: their efficacy was true, that they do indeed establish the very thing of which they are brought forward as proofs, and confirm, beyond the reach of controversy, that Jesus was one of the messengers of the God of heaven. In the first place, then, the works of our Saviour were works of wonder, widely different, and far superior to those which the uniform experience of the world has taught us to consider as lying within the range of those powers which belong to uninspired and unassisted men. In the t second place, they were appealed to, by our Saviour, in support of a particular system of doctrines and precepts. They are consequently possessed of all those qualifications and attributes, which are required in order to prove, that he was both aided and approved by some Being superior to man. In the creation and preservation of the worldin the voice which first called forth matter into existence from the barren regions of infinite space-in the hand which formed that matter into this earthly frame upon which we live, then clothed it with beauties, and filled it with the various orders of animate and inanimate objects; in all these things we perceive something more than the feebleness of a human voice, or of a human hand, and no one has ever yet seriously directed his views to the works of nature, without having learnt to confess that they are the works of God. As therefore in the revolution of years, in the recurrence of seasons, and the constant and unvaried succession of day and night, we acknowledge the traces of a great, eternal, understanding God; so were the regularity of that system to be broken, were night to take the place of day, the sun to be darkened in his course, or the moon to be turned into blood, we should all fall down with trembling before the terrors of the Lord, and immediately perceive that such things could be produced only by the immediate operation, or the tacit permission of that Infinite Power, without whose permission or operation, nothing can either be changed or established. Exactly of this character were the wonderful works of our Saviour. The usual course of things is, that men should live, suffer disease, then die and moulder into dust; and it is not more impossible for the feeble and unassisted efforts of man to create a new system of worlds or a new order of beings, than it is to recal the spirit which has once returned unto the God that gave it. Yet did our Saviour recal those spirits by the simple authority of his word. In the beginning of the creation the Almighty said, In the "Let the earth be," and the earth was. 'beginning of the Gospel, Christ said, " Awake thou that sleepest," and he that sleeped in death awoke. Again, the cure of diseases is usually preceded by the application of those remedies whose general consequences have been long and carefully observed. Yet were the healings of our Saviour preceded only by circumstances of all others apparently the most inadequate, by the mere energy of his voice, or the mere application of his touch; and whilst the restoration to health, under the mildest maladies, and with the most skilful treatment, is commonly slow and progressive, and many times uncertain and incomplete, it was, in the instances before us, almost universally immediate and perfect. Thus in all that the Lord did there was ever something remarkable, ever something above the reach of human. reason and of mortal strength. Since, then, the wisdom of Providence has ordained and continued an order of things, which the unassisted weakness of man is evidently unable to alter, the works of Christ being different from that order, must be ascribed to the co-operating influence of some intelligent Being who is much more powerful than the sons of Adam. For, as he, who was restored to sight, forcibly observed, "since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind." The uniform experience of the world is not to be urged against the credibility of the fact itself, but against the notion of that fact being produced by the efforts of an unaided man. But we should be far from justifying in its entire extent the conclusion which our Saviour deduced from his miracles, did we stop short in our inquiries here. There are a variety of the more unusual operations in nature, which are far beyond the ability of human wisdom and of human exertion to accomplish, and which must therefore have some agent different from man; yet these are never considered as conferring any divine authority upon those doctrines which may happen to be preached in the countries and at the time in which they take place. They are regarded as accidental concurrences, rather than as designed coincidences. We must prove, therefore, that the works of Christ are not only visible demonstrations of the interference, but positive marks also of the approbation of some superior Being. That this is really the case is, however, sufficiently plain. The interference, when applied to the miracles of the Gospel, implies, of necessity, the approbation of that superior Being by whose finger they were wrought. For our Saviour not only worked such wonders as would bear the very strictest examination, but he worked them also in defence of his claims to a particular character, and in support of a religion which he declared to be sanctioned and revealed by Heaven as best suited to the fallen wretchedness of man. He worked them to confirm the faith of his followers. He pointed to them as the signs and seals of his commission, and as signs and seals they never failed to follow his appeal to them. He never called but the spirits obeyed. He never spake, but the deaf and the dead heard. He never touched, but diseases fled, the blind saw, the lame leaped, and the lepers were cleansed. But it is most unnatural to suppose that any one would support a system in opposition to his most favourite wishes, contrary to his best interests, and to the inevitable ruin of his own kingdom. Had not the cause, therefore, in which our Lord was engaged, been approved by that Being by whom he was honoured with the testimony of miracles, these things would not have been so. His word would not always have been with power. There would have been a point at which his enchantments, like those of the magicians in Egypt, would have stopped; and he would frequently, like other impostors, in his own days, and under similar circumstances, have been unable to perform what he had promised, and thus become an object of hatred and contempt to his followers, instead of a stone of stumbling and |