We have given a most imperfect sketch of some of the opinions and
superstitions prevalent at the time of Jesus, and when the books of
the New Testament were written. These, as we have seen, continued with
little or no modification throughout the first centuries of our era.
It must, however, be remembered that the few details we have given,
omitting most of the grosser particulars, are the views deliberately
expressed by the most educated and intelligent part of the community,
and that it would have required infinitely darker colours adequately to
have portrayed the dense ignorance and superstition of the mass of the
Jews. It is impossible to receive the report of supposed marvellous
occurrences from an age and people like this without the gravest
suspicion. Even so thorough a defender of miracles as Dr. Newman admits
that: "Witnesses must be not only honest, but competent also; that is,
such as have ascertained the facts which they attest, or who report
after examination;"l and although the necessities of his case oblige him
to assert that "the testimony of men of science and general knowledge"
must not be required, he admits, under the head of "deficiency of
examination," that--"Enthusiasm, ignorance, and habitual credulity
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are defects which no number of witnesses removes."(1) We have shown how
rank were these "defects" at the commencement of the Christian era, and
among the chief witnesses for Christianity. Miracles which spring from
such a hot-bed of superstition are too natural in such a soil to be
objects of surprise and, in losing their exceptional character, their
claims upon attention are proportionately weakened if not altogether
destroyed. Preternatural interference with the affairs of life and the
phenomena of nature was the rule in those days, not the exception, and
miracles, in fact, had lost all novelty, and through familiarity had
become degraded into mere commonplace. The Gospel miracles were not
original in their character, but were substantially mere repetitions of
similar wonders well known amongst the Jews, or commonly supposed to
be of daily occurrence even at that time. In fact, the idea of such
miracles, in such an age and performed amongst such a people, as the
attestation of a supernatural Revelation, may with singular propriety
be ascribed to the mind of that period, but can scarcely be said to bear
any traces of the divine. Indeed, anticipating for a moment a part of
our subject regarding which we shall have more to say hereafter, we may
remark that, so far from being original either in its evidence or form,
almost every religion which has been taught in the world has claimed the
same divine character as Christianity, and has surrounded the person and
origin of its central figure with the same supernatural mystery. Even
the great heroes of history, long before our era, had their immaculate
conception and miraculous birth. There can be no doubt that the writers
of the New Testament shared the popular superstitions of the Jews.
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We have already given more than one instance of this, and now we have
only to refer for a moment to one class of these superstitions, the
belief in demoniacal possession and origin of disease, involving clearly
both the existence of demons and their power over the human race. It
would be an insult to the understanding of those who are considering
this question to pause here to prove that the historical books of the
New Testament speak in the clearest and most unmistakable terms of
actual demoniacal possession. Now, what has become of this theory of
disease? The Archbishop of Dublin is probably the only one who asserts
the reality of demoniacal possession formerly and at the present day,(1)
and in this we must say that he is consistent. Dean Milman, on the other
hand, who spoke with the enlightenment of the 19th century, "has no
scruple in avowing _his_ opinion on the subject of demoniacs to be that
of Joseph Mede, Lardner, Dr. Mead, Paley, and all the learned modern
writers. It was a kind of insanity.... and nothing was more probable
than that lunacy should take the turn and speak the language of the
prevailing superstition of the times."(2) The Dean, as well as "all the
learned modern writers" to whom he refers, felt the difficulty, but in
seeking to evade it they sacrifice the Gospels. They overlook the fact
that the writers of these narratives not only themselves adopt "the
prevailing superstition of the times," but represent Jesus as doing
so with equal completeness. There is no possibility, for instance, of
evading such statements as those in the miracle of the country of the
Gadarenes, where the objectivity of the demons is so fully recognized
that,
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on being cast out of the man, they are represented as requesting to be
allowed to go into the herd of swine, and being permitted by Jesus to do
so, the entry of the demons into the swine is at once signalized by
the herd running violently down the cliff into the lake, and being
drowned.(1) Archbishop Trench adopts no such ineffectual evasion,
but rightly objects: "Our Lord Himself uses language which is not
reconcilable with any such explanation. He everywhere speaks of
demoniacs not as persons of disordered intellects, but as subjects and
thralls of an alien spiritual might; He addresses the evil spirit as
distinct from the man: 'Hold thy peace and come out of him;'" and he
concludes that "our idea of Christ's absolute veracity, apart from the
value of the truth which He communicated, forbids us to suppose that He
could have spoken as He did, being perfectly aware all the while that
there was no corresponding reality to justify the language which He
used."(2) The Dean, on the other hand, finds "a very strong reason,"
which he does not remember to have seen urged with sufficient force,
"which may have contributed to induce our Lord to adopt the current
language on the point. The disbelief in these spiritual influences was
one of the characteristics of the unpopular sect of the Sadducees. A
departure from the common language, or the endeavour to correct this
inveterate error, would have raised an immediate outcry against Him from
His watchful and malignant adversaries as an unbelieving Sadducec."(3)
Such ascription of politic
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deception for the sake of popularity might be intelligible in an
ordinary case, but when referred to the central personage of a Divine
Revelation, who is said to be God incarnate, it is perfectly astounding.
The Archbishop, however, rightly deems that if Jesus knew that the
Jewish belief in demoniacal possession was baseless, and that Satan did
not exercise such power over the bodies or spirits of men, there would
be in such language "that absence of agreement between thoughts and
words in which the essence of a lie consists."(1) It is difficult to
say whether the dilemma of the Dean or of the Archbishop is the
greater,--the one obliged to sacrifice the moral character of Jesus,
in order to escape the admission for Christianity of untenable
superstition, the other obliged to adopt the superstition in order
to support the veracity of the language. At least the course of the
Archbishop is consistent and worthy of respect. The attempt to eliminate
the superstitious diagnosis of the disease, and yet to preserve intact
the miraculous cure, is quite ineffectual.
Dr. Trench anticipates the natural question, why there are no demoniacs
now, if there were so many in those days,(2) and he is logically
compelled to maintain that there may still be persons possessed. "It
may well be a question, moreover," he says, "if an apostle or one with
apostolic discernment of spirits were to enter into a mad-house now,
how many of the sufferers there he might not recognize as possessed?"(3)
There can scarcely be a question upon the point at all, for such a
person issuing direct
{145}
from that period, without subsequent scientific enlightenment, would
most certainly pronounce them all, "possessed." It did not, however,
require an apostle, nor even one with apostolic discernment of spirits,
to recognize the possessed at that time. All those who are represented
as being brought to Jesus to be healed are described by their friends as
having a devil or being possessed, and there was no form of disease more
general or more commonly recognized by the Jews. For what reason has the
recognition of, and belief in, demoniacal possession passed away with
the ignorance and superstition which were then prevalent?
It is important to remember that the theory of demoniacal possession,
and its supposed cure by means of exorcism and invocations, was most
common among the Jews long before the commencement of the Christian era.
As casting out devils was the most common type of Christian miracles,
so it was the commonest belief and practice of the Jewish nation.
