Chapter 20

§ 1. The Subject stated. Four Questions concerning Miracles.

In considering the truth and error in the Orthodox doctrine concerning miracles, we must, _first_, find out what this doctrine is; _secondly_, see what objections have been urged against it; and so, lastly, we may come to some conclusion as to where the truth or the error lies. There are, however, four distinct questions in regard to miracles, each of which may be considered separately. There is the philosophic question, or definition of a miracle, which asks, What is a miracle? Then there is the historical question, which asks, Did such facts actually occur? Next is the theological question, What are the value and weight of these facts in determining our Christian belief? And lastly comes the religious question, What are the spiritual meaning of miracles, and their influence on the heart and life?

§ 2. The Definition of a Miracle.

As the creeds give no authoritative definition of a miracle, we must examine individual statements, in order to get the Orthodox idea.

To answer the question, _What is a miracle?_ is not as easy as it would seem, as will appear from considering the different definitions given by different authorities, taking first those of the dictionary.

JOHNSON. “_Miracle._ A wonder—something above human power. (In theology.) An effect above human or natural power, performed in attestation of some truth.”

WEBSTER. “_Miracle._ (In theology.) An event or effect contrary to the established constitution and course of things, or a deviation from the known laws of nature; a supernatural event.”

ROBINSON’S BIBLE DICTIONARY. “_Miracle._ A sign, wonder, prodigy. These terms are commonly used in Scripture to denote an action, event, or effect, superior (or contrary) to the general and established laws of nature. And they are given, not only to true miracles, wrought by saints or prophets sent by God, but also to the false miracles of impostors, and to wonders wrought by the wicked, by false prophets or by devils.” After giving examples of this from the Scriptures, Robinson adds, “Miracles and prodigies, therefore, are not always sure signs of the sanctity of those who perform them, nor proofs of the truth of the doctrine they deliver, nor certain testimonies of their divine mission.”

AMERICAN ENCYCLOPŒDIA. _Miracle._ “It is usually defined to be a deviation from the course of nature. But this definition seems to omit one of the elements of a miracle, viz., that it is an event produced by the interposition of an intelligent power for moral purposes; for, otherwise, we must consider every strange phenomenon, which our knowledge will not permit us to explain, as a miraculous event. A revelation is itself a miracle. If one claims to be a teacher from God, he asserts a miraculous communication with God; this communication, however, cannot be visible, and visible miracles may therefore be necessary to give credibility to his pretensions. The use, then, of a miraculous interposition in changing the usual course of nature is to prove the moral government of God, and to explain the character of it.”

THEODORE PARKER. “A miracle is one of three things.

“1. It is a transgression of all law which God has made; or,

“2. A transgression of all known laws, or obedience to a law which we may yet discover; or,

“3. A transgression of all law known or knowable by man, but yet in conformity with some law out of our reach.”

He says that a miracle, according to the first definition, is impossible; according to the second it is no miracle at all; but that there is no antecedent objection to a miracle according to the third hypothesis.

PASCAL. “A miracle is an effect which exceeds the natural force of the means employed to bring it about.”

HUME. “A miracle is a violation of a law of nature.”

DR. THOMAS BROWN. “A miracle is as little contrary to any law of nature as any other phenomenon. It is only an extraordinary event, the result of extraordinary circumstances; an effect that indicates a power of a higher order than those we are accustomed to trace in phenomena more familiar to us, but whose existence only the atheist denies. It is a new consequent of a new antecedent.”

HORNE’S INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT. “A miracle defined is an effect or event _different from the established constitution or course of things_, or a _sign obvious to the senses that God has interposed this power to control the established powers of nature_ (commonly termed the laws of nature), which effect or sign is wrought either by _the immediate act_, or by the assistance, or by the permission, _of God_, and accompanied with a _previous notice_ or _declaration_ that it is performed according to the purpose and by the power of God, _for the proof or evidence_ of some particular doctrine, or in attestation of the authority or divine mission of some particular person.”—Vol. I. p. 203.

“Since, as we already have had occasion to observe, the proper effect of a miracle is _clearly_ to mark the divine interposition, it must therefore have characters proper to indicate such interposition; and these _criteria_ are six in number.

“1. It is required, then, in the first place, that a fact or event which is stated to be miraculous should have an important end, worthy of its author.

“2. It must be instantaneously and publicly performed.

“3. It must be sensible (that is, obvious to the senses) and easy to be observed; in other words, the fact or event must be such that the senses of mankind can clearly and fully judge of it.

“4. It must be independent of second causes.

“5. Not only public monuments must be kept up, but some outward actions must be constantly performed in memory of the fact thus publicly wrought.

“6. And such monuments must be set up, and such actions and observances be instituted, at the very time when those events took place, and afterwards be continued without interruption.”—Vol. I. p. 214 and 215.

From these examples we may see what different definitions have been given of miracles, and that the definition is not so easy a thing as one might at first suppose. All depends on the point of view which we take. If we look only at the outward fact, a miracle is a wonderful event, a portent, something out of the common course of nature, and unparalleled in common human experience. But if we look at it as regards the character of him who works the miracle, it then becomes a supernatural work, or a preternatural work, having a divine or a demoniac origin.

