*

secrets of nature, and the powers of natural causes, yet this does not hinder, but that in many cases we may safely and certainly pronounce that such and such effects, e. g. the raising the dead, or restoring a perished limb in an instant, exceed all natural mechanical powers. And as there may be miraculous works performed, concerning which we may be sufficiently certain, that they exceed the power of man and all natural material causes, so they may be of such a nature, and so circumstanced, that we may be certain, that they were not wrought by superior invisible evil beings, and therefore must be wrought by the immediate power of God himself; or which comes to the same thing in the present question, by the agency of invisible good beings, acting under his special influence and direction. There may be works that carry such illustrious characters of a sovereignty and dominion over nature, that they cannot reasonably be ascribed to any other than to the supreme Lord and Governor of the world, or to his special direction: nor can it, without the greatest absurdity, be supposed, in consistency with his infinite wisdom and goodness, and the glory of his unequalled majesty and dominion, that he should ever suffer them to be wrought in attestation of an imposture, or to promote the interests of vice, and falsehood, and superstition. And I am willing to join issue with this writer when he pleases, and show, that the miracles wrought in attestation of the Mosaical and Christian dispensation were such.

His third lemma or observation, with respect to miracles, is this, that where the facts are not the immediate objects of sense, but depend upon testimony, this testimony being human must be always fallible. And in this case the probability will be still less at a greater distance from the fountain, or first original evidence, or as it comes to us through more hands, and in a longer succession of time. For in this case there must be always some danger of alterations in the conveyance; and a few circumstances, either left out or added, might make the most common thing in the world look extraordinary and miraculous.' In opposition to this I lay down this position, that as miracles may be of such a nature, that those that are eye and ear witnesses may be as certain of the reality of them, as any man can be by the testimony of his senses, of any facts whatsoever, so those miracles may be transmitted to others that were not eye and ear witnesses, with such a degree of credibility, that there can be no reasonable ground for doubt of the truth of those facts. And though in this case our belief of them depends upon human testimony, yet human testimony may be so circumstantiated as to give a certain assurance, which no reasonable man can doubt of, concerning that which is conveyed to us by that testimony. And particularly with respect to accounts of facts done in past ages, all the world owns, that they may be transmitted to us with such a degree of evidence, that we can no more reasonably

The absurdity of the contrary supposition Mr. Chapman has well exposed, Euseb. pp. 82, 83.

doubt of them than if we ourselves had lived in those ages; and any man that should refuse to believe them, and give no other reason for it, but that they come to us by human testimony, and were done several ages ago, would only render himself ridiculous.

His fourth observation is this, that as 'human testimony must be always fallible, so with regard to miracles, prodigies, ghosts, apparitions, and things in themselves improbable, it has the very least and lowest degree of credibility. The same testimony and attestation which would be easily taken for a common natural fact, would not be soon admitted for an extraordinary and miraculous one, where there must be always more danger and probability of deception. And therefore the evidence or proof in this case ought to be so much the stronger and incontestable, in proportion to the natural improbability or incredibility of the thing,' p. 32. But a thing's being extraordinary and miraculous is no objection against the credibility of it, if at the same time it be of such a nature, and so circumstanced, that the persons that were witnesses to it might have as full an assurance of the certainty and reality of it, as any man can possibly have of any facts whatsoever. And of this kind were the miraculous facts that were done in attestation of the Mosaic and Christian dispensation. They were attended with such a degree of evidence as was every way equal to the importance of the facts, and far superior to the evidence brought for many other facts, which yet it would be accounted unreasonable to doubt of. And the accounts of those facts are transmitted to us with a degree of evidence and credibility, that many other accounts of past facts are not transmitted with; which yet, in the judgment of all reasonable persons, may be safely depended on.

His fifth observation is, that 'it is highly improbable, and cannot be admitted, that God should work miracles, or interpose by an immediate divine power out of the way of natural agency and common providence, but to answer some great end of vast importance to mankind. And therefore he would not work miracles, either to prove things which were plainly and necessarily true in nature and reason before, nor things in their own nature indifferent, and such as can serve to no good use or purpose at all, when they are known and put in practice,' p. 33.