Christianity merely shared the national superstition, and changed
nothing but the form of exorcism. Christianity did not through a
"clearer perception of spirits," therefore, originate the belief in
demoniacal possession, nor first recognize its victims; nor did such
superior enlightenment accompany the superior morality of Christianity
as to detect the ignorant fallacy. In the Old Testament we find the most
serious evidence of the belief in demonology and witchcraft. The laws
against them set the example of that unrelenting severity with which
sorcery was treated for so many centuries. We read in Exodus xxii. 18:
"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." Levit. xix. 31: "Regard not
them which have familiar spirits, neither
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seek after wizards, to be defiled by them." Levit. xx. 6: "And the soul
that turneth after such as have familiar spirits, and after wizards to
go a-whoring after them, I will even set my face against that soul, and
cut him off from among his people;" and verse 27: "A man also or a woman
that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put
to death; they shall stone them with stones; their blood shall be upon
them." Deut. xviii. 10: "There shall not be found among you any one
that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or an
enchanter, or a witch; 11. Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar
spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer; 12. For all that do these things
are an abomination unto the Lord," &c. The passages which assert the
reality of demonology and witchcraft, however, are much too numerous to
permit their citation here. But not only did Christianity thus inherit
the long-prevalent superstition, but it transmitted it intact to
succeeding ages; and there can be no doubt that this demonology, with
its consequent and inevitable belief in witchcraft, sorcery, and magic,
continued so long to prevail throughout Christendom, as much through
the authority of the sacred writings and the teaching of the Church as
through the superstitious ignorance of Europe.
It would be impossible to select for illustration any type of the Gospel
miracles, whose fundamental principle,--belief in the reality, malignant
action, and power of demons, and in the power of man to control
them,--has received fuller or more permanent living acceptance from
posterity, down to very recent times, than the cure of disease ascribed
to demoniacal influence. The writings of the Fathers are full of the
belief; the social
{147}
history of Europe teems with it. The more pious the people, the more
firm was their conviction of its reality. From times antecedent to
Christianity, until medical science slowly came into existence and
displaced miracle cures by the relics of saints, every form of disease
was ascribed to demons. Madness, idiotcy, epilepsy, and every shape of
hysteria were the commonest forms of their malignity; and the blind, the
dumb, and the deformed were regarded as unquestionable victims of their
malice. Every domestic calamity, from the convulsions of a child to the
death of a cow, was unhesitatingly attributed to their agency. The more
ignorant the community, the greater the number of its possessed. Belief
in the power of sorcery, witchcraft, and magic was inherent in the
superstition, and the universal prevalence shows how catholic was the
belief in demoniacal influence. The practice of these arts is solemnly
denounced as sin in the New Testament and throughout Patristic
literature, and the church has in all ages fulminated against it. No
accusation was more common than that of practising sorcery, and no class
escaped from the fatal suspicion. Popes were charged with the crime,
and bishops were found guilty of it. St. Cyprian was said to have been
a magician before he became a Christian and a Father of the Church.(1)
Athanasius was accused of sorcery before the Synod of Tyre.(2) Not only
the illiterate but even the learned, in the estimation of their age,
believed in it. No heresy was ever persecuted with more unrelenting
hatred. Popes have issued bulls vehemently anathematising witches and
sorcerers, councils have proscribed them, ecclesiastical
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courts have consigned tens of thousands of persons suspected of being
such to the stake, monarchs have written treatises against them and
invented tortures for their conviction, and every nation in Europe and
almost every generation have passed the most stringent laws against
them. Upon no point has there ever been greater unanimity of belief.
Church and State have vied with each other for the suppression of the
abominable crime. Every phenomenon of nature, every unwelcome occurrence
of social life, as well as every natural disease, has been ascribed to
magic and demons. The historical records of Europe are filled with
the deliberate trial and conviction, upon what was deemed evidence, of
thousands of sorcerers and witches. Hundreds have been found guilty
of exercising demoniacal influence over the elements, from Sopater
the philosopher, executed under Constantino for preventing, by adverse
winds, the arrival of corn ships at Constantinople, to Dr. Fian and
other witches horribly tortured and burnt for causing a stormy passage
on the return of James I. from Denmark.(1) Thousands of men and tens of
thousands of women have been done to death by every conceivable torment
for causing sickness or calamity by sorcery, or for flying through the
air to attend the witches' sabbath. When scepticism as to the reality of
the demoniacal powers of sorcery tardily began to arise, it was fiercely
reprobated by the Church as infidelity. Even so late as the 17th
century, a man like Sir Thomas Browne not only did not include the
belief amongst the vulgar errors which he endeavoured to expose, but on
the contrary wrote: "For my part, I have ever believed, and do now know
that there are
1 Pitcairn's Criminal Trials of Scotland, i. pp. 213, 223.
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witches. They that doubt of them, do not only deny them, but spirits;
and are obliquely, and upon consequence, a sort not of infidels, but
atheists."(1) In 1664 Sir Thomas Hale, in passing sentence of death
against two women convicted of being witches, declared that the reality
of witchcraft was undeniable, because "first, the Scriptures had
affirmed so much; and secondly, the wisdom of all nations had provided
laws against such persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
such a crime."(2) Even the 18th century was stained with the blood of
persons tortured and executed for sorcery.
Notwithstanding all this persistent and unanimous confirmation, we ask
again: What has now become of the belief in demoniacal possession and
sorcery? It has utterly disappeared. "Joseph Mede, Lardner, Dr. Mead,
Paley, and all the learned modern writers" with Dean Milinan, as we
have seen, explain it away, and such a theory of disease and elemental
disturbance is universally recognized to have been a groundless
superstition. The countless number of persons tormented and put to death
for the supposed crime of witchcraft and sorcery were mere innocent
victims to ignorance and credulity. Mr. Buckle has collected a mass of
evidence to show that "there is in every part of the world an intimate
relation between ignorance respecting the nature and proper treating of
a disease, and
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the belief that such disease is caused by supernatural power, and is
to be cured by it."(1) At the commencement of our era every disease was
ascribed to the agency of demons simply because the nature of disease
was not understood, and the writers of the Gospels were not, in this
respect, one whit more enlightened than the Jews. The progress of
science, however, has not only dispelled the superstitious theory as
regards disease in our time; its effects are retrospective. Science
not only declares the ascription of disease to demoniacal possession or
malignity to be an idle superstition now, but it equally repudiates the
assumption of such a cause at any time. The diseases referred by the
Gospels, and by the Jews of that time, to the action of devils, exist
now, but they are known to proceed from purely physical causes. The same
superstition and medical ignorance would enunciate the same diagnosis
at the present day. The superstition and ignorance, however, have passed
away, and with them the demoniacal theory. In that day the theory was
as baseless as in this. This is the logical conclusion of every educated
man.
It is obvious that, with the necessary abandonment of the theory of
"possession" and demoniacal origin of disease, the largest class of
miracles recorded in the Gospels is at once exploded. The asserted cause
of the diseases of this class, said to have been miraculously healed,
must be recognized to be a mere vulgar superstition, and the narratives
of such miracles, ascribing as they do in perfect simplicity distinct
objectivity to the supposed "possessing" demons, and reporting their
very words and actions, at once assume the character of mere imaginative
and fabulous writings based upon superstitious
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tradition, and cannot be accepted as the sober and intelligent report
of eye-witnesses. We shall presently see how far this.inference is
supported by the literary evidence regarding the date and composition of
the Gospels.
The deduction, however, does not end here. It is clear that, this large
class of Gospel miracles being due to the superstition of an ignorant
and credulous age, the insufficiency of the evidence for any of the
other supposed miraculous occurrences narrated in the same documents
becomes at once apparent. Nothing but the most irrefragable testimony
could possibly warrant belief in statements of supernatural events which
contradict all experience, and are opposed to all science. When these
statements, however, are not only rendered, _a priori_, suspicious
by their proceeding from a period of the grossest superstition and
credulity, but it becomes evident that a considerable part of them is
due solely to that superstition and credulity, by which, moreover, the
rest may likewise be most naturally explained, it is obvious that they
cannot stand against the opposing conviction of invariable experience.