But, on the whole, the Orthodox doctrine of a miracle seems to be this—that it is a wonderful work, contrary to the laws of nature, wrought by the direct agency of God, in proof of the divine commission of him by whom it is done. The two essential points of the definition are, that a miracle is _contrary to the laws of nature_; and that it is _the only logical proof of the divine authority of the miracle-worker_. We call this the orthodox definition, although we must admit that no one in modern times has presented this view more forcibly and decidedly than the Unitarian Andrews Norton, and though many Orthodox men have taken a different view.

§ 3. The different Explanations of the Miracles of the Bible.

The four explanations of the miracles of the New Testament (to which we now confine ourselves) are these:—

I. _The Natural Explanation._—According to this, the miraculous facts of the New Testament are to be explained as resulting from natural causes. They are on the plane of our common human life. They are such events as might easily happen anywhere at the present time. Christ himself was but a natural genius of a high order. His miracles were merely the natural results of his intellect and strength of will, or they were mistakes on the part of the observers and narrators, or myths which have grown up subsequently in the Church. Great ingenuity has been used in attempting to show how each miracle may be explained so as to be nothing very extraordinary, after all. But these explanations are often very forced. Some events which are at first sight seemingly miraculous, are often explained as natural events by the majority of commentators. Thus the account of the angel who went down into the pool and troubled the water is usually interpreted as a natural phenomenon, and no real miracle. Modern travellers have noticed that this pool of Bethesda is an intermittent spring, which may have possessed medicinal qualities.

The old-fashioned naturalism, however, has mostly gone by. Its explanations were too forced and unnatural to continue long. The more common account at present is that which assumes that the narrators were mistaken in the stories which they have given us. Mr. Parker thinks that there is not sufficient evidence of the miracles. If there were more he would believe them. He gives no explanation of their origin farther than this. But Strauss attempts an explanation based upon an unconscious action of the fancy and feelings on the part of the New Testament writers, causing them to create these incidents out of some trifling basis of fact or of history. Renan follows in the same general direction.

II. _The Unnatural Explanation._—A miracle is a violation or a suspension of a law of nature.

This, until recently, has been the favorite view of miracles among theologians, and is the view of miracles against which the arguments of those who reject them have been chiefly directed.

The arguments in favor of this view are these:—

1. The miracles of the New Testament _seem_ to be violations of laws of nature. For example: the turning water into wine; healing by a word or touch; stilling the tempest; feeding five thousand; walking on the sea; transfiguration; raising of Lazarus; Christ’s own resurrection. The law of gravitation seems to have been suspended when he walked on the sea, &c.

2. Miracles are appealed to by Christ and his apostles in proof that God was with him. But, unless these miracles had suspended the laws of nature, they would not be proofs of this.

These are the two principal reasons for this view of miracles.

_Objections._—On the other hand, it is objected,—

1. That apparent violations may not be real violations of the laws of nature. Examples: The Arab emir in “The Talisman” who was told that water sometimes became solid, so as to support a man on horseback; a steamboat sailing against wind and current; the telegraph; the daguerrotype. In all such cases the laws of nature are not violated or suspended, but new powers come in.

2. Christ appeals to the moral character of his miracles, and not merely to their supernatural character. They are miracles of benevolence.

3. If the proof of Christ’s mission depends on this view of miracles, it can never be proved. We can never be sure that the event is a violation of a law of nature.

4. On this view the sceptic’s objections to miracles are unanswerable.

So says Dr. Thomas Brown, in an article reprinted by Dr. Noyes, of Cambridge, in the “Theological Essays” published by the American Unitarian Association. He admits the principle of Hume’s Essay on Miracles, but says that his error lies in the false definition of the miracle as a violation of the laws of nature. False, because,—

(_a._) On the principle of continued uniformity of sequence our whole belief of causation, and consequently of the divine Being, is founded.

(_b._) Gives an air of inconsistency, and almost of absurdity, to a miracle.

(_c._) Laws of nature are not violated when a new antecedent is followed by a new consequent, but when, the antecedent being exactly the same, a different consequent is the result.

(_d._) No testimony could prove such a miracle. Suppose testimony so strong that its falsehood would be an absolute miracle; then we should have to believe, in either case, that a law of nature has been violated. No ground of preference between them.

5. A miracle may be supernatural, or above nature, without being unnatural, or against nature.

6. The greatest church teachers have maintained that miracles were not against law or without law, but above common law. Hahn, after mentioning the view of a miracle as a suspension of law, and calling it one neither scriptural nor conceivable, proceeds to quote Augustine and other writers, who held that miracles were by no means opposed to law.(9)

III. _The Preternatural View of Miracles._—This view admits the reality of the phenomena, but explains them as resulting from mysterious forces, which are neither divine on the one hand, nor human on the other, but which are outside of nature. This is the demoniacal view, or that which supposes that evil spirits, departed souls, or spirits neither good nor bad, surround the earth, and can be reached by magic, witchcraft, sorcery, magnetism, or what is now called Spiritualism. This theory supposes that the works of Jesus were performed by the aid of spiritual beings. The objections to this view are,—

1. If it is supposed, as it was by the Jews, that Jesus had the aid of evil spirits, the sufficient answer is, that his works were _good_ works.

2. If it is argued that he performed his miracles by the aid of departed spirits who were good spirits, the answer is, that he himself never took this view, but always declared, “My Father, who dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.” Moreover, the whole character of the miracles of Jesus differs not only from everything ever done by magnetism or spiritualism, but from everything ever claimed to be done.

