DISSERTATION

ON

MIRACLE S.

PART II.

The miracles on which the belief of Christianity is founded, are sufficiently attested.

SECTION I.

There is no presumption, arising from human nature, against the miracles said to have been wrought in proof of Christianity.

FROM what hath been evinced in the fourth and fifth sections of the former part, with regard to religion in general, two corollaries are clearly deducible in favour of Christianity. One is, That the presumption arising from the dignity of the end, to say the least of it, can in no religion be pleaded with greater advantage, than in the Christian. The other is, That the presumption arising from the religious affection, instead of weakening, corroborates the evidence of the gospel. The faith of Jesus was promulgated, and gained ground, not with the assistance, but in defiance, of all the religious zeal and prejudices of the times.

In order to invalidate the second corollary, it will possibly be urged, that proselytes to a new religion, may be gained at first; either by address and eloquence, or by the appearance of uncommon sanctity, and rapturous fervours of devotion; that if once people have commenced proselytes, the transition to enthusiasm is almost unavoidable; and that enthusiasm will fully account for the utmost pitch both of credulity and falseness.

Admitting that a few converts might be made by the afore said arts, it is subversive of all the laws of probability, to imagine, that the strongest prepossessions, fortified with that vehement abhorrence which contradiction in religious princi ples rarely fails to excite, should be so easily vanquished in multitudes. Besides, the very pretext of supporting the doctrine by miracles, if a false pretext, would of necessity do unspeakable hurt to the cause. The pretence of miracles will quickly attract the attention of all to whom the new doctrine is published. The influence which address and eloquence, appearances of sanctity and fervours of devotion, would other wise have had, however great, will be superseded by the consideration of what is infinitely more striking and decisive. The miracles will therefore first be canvassed, and canvassed with a temper of mind the most unfavourable to conviction. It is not solely on the testimony of the evangelists that Christians believe the gospel, though that testimony appears in all respects such as merits the highest regard; but it is on the success of the gospel, it is on the testimony, as we may justly call it, of the numberless proselytes that were made to a religion, opposing all the religious professions then in the world, and appealing, for the satisfaction of every body, to the visible and miraculous interposition of Heaven in its favour. The witnesses considered in this light, and in this light they ought to be considered, will be found more than a sufficient number: and though perhaps there were few of them, what the author would denominate men of education and learning? yet, which is more essential, they were generally men of good sense, and knowledge enough to secure them against all delu. sion, as to those plain facts for which they gave their testimony; men who, (in the common acceptation of the words) neither did, nor could derive to themselves either interest or honour by their attestations, but did thereby, on the contrary, evidently abandon all hopes of both.

It deserves also to be remembered, that there is here no contradictory testimony, notwithstanding that both the founder of our religion, and his adherents, were from the first surrounded by inveterate enemies, who never esteemed the matter too inconsiderable to deserve their attention or re'gard;' and who, as they could not want the means, gave evident proofs that they wanted not the inclination to detect the fraud, if there had been any fraud to be detected. They were jealous of their own reputation and authority, and foresaw but too clearly, that the success of Jesus would give a fatal blow to both. As to the testimonies themselves, we may

permit the author to try them by his own rules*. There is here no opposition of testimony; there is no apparent ground of suspicion from the character of the witnesses; there is no interest which they could have in imposing on the world; there is not a small number of witnesses, they are innumerable. Do the historians of our Lord deliver their testimony with doubt and hesitation? Do they fall into the opposite extreme of using too violent asseverations? So far from both, that the most amazing instances of divine power, and the most interesting events, are related without any censure or reflection of the writers on persons, parties, actions, or opinions; with such an unparalleled and unaffected simplicity, as demonstrates, that they were neither themselves animated by passion like enthusiasts, nor had any design of working on the passions of their readers. The greatest miracles are recorded, with as little appearance either of doubt or wonder in the writer, and with as little suspicion of the reader's incredulity, as the most ordinary incidents: A manner as unlike that of impostors as of enthusiasts; a manner in which those writers are altogether singular; and I will add a manner which can on no supposition be tolerably accounted for, but that of the truth, and not of the truth only, but of the notoriety, of the events which they related. They spoke like people, who had themselves been long familiarized to such acts of omnipotence and grace. They spoke like people, who knew that many of the most marvellous actions they related, had been so publickly performed, and in the presence of multitudes alive at the time of their writing, as to be uncontrovertible, and as in fact not to have been controverted, even by their bitterest foes. They could boldly appeal on this head to their énemies. A man, say they, speaking of their mastert, approved of God among you, by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as YOU YOURSELVES ALSO KNOW. The objections of Christ's persecutors against his doctrine, those objections also which regard the nature of his miracles, are, together with his answers, faithfully recorded by the sacred historians; it is strange, if the occasion had been given, that we have not the remotest hint of any objections against the reality of his miracles, and a confutation of those objections.

