Volume 4 — REMARKS ON A LATE BOOK, &c.

The Writer of the Inquiry into the Rejection of the Christian Miracles by the Heathens[50] having, as he is well assured[51], an undoubted claim to one of the two reasons for making a work public, that what it contains SHOULD be new, and not willing that so uncommon a merit should be thrown away upon his reader, is careful to advertise us of this point himself, and accordingly flourishes upon it with much apparent alacrity and satisfaction through a great part of his Preface. For, not content with this bare assertion of his claim, he grows so elate, as to wonder this important theme should be reserved for him[52], and that no sagacity of former times had been blessed in the discovery. Nay, lest his very Patron should neglect him, or as if he suspected my Lord might look no farther than the Dedication, he scruples not to mention even there the excellency of his work; and is very frank in declaring his own good opinion of it[53].

An exordium like this, we know, is generally inauspicious. However, it may serve to one end, not the least considerable, it may be, in an author’s views, to engage the public attention. For it is indeed but natural to inquire into the peculiar merit of a work that could inspire its writer with such boasts, and fill a place in it, till now sacred to a real or pretended modesty, with such unusual confidence and triumph. And this, we are told, consists in the discovery of a new solution of a difficulty about miracles[54], which had long perplexed the Inquirer more than all the rest put together. For, taking into his consideration the argument for the divinity of our holy Religion, as arising therefrom, he could not help thinking it extremely odd, that such numbers of men, for so long a time, could reject what to Christians in general, and himself in particular, seemed to be of so great weight[55]. And the embarras he was under from this difficulty put him upon looking for some solution of it amongst the variety of authors on this subject, both ancient and modern; but to no purpose, it seems, till the felicity of his own genius had struck out a new route, and led him to seek it in the low opinion which the heathens entertained of miracles.

And now the whole discovery is out; and, to say the truth, is every way so surprizing, that an author of less modesty than ours had assumed a still farther merit upon it. For, wherefore else should he rest in the honour of a new solution, when the objection itself is his? And surely at this time of day, when every species of hostility has been tried, and the whole armoury of the enemy been exhausted in the service, it must be deemed a higher praise of invention to have furnished new arms, than to counteract the use of them. Nor do I pay the author too great a compliment in supposing the objection his, since he fairly owns it has always been passed over[56], which, in an age like this, when every difficulty relating to Revealed Religion has been sedulously urged, and honestly examined, is in effect saying it was never started. And, indeed, this is so much the case, that, instead of dreaming of any objection from this quarter, Christian writers have universally agreed in representing the quick and speedy conversion of the heathen world, as an undeniable evidence of its divinity. And, for the truth of the fact, they appeal to the testimony of the heathens themselves complaining of the enormous growth of the new sect; which had spread itself over at orders and degrees of men, insomuch that their altars were neglected, and the temples of their gods left in a manner desolate[57]. Nay, the Christian apologists, we know, braved them to their very face with the incredible progress of Christianity[58]. And thus, instead of its being true, as the Inquirer candidly insinuates, that there was something so exceedingly perplexed and intricate in the subject itself, or something so critical and dangerous in the solution of it, that it was always thought proper to be kept from view[59], nothing, on the contrary, can be more evident than that there is no difficulty to be accounted for at all; or, if some more forward projector should affect to make one of it, the pretence might easily, and without any danger, admit a solution. So that, upon the whole (if a dealer in novelties were not too much disgraced by so stale an allusion), one should be apt to regard the learned writer as having been pushed on to this Inquiry by much the same spirit as, in an evil hour, led the valorous Knight of Manca out upon his rambles. For, struck with the conceit of his own superior prowess, and considering withal the loss the world might sustain by his not appearing in it, he marched forth into the land of Religious Disputation, in quest of adventures; where, finding no real objections to encounter, he was determined however to create imaginary ones, and so, converting the next innocent thing he came at into a monster, laid out his whole strength and force in the combat. Where too the success of the adventurers is not unlike. For the difficulty, if it be one, is much too hard for the abilities of our Inquirer; as, whatever his antagonist was, the unlucky Knight had always the worst of it. For, in examining the other part of the author’s discovery, his answer to the supposed objection, we shall find that as he set out with a difficulty without grounds, so he will salve it by a fact without proof. And this, it will be owned, consistently enough: for, where a phantom only is to be engaged, the hero but exposes himself that goes against it in real armour.