IV. _The Supernatural View of Miracles._—This view asserts that the miracles were performed by higher forces, which came into this world from a higher world than this. It asserts that besides the forces which are at work regularly in the world, there are other forces outside of the world, which may from time to time come into it. We call them higher forces not only because they are more powerful than the forces before at work in the world, by overcoming which they produce the extraordinary outward phenomena, but because they always tend to elevate the world nearer to God. They are thus proved to come from a world which is nearer to God than this. The reasons in support of this view are, as before suggested.—

1. Geology teaches it. The rocks show not only an original creation of the world, but successive creations of vegetable and animal life.

2. The creation of the world teaches it. Creation was a miracle in this sense of the word.

3. There seems to be in the constitution of man a faculty provided for recognizing the supernatural element. Phrenologists call it the organ of marvellousness. Such a faculty would argue the existence of an appropriate object on which it might be exercised.

4. The whole life and character of Jesus were supernatural and miraculous in this sense. They cannot be satisfactorily explained as the result of anything existing in the world before.

§ 4. Criticism on these Different Views of Miracles.

In attempting to discover the truths and errors contained in these statements it is a great satisfaction to feel that our faith in Christ and Christianity is not depending on them. If we believed with those who consider miracles the only or the principal proof of Christianity, we could hardly hope to be candid and just in examining the arguments of those who deny the marvellous facts of the New Testament. There is no doubt that the number of religious and Christian men who have relinquished all belief in the marvellous part of the Bible has largely increased within a few years. At the present time there is a strong tendency to disbelieve and deny all miracles as incredible and impossible. Renan, in his “Life of Jesus,” says, “Miracles never happen except among people disposed to believe them. We banish miracles from history in the name of a constant experience. No miracle has, as yet, been proved.” Renan adds, that “if a commission of men of science should decide that a man had been raised from the dead he would believe it.” “Till then,” he says, “it is the duty of the historian not to admit a supernatural fact, but to find, if he can, what part credulity and imposition have had in it.” Accordingly, Renan writes his “Life of Jesus” in this sense, discarding most of the miracles, or explaining them away, and trying to put together into some kind of shape the fragments which remain. But Renan does not go far enough to satisfy some others. Gerritt Smith, for example, in a recent lecture which he has published, called “Be Natural,” says, “Jesus neither performed nor attempted to perform miracles. His wisdom and sincerity forbid the supposition. Am I an unbeliever in the historical Jesus because I hold him innocent of the absurdities which superstition and folly tax him with? No more than I should disbelieve in Shakespeare, by denying that he walked on the Avon, or changed its waters into wine. M. Renan ought to have made no account of these stories of miracles. He should have dropped them entirely, as did Rammohun Roy in his Hindoo translation of the New Testament. Let the credulous feed on these creations of superstition, but let men of sense turn away from them.”

The reason why so many intelligent men find it impossible to believe the miracles of the New Testament, while they find it very easy to believe the religious and moral teaching of Jesus is partly due to the spirit of the age. The intellect of this age is more and more scientific. Now, science is the knowledge of facts and laws. A miracle is opposed to all usual observation of facts, and is often called by theologians a violation of the laws of nature. It is not therefore strange that men imbued with the spirit of science should dislike the notion of miracles.

§ 5. Miracles no Proof of Christianity.

Now, we should have little objection, on purely theological grounds, to give up the miracles of the New Testament. Theologians have built up the proof of Christianity on miracles. They have declared them the chief evidence of Christianity. They have said, “A miracle is a violation of a law of nature. Now, no one but God can violate a law of nature. If Jesus violated a law of nature, it proved that God was with him. But that he did so we know from the New Testament. That it tells the truth we know, because it was written, by eye-witnesses, who could not have been mistaken, because they saw the miracles with their own eyes, and were not liars, because they laid down their lives in testimony of the truth of what they asserted.” Therefore, it is argued, “Christ worked miracles; therefore he had God’s help and power; therefore he has God’s authority to teach the religion of the New Testament.”

Now, for those who hold this view of Christianity, if they renounce miracles, it is evident that the foundation of faith is gone. No wonder, therefore, that they bitterly oppose all attacks of miracles. In defending miracles, they are fighting for their lives.

But we need not hold this view of the foundation of Christianity. Christianity does not rest necessarily on the physical miracles of Christ, but on his moral miracles, which no one has ever doubted, or can doubt. Christianity proceeded from Jesus, and was transmitted by him, not as a philosophy, but as a power, a life, which renewed the old world, and created a new dispensation. This is the great miracle. We do not really believe Christianity on the ground of miracles, but we believe miracles on the ground of Christianity.

