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SECTION II.

OF THE AUXILIARY EVIDENCE, AND FIRST OF THE NUMBER OF THE MIRACLES.

In the preceding Section I have stated an outline of the direct proof of some of the particular miracles recorded in Scripture. But still there are many circumstances, and these of no trifling importance, which it is necessary to enumerate before we can appreciate the full force of all the particular parts of the proof. I may be permitted to call these circumstances the auxiliary evidence; that is, auxiliary to the proof of miracles having been performed, not to that evidence of the truth of our religion which it may possess independently of the performance of miracles, the question of miracles being the only part of the evidences into which it is the purpose of this treatise to enter.

I. The first head which I shall here take up for consideration, is that of the great number of the miracles which were performed, a consideration which I shall show to be of material im

portance to strengthen the proof of the particular miracles 2.

II. I shall then speak of the evidence from the great strength of that impression which will be shown to have been made on the original witnesses; and the perfect fulness of that conviction which they entertained".

III. I shall then show that the witnesses were good witnesses, or to be depended on, and not liable to be at all discredited as party witnesses, or as subject under all circumstances to the charge of credulity o.

IV. The next point will be to prove that the whole strength of the evidence is come down to. us unimpaired from its original, and not lessened by the lapse of time which has taken place since the miracles were actually performed".

V. I shall, lastly, recapitulate all these argu-. ments and conclusions, exhibit the certainty of the moral force with which they conclude ; and the farther confirmation which all this evidence derives from the inherent probability of the doctrine itself.

a This will be the subject of the present Section.

b Sect. III.

• Sect. IV. d Sect. V.

• Sect. VI.

First, of the number of the miracles. However incontrovertible the evidence of any particular miracle, God has not allowed us to repose the credit of miracles altogether on the particular evidence of one miracle only, or of a few miracles. It is plain from what has been said in Section III. of the preliminary discourse prefixed to this treatise, that a single miracle, if sufficiently proved, may establish the validity of all other miracles which are affirmed or asserted by the same agent, unless we can show that he must exceed his commission. Thus the one miracle of the pillar of fire and cloud, proved, as I apprehend it to be, beyond suspicion, proves all the miracles which Moses wrought before Pharaoh, proves the miraculousness of the passage of the Red Sea, proves the miracle of giving the Law from Sinai, proves the miraculousness of the punishment of Korah, and of every thing else which is related by Moses as miraculous. But then too, on the other hand, every particular proof of the real performance of these miracles reflects in the same manner on the particular evidence of that miracle. And this must be the case also, even though the specific proof of the miracles may in particular

cases be somewhat tinged with suspicion. I do not mean by this observation to throw suspicion on any one of them; but only to observe that this is a case in which a number of histories which converge to one point (that point being here the miraculous attestation given by the Almighty to the mission of Moses), derive from their very number a greater strength and importance than that which we might be entitled to claim for them singly.

For, first, it is probable that if God sanction a messenger, he will commission him to perform more than one miracle. We can hardly imagine that any messenger from heaven should mix familiarly as Christ and Moses did with mankind, and that many occasions should not arise in which it would be proper and, I may say, natural, for him to exercise that power of miracles which we suppose confided to him. Every messenger, therefore, of whom it is affirmed that he performs many miracles, must appear to come to us with a more probable story than a messenger who is said to perform only one.

But the principal reason, why the evidence of one miracle is essentially confirmed by the evidence of another, is, that though we were to

suppose it possible that one miraculous story, for example the miracle of the passage of the Red Sea, or one of the miracles worked by Moses before Pharaoh, may have gained credit through some mistake or imposture, yet we cannot imagine this to have been the case in numerous instances. There are very many chances against the success of any one imposture of this kind. There does not exist, indeed, in the whole compass of history, any one instance of a forged or falsified miracle, which is now received without much doubt and suspicion; unless indeed the sceptic affirm that the Scripture miracles are an imposture, thus taking for granted what it is his business to prove.

But the chances against the success of many impostures, each of them an imposture in matter of fact, and all of them, it is manifest, vouched far more strongly than any other claim of miracles set up any where, multiply, of course, in a most decisive progression. In truth, some of those miracles which are commonly considered as being the best evidenced, owe much of their strength to their possessing those qualities which are thus found to confer a multiplied strength on every re-iterated claim of miracles. Thus in

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