possibly have been the case at first," observes Estlin, in his Sermon on Miracles, because then persons could not have had such a confidence in the success of their application. And with respect to those cures which were afterwards performed by him, it is plain that this cause is by no means adequate to the effect. There are instances in which the application was made to Jesus, not by the sick persons themselves, but by others. Again, there are instances in the gospel of cures performed on persons who, though present, made no application to him for relief, as not knowing that he had a power of healing them. In all these cases there certainly was no impression made upon the mind of the patient to contribute to remove the malady." Into excitement, on the other hand, may the modern cures which have been invested with so much of the marvellous, be uniformly resolved. Once more. What was the object of the miracles of the first centuries? Was it not to attest the divinity of our Lord,-that rock on which his church is founded? and to induce men to forsake a life of sin, and lead a life of holiness? And what is the object of those on which we are now called upon to decide? Surely a very inadequate, or a very opposite one. If it be merely to attest the sanctity or superior faith of the persons instrumental in performing them, it

Resembles ocean into tempest wrought

To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.-YOUNG.

If it be to render the word of God, and the means of grace, more efficacious, it is a direct insult to him who has appointed them, and assured us of their sufficiency for the conversion of sinners, and the establishment of believers, through the application of the Holy Spirit. If it be to obtain our sanction to any new doctrines, what are they? There are two, indeed, discoverable in some of the publications of the party; but their complexion, I am sorry to say, is very questionable. One verges, to say the least, on those opinions which undermine the divinity of Christ; (37) and the other affirms it to be a delusion of Satan, for a believer to suppose that God is displeased with him on account of his sin. (38.) Can we suppose God would work miracles to authenticate such impious and pernicious dogmas ?

And what was the tendency of the primitive miracles? To animate the faithful to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, and to subdue the hostility, and dispel the unbelief, of opposers. While the effect of the present pretensions to them has been to introduce disunion and schism into the church, and to confirm those who make a mock at religion, in their infidelity and hardness of heart.

Were we in like manner to compare the late cures, so rashly ascribed to miraculous causes, with the counterfeit miracles on record of the same class, we should discover as remarkable a resemblance as we have just seen a contrast. Try the experiment with those attributed to the Emperor Vespasian, those which took place at the "blessed deacon's" tomb, that of Winifred White,-any, or all, indeed, to which allusion has been made; or any others,-for history has an extensive repository of them,—which may happen to recur to your recollection, or present themselves in the course of your reading. You will find in the present, and in all former instances, the same regard to convenient selection,-the same paucity of cures at one time and in one neighbourhood,—the same facilities from privacy, or obscurity, or collusion,-and in most of them the same alternate failure and success,―the same gradual or partial recovery, the same recourse had to human means in aid of those affirmed to be divine,—the same accompaniment of mental

excitement; they will all be found to have in common the same inadequacy or iniquity of object, and to be all devoid of unmixed holiness of tendency.

It appears, then, that in every important circumstance, as well as in their object and tendency, these supposed miraculous cures are as different from those of the early ages of Christianity, as darkness is different from light; while they as closely resemble various indisputably fictitious ones, as it is possible to conceive. It is passing strange, that any persons of common sense, and with the advantages of an ordinary acquaintance with sacred, not to speak of profane history, should for one moment assume an attitude of indecision, as to their validity or fallacy. The fact that such an effect has been produced by such a cause, approaches far nearer a miracle, than any of the events by which it has been elicited. One painful certainty is forced on our notice, that such persons, when they embraced the faith of the gospel, with whatever readiness of mind they might receive the word, did not imitate the Bereans in " searching the Scriptures daily, whether these things were so." Had they adopted this plan, making themselves acquainted with the scope of the Volume of Revelation, and ascertaining the plain and manifest import of the language in which its blessed truths are conveyed, the forced, irrational, unauthorized interpretations which it is necessary to resort to, in order to make the oracles of God bend to the strange system their idolized teachers would establish, could not have been so readily adopted; nor the hostile and conflicting aspect such a system wears towards doctrines still professedly retained, so completely overlooked. Such an advantage does the too common neglect of comparing the doctrines received at the mouth even of our ablest and holiest pastors and teachers, with the written compendium of them contained in the Bible, give to Satan over the mind even of a sincere believer. The Bible is the standard of our faith. A familiar acquaintance with that, acquired through the medium of a devout and teachable spirit, will preserve us from many dangerous mistakes, into which we shall otherwise be sure to fall. How careful ought we to be, from the very outset of our Christian career, to search the Scriptures with all diligence in private, under the silent teaching of the Holy Spirit, in addition to the attendance we give on the more public means of grace!

