that each of thefe books contains enough to prove the truth of the religion; that, if any one of them therefore be genuine it is fufficient; that the genuineness however of all of them is made Out, as well by the general arguments which evince the genuine. nefs of the most undifputed remains of antiquity, as alfo by pe-. culiar and specific proofs; viz. by citations from them in wri tings belonging to a period immediately contiguous to that in which they were published; by the diftinguished regard paid by early Chriftians to the authority of these books (which regard was manifefted by their collecting of them into a volume, appropriating to that volume titles of peculiar refpect, tranflating them into various languages, digefting them into harmonies, writing commentaries upon them, and still more confpicuously, by the reading of them in their public affemblies in all parts of the world) by an univerfal agreement with respect to these books, whilst doubts were entertained concerning fome others; by contending fects appealing to them; by the early adverfaries of the religion not difputing their genuineness, but, on the contrary, treating them as the depofitaries of the hiftory upon which the religion was founded; by many formal catalogues of these, as of certain and authoritative writings, published in different and diftant parts of the Chriftian world; laftly, by the absence or defect of the above-cited topics of evidence, when applied to any other hiftories of the fame fabject.

Thefe are ftrong arguments to prove, that the books actually proceeded from the authors whofe names they bear; (and have always borne, for there is not a particle of evidence to show that they ever went under any other) but the ftrict genuineness of the books is perhaps more than is neceffary to the fupport of our propofition. For even fuppofing that by reafon of the fi lence of antiquity, or the lofs of records, we knew not who were the writers of the four gofpels, yet the fact, that they were received as authentic accounts of the tranfaction upon which the religion refted, and were received as fach by Chriftians at or near the age of the apofties, by those whom the apostles had taught, and by focieties which the apoftles had founded; this fact, I fay, connected with the confideration, that they are corroborative of each other's teftimony, and that they are further corroborated by another contemporary hiftory, taking up the ftory where they had left it, and, in a narrative built upon that Hory, accounting for the rife and production of changes in the world, the effects of which fubfift at this day; connected, more

over, with the confirmation which they receive, from letters written by the apostles themselves, which both affume the fame general ftory, and as often as occafions lead them to do fo, allude to particular parts of it; and connected alfo with the reflection, that if the apostles delivered any different story, it is loft; (the prefent and no other being referred to by a feries of Chriftian writers, down from their age to our own; being likewife recognized in a variety of inftitutions, which prevailed, carly and univerfally, amongft the difciples of the religion) and that fo great a change, as the oblivion of one story and the fubftitution of another, under fuch circumftances, could not have taken place; this evidence would be deemed, I apprehend, fufficient to prove concerning thefe books, that, whoever were the authors of them, they exhibit the story which the apostles told, and for which, confequently, they acted, and they fuffered.

If it be fo, the religion mit be true. These men could not be deceivers. By only not bearing teftimony, they might have avoided all their fufferings, and have lived quietly. Would men, in fuch circumftances, pretend to have feen what they never faw; affert facts which they had no knowledge of; bring upon themfelves, for nothing, enmity and hatred, danger and death?

PROPOSITION II.

CHAP. I.

Our first propofition was, "that there is fatisfactory evidence, that many, pretending to be orginal witnesses of the Chriftian Miracles, paffed their lives in labours, dangers, and fufferings, voluntarily undertaken and undergone, in atteftation of the accounts which they delivered, and folely in confequence of their belief of the truth of thofe accounts; and that they alfo fubmitted, from the fame motives, to new rules of conduct."

Our fecond propofition, and which now remains to be treated of, is," that there is NOT fatisfactory evidence, that perfons pretending to be original witnesses of any other fimilar miracles, have acted in the fame manner, in atteftation of the accounts which they delivered, and folely in confequence of their belief of the truth of thofe accounts."

I ENTER upon this part of my argument, by declaring how far my belief in miraculous accounts goes. If the reformers in the time of Wychliff, or of Luther; or thofe of England, in the time of Henry the Eighth, or of Queen Mary; or the founders of our religious fects fince, fuch as were Mr. Whitfield and Mr. Wesley in our times, had undergone the life of toil and exertion, of danger and fuffering, which we know that many of them did undergo, for a miraculous story; that is to fay, if they had founded their public miniftry upon the allegation of miracles wrought within their own knowledge, and upon narratives which could not be refolved into delufion or mistake; and if it had appeared, that their conduct really had its origin in thefe accounts, I fhould have believed them. Or, to borrow an instance which will be familiar to every one of my readersIf the late Mr. Howard had undertaken his labours and journies in atteftation and in confequence of a clear and fenfible miracle, I should have believed him alfo. Or, to represent the same thing under a third fuppofition-If Socrates had profeffed to perform public miracles at Athens; if the friends of Socrates, Phædo, Cebes, Crito, and Simmias, together with Plato, and many of his followers, relying upon the atteftation which these miracles afforded to his pretenfions, had, at the hazard of their

