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deift than the phyfical. The purpose of the latter is confonant to the attributes of God, worthy of the Creator, Father, and Governor of mankind, and beneficial to the human fpecies. The moral miracle, on the contrary (whether we afcribe it to the immediate operation of the Almighty, to preordained phyfical laws, or to the influence of fome demon let loofe for the delufion and perdition of mankind) exhibits to us a Deity, at the difcovery of whom we muft fhudder-a Deity, who delights in bewildering man's understanding, afflicting his mind with irremoveable doubts, placing infurmountable obftacles in the course himself has marked out for him, and engaging him in a moft perilous conflict. And this fearful affliction would be more especially the lot of the worthy few, who reflect on their deftination; and the reward of thofe honeft minds, who diligently feek the truth, to raise themselves to an exalted benevolence, and a fimilitude with God. They, on the contrary, who value not the truth, the multitude of mere machines who never reflect, would vegetate in peaceful ignorance, and happy ftupidity, freed from the rack of doubt. If the confideration of the divine perfections, and a miracle answerable to them, performed in confirmation of a rational religion, in a cafe where we must choose between fuch a phyfical miracle and a moral one, do not incline us to the former, we must reject every notion of God, and his moral government, that is agreeable to right reason. If, after a careful examination of the doctrines and precepts of chriftianity, an impartial inquiry into the character, way of thinking, opinions, and views of its firft preachers, and an accurate inveftigation of the way in which it was introduced into the world, propagated and maintained, a man be convinced, that they who taught it, and they who received it on their words, thought and acted naturally and rationally, on the

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fuppofition of the miracles related being true, and on the contrary unnaturally, incomprehenfibly, and miraculously, on the fuppofition of their being falfe, and that man ftill have any grounds for doubting whether christianity be a divine inftitution; we must confefs, that to meditate on religion, and our relation towards God, is the moft vain and unfortunate occupation of our mental faculties; and that, as fuch meditations muft lead us into doubt, tranquillity is only to be obtained by adopting popular fuperftition, or abjuring thought. From what has been faid it appears how and why the overftrained requifition of the Scottish philofopher, namely, that to render the account of a miracle credible, it must be a greater miracle for it not to have happened, ought to be limited.

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But are moral miracles conceivable ?* author I fuppofe the affirmative, when I admit the human mind to be fubject to an established order, by which its changes are as firmly bound, as fubftance by the laws of motion. According to the

*No one who admits the poffibility of phyfical miracles, can well doubt the poffibility of moral ones. Whether fuch ever happened, or whether it be probable that God would perform fuch, is a different queftion. Philofophy feems to combat these miracles, or any forcible violation and change of the proper activity of the foul, on the ground, that the perfonal identity of the thinking fubftance which is acted upon would be thereby deftroyed. The fcriptures give us no inftance of a miracle changing the character and way of thinking of a man immediately. When a miracle was requifite to this purpose, a phyfical one was always employed, as in the converfion of Paul, for inftance; and this was to prevent the neceffity of a moral one. The remarkable paffage in Exodus, xiii. 17. feems to prove, that God found it inconfiftent with his wisdom to perform moral miracles. It is true we must admit, on a certain notion of divine inspiration, that God works proper pfychological miracles: but I will not attempt to decide, how far the objection to moral miracles is applicable to that infpiration. A man might be infpired by means of a pfychological miracle, without having his mind altered or amended, as was the cafe with Balaam.