Time forbids me to proceed. But before I dismiss you, bear with me while I exhort you, earnestly and affectionately, to cultivate a humble and teachable spirit. Desire the sincere milk of the word, that you may grow thereby. Let us constantly give diligent heed, my brethren, to what has been written for our instruction by apostles, and prophets, and evangelists; and to what is spoken to us according to the mind that was in them, by our pastors and teachers; all of whom Christ appointed when he ascended up on high, "for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ; from whom the whole body fitly joined together, and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love."

SERMON II.

JER. VI. 16, 17.

THUS SAITH THE LORD, STAND YE IN THE WAYS, AND SEE; AND ASK FOR

THE OLD PATHS, WHERE IS THE GOOD WAY; AND WALK THEREIN : AND YE SHALL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. BUT THEY SAID, WE WILL NOT WALK

THEREIN.

ALSO, I SET WATCHMEN OVER YOU, SAYING, HEARKEN TO THE SOUND OF THE BUT THEY SAID, WE WILL NOT HEARKEN.

TRUMPET.

*(39.)

LET us now proceed to submit to the test of reason and Scripture, the alleged instances of the gift of tongues at the present day.

This gift, as it is profanely termed, is triumphantly appealed to as decisive of the controversy. And so, we readily acknowledge, it would be, if its claim to a divine origin could be substantiated. "Verily, verily, I say unto you," said our Lord to his apostles, when he was about to announce to them the promise of the Spirit, "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do." The gift of tongues was peculiar to them, and therein they might be said to have excelled even our Lord himself. This was more convincing than any of the other signs and wonders by which their preaching was accompanied. "For he that saw one of their other miracles," observes Bishop Blackall, " might possibly entertain some little doubt whether the effect that appeared to him to be miraculous might not yet be done by some secret power of natural causes, that was unknown to him; but we all know the power of nature so well, that we are sure the knowledge of a language cannot possibly be attained naturally, even by a person of the quickest parts and faithfulest memory, but in so much time, at the least, as it will necessarily take up to be told by tutors, or to learn from Lexicons, what every particular word of the language to be learnt, is by the people of that language designed to signify; because words have not a natural relation to the notions or things thereby expressed, but are mere arbitrary signs thereof. So that whoever knew the education of the apostles, and that they were before altogether ignorant and unlearned, and yet saw them every one, on a sudden, on the day of Pentecost, able to speak readily in all the languages of all the nations under heaven, from whence had come some of the Jews that were present at Jerusalem at that time, could have no possible doubt of their supernatural assistance. They that heard them speak with tongues which they had never learned, could not but conclude that it was the Spirit that gave them utterance." (40.)

The

This gift, like that of healing, has been succeeded by many counterfeits. author of an anonymous tract, entitled, "Have ye received the Holy Ghost ?" full of such flagrant mis-statements, that it requires the utmost stretch of charity to suppose them not to have been wilful, boldly affirms, indeed, that there have been no vestiges of speaking with tongues in later times. I can point out to you many of the same sort of pretensions to it as are at present made.

To begin with the Roman Catholics, who have not neglected to put in their

claim to a participation of this, as well as of other miraculous endowments. They tell us, for instance, that a commutation of tongues took place, on a certain occasion, between their notorious Saint Dominic and a travelling companion, each of whom, during the journey, spake in the other's language, with which they were before mutually unacquainted. Some of his biographers state this to have occurred twice. But such instances, it may be objected, are drawn from a remote antiquity. So they are. But they are quite as well authenticated, and quite as credible, as is the existence of any thing supernatural in the disgraceful exhibitions ascribed to the influence of the Holy Ghost in the present day. (41.) To come, then, at once to a much more recent date. At the commencement of the last century, the French prophets, as they are called, will furnish us with another example. For seven years, says one document on the subject, abundance of people, of every age and sex, fell into violent agitations of body, in an extraordinary manner; during which they uttered large discourses, very pious, and strongly hortatory of repentance. They had also predictions of the ruin of mystical Babylon, with assurances that the church would speedily be delivered out of affliction. They always spoke good French in the inspiration, though they never could at other times. Females, including children of seven and five years of age, were among the most prominent of these declaimers. One person declares, that, at a meeting he attended, a girl of eleven years old, who could not read, and on all other occasions was a sheepish child, was seized there with inspiration, having some little agitations of body, and especially of the breast. "It surprised and affected me," continues the narrator, "to see with what freedom and boldness she spoke, with a shrill and loud voice; saying first, Fall down, ye people of God! Prostrate yourselves humbly before him; and let our trust be in the name of the Lord.' She then prayed and exhorted for about three quarters of an hour, speaking good French, which," he expresses his conviction, "this little girl could not do of herself." These fanatics fell at length into deserved contempt. (42.)