It will be easily granted, that if God interposes, by an immediate divine power, out of the way of natural agency, it will be for some worthy end of importance to mankind. And it is a valuable end, and of importance to mankind, to attest a revelation by miracles; one design of which is to confirm and illustrate those great truths and obligations, even of natural religion, which, though founded in nature and reason, yet, by the author's own acknowledgment, were, through the corruption of mankind, in a great measure defaced and obscured; and also to make a discovery of some things, which, though of considerable importance to mankind, were such as they could not have discovered without such a revelation. Nor is it any objection against the usefulness and importance of such a revelation, that it also prescribes some things of a positive nature,

which, though abstractly, and in themselves considered, they are indifferent, yet are designed, in a subserviency to the main ends of all religion, and when observed according to the institution, are really useful.

Our author, in enlarging on this last observation, takes occasion to show, that Christ's miracles were useful to remove the prejudices of the people, and to procure a due attention and regard to his doctrines; though he will not allow them to have yielded any additional proof or attestation to those doctrines. I shall take notice of this afterwards. At present I shall only observe, that if it were an end worthy of God to interpose by such glorious miracles, as this writer pretends to grant, to engage the attention of the people to our Saviour's doctrines, then certainly it must be owned to be an end worthy of God, to exhibit those miracles in order to give an attestation to the truth of those doctrines. And indeed, the one of these as the case was circumstanced, was really inseparable from the other. For if God concerned himself in so extraordinary a manner, by interposing out of the way of natural agency, to procure their attention to those doctrines, this was a proof of his approbation of those doctrines; and consequently was a proof of their being good, and true, and divine. And therefore these miracles must, in reason, not only engage the people to consider what Christ delivered, but be regarded by them as proofs and evidences of his divine mission, and of the truth and divine authority of the doctrines he taught. And accordingly it is evident, that it was in this view that our Saviour himself represented the end and design of his miracles; as I shall have occasion to show.

Our author has little more as to the general question concerning miracles; he thinks 'nothing can be plainer than this, that the bare power of working miracles can be no proof at all, either of the truth of doctrine, or any authority, or special commission, that the persons have from God,' p. 26, and again, p. 49, 'nothing can be plainer than this, that the bare exertion of power, of what nature or kind soever, can have no connexion with truth or goodness; but the ends and purposes to which that power is directed must be considered, and must denominate the persons as good or bad,' &c. This objection is so fully exposed by his learned adversary Mr. Chapman, that he ought not to have repeated it, at least without endeavouring to answer what had been offered against it. See Euseb. pp. 78, 79.

It will be easily allowed, that power and truth are distinct ideas, though inseparably united in God, the great fountain of both; but it doth not follow from thence, that power can in no case be so exerted, as to yield an attestation to truth. For supposing power exerted in such a manner as to bear the evident marks and characters of a divine interposition and agency, and that this power is exerted in confirmation of a body of doctrines and laws pretended to have been received from God, then this power so exerted may be regarded as the testimony of God himself, in favour of those doctrines and laws, and as a proof that they did, indeed, come from God. And

if it shows, that these doctrines came from God, it shows that they are true; because it is impossible that God should be deceived himself, or be accessory to deceive others, by giving his attestation to a lie.

There is a passage which this author has, pp. 80, 81, which I shall here consider, because it relates to this subject, and the evident design of it is to show, that neither inspiration, nor miracles as a proof of that inspiration, are to be regarded as yielding any attestation to the truth and divinity of doctrines received by inspiration, and confirmed by miracles. He urges, that we are obliged to 'try the spirits, to bring the doctrines themselves to the test of reason and sound judgment, and to consider their nature and tendency, thereby to know whether they came from the spirit of truth and righteousness, or of error and delusion.' And that, 'suppose doctrines to be delivered in the most extraordinary way possible, this extraordinary manner of conveyance could be no proof of those doctrines, which might be error and delusion notwithstanding; and those doctrines must be judged by the same test and rule, as if they had come to us in the most common and natural way.' And he observes, that if 'an angel from heaven should have delivered any other doctrines, different from those of natural light and purity, they must have been rejected, with what extraordinary miraculous power soever they had been proposed and delivered.'

