cles of Christ by the adversaries of the religion.
"Celsus," saith Origen, "well knowing what
great works may be alleged to have been done by
Jesus, pretends to grant that the things related of
him are true; such as healing diseases, raising
the dead, feeding multitudes with a few loaves, of
which large fragments were left."* And then
Celsus gives, it seems, an answer to these proofs
of our Lord's mission, which, as Origen under-
stood it, resolved the phenomena into magic; for
Origen begins his reply by observing,
"You see
that Celsus in a manner allows that there is such
a thing as magic."t

the persons with whom he contended would ascribe | with the old solution of magic applied to the mirathese miracles to magic; "Lest any of our opponents should say, What hinders, but that he who is called Christ by us, being a man sprung from men, performed the miracles which we attribute to him, by magical art?" The suggestion of this reason meets, as I apprehend, the very point of the present objection; more especially when we find Justin followed in it by other writers of that age. Irenæus, who came about forty years after him, notices the same evasion in the adversaries of Christianity, and replies to it by the same argument: "But if they shall say, that the Lord performed these things by an illusory appearance, (T) leading these objectors to the prophecies, we will show from them, that all things were thus predicted concerning him, and strictly came to pass." ""* Lactantius, who lived a century lower, delivers the same sentiment, upon the same occasion; "He performed miracles; we might have supposed him to have been a magician, as ye say, and as the Jews then supposed, if all the prophets had not with one spirit foretold that Christ should perform these very things."+

But to return to the Christian apologists in their order. Tertullian :-"That person whom the Jews had vainly imagined, from the meanness of his appearance, to be a mere man, they afterward, in consequence of the power he exerted, considered as a magician, when he, with one word, ejected devils out of the bodies of men, gave sight to the blind, cleansed the leprous, strengthened the nerves of those that had the palsy, and, lastly, with one command, restored the dead to life; when he, I say, made the very elements obey him, assuaged the storms, walked upon the seas, demonstrating nimself to be the Word of God."+"

It appears also from the testimony of Saint Jerome, that Porphyry, the most learned and able of the Heathen writers against Christianity, resorted to the same solution: "Unless," says he, speaking to Vigilantius, "according to the manner of the Gentiles and the profane, of Porphyry and Eunomius, you pretend that these are the tricks of demons. "+

This magic, these demons, this illusory appearance, this comparison with the tricks of jugglers, by which many of that age accounted so easily for the Christian miracles, and which answers the advocates of Christianity often thought it necessary to refute by arguments drawn from other topics, and particularly from prophecy, (to which, it seems these solutions did not apply,) we now perceive to be gross subterfuges. That such reasons were ever seriously urged, and seriously received, is only a proof, what a gloss and varnish fashion can give to any opinion.

It appears, therefore, that the miracles of Christ understood as we understand them, in their literal and historical sense, were positively and precisely asserted and appealed to by the apologists for Christianity; which answers the allegation of the

I am ready, however, to admit, that the ancient Christian advocates did not insist upon the miracles in argument, so frequently as I should have done. It was their lot to contend with notions of magical agency, against which the mere production of the facts was not sufficient for the convincing of their adversaries: I do not know whether they themselves thought it quite decisive of the controversy. But since it is proved, I conceive with certainty, that the sparingness with which they appealed to miracles, was owing neither to their ignorance, nor their doubt of the facts, it is, at any rate, an objection, not to the truth of the history, but to the judgment of its defenders.

Next in the catalogue of professed apologists we may place Origen, who, it is well known, published a formal defence of Christianity, in answer to Cel-objection. sus, a Heathen, who had written a discourse against it. I know no expressions, by which a plainer or more positive appeal to the Christian miracles can be made, than the expressions used by Origen; "Undoubtedly we do think him to be the Christ, and the Son of God, because he healed the lame and the blind; and we are the more confirmed in this persuasion, by what is written in the prophecies: Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear, and the fame man shall leap as a hart.' But that he also raised the dead; and that it is not a fiction of those who wrote the Gospels, is evident from hence, that, if it had been a fiction, there would have been many recorded to be raised up, and such as had been a long time in their graves. But, it not being a fiction, few have been recorded: for instance, the daughter of the ruler of a synagogue, of whom I do not know why he said, She is not dead but sleepeth, expressing something peculiar to her, not common to all dead persons: and the only son of a widow, on whom he had compassion, and raised him to life, after he had bid the bearers of the corpse to stop; and the third, Lazarus, who had been buried four days." This is positively to assert the miracles of Christ, and it is also to comment upon them, and that with a considerable degree of accuracy and candour. In another passage of the same author, we meet

CHAPTER VI.