Count Emanuel Swedenborg, the celebrated Swedish enthusiast, who died at London in 1772, boasted of an ability to speak with the tongues, not only of men, but of angels, with whom he professed to keep up a constant correspondence, holding conversations with them on the critical minutia of their language. (43.)

About the year 1770, Anne Lee, a native of the North of England, opened her mission, in the manufacturing districts, as the Second Messiah, in proof of which she laid claim to the power of working miracles,—such as healing the sick, --and of prophecy; speaking, it is pretended, no fewer than seventy-two tongues, and, like Swedenborg, conversing with the dead. She was styled by her followers, the Elect Lady, and the Mother of all the Elect, and was considered by them the woman mentioned in Rev. xii. Finding our northern countrymen not quite so credulous as her less gifted imitators have recently found the inhabitants of the south, she at length emigrated to America, where a flourishing settlement of Shakers, as the sect is denominated, still exists. (44.)

But I have yet a class or two of instances to enumerate of the modern gift of tongues, wherein not only is there no indication whatever of the operation of the Holy Ghost, but wherein, if any superhuman or supernatural agency were concerned, it must manifestly have been Satanic.

In the year 1566, about seventy of the children of the Orphan House at Amsterdam were so strangely agitated by some unknown cause, "that," says one of the best historians of the Netherlands, "it makes one's hair stand on end to think of it." (45.) It will be sufficient here to particularize, that they spake with

strange tongues, barked like dogs, and knew what was passing elsewhere. Of this, and much more, there was a multitude of eye and ear-witnesses, as we are assured on the best authority.

Somewhat more than a century later, about the year 1673, a very similar scene was exhibited, in a similar institution, at Hoorn, as many notaries and other reputable witnesses have certified. (46.) History, indeed, is silent, as to the speaking with tongues in this instance; but as these young persons imitated those already mentioned at Amsterdam, in assimilating the human voice to that of domestic animals, and most of their other extravagancies, it is by no means improbable they resembled them in this respect also. There was but too much to justify the supposition, that unclean spirits were concerned in both these events.

About the same time, one James Symons, of Amsterdam, astonished his fellowcitizens by a display of his proficiency in the gift of tongues. Greek and Latin are the two specified. This also was considered as a possession by evil spirits. (47.)

Who has not heard of the extravagant pretensions of Animal Magnetism,—a theory much in vogue a few years ago, even in this country, and still more so on the continent? This mystical system, nearly the latest of a series of philosophical empyricisms, closely analogous to those theological ones on which it is our present object to animadvert, is boasted of as having communicated the spirit of prophecy and the gift of tongues. Our business is with the latter; a case of which is related by Dr. Tritsckler, a physician of some repute at Cannstadt, communicated by Dr. Nasse, medical professor in the University of Halle, in the first volume of the Archives of Animal Magnetism, published in 1817. The doctor, in October, 1816, was attending a youth, whom he had magnetised, of about thirteen years of age, named Mattheus Schurr. "One crisis," he informs us, was very remarkable, as, during the whole time, the patient spoke French, without uttering a single word of German, which was his native tongue. He likewise repeatedly requested all present to speak in the same language." According to the account of a by-stander, who had lived long in France, and spoke the language uncommonly well, the boy spoke French with the greatest fluency, and with a good accent, precisely as if he had never spoken any other language. We are further assured, he had read no French books during his illness, and had not heard French spoken for a considerable time. His own knowledge of it was very trifling, though, it is admitted, he could read it tolerably, but spoke it, when not thus inspired, very badly. (48.)

These instances will amply suffice to show, that pretensions to an ability to speak, with fluency, languages previously unknown, or the ordinary means of acquiring which have not been resorted to, are not of such very uncommon occurrence ; and that they are not necessarily connected with any religious object or feeling; nay, that they are even to be found occasionally in contact with so much wickedness, so much nefarious design,—or so much avowed infidelity,—that we cannot, in such instances, impute them to any but what a writer of eminence most appropriately terms "black inspiration." (49.)

Now, between many such more than suspicious exhibitions of the gift of tongues, and those employed in the present day to shake our faith in the long-received doctrines of the gospel, there are some striking points of resemblance to which we shall do well to attend.

Women, it is observable, are the most numerous and prominent actors in these impious mockeries. Without any want of respect for the fair sex, it may be