Let us explain this. If miracles had been asserted to be wrought by God in order to prove the truth of a doctrine irrational, self-contradictory, odious to the conscience and to the heart,—to prove, for example, the justice of the Spanish Inquisition, the lawfulness of slavery, or that God loves some of his children and hates the rest,—then all the outward evidence in the world would not have convinced us that God had taught such a doctrine and confirmed it by miracles. If we had seen with our own eyes a dead man raised to life, or if M. Renan’s committee of scientific men had testified that they had seen it, we should either say they were deceived, or we should say, with the Jews, “It is done by some devilish power, not by a divine power. It is not supernatural, it is preternatural.” But Christianity itself is the great miracle of human history. It is more marvellous than raising a dead man, for it was the _resurrection of a dead world_—of a dead humanity. Read Gibbon. He is an infidel writer, but he is a perfect historian. He shows you Christianity, as a living force, coming into history, pouring a tide of life into the decaying civilization of Rome, overflowing upon the German tribes, and changing their whole character, so as to make out of those savage warriors merciful and reverential soldiers, who knew how to pardon and how to spare. Now, there seems something quite as supernatural in this as in the coming of new trees and plants into the world in the carboniferous epoch, or the coming in of mammalia, a hundred thousand years or so after. It seems as if God came near the world, and touched it in Jesus Christ; for the power of one man was wholly inadequate to such results as followed his coming. I believe Christianity a divine religion, a religion from God, because it lifts the soul nearer to God—because it has lifted mankind nearer to God, and enabled men to believe God a friend—not a tyrant, not a stern king—but a father. Christianity is divine, because its truth and love are divine—because it purifies, consoles, and elevates human hearts; because the life of Jesus is, by the testimony of such men as Theodore Parker, Rousseau, and Renan, infinitely superior to all other lives ever lived in this world. Now, believing in Christianity and Christ on such grounds, we may look with much more deference and respect upon the stories of miracles which are intertwined in his life. We should not attend to them at all if we found them told about only common men; but told about Jesus, we are led to examine them more critically, and ask whether it is, or is not, possible for them to have been, in the main, real facts.

The Orthodox doctrine has been, and still is, that Christianity rests on miracles. Our view is, that miracles rest on Christianity. But we close this section with extracts from Luther, Channing, Trench, and Walker, to show that the view for which we contend is not without able supporters in all parts of the Church.

Martin Luther says,—

“People cry it up as a great miracle, that Christ made the blind see, the deaf hear, and the lepers clean; and it is true such works are miraculous signs; but Christ regards his influence on the soul as far more important than that on the body; for as the soul excels the body, so do the miracles wrought on the former excel those wrought on the latter....

“The miracles which Christ wrought on the body are small and almost childish, compared with the high and true miracles which he constantly performs in the Christian world by his divine, almighty power; for instance, that Christianity is preserved on the earth; that the word of God and faith in him can yet hold out; yea, that a Christian can survive on earth against the devil and all his angels; also against so many tyrants and factions; yea, against our own flesh and blood. The fact that the gospel remains and improves the human heart,—this is indeed to cast out the devil, and tread on serpents, and speak with tongues; for those visible miracles were merely signs for the ignorant, unbelieving crowd, and for those who were yet to be brought in; but for us, who know and believe, what need is there of them? For the heathen, indeed, Christ must needs give external signs, which they could see and take hold of; but Christians must needs have far higher signs, compared with which the former are earthly. It was necessary to bring over the ignorant with external miracles, and to throw out such apples and pears to them as children; but we, on the contrary, should boast of the great miracles which Christ daily performs in his church.”

In the “Christian Examiner,” Dr. James Walker says,—

“Christianity embodies a collection of moral and vital truths, and _these truths_, apart from _all history_ or philosophy, constitute Christianity itself. Instead, therefore, of perplexing and confounding the young with what are called the evidences of Christianity, give them Christianity itself. Begin by giving them Christianity itself, as exhibited in the life and character of the Lord Jesus, as illustrated by his simple, beautiful and touching parables, and as it breathes through all his discourses. They will _feel it to be true_. Depend upon it, paradoxical as it may sound, children will be much more likely to believe Christianity without what are called the evidences, than with them; and the remark applies to some who are not children.

“Why talk to one about the argument from prophecy, or the argument from miracles, when these are the very points, and the only points, on which his mind, from some peculiarity in its original constitution, or from limited information, chiefly labors. Give him Christianity itself, by which we mean the body of moral and vital truths which constitute Christianity. Observe it when you will, you will find that the doubts and difficulties suggested by children relate almost exclusively to the _history_ of Christianity, or to what are called the _external_ evidences of Christianity, and not to the _truth_ of Christianity itself. Give them Christianity itself: for if they believe in that, it is enough. Nothing can be more injudicious than to persist in urging the argument from miracles on a mind, that, from any cause, has thus become indifferent, and perhaps impatient of it. How idle to think to convince a person of Christianity by miracles, when it is these very miracles, and not Christianity, that he doubts! The instances, we suspect, are not rare, even of adults, who are _first converted to Christianity itself_, and afterwards, through the moral and spiritual change which Christianity induces, are brought to believe entirely and devoutly in its _miraculous origin and history_.”

Dr. Channing says,—

“There is another evidence of Christianity still more _internal_ than any on which I have yet dwelt; an evidence to be _felt_ rather than described, but not less _real_ because founded on feeling. I refer to that conviction of the divine original of our religion which springs up and continually gains strength in those who apply it habitually to their tempers and lives, and who imbibe its spirit and hopes. In such men there is a consciousness of the adaptation of Christianity to their noblest faculties; a consciousness of its exalting and consoling influences, of its power to confer the true happiness of human nature, to give that peace which the world cannot give; which assures them that it is not of earthly origin, but a ray from the everlasting Light, a stream from the fountain of heavenly Wisdom and Love. This is the evidence which sustains the faith of thousands, who never read and cannot understand the learned books of Christian apologists, who want, perhaps, words to explain the ground of their belief, but whose faith is of adamantine firmness, who hold the gospel with a conviction more intimate and unwavering than mere arguments ever produced.”