Want of universality in the knowledge and re ception of Christianity, and of greater clear ness in the evidence.

Or a revelation which really came from God,
the proof, it has been said, would in all ages be so
public and manifest, that no part of the human
species would remain ignorant of it, no under-
standing could fail of being convinced by it.
The advocates of Christianity do not pretend
*Orig. Cont. Cels. 1. ii. sect. 48.

† Lardner's Jewish and Heath. Test. vol. ii. p. 294. ed.
Jerome cont. Vigil.
32*

4to.

that the evidence of their religion possesses these qualities. They do not deny that we can conceive it to be within the compass of divine power, to have communicated to the world a higher degree of assurance, and to have given to his communication a stronger and more extensive influence. For any thing we are able to discern, God could have so formed men, as to have perceived the truths of religion intuitively; or to have carried on a communication with the other world, whilst they lived in this; or to have seen the individuals of the species, instead of dying, pass to heaven by a sensible translation. He could have presented a separate miracle to each man's senses. He could have established a standing miracle. He could have caused miracles to be wrought in every different age and country. These, and many more methods, which we may imagine, if we once give loose to our imaginations, are, so far as we can judge, all practicable.

The question, therefore, is, not whether Christianity possesses the highest possible degree of evidence, but whether the not having more evidence be a sufficient reason for rejecting that which we have.

Now their appears to be no fairer method of judging, concerning any dispensation which is alleged to come from God, when a question is made whether such a dispensation could come from God or not, than by comparing it with other things which are acknowledged to proceed from the same counsel, and to be produced by the same agency. If the dispensation in question labour under no defects but what apparently belong to other dispensations, these seeming defects do not justify us in setting aside the proofs which are of fered of its authenticity, if they be otherwise entitled to credit.

trivance ?-The observation, which we have er emplified in the single instance of the rain of heaven, may be repeated concerning most of the phenomena of nature; and the true conclusion to which it leads is this: that to inquire what the Deity might have done, could have done, or, as we even sometimes presume to speak, ought to have done, or, in hypothetical cases would have done, and to build any propositions upon such inquiries against evidence of facts, is wholly unwarrantable. It is a mode of reasoning which will not do in natural history, which will not do in natural religion, which cannot therefore be applied with safety to revelation. It may have some foundation, in certain speculative a priori ideas of the divine attributes; but it has none in experience, or in analogy. The general character of the works of nature is, on the one hand, goodness both in design and effect; and, on the other hand, a liability to difficulty, and to objections, if such objections be allowed, by reason of seeming incompleteness or uncertainty in attaining their end. Christianity participates of this character. The true similitude between nature and revelation consists in this; that they each bear strong marks of their original; that they each also bear appearances of irrregularity and defect. A system of strict optimism may nevertheless be the real sys tem in both cases. But what I contend is, that the proof is hidden from us; that we ought not to expect to perceive that in revelation, which we hardly perceive in any thing: that beneficence, of which we can judge, ought to satisfy us, that optimism, of which we cannot judge, ought not to be sought after. We can judge of beneficence, because it depends upon effects which we experience and upon the relation between the means which we see acting and the ends which we see produced. Throughout that order then of nature, of which We cannot judge of optimism, because it neces God is the author, what we find is a system of sarily implies a comparison of that which is tried, beneficence: we are seldom or ever able to make with that which is not tried; of consequences out a system of optimism. I mean, that there are which we see, with others which we imagine, and few cases in which, if we permit ourselves to concerning many of which, it is more than probarange in possibilities, we cannot suppose some-ble we know nothing; concerning some, that we thing more perfect, and more unobjectionable, have no notion. than what we see. The rain which descends If Christianity be compared with the state and from heaven, is confessedly amongst the contri-progress of natural religion, the argument of the vances of the Creator, for the sustentation of the animals and vegetables which subsist upon the surface of the earth. Yet how partially and irregularly is it supplied! How much of it falls upon the sea, where it can be of no use! how often is it wanted where it would be of the greatest! What tracts of continent are rendered deserts by the scarcity of it! Or, not to speak of extreme cases, how much, sometimes, do inhabited countries suffer by its deficiency or delay!-We could imagine, if to imagine were our business, the matter to be otherwise regulated. We could imagine showers to fall, just where and when they would do good; always seasonable, every where sufficient; so distributed as not to leave a field upon the face of the globe scorched by drought, or even a plant withering for the lack of moisture. Yet, does the difference between the real case and the imagined case, or the seeming inferiority of the one to the other, authorize us to say, that the present disposition of the atmosphere is not amongst the productions or the designs of the Deity? Does it check the inference which we draw from the confessed beneficence of the provi sion? or does it make us cease to admire the con