The force of the testimony is gone. We are far from using this language
in an offensive sense concerning the Gospel narratives, which, by
the simple faith of the writers, present the most noble aspect of
the occurrences of which superstition is capable. Indeed, viewed as
compositions gradually rising out of pious tradition, and representing
the best spirit of their times, the Gospels, even in ascribing such
miracles to Jesus, are a touching illustration of the veneration excited
by his elevated character. Devout enthusiasm surrounded his memory with
the tradition of the highest exhibitions of power within the range of
Jewish imagination,
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and that these conceptions represent merely an idealized form of
prevalent superstition was not only natural but inevitable. We shall
hereafter fully examine the character of the Gospels, but it will be
sufficient here to point out that none of these writings lays claim to
any special inspiration, or in the slightest degree pretends to be more
than a human composition,(1) and subject to the errors of human history.
2.
We have seen how incompetent those who lived at the time when the Gospel
miracles are supposed to have taken place were to furnish reliable
testimony regarding such phenomena; and the gross mistake committed in
regard to the largest class of these miracles, connected with demoniacal
possession, seems altogether to destroy the value of the evidence for
the rest, and to connect the whole, as might have been expected, with
the general superstition and ignorance of the period. It may be well to
inquire further, whether there is any valid reason for excepting any
of the miracles of Scripture from the fate of the rest, and whether,
in fact, there was any special "Age of Miracles" at all, round which a
privileged line can be drawn on any reasonable ground.
We have already pointed out that the kind of evidence which is supposed
to attest the Divine revelation of Christianity, so far from being
invented for the purpose, was so hackneyed, so to speak, as scarcely to
attract the
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notice of the nation to which the revelation was, in the first instance,
addressed. Not only did the Old Testament contain accounts of miracles
of every one of the types related in the New, but most of them were
believed to be commonly performed both before and after the commencement
of the Christian era. That demons were successfully exorcised, and
diseases cured, by means of spells and incantations, was never
doubted by the Jewish nation. Satanic miracles, moreover, are not only
recognized throughout the Old and New Testaments, but formed a leading
feature of the Patristic creed. The early Christians were not more
ready than the heathen to ascribe every inexplicable occurrence to
supernatural agency, and the only difference between them was as to the
nature of that agency. The Jews and their heathen neighbours were too
accustomed to supposed preternatural occurrences to feel much surprise
or incredulity at the account of Christian miracles; and it is
characteristic of the universal superstition of the period that the
Fathers did not dream of denying the reality of Pagan miracles, but
merely attributed them to demons, whilst they asserted the Divine origin
of their own. The reality of the powers of sorcery was never questioned.
Every marvel and every narrative of supernatural interference with human
affairs seemed matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the
age. However much miracles are exceptions to the order of nature, they
have always been the rule in the history of ignorance. In fact, the
excess of belief in them throughout many centuries of darkness is fatal
to their claims to credence now. The Christian miracles are rendered
almost as suspicious from their place in a long sequence of similar
occurrences, as they are by being exceptions
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to the sequence of natural phenomena. It would indeed be extraordinary
if whole cycles of miracles occurring before and since those of the
Gospels, and in connection with every religion, could be repudiated as
fables, and those alone maintained as genuine.
No attempt is made to deny the fact that miracles are common to all
times and to all religious creeds. Dr. Newman states amongst the
conclusions of his essay on the miracles of early ecclesiastical
history: "That there was no Age of Miracles, after which miracles
ceased; that there have been at all times true miracles and false
miracles, true accounts and false accounts; that no authoritative guide
is supplied to us for drawing the line between the two."(1) Dr. Mozley
also admits that morbid love of the marvellous in the human race "has
produced a constant stream of miraculous pretension in the world, which
accompanies man wherever he is found, and is a part of his mental
and physical history."(2) Ignorance and its invariable attendant,
superstition, have done more than mere love of the marvellous to produce
and perpetuate belief in miracles, and there cannot be any doubt that
the removal of ignorance always leads to the cessation of miracles.(3)
The Bampton lecturer proceeds: 'Heathenism had its running stream of
supernatural pretensions in the shape of prophecy, exorcism, and the
miraculous cures of diseases, which the temples of Esculapius recorded
with pompous display."(4) So far from the Gospel miracles being
original, and a presentation, for the first time, of phenomena until
then unknown
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and unlikely to suggest themselves to the mind, "Jewish supernaturalism
was indeed going on side by side with our Lord's miracles."(1) Dr.
Mozley, however, rebuts the inference which has been drawn from this:
"That His miracles could not, in the very nature of the case, be
evidences of His distinctive teaching and mission, inasmuch as miracles
were common to Himself and His opponents," by the assertion that a very
marked distinction exists between the Gospel miracles and all others.(2)
He perfectly recognizes the consequence if such a distinction cannot
be clearly demonstrated. "The criticism, therefore, which _evidential_
miracles, or miracles which serve as evidence of a revelation, must come
up to, if they are to accomplish the object for which they are designed,
involves at the outset this condition,--that the evidence of such
miracles must be distinguishable from the evidences of this permanent
stream of miraculous pretension in the world; that such miracles must be
separated by an interval not only from the facts of the order of
nature, but also from the common running miraculous, which is the simple
offshoot of human nature. Can evidential miracles be inserted in this
promiscuous mass, so as not to be confounded with it, but to assert
their own truth and distinctive source? If they cannot there is an end
to the proof of a revelation by miracles: if they can, it remains to
see whether the Christian miracles are thus distinguishable, and whether
their nature, their object, and their evidence vindicate their claim to
this distinctive truth and Divine source."(3)
Now, regarding this distinction between Gospel and
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other miracles, it must be observed that the religious feeling which
influenced the composition of the Scripture narratives of miracles
naturally led to the exclusion of all that was puerile or ignoble in the
traditions preserved regarding the Great Master. The elevated character
of Jesus afforded no basis for what was petty, and the devotion with
which he was regarded when the Gospels were written insured the noblest
treatment of his history within certain limits. We must, therefore,
consider the bare facts composing the miracles rather than the narrative
of the manner in which they are said to have been produced, in order
rightly to judge of the comparative features of different miracles. If
we take the case of a person raised from the dead, literary skill may
invest the account with more or less of dramatic interest and dignity,
but whether the main fact be surrounded with pathetic and picturesque
details,.as in the account of the raising of Lazarus in the fourth
Gospel, or the person be simply restored to life without them, it is the
fact of the resurrection which constitutes the miracle, and it is in the
facts alone that we must seek distinction, disregarding and distrusting
the accessories. In the one case the effect may be much more impressive,
but in the other the bare raising of the dead is not a whit less
miraculous. "We have been accustomed to read the Gospel narratives of
miracles with so much special veneration, that it is now difficult to
recognize how much of the distinction of these miracles is due to
the composition, and to their place in the history of Jesus. No other
miracles, or account of miracles, ever had such collateral advantages.
As works attributed to our sublimest Teacher, described with simple
eloquence and, especially in the case of those in
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the fourth Gospel, with artistic perfection, and read generally with
reverential wonder untempered by a thought of criticism, these miracles
have seemed to be surrounded by a mystic halo certainly not emanating
from themselves. It must not be forgotten, therefore, that the
miracle lies in the bare act, and not in its dramatic arrangement. The
restoration of life to a dead man is the very same miracle whether it
be effected by the relics of a saint or by the word of an apostle. A
miracle is not antecedently more credible because of the outstretched
arm and word of command, than it is in the silence of the shrine. Being
supernatural, the real agency is not seen in either case, although the
human mind is more satisfied by the presentation of an apparent cause in
the one case, which seems to be absent in the other. In preferring the
former type, we are not only influenced by a more dramatic narrative,
but we select for belief the miracle from which we can unconsciously
eliminate more of the miraculous elements, by tracing it to a visible
natural cause which cannot be seen in the latter. The antecedent
incredibility of miracles, however, is not affected by literary skill,
and is independent of scenic effect.