And here is an extract from another writer:—

“Doubtless Christ’s spiritual glory is in itself as distinguishing, and as plainly showing his divinity, as his outward glory, and a great deal more; for his spiritual glory is that wherein his divinity consists, and the outward glory of his transfiguration showed him to be divine only as it was a remarkable image or representation of that spiritual glory. Doubtless, therefore, he that has had a clear sight of the spiritual glory of Christ may say, ‘I have not followed cunningly devised fables, but have been an eye-witness of his majesty,’ upon as good grounds as the apostle, when he had respect to the outward glory of Christ that he had seen. A true sense of the divine excellency of the things of God’s Word doth more directly and immediately convince of the truth of them; and that because the excellency of these things is so superlative. There is a beauty in them that is so divine and godlike, that is greatly and evidently distinguishing of them from things merely human, or that men are the authors and inventors of,—a glory that is so high and great, that when clearly seen, commands assent to their divinity and reality. The evidence which they who are spiritually enlightened have of the truth of the things of religion, is a kind of intuition and immediate evidence. They believe the doctrines of God’s Word to be divine, because they see divinity in them. That is, they see a divine, and transcendent, and most evidently distinguishing glory in them; such a glory as, if clearly seen, does not leave room to doubt of their being of God, and not of men.”

Trench, also, denies that the miracle can have absolute authority, since Satanic powers may work evil too. This convinces us, he says, that miracles cannot be appealed to in proof of the doctrine or of the divine mission of him who brings it to pass. The doctrine must first commend itself to the conscience as being good; then the miracle shows it to be a new word from God. But when the mind and conscience reject the doctrine, the miracle must be rejected too. The great act of faith is to believe, in despite of all miracles, what God has revealed to the soul of the holy and the true; not to believe another gospel, though an angel from heaven should bring it. Instead of compelling assent, miracles are _then_ rather warnings to us that we keep aloof; for they tell us not merely that lies are here, but that he who utters them is an instrument of Satan.

False miracles, or lying wonders, are distinguished from the true, not by the intellect, but by the moral sense, which finds in them something immoral, or ostentatious, or futile, leading to nothing. Origen says the miracles of Moses issued in a Jewish polity; those of our Lord in a Christian Church. But what fruits have the miracles of Apollonius or Æsculapius to show?

The miracles of Christ are redemptive. Modern writers of evidences make a dangerous omission when they fail to say that the doctrine is to try the miracle, as well as the miracle to seal the doctrine. To teach men to believe in Christ on no other grounds than his wonderful works is to pave the way of Antichrist. Those books of Christian evidences are utterly maimed and imperfect, fraught with the most perilous consequences, which reverence in the miracle only its power.(10)

§ 6. But Orthodoxy is right in maintaining their Reality as Historic Facts.

The first thing we notice about the miracles of Jesus is, that they are intertwined inextricably with the whole narrative. It is almost impossible to disentangle them, and to leave any solid historic residuum. There is a story in Goethe of a statue of iron and silver, with veins of gold. The flames licked out the gold veins of the colossus, and it remained standing a little while; but when at last the tenderest filaments had been licked out, the image crashed together, and fell in a shapeless, miserable heap. So when the tongue of criticism shall have eaten out the supernatural elements of the gospel narrative, the heroic figure will fall, as it has already in Renan’s construction, into an amorphous mass of unhistoric rubbish.

Then we see that most of these miracles are miracles of healing, which have their analogues in many similar events scattered through history. Many such facts might be collected to show that there is in man a latent power of overcoming disease, in himself and others, by a great exertion of will. If in common men there is such a power, latent, and as yet undeveloped, why should it be an unnatural thing that one so full of a superhuman life as Jesus should be raised to a position where, by his very word or touch, he could cure disease, and that even at a distance?

We see such wonderful discoveries made every day of latent powers in nature, and secrets hidden till now from all men, that we do not know where to put limits to the possibility of the wonderful. To go into a telegraphic office in Boston, and speak to a man in New York or Washington, and have an answer in five minutes; to have your portrait painted in a moment by the rays of the sun,—such things as these would have seemed miracles to us a few years ago. To be able to tell what metals there are in the sun’s atmosphere, and what not there; to say, “In the atmosphere of the sun there is silver, but not gold; there are iron, and antimony, and lead, and aluminum, but no copper nor zinc,”—does not this seem incredible? But we know that we _can_ now tell just that.

When we read the Gospels, we find everything in them so simple, so unpretending, so little of an attempt at making out a consistent story, such a harmony in the character of the works attributed to Jesus (with one or two exceptions), that we are irresistibly inclined to say, “These stories must be simple facts. Delusion never spoke in this tone,—so clear, so luminous,—in language so honest and sincere.”

I do not deny that some mistakes or misapprehensions may have crept into the records. Occasionally we can see signs of something being mistaken for a miracle which was really not one. For example, the finding of a piece of money in the fish’s mouth may have been the mistake of a proverbial expression, common among fishermen, and used by Matthew in his original Hebrew Gospel, but which the Greek translator, ignorant of the popular phrase, considered to be meant for a miracle.

