If, for inftance, a great number of perfons, univerfally allowed to have the use of their fenfes and understanding, feriously declare that they actually faw, or heard, any thing whatever, though a priori ever so improbable, and their veracity be not queftioned, their fenfes must have been under a miraculous illufion, if the thing be not as they reprefent it. It will also be allowed, from the opinion generally entertained of human nature, that circumstances may be fuppofed, in which a great number of perfons agreeing to tell a falfehood, when they could not have any motive to do it, would be deemed nothing lefs than miraculous.

It is readily acknowledged, that miracles not being events of daily or frequent occurrence, require more definite evidence than ordinary facts, and this in proportion to their antecedent improbability, arifing from their want of analogy to events that are common. But there is no fact that is poffible in itself, but the evidence may be fuch as to make it credible. The circumstances which tend to give credit to human teftimony with respect to miracles, are the following. The witneffes must be in fufficient number. They muft

P 3

mu be in circumstances in which they could not be deceived themselves, and they must have no apparent motive to deceive others. In order to this, the miracles must be in fufficient number, and exhibited fo long, as to afford opportunity for examining them, They must alfo be upon a large fcale, or of fuch a nature as to exclude all idea of trick or impofition. They must be exhibited before perfons who had no previous difpofition to expect or to receive them. A fufficient degree of attention must be excited to them at the time, and a number of perfons must be interested in afcertaining their reality. The history of them must be coeval with the events, and the belief of them must produce a lafting effect.

If all these circumftances fhould be found to concur in the miracles recorded in the fcriptures, it must be allowed that they have all the credibility that facts fo extraordinary, and of fo great antiquity, can have, and nothing more can be required in the cafe. The moft fceptical of men cannot demand more fatisfactory evidence. I fhall therefore now proceed to confider how far these circumflances apply to the miracles of which an ac

count

count is contained in the Old and New Teftament. For it is the truth of the system of religion propofed to us in these books that is to be proved by them.

I muft, however, remind you, that though I would by no means crave your indulgence in being fatisfied with a small degree of evidence, or less than fuch as I have described, the thing to be proved is far from being improbable a priori, fo as to make fuch extraordinary evidence neceffary. If men, who are the offspring of God, were involved in error, vice, and mifery, from which it was not in their power to rescue themselves, it might even have been expected that their benevolent parent would provide fome effectual means før their relief. And the fcheme of revelation, which gives men the fulleft information concerning the being, the perfections, and the providence, of God, concerning man's duty here, and a future ftate of retribution hereafter, the knowledge of which we have seen the wifeft of men never attained of themfelves, is excellently adapted to answer this end, and therefore it is not only defirable, but far from being improbable. On the contrary, I have fhewn at large that the plan of P 4 revelation

revelation is, in a variety of refpects, the most natural and the most effectual, and confequently the most eligible, mode of communicating religious inftruction to men.

In this, however, I fpeak to the feelings of the virtuous, the worthy, and the thinking part of mankind, thofe whofe characters and conduct are such as will naturally lead them to wish for, and rejoice in, the discovery of fuch momentous truths, and not the profligate and thoughtless, who are governed by mere appetite and paffion, like the brutes, who, looking no farther than to mere animal enjoyments, never think of a God, of a providence, or a future ftate at all; and who, if it depended upon them, would not choofe that there fhould be any fuch thing.

It is well known that there are states of mind in which no attention will be given to any thing that is offenfive to it. A philofopher of great eminence, having advanced an opinion concerning fomething that might be determined by a microfcopical obfervation, refused to look through a microscope that was brought to him, with the object ready prepared, when he was told that the inspection would refute his hypothefis. And certainly

vicious

vicious propenfities lay a ftronger bias on the mind than any fpeculative opinions what

ever.

In minds exceedingly debafed, there must be an almost invincible bias against the doctrines of revelation; and probably the evidence even of their own fenfes would not be fufficient to convince them. To fuch perfons as these I do not address myself at all, because it would be altogether in vain. Indeed I can hardly fuppofe that any motive, even that of curiofity, would bring any perfon of this character to hear me on this fubject, and therefore I will not fuppofe any fuch to be prefent.

1. To thofe perfons whofe minds are not abfolutely fhut against conviction, I would observe, in the first place, that the miracles recorded in the scriptures, and on which the truth of the Mofaic and Chriftian inftitutions refts, are fufficiently numerous. Paffing over all that preceded the age of Mofes himself, the miracles which effected the emancipation of the Ifraelites from their bondage in Egypt, and their fettlement in the land of Canaan, will certainly be allowed not to have been deficient with refpect to number, whatever elfe

be