But let us hear the fact itself. It is maintained then as the basis of the Inquirer’s whole work, that the heathens in general had a very low opinion of miracles; and that this was not put on by them to serve some particular purposes, but was really a principle that influenced their actions on the most interesting and trying occasions[60]. The Inquirer has more than once[61] expressed his apprehensions that the novelty of his doctrine would, at least with many of his readers, be a prejudice against its reception; but not once, that I can find, does he appear to have entertained any the least distrust or concern about the truth of it. And yet the public will be apt to think this the fitter object of his fears. For, allowing the utmost weight and force to the several testimonies he has put together, the whole amount of their evidence is this:—that a few particular persons, many of them under inveterate prejudices against Christianity, expressed but a low opinion of miracles, which they knew to be FALSE, or of certain REAL ones, which they did not believe. And where is the wonder? Or how has the Inquirer, with all his sagacity, been able to collect a proof of the low opinion of miracles amongst the heathen in general from the unavailing evidence of such witnesses? For, is it strange that the Roman præfects[62] were not the immediate converts of Jesus and Paul, on account of the wonders said to have been done by them? If the Inquirer believes such testimonies to his purpose, I will engage to furnish a long list of them, even as many as there were unconverted heathens, who had the means and opportunity of informing themselves of the truth of his history. Is it remarkable that the miracles of one impostor[63] are not spoken of with much esteem by writers, who were not delivering the popular opinion concerning them, and who had plainly too much sense to believe them themselves? Or is it so much as true, either of him, or the others he mentions, that they were then negligently treated by their professed admirers and encomiasts[64]? Or, were it true, could any thing more be collected from it than that the miracles imputed to them were too trifling in themselves, or too weakly supported, to be believed?

But we have not yet done with the writer’s negative testimonies. For he thinks that of Marcellinus should not be passed over; though the most he can make of it is, that the historian dissembles a miracle[65] wrought to the utter confusion of his Master, and relates an event, which he was not at liberty to confute.