objector will gain nothing by the comparison. I remember hearing an unbeliever say, that, if God had given a revelation, he would have written it in the skies. Are the truths of natural religion written in the skies, or in a language which every one reads? or is this the case with the most useful arts, or the most necessary sciences of human life? An Otaheitean or an Esquimaux knows nothing of Christianity; does he know more of the principles of deism, or morality? which, notwithstanding his ignorance, are neither untrue, nor unim portant, nor uncertain. The existence of the Deity is left to be collected from observations, which every man does not make, which every man perhaps, is not capable of making. Can it be argued, that God does not exist, because, if he did, he would let us see him, or discover himself to mankind by proofs (such as, we may think, the nature of the subject merited,) which no inadver tency could miss, no prejudice withstand?

If Christianity be regarded as a providential instrument for the melioration of mankind, its progress and diffusion resemble that of other causes by which human life is improved. The diversity is not greater, nor the advance more slow, in reli

When we argue concerning Christianity, that it must necessarily be true, because it is beneficial, we go, perhaps, too far on one side: and we certainly go too far on the other, when we conclude that it must be false, because it is not so efficacious as we could have supposed. The question of its truth is to be tried upon its proper evidence, without deferring much to this sort of argument, on either side. "The evidence," as Bishop Butler hath rightly observed, "depends upon the judgment we form of human conduct, under given circumstances, of which it may be presumed that we know something; the objection stands upon the supposed conduct of the Deity, under relations with which we are not acquainted."

gion, than we find it to be in learning, liberty, | ance, or the Christian proms, "if any man government, laws. The Deity hath not touched will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, the order of nature in vain. The Jewish religion whether it be of God," *)—it is true, I say, that they produced great and permanent effects; the Chris- who sincerely ac', or sincerely endeavour to act, tian religion hath done the same. It hath dispos- according to what they believe, that is, according ed the world to amendment. It hath put things to the just result of the probabilities, or, if you in a train. It is by no means improbable, that it please, the possibilities of natural and revealed remay become universal: and that the world may ligion, which they themselves perceive, and accontinue in that stage so long as that the duration cording to a rational estimate of consequences, and of its reign may bear a vast proportion to the time above all, according to the just effect of those of its partial influence. principles of gratitude and devotion, which even the view of nature generates in a well ordered mind, seldom fail of proceeding farther. This also may have been exactly what was designed. Whereas, may it not be said that irresistible evidence would confound all characters and all dispositions? would subvert, rather than promote, the true purpose of the divine counsels; which is, not to produce obedience by a force little short of mechanical constraint, (which obedience would be regularity, not virtue, and would hardly, perhaps, differ from that which inanimate bodies pay to the laws impressed upon their nature,) but to treat moral agents agreeably to what they are; which is done, when light and motives are of such kinds, and are imparted in such measures, that the inWhat would be the real effect of that over- fluence of them depends upon the recipients thempowering evidence which our adversaries require selves? "It is not meet to govern rational free in a revelation, it is difficult to foretell; at least, we agents in vid by sight and sense. It would be no must speak of it as of a dispensation of which we trial or thanks to the most sensual wretch to forhave no experience. Some consequences however bear sinning, if heaven and hell were open to his would, it is probable, attend this economy, which sight. That spiritual vision and fruition is our do not seem to befit a revelation that proceeded state in patriâ." (Baxter's Reasons, page 357.) from God. One is, that irresistible proof would-There may be truth in this thought, though restrain the voluntary powers too much; would not answer the purpose of trial and probation; would call for no exercise of candour, seriousness, humility, inquiry; no submission of passion, interests, and prejudices, to moral evidence and to probable truth; no habits of reflection; none of that previous desire to learn and to obey the will of God, which forms perhaps the test of the virtuous principle, and which induces men to attend, with care and reverence, to every credible intimation of that will, and to resign present advantages and present pleasures to every reasonable expectation of propitiating his favour. "Men's moral probation may be, whether they will take due care to inform themselves by impartial consideration; and, afterward, whether they will act as the case requires, upon the evidence which they have. And this we find by experience, is often our probation in our temporal capacity."*

