To thefe Requifites we may join three or four others, which tho' not fo effential, do ordinarily accompany Miracle, and render it fo much the more palpable.

1. It is announced before-hand, and preceded by the Invocation of the Name of God.

2. It is accompanied by a visible Sign, or fome Gesture proper to awaken the Attention, to mark the Inftant of the Miracle, and to render more sensible the Difproportion of the Event to fecond Caufes. Thus Mofes ftretches forth a feeble Rod over the Red Sea, and it is divided.

3. Notoriety is alfo requifite: Not that a Miracle performed in Sight of a few Witneffes is the lefs a true Miracle on that Account. It is enough that there is a fufficient Number of Spectators worthy of Credit. The Notoriety of this or that particular Miracle may be more or less reftrained by Circumstances; and one cannot justly reject a Miracle properly established, under a Pretence that it has not had all the Notoriety one might have imagined: How great foever may be the Number of the Witneffes, we can always conceive a greater. But there is a Degree of Notoriety which satisfies Reason; and if it were

not

not fo, teftimonial Proof would never be

complete.

4. Laftly, it is natural to wish that Miracles were frequently repeated, numerous, and varied. This Condition however is not of the greatest Neceffity: a fingle Miracle well proved, forms, strictly fpeaking, a Demonstration: And yet the Concurrence of feveral Prodigies in Favour of the fame Revelation is not fuperfluous; the Witneffes to one Miracle only might be fufpected of Delufion: They might themselves fear the having been deceived: But if they relate a Multitude of Miracles, wrought at different Times, in different Places, upon different Occafions, and varied a thousand Ways; every Fear of Illufion is annihilated, and every Doubt difpelled.

The Particulars I have been entering upon, give great Light to our Subject, and serve easily to answer the principal Queftions included in the Doctrine of Miracles.

To ask whether God can work Miracles, is to afk whether it is more difficult for him to fufpend the Motion of Planet, than to make it move; or to raise a dead Man, than to create a living one.

To

To ask if Miracles can be proved by human Testimony, is to afk whether Facts palpable, glaring, calculated to strike every eye, can be believed, when feveral Witnesses certify them, who are unfus pected either of Delusion or Fraud.

To ask if there can be any Propriety in Miracles, is to ask whether it be confiftent with the Wisdom of God, to interpofe in an efpecial Manner, Manner, when fecond Causes are infufficient to answer his Defigns.

Let us apply these Principles to the Dif ficulties urged by Mr. Rousseau.

Two of the chief are these.

1. Jefus Chrift did not make use of the Proof drawn from Miracles; Nay he exprefly declined it*.

2. Miracles are not an infallible Proof, or one of which Men can judge †.

CHA P. III.

Proofs that Jefus Chrift performed his Miracles to establish the Divinity of his Miffion.

Ο

Fall Mr. Rouffeau's Paradoxes, this is perhaps the strangest. To justify the Confeffion of the Savoyard Vicar, that there is no great Neceffity to believe the Miracles of the Gospel, he contests the Defign of them. The Design of Miracles, we have feen, is to mark the diviné Interpofition, and to authorife the miffion of him by whom they are performed: But Mr. Rouffeau pretends that Jefus Chrift did not make Ufe of Miracles merely to establish his Character as the Meffenger of God. He complains, "that it is made a Crime "in him not to admit a Proof, which Jefus Chrift hath not only not given, but which "he expressly declined."

And yet the four Evangelists and the Book of the Acts are full of Miracles, by which our Lord and the firft Preachers of the Faith established their Authority. By denying a clear Point, the Author forces me to prove it; but I will do fo in few words.

• P. 75

Το

To know the Defign of a Miracle, it is natural to hearken to him who performs it. Now Jefus Chrift himself faid to the Jews, 1 have greater Witness than that of John; for the Works which the Father hath given me to finish, bear Witnefs of me, that the Father' hath fent me *. And elfewhere, If you believe not the Word which I fpake unto you, that the Father is in me, at least believe me for the Works that I do *.

2. This fame Proof of his Miffion, Jefus gave to the two Disciples of John, when they came and asked him, Art thou he who should come, or are we to look for another? He might have alledged for answer the Excellence of his Doctrine, and yet however fair this Proof may be, it is not what he infifted upon on this Occafion: But in that fame Hour, fays St. Luke, he delivered many from their Infirmities and Plagues, and to many who were blind he gave fight; and then he faid unto John's Difciples, Go your Way, and report to John what Things ye have feen and heard; that the Blind fee, the Lame walk, the Lepers are cleanfed, the Deaf hear, the Dead are raised up, and to the Poor the Gospel is preached.†

John v.6 Ch. xiv. 11.

+ Mat. xi, 2-5. Luke vii. 20-22.