What comes next is indeed positive, but still less to the writer’s purpose. We can scarce think him serious, when he would urge the testimony of Hierocles, Celsus, and Julian, the avowed and virulent opposers of Christianity[66], as an evidence of a general contempt of miracles in the heathen world. Nor has he better luck with his philosophers. For, is the opinion of a few atheistical speculatists[67], and perhaps one or two more of better fame, of the least weight in deciding this matter; especially when it is plain, from the very passage referred to[68], that they saw through the imposture of the heathen miracles; and rejected them merely on that account? Can his Ægyptian Gymnosophists, piqued, as they were, at the reputation of the Indian miracles[69], and yet, in effect, confessing their esteem of them by pretending to work such themselves, can these witnesses be thought deserving the least credit? Above all, is the wonder-working Apollonius brought in to disclaim miracles, and that too in a passage intended only to express his contempt of some fooleries in witchcraft[70]? But what the philosophers could not do for him, the law-givers he resolves shall, and therefore brings in a long list of sages[71], all of them, as he thinks, concurring to establish this point. But how? Why, in his negative way of witnessing, in their making no pretence to miracles—that is, as every body sees, in their making no pretence to what they durst not counterfeit, or did not want; and when it is certain they did pretend to them in the only safe way of a secret intercourse and communication[72]. But the cause is growing still more desperate. For, are the Christian Apologists to be charged with this evil principle[73]? and that only for maintaining, in their occasional disputes with the heathens; what the ablest Divines have ever done, and still continue to maintain, the insufficiency of miracles alone, and if taken by themselves, to establish the divinity of any revelation? an opinion founded, as it should seem, on the express testimony of Jesus Christ[74]; or, if false, which has not been made appear, excusable enough in their situation, when real miracles were owned to be in the power of evil spirits, or when at least the general prevalency of this persuasion amongst their heathen adversaries might render it expedient for the Christian writers to argue on the concession of it. But, ill as this treatment is, the venerable Apologists have no cause of complaint. They share but the same fate, as ONE much their better. For, the dignity of the writer’s witnesses, whatever becomes of their evidence, is still increasing[75]; and having made free with the Fathers of the Church (for I say nothing of his Jews, not only because he confesses them nothing to his purpose[76], but because, if their evidence has any weight at all, it determines the contrary way[77]), having, as I said, made free with the Fathers of the Church, he next claims the sanction of an Apostle. Has then the Inquirer one sure and certain retreat? And is his novelty at last, all spent and wearied as it is, to elude our hopes by finding refuge in the sacred writings[78]? So indeed he would persuade himself or his readers. And this, it must be owned, is no novel practice. It is ever the last expedient of a sinking cause, when forsaken of all human help, and fearing the just vengeance of indignant reason, to strive to support itself by laying hold on the altar. But the Scriptures are no sanctuary for falshoods. We shall therefore esteem it no irreverence to approach the holy place, and, as we are instructed in a like case, to take the fugitive from it. The case appears to have been this: In the Apostle’s design of breaking an unchristian faction in the Church of Corinth, which had arose, it seems, from a vain ostentation of human science, his business was to discredit their misapplied learning with the people, and to check the arrogance of these perverse disputers themselves. To this end, he sets himself to shew that it was not on account of any advantage of skill in human learning or eloquence that God was pleased to make choice of the preachers of the Gospel; but that, on the other hand, he rather chose the foolish, i. e. the illiterate and uneducated, the better to expose the weakness of human wisdom, and to display, with greater force, the power and excellency of the Cross of Christ[79]. And this, he proceeds to observe, is but agreeable to the general œconomy of God’s providence, which doth not conform itself to our views of fitness or expediency; but most commonly by the choice of such instruments and means as to us seem unfit or inexpedient, destroys the wisdom of the wise, and brings to nothing the understanding of the prudent[80]. A remarkable example of which method of dealing with mankind, continues the Apostle[81], we have in the dispensation of the Gospel, introduced in such a manner, and established by such means, as both to Jew and Gentile appear absurd and unaccountable. For the Jews ask after a sign, i. e. look for an outward ostentatious display of worldly power and pre-eminence going along with, and attending on the Messiah; and, under the influence of such prepossession, make that a sign or test of his coming, and even refuse to acknowledge his Divine mission without it[82]. Whilst the Greeks, on the contrary, seduced by the charms of a studied eloquence, or inslaved to the tenets of a conceited philosophy, require the Gospel to be preached in agreement to their notions and prejudices; and reject a Redeemer, whose method of salvation is not conformable to the conclusions of their schools, and whose doctrine is unadorned by the graces of their learning. Whereas, in fact, proceeds the Apostle, our commission is to publish, in all plainness, a religion to the world, fundamentally opposite to the prejudices of both. For its main doctrine, and on which hangs all the rest, is that of a crucified Saviour; which therefore, as being offensive to the fond hopes and expectations of the Jew, and not suited to his ideas of the Divine power and greatness, is to him a stumbling-block: And being a method of salvation neither agreeing to their conceptions of the Divine wisdom, nor set off with the colours of heathen wit, is to the Greeks foolishness. Though yet it is to both these Jews and Greeks, when rightly instructed in the ways of God’s Providence, both the power of God and the wisdom of God[83]. Thus we see, at length, what the writer’s sacred authority is come to; which, having no foundation but in the groundless comment a mistaken passage is thus easily overturned and confuted. For from hence it appears, that the Apostle, far from attesting his whimsy of the low opinion of miracles amongst the heathens, does not so much as of Miracles at all: or, if he must be made an evidence in the cause, gives judgment against him; as plainly enough expressing his opinion, that it was not a contempt of miracles, but the conceit of wisdom, which made the great difficulty to converting the Pagan world.

And now having dispersed his cloud of witnesses (which, unlike the sacred one it would seem to resemble, instead of illustrating and reflecting a fuller light on the fact it surrounds, serves only to obscure and conceal it) having shewn, I say, if not the falshood of his fact, at least the insufficiency of his evidence to support it, I might fairly dismiss the remainder of his book without any confutation; the following chapters, as he tells us, being intended to account for this fact, which he presumes to have fully established. But, as he appears unwilling to rest the whole of his cause on the merit of so slight an evidence, and has therefore engaged for a further confirmation of it in the following pages[84], it will be proper to collect in a few words, what additional evidence may arise from that quarter: And in doing this, I shall think it sufficient to examine, not his premises, but conclusion; and so, leaving him in full possession of his facts, to argue with him, in agreement to the design of these slight sheets, on the weight and force of his deductions. And here,