The most natural supposition is, that a wonderful power dwelt in Jesus, which enabled him to heal the sick, cure the insane, and sometimes even bring back life to the dead. What do we know about death? The last breath has been drawn. The heart has ceased to beat, the lungs to move. We say, “He is dead.” But people have lain two or three days in this state, declared dead by the physicians, and then have come to life again by natural causes. A drowned man has all the marks of death; but after lying in this state half an hour, he is brought to life again. What, then, might not have been done by that supernatural power of life which, as history shows, dwelt in Jesus of Nazareth?

§ 7. Analogy with other Similar Events recorded in History.

It may very properly be asked whether miracles have occurred since the Bible record was closed; and if not, why not. Since we have regarded the miracles of the New Testament as no violations of law, but the coming in of higher laws or forces than those usually at work in the world, why may they not have taken place in our own time? If Christ’s miracles differ only from other miracles in being higher and more perfect, what are the miracles of a lower class? Can we point out any events belonging to the same class of phenomena which have happened during the last thousand years?

In reply to this question, we will proceed to mention certain phenomena which seem to belong to the same order as the works of Jesus. The _distinction_ between the miracles of Christ and all those portents will be pointed out hereafter.

In the “Atlantic Monthly” for February and March, 1864, there appeared an account (written, we believe, by R. Dale Owen), of the Convulsionists of St. Médard. The facts therein stated _seem_ to contradict all the known laws of physiology. The lower side of miracles, namely, their apparent violation of physical laws, here appears as fully developed and as fully attested as the most careful sceptic could desire. If, therefore, any one objects to believing the miracles of Jesus on the ground that they _seem_ to be violations of physical laws, we ask what they mean to do with these facts, so extraordinary, and yet so fully attested. If believed, there is no reason, based on the abnormal character of Christ’s works, for rejecting those. But if disbelieved, it can be done only by setting aside all the ordinary rules of evidence, and all the laws of belief, in favor of a negative prepossession of a purely empirical character. Phenomena somewhat similar to these have occurred elsewhere, among Protestants as well as Catholics, during periods of great religious excitement. The beginnings of most religious systems—Methodism, Quakerism, &c.—have stories like these of supernatural influences. They have usually been disbelieved because their friends have claimed too much: they have claimed that such phenomena were divine attestations to the truth of the doctrine preached. What _is_ proved by them is the simple fact that the soul of man is capable, under high excitement, of suspending, or rather overcoming, all common physiological laws. We have seen similar results follow often from such causes, only in ordinary ways. A sick person is made well in a moment by some moral influence; a weak and sickly mother will nurse a sick child, night after night, without rest or sleep, and keep well, where a strong man would break down. Mesmerism brings forward multitudes of like facts. There are, for example, the well-attested facts concerning the transfer of the senses: that people under the influence of animal magnetism can read with their forehead, the pit of their stomach, or the back of their head. We have seen a weak boy, some thirteen years old, when magnetized, lift a chair with three heavy men standing on it. Clairvoyance, or seeing things at a distance, though not so well proved, is confirmed by a vast number of facts. We come, then, to our final statement concerning miracles, which is this:—

I. There is in man a power, as yet undeveloped, and only occasionally seen in exceptional conditions, of overcoming the common laws of nature by force of will; and this is sometimes voluntary, and sometimes involuntary.

II. This phenomenon takes these forms:—

A. _Power of the soul over the body (a.) to resist pain_, as in the case of martyrs, who are burned alive without any appearance of suffering; _(b.) to resist physical injury_, as in the case of the Convulsionists; _(c.) to dispense with the usual service of the senses_, as in the case of the girl at Worcester Insane Asylum, Massachusetts, under the care of Dr. Woodward, who could read a book in a perfectly dark room and with bandaged eyes; _(d.) to give a preternatural energy and strength to the body_.

B. _Preternatural knowledge_—such cases as that narrated by Dr. Bushnell, of Yonnt, in California; or _knowledge through dreams_, waking presentiments; cases of _foresight_, or prophecy; of _insight_, or knowledge of what is passing in other minds; of _clairvoyance_, or knowledge of what is happening at a distance, of which multitudes of facts are narrated in such books as the “Seeress of Provorst,” Mrs. Crowe’s “Night Side of Nature,” Robert Dale Owen’s “Footfalls from the Boundary of the Unseen World,” which, after being sifted by a fair criticism, will leave a large residuum of irresolvable facts.

C. Higher than these is a preternatural elevation of the whole character, as in such cases as that of JOAN OF ARC, where a young girl, ignorant, a peasant, destitute of all common means of influencing any one, by the simple power of faith, because she believed herself inspired and commissioned, succeeded in gaining the command of the armies of France, and then of achieving a series of victories, equal, on the whole, as mere military exploits, to those of the first captains of the world.

In all these cases we see manifestations of a power in the soul over nature, body, men, and the laws of time and space. So we say, _secondly_,—

III. This power was possessed in the highest degree known in this world by Jesus of Nazareth, and it differed in him from these other cases in these points:—

1. It was always voluntary in its exercise, never involuntary. He was not possessed by it, he possessed it. He used it just when and where he chose to use it. It was always at his command; he never appears to have tried to work a miracle, and failed. So,—

2. It was in him constant, and not occasional. In other cases where the miraculous element appears, it seems to come and go; but to Jesus the spirit was not given by measure. He had it always.

