by their reporters to a miraculous agency. For instance, faith may sometimes be a natural principle of recovery from sickness, sometimes a miraculous instrument; the application of oil may be a mere expedient of medical art, or parallel to the supernatural effects of Baptism. The Martyrs have before now found red-hot iron on its second application even grateful to their seared limbs; on the other hand similar cases are said to have occurred where religion was not in question, and where a Divine interposition cannot be conjectured. Sudden storms and as sudden calms on the lake of Gennesareth might be of common occurrence; and yet the particular circumstances under which the waters were quieted at our Lord's word, may have been sufficient to convince beholders that it was a miracle. The Red sea may have been ordinarily exposed to the influence of the East Wind, and yet the separation Page 228.

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of its waters, as described in the Book of Exodus, may have required a supernatural influence. In these and numberless other instances men will systematize facts in their own way, according to their knowledge, opinions, and wishes, as they are used to do in all matters which come before them; and they will refer them to causes which they see or believe, in spite of their being referrible to other causes about which they are ignorant or sceptical. When then controversialists go through the existing accounts of Ecclesiastical miracles, and explain one after another on the hypothesis of natural causes, when they resolve a professed vision into a dream, a possession into epilepsy or madness, a prophecy into a sagacious conjecture, a recovery into an effect of imagination, they are but expressing their own disbelief in the Grace committed to the Church; and of course they are consistent in denying its outward triumphs when they have no true apprehension of its inward power. Those, on the other hand, who realize that the bodies of the Saints were in their lifetime the Temple of the Holiest, and are hereafter to rise again, will feel no offence at the report of miracles wrought through them; nor ought those who believe in the existence of evil spirits to have any difficulty at the notion of demoniacal possession and exorcism. And it may be taken as a general truth, that where there is an admission of Catholic doctrines, there no prejudice will exist against the Ecclesiastical miracles; while those who disbelieve the existence among us of the hidden Power, will eagerly avail themselves of every plea for explaining away its open manifestations. All that can be objected here is, that miracles which admit of this double reference to causes natural and supernatural, taken by themselves and in the first instance, are not evidences of revealed religion; but it has no where been maintained that they are. Yet, though not part of the philosophical basis of Christianity, they may be evidence still to those who admit the Divine Presence in the Church, and

in proportion as they realize it; they may be evidence in combination with more explicit miracles, or when viewed all together in their cumulative force; they may confirm or remind of the Apostolic miracles; they may startle, they may spread an indefinite awe over certain transactions or doctrines; they may in various ways subserve the probation of individuals to whom they are addressed more fully than occurrences of a more marked character. The mere circumstance that they do not carry their own explanation with them is no argument against them, unless we would surrender the most sacred and awful events of our religion to the unbelieverd. As the admission of a Creator is necessary for the argumentative force of the miracles of Moses or St. Paul, so does the doctrine of a Divine Presence in the Church clear up what is ambiguous in the miracles of St. Gregory Thaumaturgus or St. Martin.

The course of these remarks has now sufficiently shewn that in drawing out the argument in behalf of Ecclesiastical miracles, the main point to which attention must be paid is the proof of their antecedent probability. If that is established, the task is nearly accomplished. If the miracles alleged are in harmony with the course of Divine Providence in the world, and with the analogy of faith as contained in Scripture, if it is possible to account for them, if they are referrible to a

"when once taken up are seldom laid "down." Jortin, ibid. p. 24. Yet he says elsewhere of Theophilus, an Arian missionary, "I blame not Tillemont "for rejecting all these miracles, which 66 seem to have been rumours raised "and spread to serve a party; but "the true reason of his disbelief is, "that they were Arian miracles; and "if they had been reported concerning "Athanasius, all difficulties would have "been smoothed over and accounted of "small moment." p. 219. As if a miracle wrought by Athanasius was not more likely than miracles wrought by an Arian, though a missionary.

