their being performed, by four different men, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; two of whom saw these miracles with their own eyes; the other two had their account from them who did the same; and affirm, that "they had a perfect knowledge of every thing they relate."* They were plain artless men, without the least appearance of enthusiasm or credulity about them, and rather slow than forward to believe any thing extraordinary and out of the common course of nature. They were perfectly competent to judge of plain matters of fact, of things which passed before their eyes, and could certainly tell, without the least possibility of being mistaken, whether a person whom they knew to be blind was actually restored to sight, and a person whom they knew to be dead was raised to life again by a few words. spoken by their master. They were men, who, from the simplicity of their manners, were not at all likely to invent and publish falsehoods of so extraordinary a nature; much less falsehoods by which they could gain nothing, and did in fact lose every thing. There is not therefore, from the peculiar character of these persons, the least ground for disbelieving the reality of any thing they relate. Nor is there any reason to doubt whether the writings we now have under their names are those which they actually wrote. They have been received as such ever since they were published; nor has any one argument been yet produced against their authenticity which has not been repeatedly and effectually confuted. 2. It is a very strong circumstance in favour of our Saviour's miracles, that they were related by contemporary historians, by those who were eye-witnesses of them, and were afterwards acknowledged to be true by those who lived nearest to the times in which they were wrought; and what is still more to the point, by many who were hostile to the Christian religion. Even the emperor Julian himself, that most bitter adversary of Christianity, who had openly apostatized from it who Luke i. 3. professed the most implacable hatred to it, who employed all his ingenuity, all his acuteness and learning, which were considerable, in combatting the truth of it, in displaying in the strongest colours every objection he could raise up against it; even he did not deny the reality of our Lord's miracles. He admitted that Jesus wrought them, but contended that he wrought them by the power of magic, 3. Unless we admit that the founder of our religion did actually work the miracles ascribed to him by his historians, it is utterly impossible to account for the success and establishment of his religion. It could not, in short, to all appearance, have been established by any other means. Consider only for a moment what the apparent condition of our Lord was, when he first announced his mission among the Jews, what his pretensions and what his doctrines were, and then judge what kind of a reception he must have met with among the Jews, had his preaching been accompanied by no miracles. A young man of no education, born in an obscure village, of obscure parents, without any of those very brilliant talents or exterior accomplishments which usually captivate the hearts of men; without having previously written or done any thing that should excite the expectation, or attract the attention and admiration of the world, offers himself at once to the Jewish nation, not merely as a preacher of morality, but as a teacher sent from heaven; nay what is more as the Son of God himself, and as that great deliverer, the Messiah who had been so long predicted by the prophets, and was then so anxiously expected, and eagerly looked for by the Jewish people. He called upon this people to renounce at once a great part of the religion of their forefathers, and to adopt that which he proposed to them; to relinquish all their fond ideas of a splendid, a victorious, a triumphant Julian apud Cyrillum, L. vi. viži. x. Celsus also acknowledged the truth of the gospel miracles in general, but ascribed them to the assistance of de"The Christians, says he, seem to prevail, daimonon tinon onomasi kai kataklesesi, by virtue of the names and the invocation of certain demons," Orig. contra Celsum, ed. Cantab. 1. i p. 7. mons. Messiah, and to accept in his room a despised, a perse cuted, and a crucified master: he required them to give up all their former prejudices, superstitions, and traditions, all their favorite rites and ceremonies, and what was perhaps still dearer to them, their favorite vices and propensities, their hypocricy, their rapaciousness, their voluptuousness. Instead of exterior forms he prescribed sanctity of manners; instead of washing their hands, and making clean their platters, he commanded them to purify their hearts and reform their lives. Instead of indulging in ease and luxury, he called upon them to take up their cross and follow him through sorrows and sufferings; to pluck out a right eye, and to cut off a right arm; to leave father, mother, brethren, and sisters, for his name's sake, and the gospel. What now shall we say to doctrines such as these delivered by such a person as our Lord appeared to be? Is it probable, is it possible that the reputed son of a poor mechanic could, by the mere force of