3. This power in him was total, and not partial. It was therefore harmonious—in harmony with all his other qualities. He had power over diseases of the body, and also those of the soul. He knew what was in man, and what was in nature—in the present, and in the future. There was nothing ecstatic, enthusiastic, nothing of excitement, about him; but everything denoted a fulness, a PLEROMA, of this spiritual life.

4. The exercise of this power in Christ was always eminently moral, never wilful. The one or two seeming exceptions, as, for example, the cursing the fig tree, and the causing the evil spirits to go into the swine, ought to be explained in harmony with the vast majority of his actions, which always are guided by love, and justice, and a holy sense of what is true and good.

5thly, and lastly. The miracle power of Jesus reached a higher point of development than in any one else. The raising of the dead to life, and the mysterious power over nature indicated by the turning of water into wine, by the miracle of the loaves and fishes, calming the storm, if facts, are facts unparalleled in any other biography, but seem possible, however unintelligible, when considered as emanating from such a masterly and commanding spirit as that of Jesus.

And this finally brings us to the miracle of the resurrection, concerning which we will first quote from an article in a late number of the “Westminster Review,” to show the most recent ideas of the critical and negative school on this point.

§ 8. Miracle of the Resurrection. Sceptical Objections.

In an article in the “Westminster Review,” in “The Life of Christ, by Strauss,” occurs the following passage:—

“For of the two alternatives open to free inquiry, that if Jesus died he never reappeared, or if he reappeared he never died, Strauss considers the former not only preferable, but the only tenable one; for he cannot persuade himself that a feeble sufferer, who at first had scarcely strength to leave the tomb, and in the end succumbed to death, could have contrived to inspire his followers with the conviction that he was the Prince of life, the Conqueror of the grave. Strauss thus admits that faith in the supernatural revival of the buried Nazarene was undoubtedly the profession of the Christian Church, the unconditional antecedent without which Christianity could have had no existence. If, then, we refuse to assume the resurrection to be an historical fact, we have to explain the origin of the Church’s belief in it. The solution which satisfies Strauss, and which seems to us also an adequate interpretation of the problem, is dependent on the two following positions: 1. The appearance of Jesus was literally an appearance, an hallucination, a psychological phenomenon. 2. It was also a sort of practical fallacy of confusion, a case of mistaken identity.

“But it will be said that this natural solution of the problem implies a foregone conclusion—the rejection of the Orthodox or supernatural solution. Of course it does; and accordingly Strauss has been accused of dogmatical or unphilosophical assumption. But the rejection of the theological solution is not the result of ignorant prejudice, but of enlightened investigation. Anti-supernaturalism is the final irreversible sentence of scientific philosophy, and the real dogmatist and hypothesis-maker is the theologian. That the world is governed by uniform laws is the first article in the creed of science, and to disbelieve whatever is at variance with those uniform laws, whatever contradicts a complete induction, is an imperative, intellectual duty. A particular miracle is credible to him alone who already believes in supernatural agency. Its credibility rests on an assumption—the existence of such agency. But our most comprehensive scientific experience has detected no such agency. There is no miracle in nature; there is no evidence of any miracle-working energy in nature; there is no fact in nature to justify the expectation of miracle. Rightly has it been said by an English _savant_ and divine, that testimony is a second-hand assurance, a blind guide, that can avail nothing against reason; and that to have any evidence of a Deity working miracles, we must go out of nature and beyond reason.

“Strauss’s prepossession, therefore, is justifiable. It is the prepossession of the rational theist, who does not believe in a God who changes his mind and improves with practice—the prentice maker of the world; it is the prepossession of the pantheist, in whose theory of the perfect government of an immanent God, miracle is an extravagance and absurdity; it is the prepossession of the philosophical naturalist, whose experience of the operations of nature recognizes no extra-mundane interventionalism.”

We have quoted this passage as containing the most distinct statement of an extreme anti-supernaturalism. Admitting the death of Jesus as a fact, it denies his resurrection as a fact, and that on doctrinal and theoretic grounds. Declaring anti-supernaturalism to be the final irreversible sentence of scientific philosophy, it assumes supernaturalism to be a denial that the world is governed by uniform laws. It assumes the resurrection of Christ to be at variance with those uniform laws. It denies the existence of any supernatural agency in the affairs of this world. It denies that there ever has been a miracle in nature, or any extra-mundane intervention in the history of nature or man.

This is what claims to be science, at the present time. We deny that it is science, and assert it to be pure dogmatism and theory, contradicted by numerous facts. It is pure theory to assume the resurrection of Jesus to be a violation of law. It is pure theory to define a miracle to be something opposed to law. It is pure theory to assume that the miraculous facts ascribed to Jesus in the Gospels must have been, if they occurred, violations of law. It is an assumption, contradicted by geology, that there is nothing in the experience of the naturalist of the operations of nature to show any extra-mundane intervention.

We have admitted, indeed, that these same assumptions have been made by Orthodox theology. Orthodox theologians have also assumed the miracles of Christ to be violations of the laws of nature. But some of the most distinguished theologians, in all ages of the Church, have not so defined them. And there is no reason why the man of science should deny the possibility of fact because an unscientific explanation has been given of that fact by others. This writer virtually says, “I will not believe that Christ appeared after his death, on any amount of testimony, because some persons have defined such appearances as being opposed to the laws of nature.” It is certainly true that we cannot fully believe in the reality of any phenomenon which seems to us to be a violation of law. It is also true that the reported facts concerning the appearances of Jesus _seem_ like a violation of law. But the scientific course is neither to deny the facts, nor to explain them away, but to study them, in order to see whether, after all, they may not lead us to some new laws, before unknown.

