contains the genuine conclusion of the work which was supposed to be lost. It may be mentioned, that the miracle of the thundering legion, which is attested by Tertullian in two other places, (Apol. 5; ad Scap. 4,) is also alluded to in these supplementary chapters of the tract De Oratione.

The other critical remark of the Bishop of Bristol concerns the treatise De Præscriptione Hæreticorum. He thinks, that the chapters which in some MSS. are added to the end of this treatise are certainly not genuine; and in this decision we should be disposed to agree with him. It has been observed by critics who trust more than ourselves to this argument, that the style does not resemble that of Tertullian. The position which these chapters occupy in different MSS. makes their genuineness suspicious. The Codex Agobardi, which is generally considered the best, does not contain them at all; in one MS. they are placed at the beginning of the treatise; in others, they are detached from it, without any separate title; and we are not aware of any MS. which represents them as continuous with the preceding chapters. The internal evidence is also greatly against them; for whoever compares the beginning of this questionable part with the work of Jerome contra Luciferianos, will be convinced that the one must have been borrowed from the other; so that on the whole we should be inclined to reject these chapters as spurious, and consider them as a compilation made by some later writer.

The attention of the reader is now requested to a subject. which we have not hitherto touched upon, but which is intimately connected with the history of the Christian church in the days of Tertullian. We allude to the continuance of miraculous powers; and we shall proceed to give our own opinion upon this difficult and controverted question. The Bishop of Bristol discusses it, but not at much length, in his second chapter, and at the end of it he gives extracts from some unpublished lectures of Dr. Hey, which were delivered in the years 1768-9.

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In treating of this question, we may consider three descriptions persons, who have held very different opinions as to the continuance of miraculous powers in the Christian church: 1. The Romanists, who maintain that the power of working miracles has existed without any interruption from the days of the apostles to our own; 2. Infidel or sceptical writers, with whom we must class some ultra-Protestants, who deny that miracles have ever been worked since the time of the apostles; and 3. The majority of Protestants, who, though they do not agree as to the limitation of time, yet think that there were occasional instances of miracles for some centuries after the apostolical days.

It is hardly necessary to mention the writers of the Romish

church, who have claimed for it the perpetual and indefectible power of working miracles. Bellarmine, in more than one place, (de Conciliis et Ecclesia, 1. 4, c. 14; Conscio 6, p. 709, &c.,) gives a list of miracles which have been worked in every century down to his own days. Dr. Milner brings forward a similar series; and lest any doubt might be entertained as to the meaning which these writers attached to the word miracle, we may mention the following instance which is advanced by Bellarmine. He contrasts the death of Luther with the death of Lorenzo Giustiniani, patriarch of Venice; and he tells us, that "though Luther died in an extremely cold season, when bodies usually keep for many months, yet his body on the fourth or fifth day sent forth an intolerable smell, notwithstanding it was most carefully enclosed in a pewter coffin; whereas Lorenzo Giustiniani remained sixtyseven days unburied, during the whole of which time he exhaled the most delightful perfume, was without corruption, and quite fresh, and his cheeks continued red, though he had died of a putrid fever, which made the physicians think that he could not have been kept a single hour without being offensive!!" Dr. Milner relates many miraculous cures which have been worked in modern days, and he published the account of Winifred White, who was cured of a curvature of the spine by a visit to the shrine of St. Winifred, at Holywell.

We have selected these instances as showing the sense in which miracles are understood, when Roman Catholic writers speak of their being worked in their own church and in the present day. It is evident, that they mean to speak of miracles of the most unequivocal and the most supernatural character; such as could leave no doubt on the mind of any person, that, if the facts really took place, a power confessedly miraculous must have been exerted. It is also plain, if we read only a few pages of Dr. Milner's work, that the church of Rome has not lowered or altered her claim in the slightest degree since the time when Bellarmine mentioned miracles as one of the signs of the true church. Dr. Milner advanced them as still furnishing the same evidence; and the cases which he quoted are equally minute and equally superhuman; so stupendous indeed were some of the miracles which Dr. Milner believed to have been worked, that the fact of their being credited by a man of his understanding and learning, is almost as incredible as the circumstances themselves.

It was necessary, however, that Bellarmine and Dr. Milner should believe in the perpetuity of a miraculous power, when they urged it as a proof of their own church being true, and all others being false. The argument of Bellarmine is somewhat amusing; and may furnish instances of nearly all the errors which a man may

commit in conducting a train of reasoning. 1. We have a pretty instance of the medium anceps, as the schoolmen would say; or we might call it, in more common parlance, begging the question. He reasons thus: miracles are necessary to prove a new doctrine; the Protestants preach a new doctrine, but work no miracles; therefore their doctrine is not true. This may have been a very satisfactory conclusion to the learned cardinal, but if the Protestants should happen to prove, that their doctrine, so far from being new, is as old as the apostles, his syllogism would not be worth much beyond the walls of Rome. 2. In another place, he favours us with the circular mode of argument; thus he saysthe true church is proved by miracles, and the genuineness of miracles is proved by the church; for we cannot tell the certainty of a true miracle, before we have proved the church to be true. Lest it should be said, that we do injustice to the Cardinal's logic by translating his words, we will quote them in the original. "Est autem observandum, recte demonstrari ex miraculis Ecclesiam, et ex Ecclesia miracula: sed diverso genere demonstrationis: quemadmodum ex effectu demonstratur causa, et ex causa effectus: nam ex miraculis demonstratur Ecclesia, non quoad evidentiam, vel certitudinem rei, sed quoad evidentiam et certitudinem credibilitatis. Cujus rei ratio est, quia ante approbationem Ecclesiæ non est evidens aut certum certitudine fidei de ullo miraculo, quod sit verum miraculum." We leave the reader to divine how the analogy of cause and effect is to rescue this sentence from the charge of arguing in a circle. We are ready, however, to allow, notwithstanding the weakness with which the Romanists manage their own cause, that if miracles can be proved to have been worked in every century by their own church, and by no other, (which is what they assert,) it would certainly go very near to proving that their own church is right; for we could hardly conceive that such an exclusive mark of divine favour would be given to them alone, unless they exclusively deserved it. We are prepared however to deny the evidence, by which they would prove, that miracles have existed in their church from the days of the apostles to our own.