II. These modes of communication would leave no place for the admission of internal evidence; which ought, perhaps, to bear a considerable part in the proof of every revelation, because it is a species of evidence, which applies itself to the knowledge, love, and practice of virtue, and which operates in proportion to the degree of those qualities which it finds in the person whom it addresses. Men of good dispositions, amongst Christians, are greatly affected by the impression which the Scriptures themselves make upon their minds. Their conviction is much strengthened by these impressions. And this perhaps was intended to be one effect to be produced by the religion. It is likewise true, to whatever cause we ascribe it (for I am not in this work at liberty to introduce the Christian doctrine of grace or assist

• Butler's Analogy, part ii. c. vi.

roughly expressed. Few things are more improbable than that we (the human species) should be the highest order of beings in the universe: that animated nature should ascend from the lowest reptile to us, and all at once stop there. If there be classes above us of rational intelligences, clearer manifestations may belong to them. This may be one of the distinctions. And it may be one, to which we ourselves hereafter shall attain.

III. But may it not also be asked, whether the perfect display of a future state of existence would be compatible with the activity of civil life, and with the success of human affairs? I can easily conceive that this impression may be overdone; that it may so seize and fill the thoughts, as to leave no place for the cares and offices of men's several stations, no anxiety for worldly prosperity, or even for a worldly provision, and, by conse quence, no sufficient stimulus to secular industry. Of the first Christians we read, "that all that believed were together, and had all things common; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need; and, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart."+ This was extremely natural, and just what might be expected from miraculous evidence coming with full force upon the senses of mankind: but I much doubt whether, if this state of mind had been universal, or long-continued, the business of the world could have gone on. The necessary arts of social life would have been little cultivated. The plough and the loom would have stood still. Agriculture, manufactures, trade, and navigation, would not, I think, have flourished, if they could

have been exercised at all. Men would have addicted themselves to contemplative and ascetic lives, instead of lives of business and of useful industry. We observe that Saint Paul found it necessary, frequently to recall his converts to the ordinary labours and domestic duties of their condition; and to give them, in his own example, a lesson of contented application to their worldly employments.

By the manner in which the religion is now proposed, a great portion of the human species is enabled, and of these multitudes of every generation are induced, to seek and to effectuate their salvation, through the medium of Christianity, without interruption of the prosperity or of the regular course of human affairs.

CHAPTER VII.

The supposed effects of Christianity.

gree than they are upon any other subject. Religion operates most upon those of whom history knows the least; upon fathers and mothers in their families, upon men-servants and maid-servants, upon the orderly tradesman, the quiet villager, the manufacturer at his loom, the husbandman in his fields. Amongst such, its influence collectively may be of inestimable value, yet its effects, in the mean time, little upon those who figure upon the stage of the world. They may know nothing of it; they may believe nothing of it; they may be actuated by motives more impetuous than those which religion is able to excite. It cannot, therefore, be thought strange, that this influence should elude the grasp and touch of public history: for, what is public history, but a register of the successes and disappointments, the vices, the follies, and the quarrels, of those who engage in contentions for power?