1. Allowing him to have proved the vanity of the heathen pretensions to miracles, c. iv. v. vi. in the fullest sense he can wish; and that no real wonder was ever wrought, or oracle delivered, by any of the numerous pretenders to either, what will the author say is the proper inference from it?—That therefore the heathens could not but have a low opinion of miracles? That, indeed, would be to his purpose; but nothing can be less supported. For were not such miracles and oracles at least generally believed? Or, if several impostures were detected, does the author imagine that such detection would utterly sink the credit of all future miracles[85]? A writer, so skilled in the workings of superstition, and who appears to have taken much pains to pry into the dark corners of humanity, ought to know, that the passion for wonder is a foible too intimately connected with our nature to be thus easily driven out from it. And the history of mankind gives the strongest confirmation of this, in relating, as it does, notwithstanding the presumed effect of such discoveries, the very ready reception, which Miracles have ever met with. The truth is, the Inquirer might as well have set himself to prove the vanity of the Popish pretension to miracles, and then have inferred, from the frequent detection of impostures amongst them, that therefore the Papists cannot but have a very low opinion of miracles. This, I say, had been as logically inferred; and yet, I believe the first traveller from Rome, or next account he should look into of Italy, or Spain, would infallibly spoil the argument, and confute his conclusion. And, to do the author justice, he seems not unconscious of this, when, after all the learned pains he had taken to establish this point, he allows, that though his argument had shewn, what little reason the heathens had to think, that miracles had ever been wrought amongst them at all, yet it does not of consequence follow, that they would certainly make use of the light, that was held out to them; but observes, that whether they did or not, their esteem of miracles will be but little increased; for if ever they were alarmed by an appearance, which they could not tell how to account for, or over-borne by the weight of such testimony, as they could not tell how to invalidate, the principle of magic was one general recourse.

2. His strong-hold, then, we see, at last, is Magic. We shall follow him therefore one step further, and try if we cannot dislodge him from it. The fact conceded to him is, that the persuasion was pretty general in the heathen world, that by means of magic, that is, of certain superstitious rites, and sacrifices, and by certain words and invocations of dæmons, many things could be done exceeding the power of man; and that accordingly many seeming miracles, wrought amongst them, were imputed to this power of magic. But then to infer from hence, as the Inquirer would have us, that therefore the heathens under the persuasion of these principles, must necessarily entertain a very low opinion of all miracles, is sure concluding too fast. For, though I could admit this to be a tolerable reason for the rejection of some Pagan miracles, it does not, we see, at all affect the Christian; which only are, or ought to be, the concern of his book. So that the argument, fairly stated, confutes itself. For it stands thus: The heathens conceived many miraculous appearances, produced for some trifling or noxious purpose, to be in the power of certain persons, acting under the power of bad dæmons[86], and by the means of certain magical, and superstitious rites.—Therefore they of necessity entertained a low opinion of all miracles, though wrought by pawns, claiming their power and pretensions from God himself, for purposes the most momentous and benevolent, and without the interposition of any sacrificial or superstitious rites[87]. But this is not all: We learn from the history of the propagation of Christianity, that in certain places (and who can doubt in all where the pretended powers of magic were opposed to the genuine workings of the Spirit of God?) such methods were used by Christ and his Apostles, as were sufficient to manifest the difference of their miracles from those of magicians, and to assert the divinity of their mission, in the very judgment of the magicians themselves[88]. And this, as it seems, always with such illustrious evidence, as to render it inexcusable in those, who had the opportunity of seeing and examining the difference, to remain unsatisfied of it. For I cannot but think it worthy the Inquirer’s regard, though no novelty, that the Heathen charge of magic, was but in other words the Jewish accusation of Beelzebub; either of them the genuine result of pure unallayed malice, and, concerning which, our Saviour’s determination is well known. And therefore when the learned writer contends, that the Heathens had a low opinion of miracles in general, on account of the supposed power and efficacy of charms, and magical incantations, he might with equal reason here have taken upon him to shew, that the Jews also had it low opinion of miracles in general on account of the supposed power of their diviners, and sorcerers, of which we likewise bear much amongst them, and from their ascribing, as we know they did, many miraculous effects and operations to them: an opinion, which, I presume, the learned writer will not find it to his purpose to maintain.