known cause or system, and especially if it can be shewn that they are recognised, promised, or predicted in Scripture, very little positive evidence is necessary to induce us to listen to them or even accept them, if not individually, yet viewed as a collective body. In that case they are but the natural effects of supernatural agency, and Middleton's canon, which Douglas, as above quoted, adopts to their disadvantage, becomes their protection. Then "the history of miracles" instead of being

suspected always of course, without the strongest evidence "to confirm it," is at first sight almost "to be admitted "of course, without a strong reason to suspect it ;" the suspicions which attach to it arising from the actual experience of fraud, not from difficulties in its subject matter. If "the "tabernacle of God is with men and He will dwell with "them;" if the Church is "the kingdom of heaven;" if our Lord is with His disciples "alway even unto the end of the world ;" if He promised His Holy Spirit to be to them what He Himself was when visibly present, and if miracles were one special token of His Presence when on earth; if moreover miracles are expressly mentioned as tokens of the promised Comforter; if St. Paul speaks of "mighty signs and wonders by the power of the Spirit of God," and of his "speech and preaching" being "in demonstration of the Spirit and of power," ," and of "diversities of gifts but the same Spirit," and of "healing," "working of miracles," and "prophecy" as among His gifts; surely we have no cause to be surprised at hearing supernatural events reported in any age, and though we may freely exercise our best powers of enquiry and judgment on such and such reports as they come before us, yet this is very different from hearing them with prejudice and examining them with contempt or insult .

f No better illustration can be given of the point before us than the language used by a late writer in the course of his "Reasons for rejecting

"the Nicene Miracles." After maintaining that the miraculous narratives of the fourth century "in their style "and circumstances exhibit the in

In the train of thought which we have been pursuing, reference has been made to the general bearing of the theological portion of the New Testament upon the question of the Ecclesiastical miracles, a subject indeed of the utmost importance in the controversy, but one which could not be entered upon here at length without the introduction of doctrinal discussions, for which this is not the place. There is one text, however, to which attention may be drawn without this inconvenience, in consequence of what may be called its

"dubitable characteristics of fraud and folly," (a ground of objection which it is most legitimate to take, and most necessary for believers in them carefully to consider,)-he proceeds to observe, that if there be any of a different character, rather than account them Divine works he attributes them to Satanic power; and that because they are mainly wrought in sanction and encouragement of Saint-worship. "We "will suppose that there are some instances, which, as to the exterior facts, "must not be dismissed, if the prin

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ciples of historical evidence are to be respected; and which baffle every "endeavour to explain them on any "known or imaginable physical prin"ciples. We then appeal to the ten

dency, or drift and ulterior consequence "of such miracles. If, in fact, and when "regarded in the calmest and most "comprehensive manner, such miracles "have constantly operated to debauch "the religious sentiments of mankind, "if they have confirmed idolatrous "practices, if they have enhanced that "infatuation which has hurried men "into the degrading worship of subor"dinate divinities, we then boldly say "that, whether natural or preternatural, "such miracles are not from God, but 'from the Enemy.' And let it be well "observed, that in any such case, just "in proportion as the evidence of a preternatural agency is strong, the "presumption is also strengthened that "the system or scheme of religion "which rests on these miracles, is of "Satanic origin." Ancient Christ. No. 7. p. 361. A parallel argument is adopted by others concerning those who do not hold the doctrine of justification by faith in their way, that the holier such men

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tons were found, [of St. Gervasius and "St. Protasius,] was indeed the blood "which had belonged to the living men. Very few would acknowledge so ample a stretch of faith as this." Ibid. p. 264. He proceeds to mention a further reason against them, that it is fatal to Protestantism: "If there be

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any such persons, they should con"sider to what, and to how much they "implicitly pledge themselves in pro"fessing to believe this miracle. The "blood miracles of this and the following centuries are countless; and many of them are as well, or better "attested than is this one. The mo"dern Romish Church, &c." Ibid. "This blood then is a decisive cir"cumstance in the entire narrative. If "genuine, it carries all the accessories, "and not only so, but it establishes "Saint-worship, and condemns, as a "flagrant impiety, the rejection of this worship by the Protestant Churches. "But if otherwise, then the whole is a 66 congeries of blasphemous knavery, a "lying wonder.'' """Ibid. p. 267. Doctrinal and religious views of such character and intensity of course distort to an indefinite extent a writer's view of the evidence.