The Archbishop of Dublin says: "Few points present greater difficulties
than the attempt to fix accurately the moment when these miraculous
powers were withdrawn from the Church;" and he argues that they were
withdrawn when it entered into what he calls its permanent state, and no
longer required "these props and strengthenings of the infant plant."(1)
That their retrocession was gradual, he considers natural, and he
imagines the fulness of Divine power as gradually waning as it was
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subdivided, first among the Apostles, and then amongst the
ever-multiplying members of the Church, until by sub-division it became
virtually extinct, leaving as a substitute "the standing wonder of
a Church."(1) This, of course, is not argument, but merely the
Archbishop's fanciful explanation of a serious difficulty. The fact
is, however, that the Gospel miracles were preceded and accompanied
by others of the same type, and we may here merely mention exorcism of
demons, and the miraculous cure of disease, as popular instances;
they were also followed by a long succession of others, quite as well
authenticated, whose occurrence only became less frequent in proportion
as the diffusion of knowledge dispelled popular credulity. Even at the
present day a stray miracle is from time to time reported in outlying
districts, where the ignorance and superstition which formerly produced
so abundant a growth of them are not yet entirely dispelled.
Papias of Hierapolis narrates a wonderful story, according to Eusebius,
which he had heard from the daughters of the Apostle Philip, who lived
at the same time in Hierapolis: "For he relates that a dead man was
restored to life in his day."(2) Justin Martyr, speaking of his own
time, frequently asserts that Christians still receive the gift of
healing, of foreknowledge, and of prophecy,(3) and he points out to the
Roman Senate as a fact happening under their own observation, that many
demoniacs throughout all the world [--Greek--] and in their own city have
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been healed and are healed, many of the Christian' men among is [--Greek--]
exorcising them in the name of Jesus Christ, subduing and expelling the
possessing demons out of the man, although all the other exorcists with
incantations and spells had failed to do so.(1) Theophilus of Antioch
likewise states that to his day demons are exorcised.(2) Irenaeus in
the clearest manner claims for the Church of his time the continued
possession of the Divine [--Greek--] He contrasts the miracles of the
followers of Simon and Carpocrates, which he ascribes to magical
illusions, with those of Christians. "For they can neither give sight
to the blind," he continues, "nor to the deaf hearing, nor cast out all
demons, but only those introduced by themselves, if they can even do
that; nor heal the sick, the lame, the paralytic, nor those afflicted
in other parts of the body, as has been often done in regard to bodily
infirmity.... But so far are they from raising the
dead,--as the Lord raised them and the Apostles by prayer, and as
frequently in the brotherhood, when the whole Church in a place made
supplication with much fasting and prayer, the spirit of the dead was
constrained to return, and the man was freely restored in answer to the
prayers of the saints--that they do not believe this can possibly be
done."(3) Canon
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Mozley, who desires for the purpose of his argument to weaken the
evidence of patristic belief in the continuance of miracles, says
regarding this last passage on raising the dead:--"But the reference is
so vague that it possesses but little weight as testimony."(1) We should
be sorry to think that the vice, which seems at present to characterize
the Church to which Dr. Mozley belongs, of making simple language
mean anything or nothing just as any one happens to wish, should be
introduced into critical or historical studies. The language of Irenaeus
is vague only in so far as specific detailed instances are not given
of the miracles referred to; but no language could be more definite or
explicit to express the meaning of Irenaeus, namely, the assertion that
the prayers of Christian communities had frequently restored the dead to
life. Eusebius, who quotes the passage, and who has preserved to us
the original Greek, clearly recognized this. He says, when making the
quotations: "In the second book of the same work he (Irenaeus) testifies
that up to his time tokens of Divine and miraculous power remained in
some Churches,"(2) In the next chapter Irenaeus further says:--"On
which account, also, his true disciples receiving grace from him, work
(miracles) in his name for the benefit of the rest of mankind, according
to the gift received from him by each of them. For some do certainly and
truly [--Greek--] cast out demons, so that frequently those very men who
have thus been cleansed from the evil spirits both
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believe and are now in the church. And some have foreknowledge of future
occurrences, and visions, and prophetic utterances. Others heal the
sick by the imposition of hands and make them whole. Indeed, as we have
already stated, even the dead have been raised up, and have remained
with us for many years. And what more shall I say? It is not possible to
state the number of the gifts which the Church throughout the world has
received from God in the name of Jesus Christ, crucified under Pontius
Pilate, and which she each day employs for the benefit of the heathen,"
&c.(1)
Tertullian speaks with the most perfect assurance of miracles occurring
in his day, and of the power of healing and of casting out devils still
possessed by Christians. In one place, for iustance, after asserting
the power which they have generally over demons, so that if a person
possessed by a devil be brought before one of the Roman tribunals, a
follower of Christ can at once compel the wicked spirit within him to
confess that he is a demon, even if he had before asserted himself to
be a God, he proceeds to say: "So at our touch and breathing, violently
affected by the contemplation and representation of those fires (of
hell) they (demons) also depart at our command out of bodies, reluctant
and complaining, and put to shame
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in your presence."(1) He declares that although dreams are chiefly
inflicted upon us by demons, yet they are also sent by God, and indeed
"almost the greater part of mankind derive their knowledge concerning
God from visions."(2) He, elsewhere, states that he himself knows that a
brother was severely castigated by a vision the same night on which his
slaves had, without his knowledge, done something reprehensible.(3)
He narrates as an instance of the continued possession of spiritual
_charismata_ by Christians: "There is at this day among us a sister who
has the gift of revelations, which she receives in church amidst the
solemnities of the Lord's day by ecstasy in the spirit: she converses
with angels, and sometimes also with the Lord, and she both hears and
sees mysteries (_sacramenta_), and she reads the hearts of some men, and
prescribes medicines to those who are in need."(4) Tertullian goes on to
say that, after the people were dismissed from the Church, this sister
was in the regular habit of reporting what she had seen, and that
most diligent inquiries were made in order to test the truth of her
communications;(5) and after narrating a vision of a disembodied soul
vouchsafed to her, he states: "This is the vision, God being witness,
and
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the Apostle(1) having foretold that such spiritual gifts should be in
the Church."(2) Further on Tertullian relates another story within his
own knowledge: "I know the case of a woman, born within the fold of the
Church, who was in the prime of life and beauty. After being but once,
and only a short time, married, having fallen asleep in peace, in the
interval before interment (sp.) when the presbyter began to pray as
she was being made ready for burial, at the first breath of prayer
she removed her hands from her sides, folded them in the attitude of
supplication, and again, when the last rites were over, restored them to
their former position."(3) He then mentions another story known amongst
them: that a dead body in a cemetery moved itself in order to make room
beside it for another body;(4) and then he remarks: "If similar cases
are also reported amongst the heathen, we conclude that God displays
signs of his power for the consolation of his own people, and as a
testimony to others."(5) Again, he mentions cases where Christians had
cured persons of demoniacal possession, and adds: "And how many men of
position (for we do not speak of the vulgar) have been delivered either
from devils or from diseases."(6) Tertullian
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in the same place refers to the miracle of the "Thundering Legion,"(1)