As far as I can understand the force of his argument, it runs thus; that because all doctrines are to be brought to the test and judgment of reason, so far that no doctrines must be admitted that are evidently contradictory to the clear principles of sound reason, and subversive of morality, and the eternal rules of righteousness, therefore neither inspiration nor miracles can be depended upon as any proofs of doctrines at all; nor is any more regard to be had to what comes this way, and is thus attested, than if it had come in the ordinary way. This is a very strange way of reasoning; nor is it easy to discern the connexion of the conclusion with the premises. But let us suppose doctrines which are not contradictory to the clear principles of reason, or subversive of morality, but yet, which we could not have found out of ourselves by our own reason, and which cannot be proved to be necessarily true by any arguments drawn from the nature of the thing, and that these doctrines are confirmed by numerous uncontrolled miracles: the question is, whether such miracles may not be justly regarded as yielding a divine testimony to those doctrines ? and, whether they may not be reasonably received as of divine authority, on the account of those extraordinary miraculous attestations, though we should not have thought ourselves obliged to receive them without those attestations? and to this the author's argument here saith nothing at all.

It will be granted, that no doctrines are to be admitted upon any pretence whatsoever that are contrary to the evident light of reason, and which subvert the obligations of morality; and in this sense it

may be admitted, as our author observes, that 'if the doctrines of Christ himself could not have borne this test of light and purity, they could not have been rationally received.' But then, at the same time, it may also be certainly concluded from the wisdom and goodness of divine providence, that if this had been the case, Christ would never have been enabled to work such illustrious miracles in confirmation of his divine mission, much less would God have raised him from the dead. It can, in no consistency with the divine perfections, be supposed, that God would have given, or suffered to be given, such a series of illustrious attestations, bearing all the marks of divinity, in confirmation of an imposture, and to favour the cause of idolatry, false doctrine, vice, and licentiousness. The apostle Paul, in his epistle to the Galatians, chap. i. 8, puts the case, that if he himself, or an angel from heaven,' should preach a different gospel from that which he had preached to them, they were not to regard it. This is only a vehement form of asseveration, to show, that on no pretence whatsoever should they swerve from the gospel they had received from him. But why were they so firmly to adhere to the gospel he had taught them? it was, because it was the gospel he had received by revelation from Jesus Christ;' see ver. 12, and which was confirmed by the most illustrious miraculous attestations, and gifts of the Holy Spirit; see chap. iii. 2. 5. So that he is so far from intending by this to insinuate, that inspiration and miracles can be no proof of doctrines, that on the contrary he produces these as manifest and incontestable proofs of the truth and divinity of that gospel, from which they were never under any pretence to depart.

CHAPTER III.

The miracles wrought by Moses vindicated against the author's objecticns. The case of the Egyptian sorcerers, and their miracles, considered. His attempt to prove that Moses might have been assisted by some supernatural evil power, because his miracles were wrought, not for the good, but for the destruction, of mankind, and were done out of a particular partiality to the Israelites. The nature of those miracles, and the end for which they were wrought, prove they could not be the work of an evil being. The miracles of Jesus Christ vindicated. Not merely wrought to procure attention from the people, but designed as proper proofs and attestations to his divine mission, and the truth and divine authority of his laws and doctrine. The wonderful effects of Christ's miracles not owing to the strength of imagination. The extraordinary miraculous facts wrought in attestation of the Mosaical and Christian dispensation come to us with sufficient evidence to make it reasonable for us to believe the truth of these facts.

HAVING Considered what this writer offers on the general question about miracles, I shall now proceed to examine what he hath