The resurrection of Jesus deserves this study, since, according to the confession of science itself, the Christian Church rests upon that belief. Strauss admits that Christianity could not have existed without it. But, hastily assuming that the real appearance of Jesus himself would be a violation of a law of nature, he supposes this immense fact of Christendom to rest on an hallucination and a case of mistaken identity.

But perhaps, after all, the resurrection may have been an example of a universal law. Like other miracles, which are sporadic instances, in this world, of laws which may be the nature of other worlds, so the resurrection may have been as natural an event as any other in the life of Jesus. Perhaps it is a law of nature that all souls shall become disengaged from the earthly body on the third day after death. Perhaps they all rise in a spiritual body, substantial and real, but not usually perceptible by the senses. Perhaps, in the case of Jesus, that same superior command of miraculous force, which appeared during his life, enabled him to show himself easily and freely whenever he would. What became of the earthly body we do not know; it may have been removed by the priests or soldiers to prevent the disciples from getting possession of it. The body in which Christ appeared differed evidently from the earthly body in various ways. It came and went mysteriously; it was sometimes recognized, and sometimes not; and it ascended into the spiritual world instead of passing again to death and the grave. Perhaps, therefore, it may be a universal law that souls rise out of the material body into a higher state, clothed in another body, substantial and real, but not material. The essence of the resurrection is this: Resurrection is not coming to life again with the same body, but ascent into a higher life with a new body.

It may be said that all this is only a _perhaps_. Very well; it _is_ only a _perhaps_, but that is all we want in order to refute the logic of the article just quoted. The scientific sceptic says, “I will not believe that Jesus was really seen after death, because that would be a violation of a law of nature.” We reply, “No, not necessarily. It might _perhaps_ have been thus and so.” That will do; for if we can show that it is not _necessarily_ a violation of a law of nature, we wholly remove the objection.

But we may go farther, and assert that such a supposition as we have made not only accords with the story in the Gospels, but also with the whole spirit of Christianity, and with all the analogies of nature. The resurrection of Jesus, so regarded, becomes the most _natural_ thing in the world. If souls live after death, as even natural instinct teaches, they live somewhere. As by the analogy of nature we see an ascending scale of bodily existence up to man, whose body is superior to that of all other animals, because fitted for the very highest uses, so if man is to live hereafter and elsewhere, and not in this earthly body, analogy would anticipate that he should live in a body still, but in a higher form. If Jesus, therefore, rose in this higher body, and appeared to his disciples, it was to lift them above fear of death by showing that this corruptible must put on incorruption. So his resurrection was not merely coming to life again in the same body, but rising up into a higher body and a higher state, to show us how we are to be, to give us a glimpse of the hereafter, to bridge over the gulf between this life and that to come.

§ 9. Final Result of this Examination.

We have thus examined, as thoroughly as our limited space will allow, the questions at issue, on the subject of miracles, between the old Orthodox and recent heterodox views; and the result to which we have arrived may be thus stated:—

1. We may believe, on the testimony of history, that through Jesus of Nazareth there entered the world a great impulse of creative moral life, which has been, and is now, renewing society. This new impulse of life may be regarded as miraculous or supernatural.

2. We may believe, though perhaps less strongly, but still decidedly, that during the stay of Jesus on earth many extraordinary phenomena took place, such as the sudden healing of the sick, the raising of the dead to life, a display of miraculous insight and foresight, or knowledge of the present and the future, and some influence over organic and material life, and over the lifeless forces of nature. The precise limits of this we do not know, and need not pretend to define. We need not think it essential to fix the boundary. It may be interesting as speculation, but it is not important as religion.

3. For, in the third place, we may say that these miracles of Jesus have very little direct bearing on our _religion_. As they illustrate his character, they are valuable, and also as they help us to believe that the laws of nature are not stiff and rigid, like the movement of a machine, but that there is force above force, a vortex of living powers, in the universe, rising higher and higher towards the fountain of all force and life in God. All portents and wonders are useful, as they shake us out of the mechanical view of things, and show that even the outward, sensible world is full of spiritual power.

4. We may also believe the miracles of Jesus to be _natural_ in this sense—that under the same conditions they could have been done by others, and that they are probably prophetic of a time in which they _shall_ be done by others. Looked at as mere _signs_ or _portents_, he himself discouraged any attention being paid to them. Looked at as logical proofs to convince an unbeliever, he never brought them forward. His object in miracles, as stated by Mr. Furness, was simply to express his character. Some, indeed, were symbolical, as the cursing of the fig tree. It is the custom in the East for teachers to speak in symbolic language.

Miracles were at first believed, on low grounds, as violations of law by a God outside of the world. Now they are disbelieved on scientific grounds. They may possibly be believed again on grounds of philosophy and historic evidence, not as portents, not as violations of law, not as the basis of a logical argument, but as the natural effluence and outcome of a soul like that of Jesus, into which a supernatural influx of light and life had descended. They are not more wonderful than nature; they are not _so_ wonderful as the change of heart by which a bad man becomes a good man. But they will find their proper place as evidence how plastic the lower laws are to the influence of a higher life.