and he exclaims: "When indeed have not droughts been removed by our
prayers and fastings."(2) Minucius Felix speaks of the casting out of
devils from sick persons by Christians in his own day, as a matter
of public notoriety even among Pagans.(3) St. Cyprian echoes the same
assertions.(4) He likewise mentions cases of miraculous punishment
inflicted upon persons who had lapsed from the Christian faith. One
of these, who ascended the Capitol to make denial of Christ, suddenly
became dumb after he had spoken the words.(6) Another, a woman, was
seized by an unclean spirit even at the baths, and bit with her own
teeth the impious tongue which had eaten the idolatrous food, or spoken
the words, and she shortly expired in great agony.(6) He likewise
maintains that Christians are admonished by God in dreams and by
visions, of which he mentions instances.(7) Origen claims for Christians
the power still to expel demons, and to heal diseases in the name
of Jesus,(8) and he states that he had seen many persons so cured of
madness and countless other evils, which could not be otherwise cured by
men or devils.(9) Lactantius repeatedly asserts the power of Christians
over demons; they make them flee from bodies when they adjure them in
the name of God.(10)
Passing over the numerous apocryphal writings of the early centuries of
our era, in which many miracles are
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recorded, we find in the pages of Eusebius narratives of many miraculous
occurrences. Many miracles are ascribed to Narcissus, Bishop of
Jerusalem, of which Eusebius relates several. Whilst the vigils of the
great watch of the Passover were being kept, the oil failed, whereupon
Narcissus commanded that water from the neighbouring well should be
poured into the lamps. Having prayed over the water, it was changed
into oil, of which a specimen had been preserved until that time.(1)
On another occasion, three men having spread some vile slanders against
Narcissus, which they confirmed by an oath, and with imprecations upon
themselves of death by a miserable disease, of death by fire, and of
blindness, respectively, if their statements were not true, omnipotent
justice in each case inflicted upon the wretches the curse which each
had invoked.(2) The election of Fabianus to the Episcopal chair of Rome
was marked by the descent of a dove from on high, which rested upon his
head, as the Holy Ghost had descended upon our Saviour.(3) At Caesarea
Philippi there is a statue of Jesus Christ which Eusebius states that he
himself had seen, said to have been erected by the woman healed of the
bloody issue, and on the pedestal grows a strange plant as high as the
hem of the brazen garment, which is an antidote to all diseases.(4)
Great miracles are recorded as taking place during the persecutions in
Caesarea.(5)
Gregory of Nyssa gives an account of many wonderful works performed by
his namesake Gregory of Neo-Caesarea, who was called _Thaumaturgus_ from
the miraculous power which he possessed and very freely
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exercised. The Virgin Mary and the Apostle John appeared to him, on
one occasion, when he was in doubt as to the doctrine which he ought to
preach, and, at the request of Mary, the Apostle gave him all needful
instructions.(1) If his faith did not move mountains, it moved a huge
rock to convert a pagan priest.(2) He drove a demon out of a heathen
temple in which he had taken refuge, and the evil spirit could not
re-enter until he gave permission.(3) Nyssen relates how St. Gregory
averted an armed contest of two brothers who quarrelled about the
possession of a lake on their father's property. The saint passed the
night in prayer beside the lake, and in the morning it was found dried
up.(4) On another occasion he rescued the country from the devastation
of a mountain stream, which periodically burst the dykes by which it was
restrained and inundated the plain. He went on foot to the place, and
invoking the name of Christ, fixed his staff in the earth at the place
where the torrent had broken through. The staff took root and became a
tree, and the stream never again burst its bounds. The inhabitants of
the district were converted to Christianity by this miracle. The tree
was still living in Nyssen's time, and he had seen the bed of the lake
covered with trees, pastures, and cottages.(5) Two vagabond Jews once
attempted to deceive him. One of them lay down and pretended to be
dead, while the other begged money from the saint wherewith to buy him
a shroud. St. Gregory quietly took off his cloak and laid it on the man,
and
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walked away. His companion found that he was really dead.(1) St. Gregory
expelled demons from persons possessed, healed the sick and performed
many other miracles;(2) and his signs and wonders are not only attested
by Gregory of Nyssa, but by St. Basil,(3) whose grandmother, St.
Macrina, was brought up at Neo-Caesarea by the immediate followers of the
saint.
Athanasius, in his memoir of St. Anthony, who began to lead the life of
a recluse about a.d. 270, gives particulars of many miracles performed
by the saint. Although he possessed great power over demons, and
delivered many persons possessed by them, Satan tormented him sadly,
and he was constantly beset by legions of devils. One night Satan with a
troop of evil spirits so belaboured the saint that he lay on the ground
speechless and almost dead from their blows.(4) We have already referred
to the case of Natalius, who was scourged by angels during a whole
night, till he was brought to repentance.(5) Upon one occasion when
St. Anthony had retired to his cell resolved to pass a time in perfect
solitude, a certain soldier came to his door and remained long there
knocking and supplicating the saint to come and deliver his daughter,
who was tormented by a demon. At length St. Anthony addressed the man
and told him to go, and if he believed in Jesus Christ and prayed to
God, his prayer should
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be fulfilled. The man believed, invoked Jesus Christ, and his daughter
was delivered from the demon.(1) As Anthony was once travelling across
the desert to visit another monastery, the water of the caravan failed
them, and his companions in despair threw themselves on the ground. St.
Anthony, however, retired a little apart, and in answer to his prayer
a spring of water issued at the place where he was kneeling.(2) A man
named Fronto, who was afflicted with leprosy, begged his prayers, and
was ordered by the saint to go into Egypt, where he should be healed.
Fronto at first refused, but being told that he could not be healed
if he remained, the sick man went believing, and as soon as he came in
sight of Egypt he was made whole.(3) Another miracle was performed by
Anthony at Alexandria in the presence of St. Athanasius. As they were
leaving the city a woman cried after him, "Man of God, stay; my daughter
is cruelly troubled by a demon;" and she entreated him to stop lest she
herself should die in running after him. At the request of Athanasius
and the rest, the saint paused, and as the woman came up her daughter
fell on the ground convulsed. St. Anthony prayed in the name of Jesus
Christ, and immediately the girl rose perfectly restored to health,
and delivered from the evil spirit.(4) He astonished a number of pagan
philosophers, who had come to dispute with him, by delivering several
demoniacs, making the sign of the cross over them three times, and
invoking the name of Jesus Christ.(5) It is unnecessary, however, to
multiply instances of his miraculous power to drive out demons and heal
diseases,(6) and to perform other
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wonderful works. St. Athanasius, who was himself for a long time
a personal follower of St. Anthony, protests in his preface to the
biography his general accuracy, he having everywhere been mindful of the
truth.(1)
Hilarion, again, a disciple of St. Anthony, performed many miracles, an
account of some of which is given by St. Jerome. He restored sight to a
woman who had been blind for no less than ten years; he cast out
devils, and miraculously cured many diseases. Rain fell in answer to his
prayers; and he further exhibited his power over the elements by calming
a stormy sea. When he was buried, ten months after his death, not only
was his body as perfect as though he had been alive, but it emitted a
delightful perfume. He was so favoured of God that, long after, diseases
were healed and demons expelled at his tomb.(2) St. Macarius, the
Egyptian, is said to have restored a dead man to life in order to
convince an unbeliever of the truth of the resurrection.(3) St. Martin,
of Tours, restored to life a certain catechumen who had died of a fever,
and Sulpicius, his disciple, states that the man, who lived for many
years after, was known to himself, although not until after the miracle.