any

lives, and the certain expenfe of their cafe and tranquillity, gone about Greece, after his death, to publish and propagate his doctrines; and if these things had come to our knowledge, in the fame way, as that in which the life of Socrates is now tranf mitted to us, through the hands of his companions and disciples, that is, by writings received without doubt as theirs, from the age in which they were published to the prefent, I fhould have believed this likewife. And my belief would, in each cafe, be much strengthened, if the subject of the million were of impor-tance to the conduct and happiness of human life; ifit teftified thing which it behoved mankind to know from fuch authority; if the nature of what it delivered required the fort of proof which it alleged; if the occafion was adequate to the interpofition, the end worthy of the means. In the last cafe, my faith would be much confirmed, if the effects of the transaction remained; more especially, if a change had been wrought, at the time, in the opinion and conduct of fuch numbers, as to lay the foundation of an inftitution, and of a fyftem of doctrines, which had fince overfpread, the greatest part of the civilized. world. I should have believed, I fay, the testimony, in these cafes; yet none of them do more, than come up to the apoftolic history.

If any one choofe to call affent to this evidence, credulity, it is at least incumbent upon him to produce examples, in which the fame evidence bath turned out to be fallacious. And this contains the precife queftion which we are now to agitate.

In ftating the comparison between our evidence, and what our adverfaries may bring into competition with our?s, we will divide the diftinctions which we wish to propofe into two kinds, those which relate to the proof, and those which relate to the miracles. Under the former head we may lay out of the cafe,

I. Such accounts of fupernatural events, as are found only in hiftories, by fome ages pofterior to the tranfaction; and of which it is evident that the hiftorian could know little more than his reader. Our's is contemporary hiftory, This differ ence alone removes out of our way the miraculous history of Pythagoras, who lived five hundred years before the Chriftian era, written by Porphyry and Jamblicus, who lived three hundred years after that era; the prodigies of Livy's hiftory; the fables of the heroic ages; the whole of the Greek and Roman, as well as of the Gothic mythology; a great part of the legendary history of Popifh faints, the very beft attefted of which,

is extracted from the certificates that are exhibited during the procefs of their canonization, a ceremony which seldom takes place till a century after their deaths. It applies alfo with confiderable force to the miracles of Apollonius Tyaneus which are contained in a folitary hiftory of his life, published by Philoftratus, above a hundred years after his death; and, in which, whether Philoftratus had any prior account to guide him depends upon his single unsupported affertion. Alfo to fome of the miracles of the third century, especially to one extraordinary inftance, the account of Gregory, bishop of Neocefarea, called Thaumaturgus, delivered in the writings of Gregory of Nyffen, who lived one hundred and thirty years after the fubject of his panegyric.

The value of this circumftance is fhown to have been accurately exemplified, in the hiftory of Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the order of Jefuits. His life, written by a companion of his, and by one of the order, was published about fifteen years after his death. In which life, the author, so far from afcribing any miracles to Ignatius, induftriously states the reafons, why he was not invested with any fuch power. The life was re-published fifteen years afterwards with the addition of many circumstances, which were the fruit, the author fays, of further inquiry, and of diligent examination; but ftill with a total filence about miracles. When Ignatius had been dead near fixty years, the Jefuits conceiving a wifh to have the founder of their order placed in the Roman calendar, began, as it fhould feem, for the first time to attribute to him a catalogue of miracles, which could not then be diftinctly difproved; and which there was in thofe who governed the church, a ftrong dif pofition to admit upon the moft flender proofs.

II. We may lay out of the cafe, accounts published in one country, of what passed in a distant country, without any proof that fuch accounts were known or received at home. In the cafe of Chriftianity, Judea, which was the scene of the tranfac tion, was the centre of the miffion. The story was published in the place in which it was acted. The church of Christ was first planted at Jerufalem itfelf. With that church others cor1efponded. From thence the primitive teachers of the inftitu tion went forth; thither they affembled. The church of Jerufalem and the feveral churches of Judea fubfifted from the be

a Douglass's Criterion of Miracles, p. 74.