398 



nals of modern Rome, are yet rejected 

 as false, this rejection must woefully 

 lessen the probability of those record- 

 ed by fewer persons, 1800 or more 

 years ago. Hume's argument applies 

 with double force ; for there will be 

 not only the cliances against the regu- 

 lar laws of the universe having been 

 suspended ; but, in case modern mira- 

 cles are reckoned impossible, we shall 

 have to calculate the chances, also, 

 that the world, within only 2000 years, 

 has undergone such a change, that 

 what was common then was now im- 

 possible. 



Independent, however, of all this, 

 the recent Catholic miracles are re- 

 corded on better testimony ; in some 

 cases, numerous persons of intelligence 

 and veracity have sworn to tiicm. 



Another argument against new mi- 

 racles often used is, that if such things 

 bad happened thoy would have been 

 spread abroad more among intelligent 

 people, and carried conviction with 

 them. This, again, is a dangerous 

 argument to hold : for where is the 

 collateral testimony for the miracles 

 recorded by St. Matthew or St. John. 

 One of them performed in the forum 

 at Rome would have done more for 

 Christianity than fifty at Bethlehem. 

 If the bishops are apostolical, which 

 no good Christian doubts, and if they 

 hold their sees in lineal descent from 

 the chair of St. Peter, why should fhey 

 deliver to us false accounts of the 

 Creator's miraculous attestation of the 

 sanctity of the church, any more than 

 the first twelve Apostles? When I 

 was a boy, I remember I was shown 

 the " Criterion" by the Protestant 

 Bishop of Salisbury. The efl'ect it had 

 on me was, that I forthwith disbelieved 

 miracles altogether, and continued to 

 do so till better informed ; and 1 came 

 to this sceptical conclusion, because I 

 saw modern miracles disproved at the 

 same time that a false criterion appear- 

 ed to be set up between them and old 

 ones. 



Another argument used against what 

 are vulgarly called Popish miracles, is 

 the apparent meanness of them: this, 

 however, a learned Catholic writer 

 shows to be no argument at aU, by re- 

 minding us of the mean and nasty 

 nature of those vermin whose obtru- 

 sive and unwelcome presence consti- 

 tuted one of the miraculous plagues 

 of Pharaoh. 



If we believe the miracles of the Old 

 Testament, (and they are recorded on 



Old and New Miracles. [June 1, 



an authority that Christians cannot 



deny,) — if we believe those also per- 

 formed by Christ and the Christian 

 Apostles, — we cannot doubt those of 

 St. Cyprian, St. Bernard, and others, 

 in the very early ages of the church. 

 Tiiese being admitted, others yet more 

 recent must be also allowed to be ge- 

 nuine, if their authority be equally 

 good, — a prominent instance of which 

 may be taken from the late miracle 

 performed at Holywell in Wales, at 

 the holy fountain of St. Winifred, 

 which two medical men, several en- 

 lightened Protestants, and numerous 

 Catholics, testified to ; and which the 

 object of the miracle herself (a poor 

 girl, cured of curvature of the ^ino 

 by immersion in the well, accompanied 

 by fervent prayer to the Holy Virgin,) 

 is ready to attest on oath, it required. 

 An account of this miracle is recorded 

 in a separate pamphlet, and also in 

 the Gentleman's Magazine, the daily 

 papers, and tlie Monthly Magazine for 

 1817, — the editor of which publication 

 cannot himself deny its overwhelming 

 weight of evidence, and even goes the 

 length of explaining it as a sort of 

 physical principle, ascribing it to the 

 physical effects of faith on the nerves, 

 as I have stated below. 

 Criterion of the Importance to he attach- 

 ed to Miraculous Cures. 

 By keeping constantly in view the 

 rule laid down already, that the proofs 

 of religious doctrines are entirely of a 

 mystical and moral, and never of a 

 physical, nature, we shall be enabled 

 to bring their evidence into a smaller 

 compass, and to establish a criterion 

 whereby to judge of the importance of 

 any particular miracle, vision, or any 

 other imposing event, brought forward 

 as a proof of Divine interposition. 

 Their value as Divine agents must de- 

 pend on their coincidence with events, 

 or their precise relation to certain 

 professed and important religious 

 objects. A very similar argument to 

 that applied to ghosts and visions may 

 be applied to miraculous cures ; of 

 which the history of all countries fur- 

 nishes such abundant examples. The 

 instances oF restoration to health of 

 patients labouring under diseases in- 

 curable by medical skill, by means of 

 an extreme exertion of faith, are too 

 numerous and well-authenticated to 

 admit of much doubt about their oc- 

 currence. They happen in all coun- 

 tries, and in consequence, apparently, 

 of having faith inverv dissimilar sorts 



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