He also restored to life a servant who had hung himself.(4) He performed
a multitude of other miracles, to which we need not here more minutely
refer. The relics of the two martyrs Protavius and Gervasius, whose
bones, with much fresh blood, the miraculous evidence of their martyrdom
and identity, were discovered by St. Ambrose, worked a
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number of miracles. A man suffering from demoniacal possession indicated
the proximity of the relics by his convulsions. St. Augustine states
that he himself was in Milan when a blind man, who merely touched
the cloth which covered the two bodies as they were being moved to
a neighbouring church, regained his sight.(1) Paulinus relates many
miracles performed by his master, St. Ambrose, himself. He not only cast
out many demons and healed the sick,(2) but he also raised the dead.
Whilst the saint was staying in the house of a distinguished Christian
friend, his child, who, a few days before, had been delivered from an
unclean spirit, suddenly expired. The mother, an exceedingly religious
woman, full of faith and the fear of God, carried the dead boy down
and laid him on the saint's bed during his absence. When St. Ambrose
returned, filled with compassion for the mother and struck by her faith,
he stretched himself, like Elisha, on the body of the child, praying,
and restored him living to his mother. Paulinus relates this miracle
with minute particulars of name and address.(3)
St. Augustine asserts that miracles are still performed in his day in
the name of Jesus Christ, either by means of his sacraments or by the
prayers or relics of his saints, although they are not so well-known
as those of old, and he gives an account of many miracles which had
recently taken place.(4) After referring to the miracle performed by the
relics of the two martyrs upon the blind man in Milan, which occurred
when he was there, he goes on to narrate the miraculous cure of a friend
of
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his own, named Innocent, formerly advocate of the prefecture, in
Carthage, where Augustine was, and beheld it with his own eyes (_ubi nos
interfuimus et oculis aspeximus nostris_). A lady of rank in the same
city was miraculously healed of an incurable cancer, and St. Augustine
is indignant at the apathy of her friends, which allowed so great a
miracle to be so little known.(1) An inhabitant of the neighbouring town
of Curubis was cured of paralysis and other ills by being baptized.
When Augustine heard of this, although it was reported on very good
authority, the man himself was brought to Carthage by order of the holy
bishop Aurelius, in order that the truth might be ascertained. Augustine
states that, on one occasion during his absence, a tribunitian man
amongst them named Hesperius, who had a farm close by, called Zubedi, in
the Fussalian district, begged one of the Christian presbyters to go and
drive away some evil spirits whose malice sorely afflicted his servants
and cattle. One of the presbyters accordingly went, and offered the
sacrifice of the body of Christ with earnest prayer, and by the mercy of
God, the evil was removed. Now Hesperius happened to have received from
one of his friends a piece of the sacred earth of Jerusalem, where Jesus
Christ was buried and rose again the third day, and he had hung it up
in his room to protect himself from the evil spirits. When his house had
been freed from them, however, he begged St. Augustine and his colleague
Maximinus, who happened to be in that neighbourhood, to come to him,
and after telling them all that had happened, he prayed them to bury
the piece of earth in some place where Christians could assemble for the
worship of God. They consented, and did as he desired. A young peasant
of the neighbourhood, who was paralytic, hearing of this, begged that
he might be carried without delay to the holy spot, where he offered
up prayer, and rose up and went away on his feet perfectly cured.
About thirty miles from Hippo, at a farm called Victoriana, there was a
memorial to the two martyrs Protavius and Gervasius. To this, Augustine
relates, was brought a young man who, having gone one summer day at noon
to water his horse in the river, was possessed by a demon. The lady to
whom the place belonged came according to her custom in the evening,
with her servants and some holy women to sing hymns and pray. On hearing
them the demoniac started up and seized the altar with a terrible
shudder, without daring to move, and as if bound to it, and the demon
praying with a loud voice for mercy confessed where and when he had
entered into the young man. At last the demon named all the members of
his body, with threats to cut them off as he made his exit, and, saying
these words, came out of him. In doing so, however, the eye of the youth
fell from its socket on to his cheek, retained only by a small vein
as by a root, whilst the pupil became altogether white. Well pleased,
however, that the young man had been freed from the evil spirit, they
returned the eye to its place as well as they could, and bound it up
with a handkerchief, praying fervently, and one of his relatives said:
"God who drove out the demon at the prayer of his saints can also
restore the sight." On removing the bandage seven days after, the eye
was found perfectly whole. St. Augustine knew a girl of
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Hippo who was delivered from a demon by the application of oil with
which had mingled the tears of the presbyter who was praying for her. He
also knew a bishop who prayed for a youth possessed by a demon, although
he had not even seen him, and the young man was at once cured.
Augustine further gives particulars of many miracles performed by the
relics of the most glorious martyr Stephen.(1) By their virtue the blind
receive their sight, the sick are healed, the impenitent converted,
and the dead are restored to life. "Andurus is the name of an estate,"
Augustine says, "where there is a church and in it a shrine dedicated to
the martyr Stephen. A certain little boy was playing in the court,
when unruly bullocks drawing a waggon crushed him with the wheel, and
immediately he lay in the agonies of death. Then his mother raised him
up, and placed him at the shrine, and he not only came to life again,
but had manifestly received no injury.(2) A certain religious woman, who
lived in a neighbouring property called Caspalianus, being dangerously
ill and her life despaired of, her tunic was carried to the same shrine,
but before it was brought back she had expired. Nevertheless, her
relatives covered the body with this tunic, and she received back the
spirit and was made whole.(3) At Hippo, a certain man named
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Bassus, a Syrian, was praying at the shrine of the same martyr for his
daughter who was sick and in great peril, and he had brought her dress
with him; when lo! some of his household came running to announce to him
that she was dead. But as he was engaged in prayer they were stopped by
his friends, who prevented their telling him, lest he should give way
to his grief in public. When he returned to his house, which already
resounded with the wailing of his household, he cast over the body of
his daughter her mantle which he had with him, and immediately she was
restored to life.(1) Again, in the same city, the son of a certain man
among us named Irenaeus, a collector of taxes, became sick and died. As
the dead body lay, and they were preparing with wailing and lamentation
to bury it, one of his friends consoling him suggested that the body
should be anointed with oil from the same martyr. This was done, and
the child came to life again.(2) In the same way a man amongst us named
Eleusinus, formerly a tribune, laid the body of his child, who had died
from sickness, on a memorial of the martyr which is in his villa in the
suburbs, and after he had prayed, with many tears, he took up the child
living."(3)
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We shall meet with more of these miracles in considering the arguments
of Dr. Mozley. In a note he says: "Augustine again, long after, alludes
in his list of miracles (De Civ. Dei, xxii. 8,) to some cases in which
persons had been raised to life again by prayer and the intercession of
martyrs, whose relics were applied. But though Augustine relates with
great particularity and length of detail some cases of recoveries
from complaints in answer to prayer, his notices of the cases in which
persons had been raised to life again, are so short, bare, and summary,
that they evidently represent no more than mere report, and report of a
very vague kind. Indeed, with the preface which he prefixes to his list,
he cannot be said even to profess to guarantee the truth or accuracy of
the different instances contained in it. 'Haec autem, ubicunque fiunt,
ibi sciuntur vix a tota ipsa civitate vel quocumque commanentium loco.
Nam plerumque etiam ibi paucissimi sciunt, ignorantibus eseteris, maxime
si magna sit civitas; et quando alibi aliisque narrantur, non tantum ea
commendat auctoritas, ut sine difficultate vel dubitatione credantur,
quamvis Christianis fidelibus a fidelibus indicentur.' He puts down
the cases as he received them, then, without pledging himself to their
authenticity. 'Eucharius presbyter... mortuus sic jacebat ut ei jam
pol-lices ligarentur: opitulatione memorati martyris, cum de memoria
ejus reportata fuisset et supra jacentis corpus missa ipsius presbyteri
tunica, suscitatus est... Andurus nomen est &C.",(1) and then Dr. Mozley
gives the passage already quoted by us. Before continuing,
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we must remark with regard to the passages just quoted, that, in the
miracle of Eucharius, Dr. Mozley, without explanation, omits details.
