CONCERNING MIRACLES. 103 



imagination, is in this cafe always more natural, con- 

 fequently more rational, than to admit of an exception 

 to the known and ftated laws of nature # . 



For, that our fenfes are liable to illulion, and that 

 the imagination frequently fees what does not exifl, 

 is a matter that cannot be called in queflion. 



Belides, do not certain marvelous facls of antiquity 

 become probable by appealing to limilar, vhible, and 

 inconteftible matters of fac~l of our own times ; though 

 we will not quote, in defiance of found reafon, the mi- 

 racles of the numerous faints of the Legend, with thofe 

 of the abbe Paris, the mendicantJLabre, &c. as unde- 

 niable evidences of the continuance of the difplay of 

 miraculous powers in our times. 



A certain cardinal chofe rather to fay : The modern 

 miracles make me fufpect the old ones, 



* I do not take this to be the fenfe of the words applied from 

 RoufTeau. I tranflate them thus : If it mould happen to me to 

 fee fomething, that I muft hold to be a miracle, I mould be much 

 afraid, that, inftead of making me believing, it would make me 

 foolifh, or, I mould lofe my imderitanding upon it. He pro- 

 bably means by it: one lingle cafe, where the teftimony of his 

 fenfes were in contradiction to what mull: happen according to the 

 ordinary courfe of nature, would leave him nothing biit the alter- 

 native, either of no more trailing to his own fenfes, or to his 

 reafon"; and the violent and unnatural ftate in which he mould 

 thus be caft would be enough to ruin his intellect, I think that 

 RoulTeau has here uttered a very great truth. There are cafes 

 where only thofe do not lofe their undemanding who have none to 

 lofe ; or, which very often amounts to the fame, who have acqui- 

 red the unhappy habit, on certain occafions, of making no ufe of 

 their underftanding. 



H 4 si 