But we will first consider the next of the three divisions which we made above, the opinion of infidel or sceptical writers, with whom we must class some ultra-Protestants, who deny that miracles have ever been worked since the time of the apostles. When we speak of ultra-Protestants, we mean such writers as Dr. Middleton; though some persons will perhaps object to our division in this case, and think that, having mentioned sceptical writers, we need not make another class in order to include Dr. Middleton. It is singular, that a leading argument with writers

of this cast is precisely the same with the leading argument of Roman Catholics; though each party, as might be expected, advances it with a very different motive, and draws from it a very different conclusion. We allude to the assertion, that the evidence in favour of miracles is equally strong in every century; from which the Romanist argues, that all miracles are equally true; while the sceptic is disposed to infer, that since modern miracles are undoubtedly false, and yet are supported by as positive evidence as that which records the miracles of early times, we are to reject the latter as well as the former.

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We need only refer to Gibbon and Dr. Middleton, both of whom have made the same assertion concerning the evidence of miracles. The Bishop of Bristol appears to have quoted Gibbon from memory; but his words are these: From the first of the Fathers to the last of the Popes a succession of miracles is continued without interruption, and the progress of superstition was so gradual and almost imperceptible, that we know not in what particular link we should break the chain of tradition. Every age bears testimony to the wonderful events by which it was distinguished, and its testimony appears no less weighty and respectable than that of the preceding generation."-(c. 15, p. 312.) Dr. Middleton writes in the same strain:- "It must be confessed, that this claim of a miraculous power, which is now peculiar to the church of Rome, was universally asserted and believed in all Christian countries, and in all ages of the church, till the time of the Reformation. For ecclesiastical history makes no difference between one age and another, but carries on the succession of miracles, as of all other common events, through all of them indifferently, to that memorable period." (Introduct. Disc. p. xxxxiii.) This assertion has been made so often, and by writers of such very different persuasions, that it seems almost to have been admitted as incontrovertible; and perhaps one of the chief difficulties in discussing this question has arisen from the concession of the fact, that the miracles of every century are supported by precisely the same evidence. It will be our endeavour to show that this assertion is fundamentally untrue, and we have no hesitation in saying, that for a long time before the three first centuries were expired, miracles were spoken of in a very different way from what we find to be the case in the end of the fourth and fifth centuries.

We will begin with Eusebius. He is the earliest writer whose ecclesiastical history has come down to us; and since he treats not only of his own times, but of the three centuries which preceded him, we may see whether he supplies the same evidence for the existence of miracles at different times. It might be expected,

from the remarks of Gibbon and Dr. Middleton, that Eusebius would record many miraculous events which took place in his own times; but the fact is certainly otherwise. If we mean by a miracle the power which any individual possesses of producing a supernatural effect, such as healing the sick, raising the dead, &c., Eusebius does not mention one single instance of that kind; and almost the only circumstances which he seems to have considered miraculous, were a few occurrences which befel some of the Christian martyrs. There is only one such event which he mentions as having witnessed with his own eyes. He says, that during the persecution which took place at Tyre, in the reign of Diocletian, he saw the wild beasts refuse to touch the Christians in the amphitheatre, (1.8, c.7.) In this occurrence, there certainly may have been a miraculous intervention of Providence; nor do we see any reason to doubt that there was so. We can hardly deny that the fact appeared as Eusebius states it, because, if he had invented it, he could have been so easily contradicted by the multitudes who had been present, and who were still alive when he published his history. It is obvious, however, that other circumstances may sometimes have produced the same appearance; and he only says, that the wild beasts abstained from touching the martyrs for a considerable time. When he is speaking of the persecution under Maximinus, and the martyrdom of Apphianus, he prepares his readers for something very extraordinary, After suffering most unheard of torments, Apphianus died, and his body was thrown into the sea; upon which Eusebius continues thus: It is not improbable, that the event which happened after this will be disbelieved by those who were not eye-witnesses of it. But although I am well aware of this, I cannot upon the whole refrain from relating the history, because almost all the inhabitants of Cæsarea were witnesses of what happened. In fact, there was no person of any age who missed this extraordinary sight." (De Mart. Pal. p. 415.) Such a preface would prepare the reader for something most prodigiously supernatural; and he will be surprised to meet with nothing else, but that "an unusual agitation and crash suddenly affected the atmosphere and the sea, so that the city was violently shaken; and during this extraordinary and sudden earthquake, the sea, as if unable to contain the dead body of the holy martyr, cast it up before the city gates.' We should hardly have noticed this circumstance at all, but for the paucity of miracles in the history of Eusebius; and we may surely argue, that if miracles were said to be so common in those days as some writers would persuade us, there would not have been need of so much preamble, to induce people to believe what after all is no uncommon phenomenon in that part of the world.