The whole passage is as follows: "Eucharius, a presbyter from Spain,
resided at Calama, who had for a long time suffered from stone. By the
relics of the same martyr, which the Bishop Possidius brought to him,
he was made whole. The same presbyter, afterwards succumbing to another
disease, lay dead, so that they were already binding his hands. Succour
came from the relics of the martyr, for the tunic of the presbyter being
brought back from the relics and placed upon his body he revived."(1) A
writer who complains of the bareness of narratives, should certainly not
curtail their statements. Dr. Mozley continues: "There are three other
cases of the same kind, in which there is nothing to verify the death
from which the return to life is said to take place, as being more than
mere suspension of the vital powers; but the writer does not go into
particulars of description or proof, but simply inserts them in his list
as they have been reported to him."(3)
Dr. Mozley is anxious to detract from the miracles described by
Augustine, and we regret to be obliged to maintain that in order to do
so he misrepresents, no doubt unintentionally, Augustine's statements,
and, as we think, also unduly depreciates the comparative value of the
evidence. We shall briefly refer to the two points in question. I. That
"his notices of the cases in which persons had been raised to life again
are so short,
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bare, and summary that they evidently represent no more than mere
report, and report of a very vague kind." II. "That with the preface
which Augustine prefixes to his list, he cannot be said even to profess
to guarantee the truth or accuracy of the different instances contained
in it."
It is true that in several cases Augustine gives the account of
miraculous cures at greater length than those of restoration to life.
It seems to us that this is almost inevitable at all times, and that
the reason is obvious. Where the miracle consists merely of the cure of
disease, details are naturally given to show the nature and intensity of
the sickness, and they are necessary not only for the comprehension of
the cure but to show its importance. In the case of restoration to
life, the mere statement of the death and assertion of the subsequent
resurrection exclude all need of details. The pithy _reddita est
vitae_, or _factum est et revixit_ is more striking than any more
prolix narrative. In fact, the greater the miracle the more natural
is conciseness and simplicity; and practically, we find that Augustine
gives a more lengthy and verbose report of trifling cures, whilst he
relates the more important with greater brevity and force. He narrates
many of his cases of miraculous cure, however, as briefly as those in
which the dead are raised. We have quoted the latter, and the reader
must judge whether they are unduly curt. One thing may be affirmed, that
nothing of importance is omitted, and in regard to essential details
they are as explicit as the mass of other cases reported. In every
instance names and addresses are stated, and it will have been observed
that all these miracles occurred in, or close to, Hippo, and in his own
diocese. It is very certain that in
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every case the fact of the miracle is asserted in the most direct and
positive terms. There can be no mistake either as to the meaning or
intention of the narrative, and there is no symptom whatever of a
thought on the part of Augustine to avoid the responsibility of his
statements, or to give them as mere vague report. If wo compare these
accounts with those of the Gospels, we do not find them deficient in any
essential detail common to the latter. There is in the synoptic Gospels
only one case in which Jesus is said to have raised the dead. The
raising of Jairus' daughter(1) has long been abandoned, as a case of
restoration to life, by all critics and theologians, except the few
who still persist in ignoring the distinct and positive declaration of
Jesus, "The damsel is not dead but sleepeth." The only case, therefore,
in the Synoptics is the account in the third Gospel of the raising of
the widow's son,(3) of which, strange to say, the other Gospels know
nothing. Now, although, as might have been expected, this narrative is
much more highly coloured and picturesque, the difference is chiefly
literary, and, indeed, there are really fewer important details given
than in the account by Augustine, for instance, of the restoration to
life of the daughter of Bassus the Syrian, which took place at Hippo, of
which he was bishop, and where he actually resided. Augustine's object
in giving his list of miracles did not require him to write picturesque
narratives. He merely desired to state bare facts, whilst the authors
of the Gospels composed the Life of their Master, in which interesting
details were everything. For many reasons we refrain here from alluding
to the artistic narrative of the raising
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of Lazarus, the greatest miracle ascribed to Jesus, yet so singularly
unknown to the other three Evangelists, who, so readily repeating the
accounts of trifling cures, would most certainly not have neglected this
had they ever heard of it.
Dr. Mozley complains of the absence of verification and proof of actual
death in these cases, or that they were more than mere suspension of
the vital powers. We cordially agree with him in the desire for such
evidence, not only in these, but in all miracles. We would ask, however,
what verification of the death have we in the case of the widow's son
which we have not here? If we apply such a test to the miracles of the
Gospels, we must reject them as certainly as those of St. Augustine.
In neither case have we more than a mere statement that the subjects
of these miracles were dead or diseased. So far are we from having
any competent medical evidence of the reality of the death, or of the
disease, or of the permanence of the supposed cures in the Gospels, that
we have little more than the barest reports of these miracles by writers
who, even if their identity were established, were not, and do not
pretend to have been, eye-witnesses of the occurrences which they
relate. Take, for instance, this very raising of the widow's son in
the third Gospel, which is unknown to the other Evangelists, and the
narrative of which is given only in a Gospel which is not attributed to
a personal follower of Jesus.
Now we turn to the second statement of Dr. Mozley, "that with the
preface which Augustine prefixes to his list, he cannot be said even to
profess to guarantee the truth or accuracy of the different instances
contained in it." This extraordinary assertion is supported by a
quotation
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given above, which Dr. Mozley has separated from what precedes and
follows it, so that its real meaning is scarcely apparent. We shall
as briefly as possible state what is actually the "preface" of St.
Augustine to his list of miracles, and his avowed object for giving
it. In the preceding chapter, Augustine has been arguing that the
world believed in Christ by virtue of divine influence and not by human
persuasion. He contends that it is ridiculous to speak of the false
divinity of Romulus when Christians speak of Christ. If, in the time of
Romulus, some 600 years before Cicero, people were so enlightened that
they refused to believe anything of which they had not experience, how
much more, in the still more enlightened days of Cicero himself, and
notably in the reigns of Augustus and Tiberius, would they have rejected
belief in the resurrection and ascension of Christ, if divine truth and
the testimony of miracles had not proved not only that such things could
take place, but that they had actually done so. When the evidence of
prophecy joined with that of miracles, and showed that the new doctrines
were only contrary to experience and not contrary to reason, the world
embraced the faith.(1) "Why, then, say they, do these miracles which you
declare to have taken place formerly, not occur now-a-days?" Augustine,
in replying, adopts a common rhetorical device: "I might, indeed,
answer," he says, "that miracles were necessary before the world
believed, in order that the world might believe. Any one who now
requires miracles in order that he may believe, is himself a great
miracle in not believing what all the world believes. But, really,
they say this in order that even those miracles should not be believed
either."