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doctrines of neceffity, all the perceptions and determinations of the mind are fo connected, fo dependant on each other, that the fubfequent ftate of the mind is always determinable from the preceding, and chance is entirely excluded. On this fuppofition we are justified in prefuming upon as firm an order in the moral as in the phyfical world, and deviations. from it, or an apparent union of caufes and effects contradicting all analogy and experience, are as much miracles, as fimilar deviations from the analogy obferved and admitted in the phyfical world. If, however, we deny neceffity, and maintain the freedom of indifferency, we must admit no moral miracles, at leaft in the manner required by Hume to establish the truth of the miracles related in fcripture. According to this fyftem, chance rules over the actions of the mind, though not over the phænomena of the corporeal world. Now where chance exists anomalous confequences may and muft follow, and new appearances muft arife, which will not be more improbable than those hitherto observed, or at leaft cannot pafs for miracles, as we have nothing fixed, no course of nature, no analogy to be violated. We cannot on this fyftem determine, whether a certain mode of thinking or acting be natural, unnatural, or fupernatural, in any individual character (if according to it there be any fuch thing as a determinate character). According to this notion the mind and its actions may be compared to a cafe, out of which the letters to compofe a book are taken blindfold. Whatever be the order into which the letters fall, I cannot fay of the feries arifing, after a certain number of attempts, that some are natural and probable, and others unnatural and miraculous: new and various combinations may, and indeed must, ever arife, and the only improbable feries would be one giving an intelligible and connected fenfe, as fuch

would

would be contrary to the nature of chance. If we fay of God, with Pope in his Universal Prayer, that he

Binding nature faft in fate, left free the human will;

and understand it to fignify that God has fubjected the irrational and inanimate creation to fate, or a connection of cause and effect, and on the contrary has left the human mind free from all laws, and to the arbitrary guidance of a blind choice; the former cannot deviate from its laws, fhew itself under a new form, or exhibit effects arifing from no caufe; but the human will may, from the freedom given it, run into the most irrational propenfities, and incomprehenfible determinations. In fhort, we thus find in man no determinate certain character, no way of thinking, defign, or plan, on which we can fix our eyes, or from which we can deduce any inferences with the leaft appearance of probability. If these

confequences of the fyftem of the freedom of indifferency, or chance, be juftly drawn, its partifans, if they be true to their fyftem, muft find it difficult, if not impoffible, to admit any human teftimony as fufficient to fupport the credibility of a miracle. For how could they overcome the objection, that, as it is poffible for the witneffes to have been deceived, and to have advanced falfehoods, in an irrational and incomprehenfible manner, this was probably the cafe? Now as fuch witneffes are most important and indifpenfable to the logical demonftration of the truth of chriftianity, it is clear, from this. confideration, that the fyftem of neceffity, which must be tacitly admitted, if we would establish their validity and credibility, cannot be dangerous or detrimental to the chriftian religion. So little is it either, that it gives the due force and validity to the most rational arguments for its truth.

But are we as capable of remarking a deviation.

from

from moral, as from phyfical order? Is our judgment as certain in the former cafe, as in the latter? Thefe difficulties may be objected, though we admit what has hitherto been advanced. To me every thing feems to be alike in both cafes, except that more understanding, fkill, attention, and reflection, are neceffary to judge of a pfychological or moral miracle, than to the difcovery of a phyfical one; at leaft if it be fo public, firm, and void of all juggle, or deceptio vifus, as the miracles in the gofpel. If thefe greater requifites to the difcovery of a moral miracle render the point more difficult, ftill it will not be less certain, if they be properly applied. Probably the judgment may be ftill more certain, if it be true, as it appears to me, that philofophy is farther advanced in the knowledge of the human mind, its faculties, powers and actions, than in the knowledge of nature and its powers; has made greater and more important difcoveries in the moral, than in the phyfical world; and is more perfectly and accurately acquainted with the changes produced in our minds, than with any thing else. Some philofophers, it is true, will maintain the contrary; but the reafon is, that in their inquiries into fo near and interefting an object, they are defirous of tracing every thing to its primary fource, without confidering how much lefs of the nature of fubftance we are capable of discovering by an equally deep and ardent investigation. I will not prefume to fay, that there are no unexplored regions in the moral world, or nothing left for future inquirers into the human mind to difcover; but I do not believe that we are fo ignorant of the powers and actions of the mind, as to be unable to decide whether a certain mode of conduct be natural, or unnatural, fuitable to its nature, or contradictory to it. In my opinion, what we know of the fubject, and what we are capable of knowing from conftant experience, and from an VOL. III.

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