3. As to the author’s argument from the multiplication of the Heathen Gods (which is the only remaining part of his book I think myself concerned in[89]) if he means to conclude from it, that in consequence of the multitude of pretended miracles, flowing from such belief, miracles themselves must of necessity lose their force, and sink in their esteem[90], it is very frivolous, and admits an easy answer. For, besides its inherent weakness of bad logic, in concluding from a cause of possible efficiency to a certain effect, it has the misfortune, in common with his other reasonings on this subject, to be confuted by plain matter of fact. And, for his satisfaction in this point, I refer him once more to the case of the Romanists; who, notwithstanding the multiplicity of their saints, all of them dealers in miracles, and swarming in such numbers as to equal, if not exceed, the rabble of Pagan divinities, do not yet appear to have contracted from thence and disrelish, or disesteem for miracles. The truth is, the whole additional evidence arising from the main of his book in confirmation of his pretended fact, that the Heathens entertained a low opinion of miracles, is so very inconsiderable, that, as we now see, it hardly amounts to a bare probability. For, after all, the reader will perhaps incline to think, contrary to what the learned writer directs him, that such prevalency of magic, and multiplicity of gods, is no bad proof of the esteem and credit, that miracles were in amongst them. At least, ’tis no unfair presumption, that a people could not be so averse to miracles, as the author pretends, nor generally be possessed by a thorough contempt of them, when, notwithstanding the frequent detection of false miracles, and more than one degrading solution at hand for the true, they should yet be able to maintain their ground, and take such footing in the popular belief, as to be continually affording fresh occasion to imposture, and fresh encouragement to the dealers in this traffic to practise on the wonder and credulity of mankind.

2. And whoever sets out with this surmise, (which is apparently not ill-founded) will find it greatly strengthened in observing, that of all the reproaches cast upon the Heathen world, and of all the prejudices objected to them by the first propagators of Christianity, this of the contempt of miracles was not so much as once mentioned, there not being the least hint, or remotest intimation in the sacred writings of their labouring under any peculiar prepossession of this kind. A circumstance perfectly unaccountable, if what the Inquirer contends for be true, since such prepossession could not but greatly obstruct the Apostolic labours, and make it necessary for them to bend their first care and application that way.

3. And it raises the wonder still higher to observe, that whilst the Heathens escape uncensured in this respect, the Jews are severely rebuked for their incredulity and disregard miracles[91]; where too, by the very cast and turn of the reproof, the Heathens are to be understood as less chargeable on this head, than the Jews.

4. But, what has still the worst aspect on the writer’s scheme, is, that whilst the Apostles are quite silent as to this charge upon the Gentile, nor appear once to rank it in the list of such impediments, as retarded the conversion of the Pagan world, they are at the same time very express in declaring to us, what the chief of those impediments were. They in part have been already suggested[92], and were, if St. Paul may be credited, in reality, these: 1. A conceit of superior wisdom amongst the men of letters and education[93]. And, 2. The corruptions and gross idolatries of the people at large[94].

5. But what! it will after all be asked, Is there then no truth in what the leaned writer has advanced concerning the Heathen contempt of miracles; and in particular, is his long detail of principles and circumstances, concurring, as it should seem, to produce such contempt, utterly without all force or meaning?

This has no where been said; and the contrary is what I am now ready to affirm. For, to do the Inquirer justice, it was upon the basis of a good, old truth, that this wondrous novelty was erected. A fine writer[95] will tell us what it was. “We may observe,” (says he, in accounting for the silence of Pagan writers in respect of our Saviour’s history) “that the ordinary practice of MAGIC in those times, with the many pretended PRODIGIES, DIVINATIONS, APPARITIONS, and LOCAL MIRACLES amongst the Heathens, made them less attentive to such news from Judæa, till they had time to consider the NATURE, the OCCASION, and the END of our Saviour’s Miracles, and were awakened by many surprizing events to allow them any consideration at all.” We see here the ground-work of our author’s performance, and have determined to our hands with great accuracy, how far his general position is true, and to what extent the particular circumstances and situation of the Heathens would in reality affect their opinion of miracles. Had the learned writer confined himself within these limits, he would, I conceive, have had reason and history on his side, and, whatever alarm he may be in from the froward and contentious spirit of party in religion, no enemies to oppose him. But then this, it must be owned, had been saying nothing new: The world had lost the benefit of a discovery, and the author, what of all things he would most regret, the glory of INVENTION.