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And he reduces what he considers to be the position of the world in
regard to miracles and to the supernatural dogmas of Christianity to
the following dilemma: "Either things incredible which nevertheless
occurred, and were seen, led to belief in something else incredible,
which was not seen; or that thing was in itself so credible that no
miracles were required to establish it, and so much more is the unbelief
of those who deny confuted. This might I say to these most frivolous
objectors." He then proceeds to affirm that it cannot be denied that
many miracles attest the great miracle of the ascension in the flesh of
the risen Christ, and he points out that the actual occurrence of all
these things is not only recorded in the most truthful books, but the
reasons also given why they took place. These things have become known
that they might create belief; these things by the belief they have
created have become much more clearly known. They are read to the
people, indeed, that they may believe; yet, nevertheless, they would not
be read to the people if they had not been believed. After thus stating
the answer which he might give, Augustine now returns to answer the
question directly:--"But, furthermore," he continues, "miracles are
performed now in his name, either by means of his sacraments, or by the
prayers or relics of his saints, but they are not brought under the
same strong light as caused the former to be noised abroad with so
much glory; inasmuch as the canon of sacred scriptures, which must be
definite, causes those miracles to be everywhere publicly read, and
become firmly fixed in the memory of all peoples;"(l) and then follows
Dr. Mozley's
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quotation: "but these are scarcely known to the whole of a city itself
in which they are performed, or to its neighbourhood. Indeed, for the
most part, even there very few know of them, and the rest are ignorant,
more especially if the city be large; and when they are related
elsewhere and to others, the authority does not so commend them as
to make them be believed without difficulty or doubt, albeit they are
reported by faithful Christians to the faithful." He illustrates this by
pointing out in immediate continuation, that the miracle in Milan by the
bodies of the two martyrs, which took place when he himself was there,
might reach the knowledge of many, because the city is large, and the
Emperor and an immense crowd of people witnessed it, but who knows of
the miracle performed at Carthage upon his friend Innocent, when he was
there also, and saw it with his own eyes? Who knows of the miraculous
cure of cancer, he continues, in a lady of rank in the same city? at the
silence regarding which he is so indignant. Who knows of the next case
he mentions in his list? the cure of a medical man of the same town,
to which he adds: "We, nevertheless, do know it, and a few brethren to
whose knowledge it may have come."(1) Who out of Curubus, besides the
very few who may have heard of it, knows of the miraculous cure of the
paralytic man, whose case Augustine personally investigated? and so on.
Observe that there is merely a question of the comparative notoriety of
the Gospel
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miracles and those of his own time, not a doubt as to the reality of the
latter. Again, towards the end of his long list, immediately after the
narrative of the restoration to life of the child of Eleusinus, which
we have quoted, Augustine says:--"What can I do? The promise of the
completion of this work is pressing, so that I cannot here recount all
(the miracles) that I know; and without doubt many of our brethren when
they read this work will be grieved that I have omitted so very much,
which they know as well as I do. This I even now beg that they will
pardon, and consider how long would be the task of doing that which, for
the completion of the work, it is thought necessary not to do. For if
I desired to record merely the miracles of healing, without speaking of
others, which have been performed by this martyr, that is to say, the
most glorious Stephen, in the district of Calama, and in ours of Hippo,
many volumes must be composed, yet will it not be possible to make a
complete collection of them, but only of such as have been published for
public reading. For that was our object, since we saw repeated in our
time signs of divine power similar to those of old, deeming that they
ought not to be lost to the knowledge of the multitude. Now this relic
has not yet been two years at Hippo-Regius, and accounts of many of the
miracles performed by it have not been written, as is most certainly
known to us, yet the number of those which have been published, up to
the time this is written, amounts ta about seventy. At Calama, however,
where these relics have been longer, and more of the miracles were
recorded, they incomparably exceed this number."(1)
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Augustine goes on to say that, to his knowledge, many very remarkable
miracles were performed by the relics of the same martyr also at Uzali,
a district near to Utica, and of one of these, which had recently taken
place when he himself was there, he gives an account. Then, before
closing his list with the narrative of a miracle which took place at
Hippo, in his own church, in his own presence, and in the sight of the
whole congregation, he resumes his reply to the opening question:--"Many
miracles, therefore," he says, "are also performed now, the same God who
worked those of which we read, performing these by whom he wills and as
he wills; but these miracles neither become similarly known, nor, that
they may not slip out of mind, are they stamped, as it were like gravel,
into memory, by frequent reading. For even in places where care is
taken, as is now the case amongst us, that accounts of those who receive
benefit should be publicly read, those who are present hear them only
once, and many are not present at all, so that those who were present do
not, after a few days, remember
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what they heard, and scarcely a single person is met with who repeats
what he has heard to one whom he may have known to have been absent"(1)
So far from casting doubt upon the miracles which he narrates, the
"Preface" of Augustine is clearly intended to establish them. These
"signs of divine power similar to those of old," are not less real and
important, but merely less known, because the eyes of the world are not
directed to them, and they have not the advantage of being everywhere
published abroad by means of canonical scriptures constantly read to the
people and acknowledged as authoritative. Dr. Mozleys statement is quite
unwarranted, and it seems to us gratuitously injurious to St. Augustine.
This Father of the Church and Bishop must have had as little good faith
as good sense, if he did what such a statement implies. In order to
demonstate the truth of his assertion that miracles were still performed
in his day, Dr. Mozley represents Augustine as deliberately producing a
long list of instances of which "he cannot even be said to guarantee the
truth," and the more important cases in which "evidently represent
no more than mere report, and report of a very vague kind." We have
furnished the reader with the materials for forming an opinion on these
points. The judgment of Dr. Mozley may with equal justice be applied to
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the authors of the synoptic Gospels. They certainly do not guarantee
the truth of the miracles they relate in any more precise way than
Augustine. Like him, they merely narrate them as facts, and he as
evidently believes what he states as they do. Indeed, as regards
comparative fulness of testimony, the advantage is altogether on the
side of the miracles reported by St. Augustine. These miracles occurred
within two years of the time at which he wrote, and were at once
recorded with the names of the subjects and of the places at which they
occurred; most of them were performed in his own diocese, and several
of them in his own presence; some, of which he apparently did not feel
sure, he personally investigated; he states his knowledge of others,
and he narrates the whole of them with the most direct and simple
affirmation of the facts, without a single word indicating hesitation,
or directly or indirectly attributing the narrative to mere report.
Moreover, he not only advances these miracles deliberately and in
writing, in support of his positive assertion that miracles were still
performed, but these accounts of them had in the first instance been
written that they might be publicly read in his own church for the
edification of Christians, almost on the very spot where they are stated
to have occurred. We need scarcely say that we do not advance these
reasons in order to argue the reality of the miracles themselves, but
simply to maintain that, so far from his giving the account of them
as mere report, or not even professing to vouch for their truth, St.
Augustine both believed them himself, and asked others to believe them
as facts, and that they are as unhesitatingly affirmed as any related in
the Gospels.
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We shall not attempt any further detailed reference to the myriads of
miracles with which the annals of the Church teem up to very recent
times. The fact is too well known to require evidence. The saints in the
Calendar are legion. It has been computed that the number of those whose
lives are given in the Bollandist Collection(1) amounts to upwards of
25,000, although, the saints being arranged according to the Calendar,
the unfinished work only reaches the twenty-fourth of October. When it
is considered that all those upon whom the honour of canonization is
conferred have worked miracles, many of them, indeed, almost daily
performing such wonders, some idea may be formed of the number of
miracles which have occurred in unbroken succession from Apostolic days,
and have been believed and recognized by the Church. Vast numbers of
these miracles are in all respects similar to those narrated in the
Gospels, and they comprise hundreds of cases of restoration of the dead
to life. If it be necessary to point out instances in comparatively
recent times, we may mention the miracles of this kind liberally
ascribed to St Francis of Assisi, in the 13th century, and to his
namesake St. Francis Xavier, in the 16th, as pretty well known to all,
although we might refer to much more recent miracles authenticated by
the Church. At the present day such phenomena have almost disappeared,
and, indeed, with the exception of an occasional winking picture,
periodical liquefaction of blood, or apparition of the Virgin, confined
to the still ignorant and benighted corners of the earth, miracles are
extinct.
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