argument or persuasion, induce vast numbers of his countrymen to embrace opinions and practices so directly opposite to every propensity of their hearts, to every sentiment they had imbibed, every principle they had acted upon from their earliest years; Yet the fact is, that he did prevail on multitudes to do so; and therefore he must have had means of conviction superior to all human eloquence or reasoning; that is, he must have convinced his hearers by the miracles he wrought, that all power in heaven and in earth was given to him, and that every precept he delivered, and every doctrine he taught, was the voice of God himself. Without this it is utterly impossible to give any rational account of his suc cess. In order to set this argument in a still stronger point of view, let us consider what the effect actually was in a case where a new religion was proposed without any support from miracles. That same impostor Mahomet, to whom I before alluded, began his mission with every advantage that could arise from personal figure, from insinuating manners, from a commanding eloquence, from an ardent enterprising spirit, from considerable wealth, and from powerful connections. Yet with all these advantages, and with every artifice and every dexterous contrivance to recommend his new religion to his countrymen, in the space of three years he made only about six converts, and those principally of his own family, relations, and most intimate friends. And his progress was but very slow for nine years after this, till he began to make use of force; and then his victorious arms, not his arguments, carried his religion triumphantly over almost all the eastern world. It appears therefore, that without the assistance either of miracles or of the sword, no religion can be propagated with such rapidity, and to such an extent, as the Christian was, both during our Saviour's life time, and after his death. For there is, I believe, no instance in the history of mankind of such an effect being produced, without either the one or the other. Now of force we know that Jesus never did make use; the unavoidable consequence is, that the miracles asscribed to him were actually wrought by him. 4. These miracles being wrought not in the midst of friends, who were disposed to favour them, but of most bitter and determined enemies, whose passions and whose prejudices were all up in arms, all vigorous and active against them and their author, we may rest assured that no false pretence to a supernatural power, no frauds, no collusions, no impositions, would be suffered to pass undetected and unexposed, that every single miracle would be most critically and most rigorously sifted and enquired into, and no art left unemployed to destroy their credit and counteract their ef fect. And this in fact we find to be the case.-Look into the ninth chapter of St. John, and you will see with what extreme care and diligence, with what anxiety and solicitude the pharisees examined, and re-examined, the blind man that was restored to sight by our Saviour, and what pains they took to persuade him, and to make him say, that he was not restored to sight by Jesus, They brought," says St. John, "to the pharisees him that aforetime was blind; and the pharisees asked him how he had received his sight. And he said unto them, Jesus put clay upon mine eyes and I washed, and did see. A plain and simple and honest relation of the fact. But the Jews, not content with this, called for his parents, and asked them, saying, Is this your son who ye say was born blind? How then doth he now see? His parents, afraid of bringing themselves into danger, very discreetly answered, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but by what means he now seeth we know not, or who hath opened his eyes we know not; he is of age, ask him, he shall speak for himself. They then called the man again, and said to him, Give God the praise, we know that this man (meaning Jesus) is a sinner. The man's an swer is admirable: Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not; but this I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see. Since the world began, was it not known that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. If this man were not of God, he could do nothing. And they answered him and said, Thou wast altogether born in sin, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out." A very effectual way it must be confessed of confuting a miracle. -- The whole of this narrative (from which I have only selected a few of the most striking passages) is highly curious and instructive, and would furnish ample matter for a variety of very important remarks. But the only use I mean to make of it at present, is to observe, that it proves, in the clearest manner, how very much awake and alive the Jews were to every part of our Saviour's conduct. It shews that his miracles were presented not to persons prepossessed and prejudiced in his favour, not to inattentive or negligent, or credulous spectators, but to acute, and inquisitive, and hostile observers, to men disposed and able to detect imposture wherever it could be found. And it is utterly impossible that the miracles of Christ could have passed the fiery ordeal of so much shrewdness |