But passing the manner in which the first proselytes may be gained to a new religion, and supposing some actually gained, no matter how to the faith of Jesus; can it be easily accounted for, that, even with the help of those early converts, p. 178,

*

+ Acts ii. 22.

this religion should have been propagated in the world, on the false pretence of miracles? Nothing more easily, says the author. Those original propagators of the gospel have been deceived themselves; for "a religionist may be an enthusiast, "and imagine he sees what has no reality*."

Were this admitted, it would not in the present case, remove the difficulty. He must not only himself imagine he sees what has no reality, he must make every body present, those who are no enthusiasts, nor even friends, nay he must make enemies also imagine they see the same thing which he imagines he sees; for the miracles of Jesus were acknowledged by those who persecuted him.

That an enthusiast is very liable to be imposed on, in whatever favours the particular species of enthusiasm, with which he is affected, none, who knows any thing of the human heart, will deny. But still this frailty hath its limits. For my own part, I cannot find examples of any, even among enthusiasts, (unless to the conviction of every body they were distracted) who did not see and hear in the same manner as other people. Many of this tribe have mistaken the reveries of a heated imagination, for the communications of the Divine Spirit, who never, in one single instance, mistook the operations of their external senses. Without marking this difference, we should' make no distinction between the enthusiastick character and the frantick, which are in themselves evidently distinct. How shall we then account from enthusiasm, for the testimony given by the apostles, concerning the resurrection of their master, and his ascension into heaven, not to mention innumerable other facts? In these it was impossible that any, who in the use of their reason were but one remove from Bedlamites, should have been deceived. Yet, in the present case, the unbeliever must even say more than this, and, accumulating absurdity upon absurdity, must affirm, that the apostles were deceived as to the resurrection and ascension of their master, notwithstanding that they themselves had concerted the plan of stealing his body, and concealing it.

But this is not the only resource of the infidel. If he is driven from this strong hold, he can take refuge in another. Admit the apostles were not deceived themselves, they may nevertheless have been, through mere devotion and benevolence, incited to deceive the rest of mankind. The religionist, rejoins the author, " may know his narration to be false, and yet persevere in it, with the best intentions in the world, for "the sake of promoting so holy a causet."

Our religion, to use its own nervous language, teacheth us*, that we ought not to lie, or speak wickedly, not even for God; that we ought not to accept his person in judgment, or talk, or act deceitfully for him. But so very little, it must be owned, has this sentiment been attended to, even in the Christian world, that one would almost think, it contained a strain of virtue too sublime for the apprehension of the multitude. It is therefore a fact not to be questioned, that little pious frauds, as they are absurdly, not to say impiously, called, have been often practised by ignorant zealots, in support of a cause, which they firmly believed to be both true and holy. But in all such cases the truth and holiness of the cause are wholly independent of those artifices. A person may be persuaded of the former, who is too clear-sighted to be deceived by the latter for even a full conviction of the truth of the cause is not, in the least, inconsistent with either the consciousness, or the detection of the frauds used in support of it. In the Romish church, for example, there are many zealous and orthodox believers, who are nevertheless incapable of being imposed on by the lying wonders, which some of their clergy have exhibited. The circumstances of the apostles were widely different from the circumstances, either of those believers, or of their clergy. Some of the miraculous events which the apostles attested, were not only the evidences, but the distinguishing doctrines of the religion which they taught. There is therefore in their case an absolute inconsistency be twixt a conviction of the truth of the cause, and the consciousness of the frauds used in support of it. Those frauds themselves, if I may so express myself, constituted the very essence of the cause. What were the tenets, by which they were distinguished, in their religious system, particularly from the Pharisees, who owned not only the unity and perfections of the Godhead, the existence of angels and demons, but the general resurrection, and future state of rewards and punishments? Were not these their peculiar tenets, That Jesus, whom the 'Jews and Romans joined in crucifying without the gates of Jerusalem, had suffered that ignominious death, to make atonement for the sins of men t? that, in testimony of this, and of the divine acceptance, God hath raised him from the dead? that he had exalted him to his own right hand, to be ' a prince and a saviour, to give repentance to the people, and the remission of their sinst? that he is now our advocate ⚫ with the father? that he will descend from heaven at the.

*Job xiii. 7, 8. Rom. v. 6. &c. John ii. 1.

Acts ii. 32. &c. v. 30. &c, x. 40. &tx

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