I will add, that much of this influence may be felt in times of public distress, and little of it in times of public wealth and security. This also increases the uncertainty of any opinions that we draw from historical representations. The influence of Christianity is commensurate with no effects which history states. We do not pretend that it has any such necessary and irresistible power over the affairs of nations, as to surmount the force of other causes.

THAT a religion, which, under every form in which it is taught, holds forth the final reward of virtue and punishment of vice, and proposes those distinctions of virtue and vice, which the wisest and most cultivated part of mankind confess to be just, should not be believed, is very possible; but that, so far as it is believed, it should not produce The Christian religion also acts upon public any good, but rather a bad effect upon public hap-usages and institutions, by an operation which is piness, is a proposition which it requires very strong evidence to render credible. Yet many have been found to contend for this paradox, and very confident appeals have been made to history, and to observation, for the truth of it.

In the conclusions, however, which these writers draw from what they call experience, two sources, I think, of mistake, may be perceived.

One is, that they look for the influence of religion in the wrong place.

The other, that they charge Christianity with many consequences, for which it is not respon

sible.

only secondary and indirect. Christianity is not a code of civil law. It can only reach public institutions through private character. Now its influence upon private character may be considerable, yet many public usages and institutions repugnant to its principles may remain. To get rid of these, the reigning part of the community must act, and act together. But it may be long before the persons who compose this body be sufficiently touched with the Christian character, to join in the suppression of practices, to which they and the public have been reconciled by causes which will reconcile the human mind to any I. The influence of religion is not to be sought thing, by habit and interest. Nevertheless, the for in the councils of princes, in the debates or re- effects of Christianity, even in this view, have solutions of popular assemblies, in the conduct of been important. It has mitigated the conduct of governments towards their subjects, or of states war, and the treatment of captives. It has softenand sovereigns towards one another; of conquer-ed the administration of despotic, or of nominally ors at the head of their armies, or of parties in- despotic governments. It has abolished polygamy. triguing for power at home, (topics which alone It has restrained the licentiousness of divorces. It almost occupy the attention, and fill the pages of has put an end to the exposure of children, and history;) but must be perceived, if perceived at the immolation of slaves. It has suppressed the all, in the silent course of private and domestic combats of gladiators, and the impurities of relilife. Nay more; even there its influence may not gious rites. It has banished, if not unnatural vices, be very obvious to observation. If it check, in at least the toleration of them. It has greatly some degree, personal dissoluteness, if it beget a meliorated the condition of the laborious part, that general probity in the transaction of business, if is to say, of the mass of every community, by proit produce soft and humane manners in the mass curing for them a day of weekly rest. In all counof the community, and occasional exertions of la- tries in which it is professed, it has produced nuborious and expensive benevolence in a few indi-merous establishments for the relief of sickness viduals, it is all the effect which can offer itself to external notice. The kingdom of heaven is within us. That which is the substance of the religion, its hopes and consolations, its intermixture with the thoughts by day and by night, the devotion of the heart, the control of appetite, the steady direction of the will to the commands of God, is necessarily invisible. Yet upon these depend the * Lipsius affirms, (Sat. b. i_c. 12,) that the gladiatovirtue and happiness of millions. This cause ren-thousand lives in a month; and that not only the men, rial shows sometimes cost Europe twenty or thirty ders the representations of history, with respect to but even the women of all ranks were passionately fond religion, defective and fallacious, in a greater de- of these shows.-See Bishop Porteus's Sermon XÍ¡¡

and poverty; and, in some, a regular and general provision by law. It has triumphed over the slavery established in the Roman empire; it is contending, and, I trust, will one day prevail, against the worse slavery of the West Indies.

A Christian writer, so early as in the second been observed, there may be also great consecentury, has testified the resistance which Chris-quences of Christianity, which do not belong to tianity made to wicked and licentious practices, it as a revelation. The effects upon human salthough established by law and by public usage:-vation, of the mission, of the death, of the present, "Neither in Parthia, do the Christians, though of the future agency of Christ, may be universal, Parthians, use polygamy; nor in Persia, though though the religion be not universally known. Persians, do they marry their own daughters; nor among the Bactri, or Galli, do they violate the sanctity of marriage; nor, wherever they are, do they suffer themselves to be overcome by illconstituted laws and manners."